Category: Teaching

Reading for Analysis

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 2 Comments

I am in the stages of preparing for the two exams that would allow me to teach English and be “highly qualified”.  In doing so, I need to expand my knowledge of the literature “frequently taught in high school”.  Some of it I know (the Hobbit, Romeo & Juliet, Scarlet Letter), some I knew (To Kill a Mockingbird, Animal Farm, Our Town), some I have secondhand knowledge of (Great Gatsby, The Crucible, A Streetcar Named Desire), and some I just don’t know (Joy Luck Club, Grapes of Wrath, Great Expectations).  I want to bring my “knew-it” stories back up to the surface, get a fuller picture of the “secondhand-knowledge” stories, and get a few clues on the “don’t-know-it” stories.  I’m not well-read enough.  I doubt Orson Scott Card and Asimov will be on the tests (though Tolkein and Orwell could be).

Now I pause to laugh at the idea of me being “highly qualified” to teach English classes.  Sure, I am probably as qualified as anyone to teach a high school creative writing class (the reason I’m taking the test), but not literature.  I can’t analyze a poem to save my life.  Looking at my expertise in math and comparing it to my background in literature, it’s a joke to think I can teach the latter.  I simply can’t.  It’s a phantom status that means nothing.  A properly trained and educated English teacher would kick my butt in the teaching of…well, anything.  Grammar, lit, literary movements, authors…  The only thing I have is a reasonable knowledge of what it takes to sell a manuscript.  Even that is pretty narrowly focused.  (Note that knowing how to sell and actually selling are two different beasts; I have some of each.)  So I can teach how to write and how to sell, even how to use grammar, but that shouldn’t qualify (highly or not) me to teach literature.

Why the rant?  well I have this fear that one day I’ll have to teach an English class.  I get forced into enough math classes I don’t want to teach (anything full of failure kids or non-college-bound students is like herding radioactive tomcats), I don’t need to free myself up to gain new classes I don’t want.  I do want to teach the writing — why else would I take the test? — but not a regular English class.  Shouldn’t the desire to teach be part of the “highly qualified” formula?

Unexpected proposal

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 2 Comments

Finally back to school today.  Wow, it’s hard to get back into the swing after so many snow days.  There’s no indication we’ll be missing any more soon.  But never say never.

I managed to do a little boasting about my big WotF win, even to my principal.  She’s a former English teacher and was interested in my progress.  Remember, I’m a math teacher with no formal writing or literature training outside basic high school and college curricula.  So I was more than slightly surprised when she suggested I take the two English teacher certification exams to get certified to teach a creative writing class.

Yeah, a math teacher just up and taking an English teacher’s test –nay, two English teacher tests.  And then given a writing class?    Who was she kidding?

Let’s go through my reactions by the numbers: (1) English test?  Are you insane?  (2) Man, it would be awesome to teach a creative writing class.  (3) Ooh, isn’t that a slap in the face to full-time English teachers that might want to teach creative writing? (4) Could I pass a test for high school English teachers?  (5) How much literature would be on it?  (6) I bet I could kick grammar’s booty.  (7) Is she serious?

I cycled through these feelings over the course of about four seconds.  I immediately set out to clear up some of the questions.  First came #7: The principal insisted I do it this spring so she could get it into next year’s schedule.  So I think she is serious.  Next #5: A quick trip to the test maker’s website suggests lit is half the pedagogy (how-to-teach test) and combines with “understanding language” to constitute half the knowledge test.  *gulp*  Finally #4: I answered 24 sample questions on the same website; I got 23 correct.  Sweet!  Sure, one was a lucky guess and one at least one other was a reasonably educated but still lucky guess, but I still rocked it.  The real test will be 120 questions, not 24, but it suggests I can do it, especially considering I could have gotten the one I missed with somewhat more careful reading.  So yeah, with some studying, it could happen.

Still unresolved is question 3.  I doubt anyone at my school is more qualified than I am to instruct students in writing, but they may be more qualified to teach it.  What’s the difference?  Grading.  I’ve had to learn every lesson on my own, the hard way.  What kind of position does that put me in to grade students?  I learned in a pass/fail environment.  I’m not sure how to give a B.  I can figure it out, but I’m not so sure now.  And what about the people that dedicated their lives to teaching language arts?  A (presumably) senior level writing course could be the crown jewel of English classes.  How would I feel if an English teacher swooped in and started teaching a brand new discrete math class?  But could I complain if they had placed in an international discrete math competition (whatever that is)?  If I can pass their test, I guess it’s enough to get me in their club.

There’s risk here.  For instance, I could catch a tenth grade English class instead of (or as well as) the creative writing class.  Or I could waste my time prepping for this test only to have the class cut for budget purposes.  And what if I hate teaching writing to high schoolers?  Or, worst case, what if the class becomes a dumping ground for aimless students?  But if the class if filled with kids that truly want to write and write better than they do now, I can help them.  I can teach them to critique each others’ work, how to accept and apply criticism, how to analyze their favorite stories for techniques that work, how to build characters and make a story.  Am I great?  I think I’m pretty good, but I’m not “there” yet.  If I go to Clarion, that’s that much more I can bring home with me.  I wonder if it would have helped me if this kind of class was available when I was in school?

So I’ve decided to pursue it.  It may pan out, it may not.  It’s an interesting twist to my world.  It might even qualify me to get reimbursed for part of Clarion’s cost!  Cool.

We’ll see.

Pulling myself together

~ Scott W. Baker ~ 1 Comment

It’s amazing how real life can get in the way of writing.  More astounding is when real life gets in the way of real life that was already interfering with my writing.

Case and point: the bout of illness that has struck my house like the plague.  I got sick and got behind grading papers.  My wife got sick and I couldn’t catch up grading papers.  I got sick again and got way behind grading papers.  Through all this, there was no time for writing.  Heck, I had trouble finding time for little things like sleeping and eating and pooping (yep, I said it).  What little I did manage to write was always trite, cliche, and totally directionless because I couldn’t find time to think, to plan.  Bottom line: no production in two months.  None worth keeping, anyway.

Maybe that’s not such a bad thing.  I hit slumps periodically, often longer than a couple months.  There was one year where I only finished one story (but tinkered on all my half-baked novels).  One.  I don’t even recall which story it was.  But I came back from that stronger than I had been when I slumped.  Maybe I’m in for another of those rebounds.  Maybe.

The family seems to be on the mend, myself included, and the papers are almost caught up, just in time for the end of the fall semester.  I already did Christmas (so to speak) with my parents when they came to town for my daughter’s birthday, so that’s one Christmas distraction I can avoid.  There are always others, but it looks like I can finagle some quality writing time during this semester break.  I’ll be scurrying like a rat on the Titanic for the rest of the week while finals are going on, but at least there is light at the end of the tunnel.  Time for a deep breath and a system reset.  Time to be a writer again.

I suspect I’m not the only part-time writer, full-time flunky that gets in these jams.  They’re natural.  Stressful situations are good for a writer.  I hope to use mine, build on it, make my stories deliver the kind of I-can’t-escape-the-vortex stress that I’ve been battling.  Ironic that I need that stress to settle before I can create it in fiction.  It shouldn’t be that way, I should be able to write through the hurricane.  I’m not that organized…yet.  It will come.  It will take a lot of work, but I’ll get there.  Right now, writing is my hobby and hobbies have to take a back seat to jobs that bring home pork products.  I need to be a better teacher in order to be a better writer.  No, that’s not true.  I need to be a more productive teacher in order to be a more productive writer.  Production comes from organization, not chaos.

I simply have to get my $#!+ together.

-Oso

Stupid People

~ Scott W. Baker ~ Leave a comment

By day, I teach high school math. I am consistently shocked by the stupidity I see on a daily basis. I am not saying that all our students are stupid or that any of them are stupid, but they sure do stupid things.

For instance, I had a student today turn around during a test and ask the kid behind him, “Is this the ones where we…” Not only did he do this during a test, he did it in my eye line. Then he had the nerve to be shocked when I called him down for cheating.

I didn’t give him the zero he deserved; I isolated him and will take off ten points. It’s easier to defend than a zero. Sad, isn’t it, that teachers have to defend their grading and disciplinary actions these days. It used to be that a teacher’s word was law.

I also find myself constrained by rules designed for students. For instance, students are not allowed to use cell phones during school hours, not allowed to have them turned on. Sound reasonable? But teachers are prohibited from using cell phones “in view of students”. I can’t whip my phone out to call a parent. Coaches can’t use them to verify the status of a game in bad weather. If my daughter’s babysitter calls to tell me something bad happened, I am expected to slink into a workroom before I answer, and I’ll be “talked to” about the simple fact that the phone rang at all.

See? Stupidity. It ain’t all from the kids.

For the record, I agree that teachers don’t need to be making dinner reservations or chatting up boyfriends during class time. But there used to be a line between what was acceptable for children and for adults. That line is blurred now, presumably out of respect for the feelings of the poor dears.

All right, I am ranting now. *deep breath* I just long for the day when teachers are considered professionals again, experts even. We went to college, we know our stuff. Why am I treated like a student and paid worse than a garbage collector?

-Oso