Without Discipline, You Can't Teach - Ed. Blog, pt. 14

In the last part of this series, I argued that Discipline Must Come First.  This post if a further explanation on that.  It might be hard to believe if you're naturally obedient, follow rules, and see a need for order, that there are entire schools where no children pay attention or follow the rules.  But, if you've taught in a bad school, you've seen it on a daily basis.  

It is my belief that students want to be challenged, and that most students will follow rules if they are fair and consistent.  Barring the occasional outlier, students want to feel safe and want to know what to expect.   Curriculum 'experts' talk about this in content all the time; daily objectives, and rubrics are all the rage, but this same logic often goes out the door when it comes to discipline.  

If you have a good principal that is willing to set and follow codes of behavior, a school can begin taking shape in two weeks.  That's about the amount of time it takes for students to fall in line.  It's okay to give a warning on some rules, but the second time a student breaks any rule, there must be a consequence.  

When there is no system of discipline, as there wasn't in the Grand Rapids Public Schools, normal behavior falls to slightly better than the worst kids.  At least I'm not that bad, is the logic of the class.  If students are not punished for breaking rules, then more and more students start to break them.  This happens for a few reasons:

1. Students see that bad behavior is how they get attention, so they mimic what they see for attention.
2. When bad behavior is allowed, standards are lowered.  Humans tend to either rise or sink to the standards and expectations set for them. 
   1. Ex. If you tell a student they will not understand something, they often will not understand it.
   2. If you tell a student that they'll probably end up in jail: they'll probably get in some trouble in school. 

But what is worse is that when all students act badly, then nothing academic can happen.  Like, at Alger Middle School.  In theory, they had a 10-minute period of silent reading to start every class period on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  In practice, it looked like this: students ran in the room, wouldn't sit down, threw books around, and talked for the entire class 10-minutes.  No one could read.  Thus, the objective of the lesson was not met.  Or, at UPREP if a student cussed out a teacher and was then kicked out of class, this is what would happen.  When they were kicked out of class they'd go to a principal; a principal would walk the student back to class, and pull the teacher in the hall.  They'd have a long conversation about the incident, ignoring the content and the other students in the class.  If the student mentioned what a hard time they were having in life, he or she would be allowed back in class with no consequence.  What did the class hear: It's okay to cuss out a teacher.  Your situation at home is more important than how you act in class.  The result: academics suffer.

How the bulk of students behave is called The School Culture.  The two real examples show a culture of bad behavior.  At both places, bad behavior was rewarded.  When this is the case, academics are not the center, and - in turn - students perform poorly.  In districts like GRPS, where administrators are more worried about suspension rates and public relations than student success, they lower the number of suspensions by easing up on the consequences of bad actions.  The result is poor academics.

This cannot happen.  

Rather, there needs to be clearly established rules that are explicitly and directly explained to students.  When the rules are broken, consequences are needed.  These consequences need to be timely and fair.  When this happens, a culture of respect and responsibility is established, and then, and only then, can academics improve.    

Discipline Must Come First - Ed Blog, pt 13

The most important thing in a school, more important than the students, the teachers, the admin, or the building is the structure.  The most important part of structure is discipline.  The counter point to this, or the alternative view, is that relationships are most important.  But, that errant belief neglects to acknowledge that the point of school is learning.  Education needs to be for the whole child, in an environment structured to help the child succeed.  There is a place for many things; academics of course, but also sports, field trips, enrichment opportunities, and discipline.  Without discipline, entire schools fail.  

School is the formation of a large basis of the worldview of our nation's youth.  The good schools use the school years to shape character, ethics, and interest.  The bad ones ignore those same things, focusing on some abstract 'content' over character and self-control.  By doing so, they don't deal with discipline, and are unknowingly also teaching students a lesson.  When a kid acts up and doesn't get in trouble for it, they start to think their actions are no big deal.  They learn that behaving on emotion is acceptable, and should be tolerated instead of controlled.  So they do worse and worse things.  This isn't unique to students.  

Let's take this situation: A student wants to go to the bathroom, so interrupts instruction to get permission.  The teacher tells the student to wait for a moment or two, so he or she can finish the instruction, and proceeds to do just that.  The student gets mad and says, "You're fucking annoying" and walks out of the room and slams the door.  Getting cussed out by students is something that happens to every (at least almost) single teacher of low income students.  It's a part of the deal.  How the school responds, changes.

What happens next - in how both the other students and the principal reacts - lets you know how a school does academically.  

Here are two real life examples of how different schools respond to this situation.  

At Union High School, in Grand Rapids, MI.  The student would run up to the principal, say that the teacher doesn't allow students to go to the bathroom, and was then kicked out of class.  The principal will side with the student, walk the student back to class, and tell the teacher to be more sensitive.  When the teacher says, "Did you know that the student interrupted the class to say 'you're fucking annoying' and then walked out without permission and slammed the door?"  The principal will say that teachers need to be more sensitive in how they respond to students.  The principal will tell the teacher, in front of the student, to allow the student to go to the bathroom.  The next time, the student will simply walk out of class, and when her friend says, "You can't do that", will respond, "The principal lets me."   Problem neglected, students realize there are no consequences.  Academics suffer. 

At Global Visions Academy in Chicago, IL.  The student will walk up to the principal, and complain about the teacher.  The principal will ask "What did you say?"  The student will respond, "I cussed him out."  The principal will say, "What did you say?" The kid will respond, "I said he was fucking annoying."  The principal will suspend the kid for the minimum of a day.  When the student comes back to class, he or she must apologize.  The next time the student needs to go to the bathroom, the student waits for permission.  Problem solved, student and class learn a lesson.  Academics improve.

When the student walks out, the reaction of the students in the classroom will also let you know how the school performs.  If the students are like, "That's a suspension", you know that there are standards of behavior that permeate throughout the school.  You know that there is a threshold.  If, however, the students turn to the teacher and say, "You're going to get in trouble" or "the principal is going to yell at you" you know the place does not value academics.  

Rocket science, this is not.  

If discipline problems happen only in one teachers room, that teacher is often thought of as bad.  Bad teachers are often the ones that cannot control a classroom.  The kids run all over the teacher, and in turn, the students don't learn.  If that's the case, it's on the teacher.  But, if a school doesn't have a structure in place to deal with the discipline, the whole school suffers.  

I've argued in the last few posts that the principal is responsible for how the school is run.  One of the easiest ways you can tell the difference between a good and a bad principal is how the school deals with discipline.  If the students receive no discipline, then the school has an incompetent administrator that will fuck up virtually all areas of the school, especially academics.

I've been in a lot of schools, and this is true in every single one.  No boundaries ='s No academics.  But think about it a little bit and it's obvious.  Learning something new is hard, and can be frustrating.  You need to be engaged, be challenged, and even make mistakes.  When these things happen, they trigger certain types of emotions that can lead to lashing out and doing something you shouldn't.  Which is fine.  When this happens, students must be accountable for how they act.  

School is one of the easiest - and safest - places to make mistakes, because the stakes are the lowest.  Cussing out a teacher, getting in a fight, walking out of a class: these are all pretty low stakes in the scheme of things.  If someone makes a bunch of them, suspension is better than getting fired, getting sued, or going to jail.  So, if you learn from them: all good.  When they don't, the ramifications are huge in the real world.  Not teaching discipline is a major part of the school-to-prison pipeline (but more on that in a later post).

That's why the discipline matters so much.  

Discipline must be a pillar in a school.  Must be consistent and fair.  It must be given quickly, and used as a lesson.  And, it must affirm the importance of academics.  

Pt. 12 Examples

In the last post, I talked about how good teachers are often made administrators, but argued that the skills of a good teacher do not necessarily translate to good administrator.  In this post, I will provide three specific examples of what I'm talking about.  Examples of people that were taken from one role, placed into another, with devestating effects.

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1. The Damn Good Teacher

I had one administrator that told me, verbatim during a post-conference, "I was a damn good teacher."  For the record, I hear that only from this administrator.  Some colleagues disagreed with this person's self-assessment.  

(Tangent: What I should have said was, "You should go back to that, because you suck at this."  I didn't, though, because I was too worried about playing the game and having a bad evaluation.  But then I did have a bad evaluation, from this person, so my worries were all for naught.  Especially, because this person used their own children so much that I quite literarally had to ask, "Could you please stop bringing up your own children".  This was responded to by this, "I consider every one of these students to be my own children".  Ah, no wonder you suck at this.)

This admin perfectly exemplifies the problems of promoting a 'damn good teacher'.   This same person was 'damn good' in middle school, yet 'promoted' to a high school administrator.  In this person's new role, they were in charge of curricular matters over the entire building, including evaluating teaching, though they'd taught nothing but science and had zero experience in this grade.  So when you asked practical advice, there was no answer.  I tested this theory.  I asked, "What would your recommend?" to a specific piece of 'feedback'.   The response: "Talk to the curriculum coach".  Read: I have no idea.  This was not helpful at all.  This person was simply promoted because someone thought this person would be good.  They aren't.  

But the real irony is that this person is currently doing the district a double disservice.  Because by accepting an administrative role, this person removed one "damn good teacher" from the district, while adding another terrible administrator.  

The district is at a net-loss.

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2. The Next-in-Line Promotion.

Another example of how this happens, is that a school experiences a sudden change in leadership (like the principal leaves) and they must scramble to find a replacement.  Rather than due dilligence, they go to the 'next in line'.  For example, there was a principal that was hired as a Dean of Students.  This person was personable, and talented at this job.  No one would doubt this.  As a Dean, this person was great, took the job seriously, and had a very positive impact.  So, when the principal took a higher position in the district, this person was 'next-in-line' and promoted the head principal.  The problem was that this person was a terrible principal.  This person had no academic training or teaching experience.  So, while this person was good with people and relationships, when it came to managing teachers and curriculum - most of whom had decades of experience and masters degrees, this person was immediately recognized as a failure.  This person had zero teaching training, or content training, yet was thrown into creating and evaluating all of it.  This person needed help editing evaluations, and didn't know any of the terms that go with academic language.  So, while this person was a very good fit for a dean, the 'promotion' hurt everyone involved.  

The problem compounds, though, because with the general nature of people, once we get promoted, we almost never say we deserve a demotion.  

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3.  They Know More Than Anyone Else

Another sad example of how this happens is akin to the big fish in a small pond.  This usually happens when a place is looking for stability or a new direction, so goes for a short term - rather than a long term - solution.  One example is a building was doing some experimental education.  An interesting program.  One person had more knowledge and training than the rest of the staff, so was considered the expert on a particular type of teaching.  Due to this 'expertise', this person was placed as the principal of the entire program.  The short term solution may have worked.  But this person was then awarded the long term position.  But this was awarded not based upon qualifications or experience, but rather because this person knew more than their peers.  The problem was that when the program expanded, there were several people that knew more than the Big Fish.  Consequently, the long-term suffered due to the short-term.  No good.  

How to Take a Good Teacher and Turn them Into a Bad Adminisrtator - Ed Blog pt. 12

In the world of education, there isn't a way to go 'up', unless you go the route of administration.  When you begin your teaching career, you're placed on a salary schedule, given a set of classes, and then you begin your career.  You do this for 30-some years, and then retire.  Good teachers communicate their information better than bad teachers.  They may get more leadership roles in schools, may have better schedules and classrooms, and may therefore enjoy their job more, but there isn't really a way to go 'up' in this role.  Even if you're great and the person next to you sucks, you get the same raise every year.  

So what happens, quite often, is that a teacher wants to make more money, wants a 'promotion', and goes the route of administration - the only significant pay raise.  (Ex. In Grand Rapids, admin make, on average, $20K more than teachers; In Chicago, it was about $40K).  Even when it stems from a good place "I want to make this place better!" this logic is flawed.  The things that make a teacher good, and the things that make an administrator good are very different things.  

But, few people with power realize this, and a lot of districts take good teachers and 'promote' them to administrators.  The logic is like this: since this person was good as a teacher, they'll be good as an administrator.  They know the schools, relate well to kids, and can control a room: obviously this will be good.  This logic is just as flawed as the assumption that a good athlete would make a good coach.  

The skills needed for both jobs are entirely different.  Good teachers are knowledgeable about a subject, able to communicate that subject, and can relate the content of that subject to a wide range of people.  Good teachers are compassionate, forgiving, helpful, and take specific instances into consideration on a frequent basis.  A good teacher is adaptable, flexible, and creative.  In every decision a teacher makes, they're weighing the good of the class v the good of the student.  You may adapt one assignment for a particular class, change a book for a certain group, or allow one student much extra time on a task.  This is because your job is to teach every student and how a teacher does this must change.  Sometimes, this might mean passing someone that should have failed.  Sometimes that means allowing one more retake, or not writing someone up and instead allowing them to ask forgiveness (ex. 'teachable moments').  In an English class, this may mean not failing a student for plagiarism, because their mistake was close enough to an accident that you can use that same mistake to help many other students not plagarize.  It might mean dropping the lowest test score of a student so that their average is an 80% rather than a 79% at the end of a semester.  Or, it might mean offering 'extra credit' for learning opportunities to help a student pass your class.

And these all may be great things, but that's up to a teacher.  The problem is that these same positive attributes of compassion and flexibility actually hurt an administrator.  Often, when these good teachers get promoted, they use these skills on the school as a whole.  It's very common to hear an administrator say, "In my class I used to..." and this is a major problem.  Already, they're showing the lens that they look at students through.  I've heard more than one administrator say, "These are all my kids" or "I view every kid in this school like my own child". 

This is problematic for a few reasons, but one is: what if you're a bad parent?  

Being a parent and in charge of the good of the whole are completely different things.  

Administrators have the job and responsibility of educating the collective whole.  And this must have firm rules.  If the rules say "Anyone found with a cellphone in class will have this cellphone confiscated until a parent or guardian collects it at the school office" you better make damn sure to follow this.  The second that you allow one student to use that phone, while confiscating the other, you just showed an entire building that rules are subject to the breaker of the rule.  (This is also an example of when a good teacher may show forgiveness: ex. a student has never used a phone in class, and it rings loudly during a quiz.  They simply forgot to silence the phone.  Maybe you allow them to quickly perform that task and put it away without consequence.)

Too often, what happens is that the good teacher was promoted to administration.  Then they work in this role for a while, but are never good at it.  They use their teacher skills to look at everything, putting in place rules and policy that have no good for the collective whole.  They cut deals in almost every situation, and the overall structure of a place goes down.  Without even trying, I can think of seven such teachers that have been placed in these roles.  I've seen their schools and approach, and they hurt the school overall.

When this happens, when you take a good teacher and place them in the role of administration, you're setting them up for failure.  But, the other thing you're doing is removing a good teacher from a classroom.  So, in turn, you're actually hurting the district that you claimed you were there to help.  

So, simply promoting someone into the position of power, because they were good at one job, is how you take a good teacher, and turn them into a bad administrator.  (For this one, the examples will definitely help).

This Month's Thoughts...July

• Very glad that Revisionist History is back.  It's so nice to hear stories looked at in a way that doesn't go with the mainstream.  
• Why is it that almost everywhere we go, the first thing to greet us is: Don't! 
• Which brings me to everyone's favorite subject: politics.  
• I've been listening to The Daily, hosted by the New York Times.  It's good, but if you listen to it, you see how conservatives think the news is slanted toward The Left.  You need look no further than July 13's edition.  
• In it, they talk about how Donald Trump Jr.'s email saying they had dirt on Hillary Clinton crosses a line that hasn't been crossed before, and believe that if Hillary Clinton had received a similar email, she'd have reported it to 'the authorities'.  
• Really?  
• This is maybe the stupidest thing that I've ever heard.
• There's been a lot of rumors going around that LeBron is gone in 2018, and, where he goes, there will go I.  I wouldn't blame him this time round. 
• Dan Gilbert: WHAT ARE YOU DOING?  You've got a great GM that assembled a team that brought you a championship.  He could have brought you Carmelo Anthony and/or Paul George and you won't pay him an extra 2 million a year?  
• Really?
• We need look no further than hotels to show how and why accountability and ownership matter.  I use about three times as many towels in a hotel as I ever do at home.  I take whatever I can, make as big a mess as possible, and don't try to conserve anything.  There's no ownership.  For us to care, there needs to be ownership.
• It's crazy how easy it is to gain weight in your upper 30's.  It seems like I work hard and eat ok for about two months, only to have it more-than-negated in a weekend.  
• I suck at selfies.