The Power of Positive Emails

I am not a fan of Mondays.

I am in at work even earlier than normal in order to combat the frazzled feeling I will get coming back from the weekend and not feeling prepared.

Even when I get into work early, I still end up feeling a little frazzled somehow. Today was no different with my students being just as frazzled as I was.

Normally, at the end of Mondays, I just sit at my desk for a few minutes and go on Imgur, Facebook, something mindless.

Today I decided to do something different. I decided to make a student and parent's Monday.

There is a sophomore that I had last year as a freshmen. Bright kid just very forgetful and unorganized. They would constantly have missing assignments or work turned in late which frustrated their parents to no end.

I have them again this year and it is a complete turn around. There are no missing or late assignments and it is obvious tests and quizzes have been studied for. The student is currently earning an "A-"

I decided to email their parents, while cc'ing the student, informing them that I am very proud of their child. The repsonse back was immediate and happy:

Thank you so much!  It is wonderful to hear!

You made our Monday!



Yes, my school has live grading so yes, my parents can easily log in to see how their child is doing. I could have easily assumed that the parents are doing this. For all I know, they are and are fully aware of their child's grade. However, just this little email validated what they see. It made what otherwise is a crappy day by default into something to smile about.

Now, with 120 students, there is no way I can constantly do this. The time it would take me to compose a "happy" email for each student a week would be insane. However, I'm totally for this when a teacher sees something extraordinary. It reminds me of the Taylor Mali poem "What Teachers Make"* and the line where he says:

"I make parents see their children for who they are/
And who they can be"

I knew what this child could be. I've known since last year. Yeah, a grade can tell the parents what their child could be but by sending that one, small, little email, I am able to make them see who their child is not just a number in the gradebook.

It is why I teach. It is why I love my job even on Mondays and even when I complain.

I wouldn't trade it for the world.


*If you have never heard this poem, below is a drawing of it done by Zen Pencils and also a video of the poem performed by Taylor Mali himself

10 Problems Only Teachers Will Understand

Being a teacher is classified as a "white collar" job. Somethings are the same; we have contracts like most other professions and have assigned hours we have to be at work. We also have to have meetings and do reports.

However, our days are super unique in that there are a lot of events and problems that other "white collar" jobs, specifically those that occur in an office, will never understand.

I am lucky in the sense that two of my best friends are teachers so when I complain about this stuff, they understand me and can relate. When I complain to my boyfriend, he kind of stares at me bewildered that these things happen. 

I do apologize if this is pretty high school specific. Although, many elementary teachers will be able to relate to the majority of them.

10 Problems Only Teachers Will Understand

1. Finished reading directions out loud in class. "Does anyone have any questions?" ~teacher "Yeah, I don't understand." ~student "Okay, what don't you understand?" ~teacher "All of it. What are we doing again?" ~student
   
   
   
   
2. Read out loud in class: "In what vile part of this anatomy / Doth my name lodge?" (Romeo and Juliet III.iii) "What does Romeo literally ask for the location of?" ~teacher ::silence:: ~students
   
   
   
   
3. "What do you mean it doesn't make sense? I made sure I used big words so that it would make sense." ~ student "Do you know the definition of the word you used?" ~teacher "No. But why does that matter? It is a smart word" ~student
   
   
   
   
4. The constant murmur of students talking while you're trying to explain directions
   
   
   
   
5. Day after turning in essay: "Did you grade my essay yet?" ~student
   
   
   
   
6. "I don't get it!" ~student "Did you read the directions?" ~teacher "No. But it is still confusing!" ~student
   
   
   
   
   
7. Parent sends an email during 1st period while you are teaching. Check your email the first chance you get three periods later: you have three follow up emails demanding to know why you haven't answered yet
   
   
   
   
8. "My son is smart! Why are you failing him?" ~ parent "He hasn't turned in any assignments or his paper." ~teacher "So? Why is that stuff even important?" ~ parent
   
   
   
   
   
9. "What do you mean you can't go to Taco Tuesday because you have to grade? Don't you get off work at 3pm? Why would you have to do work after you're done with work" ~"friends"
   
   

   

   My actual response to that text message

   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
10. Reviews with class. Offers to stay early and late for help. Constantly asks if the students understand. Class average on test: 65%
    
    

Despite all of this, I still love my job. I must be crazy

Your Child is Doing Fine, I Promise.

It has been a very very difficult week. Normally, I enjoy teaching but this week multiple factors made it very difficult to enjoy it.

The biggest one was due to parent, teacher, student conferences on Thursday. I had many parents concerned about their freshmen child because they were not doing "well" with a "B." I was able to calm these parents down because I reassured them that their child has shown improvement in their organization, study skills, self-activity, etc. and that their child will be able to live up to their full potential. They are just currently struggling to figure it out.

Besides the fact that these parents want perfection from their child when they may not in fact be able to achieve it, I was fine until one conference that was extremely difficult.

It was a mother of a freshmen. Both of them came in and I figured it would be like the conferences above. However the mother decided to berate me in front of her son claiming I didn't know how to teach writing and that I didn't know basic English. The reason she knew better was because she went to a top tier university and graduated with a degree in English.

What got me was not the lack of respect from the mother, it was that she was doing this all in front of her son. Her son was sitting in the desk head down and trying to appear as small as he could. He was clearly embarrassed and only talked when I engaged him. The student even admitted that he had made a mistake on his paper and that he hadn't listened to what I told him to do (which I assured him was okay as long as he learned from it). This did not stop the mother from going on and on about how I didn't know what I was doing but she did.

What pissed me off was that the conference became more about the parent trying to validate their existence than what we could do to help her son in my class specifically with writing.

Her son was so embarrassed that he came up and apologized to me in class on Friday, completely worried that I was going to assume that he shared the same view as him mom in regards to what she had said. I assured him this was not true.

Now, I know I am not a parent but as a teacher this makes me very angry. This parent made the conference about her and completely ignored her son and his needs. She feels like she is a wiz in English and the fact that someone tells her otherwise makes her angry. She completely ignored the fact that her son is not a natural writer and that he needs to develop her skills. She completely ignored him and his wishes. It was obvious her son did not feel the same way she did but she completely ignored him and did what would validate her.

I was proud her son got a "C" on his paper because he improved from his first. He worked hard on it. Could have he worked harder and done better? Yes but he is 14. He is figuring it out. Why can't you feel the same?

Stop worrying about your ego and focus on your son's needs.

The Dangers of Grade Inflation: Not Everyone is Special

Courtesy of Washington Post: Know More

(note: this chart refers to colleges but I promise the same trend is happening in primary and secondary schooling)

According to my school this is what each letter grade stands for:
"A" = Excellent
"B" = Above Average
"C" = Average
"D" = Below Average
"F" = Failing

If "C" is average, shouldn't the majority of students be earning this grade?

The fact that 40% of college students earn "A's" or better worries me. Maybe our students are getting smarter. If they are, shouldn't our schools get more difficult? "A" stands for "excellent." If almost half of our students are "excellent" doesn't that make them almost "average"?

This is the problem with grade inflation. Schools want to claim that their average graduation rate is above a 3.0 so many programs make it so that if you don't get a "B" or better in the class, you can't "pass" the class (this was true of my program). That virtually makes my GPA useless. If you're going to do that, then why claim that a "C" is "average"? Not everyone can be special.

The mentality of "A's" and "B's" being the only acceptable grades is not unique to colleges. I have had students say to me "Man did I fail that test." The apparent "fail" was a grade within the 70's or 80's. I tell them "No, you didn't fail. You just didn't do as well as you wanted to. But you did not fail." Without fail, the response is "Yeah, but you try telling that to my parents."

Parents demand perfection. When their children earn less than an "A" they ask me "What can my child do to earn an 'A'?" I can't just come out and say to them "You're child isn't this amazing student when it comes to English. They are a good person but they aren't going to get an 'A' unless they cheat." It is the facts of life. Not everyone can get an "A" but every parent expects that.

This is attached to the mentality that you should get a trophy for participating because "everyone is a winner." Everyone is a winner, but not everyone is a winner at baseball. Everyone is gifted, but not everyone is gifted in English. We have to stop assuming every child can get an "A" in every single subject. We should start admiring their efforts they put into the grades they do receive and take pride in what they are gifted in. So what if your child can't get an "A" in English? If they worked their butt off and earned a "C" you, as a parent, should be proud. If they are amazing at skateboarding, you should be proud of them for that. If they are amazing at scrap-booking, be proud of them for that. Be proud of them for what they can do, not critical of what they can't.

To fix the obvious issue of grade inflation that the chart above shows, we need to fix our mentality about students. Not everyone is the same. Not everyone can achieve the same goals. We should be proud of our students for what they work hard for. This will take stress of students and allow the world to grow because they will be able to actually focus on what they can do not what they can't.

Validation

Today was the type of day where I was struggling to figure out why I do this job.

I had planning first period today and didn't get anything done that I wanted to because I had to meet with another teacher. What should have taken 5 minutes turned into 30 so I ended up wasting almost my entire planning period.

Not only that but my students are slowly going stir crazy which means they are starting to bounce off the walls in class. Not only that, but I caught a student cheating today as well as another one misusing their computer (we are a 1-to-1 school). So I had to write two detentions.

I had 30 emails in my inbox from various people. Most from parents that have seemed to have only recently discovered our online grade book with live grading. They are suddenly wondering why their child is failing when they could see all the missing homework assignments. The others are from students that are realizing that their interim grade will get them in trouble (grades were due this morning) so they now decide to take an interest in their academic performance.

One of these parent emails was questioning if their child really received a 13/15 on a pop quiz dealing with MLA citations. The reason they were questioning was because I had put in the directions "all or nothing." I responded back saying that when I didn't say that on the first quiz, I got total crap back (I said this in a much more professional manner don't worry) so I figured I would scare them into giving me the correct citation. Needless to say it worked because 90% of my sophomores gave me a citation that was either perfect or near perfect. I had no idea what type of response I would get back from this parent, so when I saw that he responded to me my email, I held my breath. I opened it to find this:

      Yes, thank you.  That does clear up things, if not assuage my concerns.  Couple of things, first both my wife and I support you (and the other faculty) 100% - we stand by your calls.  Secondly, I place English, specifically writing composition, as equally important as any STEM course work.  I continually find the engineers and scientist I work with needing my help putting their message on paper in a succinct and grammatically correct manner.   Also, as far as the students these days need subtle threats to get their attention, what’s up with that?  It used to work on me, but the kids these days are impervious.  All joking aside, thank you for making our children think, and we really appreciate the job you are doing.

 I had to read the email a couple of times to make sure that I had read it correctly and to let it sink in. It isn't every day that you get an email telling you that what you're doing has meaning and a purpose. Especially from a parent.

This gave me the validation I needed and reminded me that what I do does have a purpose and it isn't just about babysitting crazy kids and bowing to demands of parents. I am actually attempting to teach my students something valuable in life.

I will save this email forever so that when I need a pick me up, I can just look at it and remember.

All you parents out there, if you think your child's teacher is doing a good job, tell them. You never know how much better you can make a teacher's day with a simple five minute email.