A. Getting started!
1. You must recruit 10 or more followers to your blog. These followers can be friends, family, colleagues, peers, or faculty that you work with in your academic life. They will be your audience and if they agree to 'follow' you in your blog, they must also agree to do more than lurk. They must agree to actively follow. To 'actively follow' means that they must comment on the blog. These comments can and should include the following: encouragements, questions, links to ideas or readings, etc..
You will receive instructions on how to invite people to your blog during the last orientation session
2. You are responsible for 10 blog entries during the span of your commitment.
3. Your blog must include more than text. Photos, clips of video, and other artifacts.
4. You must never use real names of students, teachers, or administrators.
B. So what do I blog about?
Your posts will be a mix of the following:
1. Pre-placement knowledge building TO BE COMPLETED BY JAN 1st:
A. Paul Tough, Whatever It Takes.
B. This American Life, "Going Big" podcast.
C. Richard Rothstein, "Must Schools Fail"?
2. Active reflection: Description of what you are doing and reflections (min. 3 posts).
3. Commentary and Analysis of Policy Issues (min. 3 posts -- see below).
4. Entries written specifically in response to assigned readings (3 posts - posted by Sunday of the assigned week)
Week 1 - Paul Tough - What It Takes To Make A Student
Week 2 - James Traub - What No School Can Do
Week 3 - Doug Lemov - Building A Better Teacher
For each of the reading reflections, you should focus your response on:
A. What are the 'big ideas' that you take away after reading the article?
B. What have you experienced during your placement so far that speaks to these concepts?
C. What do you think can be done - either at the micro or macro level - to improve matters?
5. "City Snippets" - an array of c. 20 articles, news stories, events, etc. that relate to the city in which you'll be working. For each snippet there should be:
A. A link to the story, article, event...
B. A sentence summarizing your chosen link.
C. A sentence explaining the relevance of it.
6. Closing commentary: A synthesis of what you have learned, and the 'big ideas' (mandatory).
Possible sources of content for #3:
Reflecting on the Teachers:
- What are your impressions of the teachers?
- What do the teachers say about their jobs?
- What do they describe as frustrating or rewarding?
- How would you explain that nearly 60-70% of new teachers leave the teaching profession in their first five years?
- If you wanted to teach at the school where you are working, what could you do to prepare yourself to be successful?
Hope and Educational Reform:
- What signs of hope have you seen in your schools?
- What strengths have you observed that can be built on?
- What ideas do you have to improve the school that you are working in?
- What ideas do you see working in your school that you would transport to other schools or other urban districts?
Accountability
The idea of holding schools, districts, educators, and students responsible for results—has become the watchword in education. In more and more states and districts, policymakers are moving to reward achievement and punish failure in schools in an effort to ensure that children are getting a good education and that tax dollars aren't being wasted. "Accountability for student performance is one of the two or three-if not the most-prominent issues in policy at the state and local levels right now," says Richard F. Elmore, a professor at Harvard University's graduate school of education.
- To what extent do you see evidence that this reform initiative influences what happens at your school site?
- How do teachers/students/parents talk about this initiative?
- What’s your impression of this approach? Will it work? Why not?
