"GREAT TEACHER!" Judgment Call or Objective Evaluation?

"When a high value added teacher joins a school, test scores rise immediately in the grade/subject taught...and falls if/when that teacher leaves...All else equal, a student with one excellent teacher for one year between fourth and eighth grade would gain $4,600 in lifetime income, compared to a student of similar demographics who has an average teacher." -economists Raj Chetty and John Friedman of Harvard and Jonah Rockoff of Columbia as reported in  The New York Times (1/6/12) article, "Big Study Links Good Teachers to Lasting Gain"

"Those who can't do, teach. And those who can't teach, teach gym." --Woody Allen

Comedy aside, it isn't WHO makes a great teacher, but WHAT makes a great teacher and HOW do we determine "GREAT TEACHER?" Are there objective criteria or is it a JUDGMENT CALL? And what are the ramifications if it is a judgment call - especially now with the Chicago teachers' strike and teacher evaluations as a pivotal national domestic issue? 

In attempting to answer this question, let's first distinguish between "objective" evaluations and "judgment" calls:

objective  (adj.)   http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/objective

•  not influenced by personal feelings, interpretations, or prejudice; based of facts; unbiased.
• intent upon or dealing with things external to the mind rather than with thoughts or feelings
• of or relating to actual and external phenomena as opposed to thoughts, feelings, etc....existing independent of thought or an observer as part of reality

According to many, using this last definition may make it promising for us to evaluate teacher effectiveness by measuring external criteria relating what students have LEARNED.  Granted this is easier said than done, but many believe that if you measure students facility with a subject matter at the onset of the year, one can assess 'growth of knowledge' by measuring their (increased) facility with those same skills at the end of the school year (as long as we don't go overboard with continuous testing and overly consuming overblown test-taking preparations).

BUT does teaching material make someone a GREAT teacher or just a GOOD/ EFFECTIVE teacher?

Furthermore, IF one looks at the first two definitions of "objective" I wonder and am somewhat doubtful if one can objectively determine what makes a great teacher. 

So what might a judgment call look like?

judgment calls ( judgment calls plural  (also use judgement call)    ) http://dictionary.reverso.net/english-cobuild/judgment%20call

If you refer to a decision as a judgment call, you mean that there are no firm rules or principles that can help you make it, so you simply have to rely on your own judgement and instinct.   

According to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value_judgment

A value judgment is...based on a comparison or other relativity. As a generalization, a value judgment can refer to a judgment based upon a particular set of values or on a particular value system. A related meaning...is an expedient evaluation based upon limited information at hand, an evaluation undertaken because a decision must be made on short notice.

Incorporating these definitions brings us awfully close to the current debate on teacher evaluations and merit and whether these can be measured at all.  While we need to hold both educators AND their students accountable for learning, are we ready to objectively define and evaluate "GOOD TEACHER?"  

Looking back at my experiences as student, as an educator, and as parent, I think there IS A PERSONAL COMPONENT to what makes a GREAT TEACHER - there has to be.  A great teacher must relate to his or her students, make learning come alive. bring out emotions and feelings in their students while addressing student fears and passions associated with learning.

Maybe we can objectively quantify an effective teacher but must make judgement calls on "GREAT" teachers... 

Whether 'Great Teacher' is a judgment call or objective reality (I leave the continuing debate to you in the comments) I want to focus on...the making of a GREAT teacher.

 Illustration by R. Kikuo Johnson found in http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/07/magazine/07Teachers-t.html?pagewanted=all    

THE MAKINGS OF A GREAT TEACHER:

I have been an educator for over 25 years.  I have worked as a school psychologist, as a language arts/reading teacher (grades 1,3,4,5,6,7 and 8), as a teacher-mentor, and as an educational consultant, and was actively involved as a parent in my kids' education.  I have met, observed, and taught with many, many teachers - some who were outstanding, some who were mortifying, and most who were 'good'.  Here are the TOP TEN components I have found (based on literature searches and my own experiences) that make a teacher GREAT :

• Great teachers exude INTELLECTUAL CURIOSITY  and they push their students to follow and feed the curiosity they model as they constantly question the world around them. When teachers can channel and push a 'need to know' attitude, learning and remembering are much more effective.
• Great teachers exude PASSION - for their students and for learning.  Passion is motivating. It is exciting, it is engaging and it is catchy.  This passion motivates and pushes students to want more, to embrace more, and to contribute more.
• Great teachers RESPECT their students' needs and perspectives.
• Great teachers have KNOWLEDGE and expertise in the content they teach while- 
• Knowing what they know
• Knowing when they don't know 
• Knowing how to acknowledge that they don't know (this is so important for modeling intellectual curiosity which in turn is so important for true, attainable learning)
• Knowing how to find out what they don't know - or when to have their students find out what they don't know - and bringing it back to class.
• Great teachers express CONFIDENCE and COMFORT in their subject matter AND  in not always knowing ALL the answers.  Modeling 'not (always) knowing' will make it easier for your students to acknowledge what they don't know while strengthening and modeling intellectual curiosity.
• Great teachers set EXPECTATIONS high (but obtainable) for themselves and for their students, facilitating and nurturing their attainment.
• Great teachers ACKNOWLEDGE that there are all kinds of minds in their classrooms and 
• Great teachers have the FLEXIBILITY to build and integrate multi-modal components into their lessons addressing auditory learners, visual learners, students with longer and shorter attention spans, students who easily can move sequentially along steps of a problems and those who need more structure (to name just a few).
• Great teachers ENGAGE students, making the curriculum meaningful, pertinent, exciting, and getting students to critically evaluate and perceive issues in a variety of ways.
•  Great teachers form PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS with their students, listening to their needs and their comments, acknowledging the right for different perspectives while GUARANTEEING A SAFE LEARNING ENVIRONMENT for all.

Before closing I want to thank you for your visit and send you off with clips of inspiration...view them all or chose your favorites: From Dead Poet's Society: "What will your verse be?"

From Dead Poet's Society: "Just when you think you know something, you must look at it in a different way...triving to find your own voice...Dare to strike out and find new ground!"

And maybe, the question isn't "What makes a great teacher" but "What great teachers make...a god damned difference!!!!!"

 

Thanks for your visit, please leave you opinions in the comments. 

CALL FOR PAPERS... EDUCATORS, LIBRARIANS, AUTHORS, HISTORIANS...

My editor, Emily Raij from Maupin House (publishing my book Using Content Area Graphic Texts for Learning: A Guide for Middle-Level Educators - sorry but I couldn't help plugging my work) has forwarded TWO CALLS FOR PAPERS that I thought I would pass on to you.

A brief overview:

1. The first call for papers is from The Conversations Project: Interdisciplinary Conversations About Comics, Literacy, and Scholarship. The editor, James Bucky Carter, is looking for "conversations" between two figures, from different professional or personal perspectives who can create a narrative interview where each voice relates their perspective of comics in libraries, in classrooms (grades k-12), or on the drafting board.  Submissions due January 1, 2013 -see details below.  (If you want to submit but don't have a 'partner to converse with' - contact me, maybe I can help)
2. The second call for papers is from Comics and the American Southwest and Borderland.  The editors of Comics and the American Southwest and Borderlands and the University Press of Mississippi are seeking pieces addressing  the "creating, and illuminating the intersections of comics scholarship and established academic writing on the Southwestern United States, the U.S-Mexico border, and their literatures, identities, and cultures."  Submissions due January 1, 2013 -see details below.

CFP: The Conversations Project: Interdisciplinary Conversations About Comics, Literacy, and Scholarship  Dr. James Bucky Carter seeks abstracts/papers for an edited collection currently entitled The Conversations Project.

Comics scholarship has grown substantially over the last twenty years and has always inhabited an interdisciplinary domain. However, rarely do the myriad voices have an opportunity to intersect and interact like they might. This is especially true between those involved in humanities-based comics scholarship and those who explore comics from pedagogical potentialities – and an even more salient divide exists when one looks at those who are doing work with comics in the humanities and those who study comics’ k-12 applications and potentials.

The goal of the Conversations Project is to bring together leading and emergent voices in often distinctive and divergent sub-fields of comics scholarship via pairing those who study comics primarily from a humanities scholarship perspective with those who study comics mostly from the social sciences/ education/ literacy perspectives.

The editor argues that this has had a limiting effect on comics scholarship and offers the Conversations Project as a mode of addressing the issue (while, of course, recognizing that there are figures who work in and across multiple disciplines).

Each chapter of the project will be a conversation between two figures, one involved mostly in humanities-based comics scholarship and the other mostly involved in literacy/education-based comics scholarship.

Non-exhaustive examples of possible pairings:

• A children’s literature scholar might pair with a literacy scholar.
• Someone studying reader response theory in comics might pair with an education professor or practicing k-12 teacher
• A librarian of a comics collection at a university might pair with a public. school librarian or a librarian studying literacy issues associated with comics.
• A visual rhetoric scholar might pair with a social scientist studying how young people read or decode the language/systems of comics.
• A scholar of a specific cartoonist or comics work might pair with a k-12 teacher who has used that artist’s works or the specific text.
• A scholar-practitioner of Design might pair with a literacy educator or k-12 teacher.
• An art historian might pair with an Art educator or k-12 art teacher
• An academic who runs an after-school program connecting comics and literacy might pair with a practicing k-12 teacher who does the same.
• Someone who studies media might pair up with a media literacy educator.

Pairs will be instructed to craft their narrative in the form of a mutual interview, similar to and inspired by the format of the University Press of Mississippi’s Conversations series, where each voice is clearly distinguished and labeled each time it speaks. Editors will provide a brief introduction of both figures to introduce the readership to the authors, their areas of expertise, and the general gist of their arguments presented in the chapter.

Pairs might consider the following:

• What are your big questions and concerns regarding how the “other side” seems to view comics.
• How could your own work be used to advance understandings for the “other side.”
• Where do you see common ground in your work and theories and big ideas on comics, their value, use, and importance?
• Where do you and your paired partner agree? Disagree? Mine these spots for communication. Cite scholarship to assert your claims. Can you find middle ground?
• What major texts and figures inform thoughts?
• What new perspectives have you gained from working with your partner? What new avenues do you feel you may have opened up for readers who might also be looking to bridge the space between one form of comics scholarship and another?

The editor will craft a summative chapter that treats the bulk of the collection as qualitative data and will draw conclusions and make recommendations to readers based on emerging ideas, theories, and problem areas across the contributions. In this way, the book is similar to Aldema’s work in Multicultural Comics: From Zap to Blue Beetle and Your Brain on Latina Comics.

Interested parties should contact general editor Dr. James Bucky Carter at jbcarter777@gmail.com. Those who already have a co-author in mind are welcomed, but Dr. Carter can assist in finding possible partners. Once a pairing is approved, the authors should prepare a 300-500 word abstract and submit it to the editor by January 1, 2013.

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CFP: Comics and the American Southwest and Borderland

The editors of Comics and the American Southwest and Borderlands seek submissions for this collection, which has interest from the University Press of Mississippi. We hope the collection does for the Southwest and Border region what Costello and Whitted’s Comics and the U.S. South did for that region and Southern studies via mining, creating, and illuminating the intersections of comics scholarship and established academic writing on the Southwestern United States, the U.S-Mexico border, and their literatures, identities, and cultures.


Submissions might consider:
• The impact of comics creators from the Southwest or Border region
• The work of Jaxon/Jack Jackson, specifically
• Characters or storylines set in and/or influenced by the Southwest or Border region
• Depictions of the Southwest or Borderlands in comics
• Examinations of how non-American artists have represented the American West (Charlier, Moebius, Blain, etc.)
• U.S-Mexico relations in comics
• Immigration; citizenship; nationalism in comics from or about the region
• Race, gender, sex and ethnic studies in comics from or about the region
• Nationalism; politics; violence in comics from or featuring the region
• Liminal spaces; contact zones; politics of the region in comics
• Westerns
• Adaptations of Southwest, Chicano, Latina, or Mexican literature
• Chicana/a or Latina/o studies as frames for analysis of comics
• Class and economic issues in comics from or featuring the region
• Depictions of Native peoples from the region in comics

Submissions may explore comic strips, comic books, graphic novels, web comics, and editorial cartoons. Submissions may focus on any genre.

Please send 300-500 word abstracts to both Dr. James Bucky Carter (jbcarter777@gmail.com) and Dr. Derek Parker Royal (Derek@DerekRoyal.com) by January 31, 2013.

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Again, if you have any questions or need help find a conversation partner, please use the comment section as a bulletin board.  I would also love your comments and feedback.

Thanks you, as always, for your visit, I hope to see you again soon!

Teachers' Worth: The Real Zinger...

From: teacherweb.puyallup.k12.wa.us

This past Friday, January 6, 2012 the New York Times ran a front page article "Big Study Links Good Teachers to Lasting Gain" in which Annie Lowrey reported findings of a recent study by Chetty, Friedman (Harvard) and Rockoff (Columbia).  As I approached the paper and saw the article, I thought sarcastically to myself, "...and this is new?"  But, the first zinger for me was that the this study was not conducted by educators - it was conducted by economists, and I took a closer look.

These economists examined 2.5 million children (the largest pool of students ever studied) from a large urban school district from 3rd -8th grade and then to adulthood (the longest period one particular subject pool has been studied) looking at a teacher's "value added" score and its impact upon these students over time.  This score was defined as the average test-score gain (in reading and math) for their students, statistically "adjusted for differences across classrooms in student characteristics." These data covered the 2.5 million students and 18 million math and reading tests spanning 1989-2009.

Here are some of the ZINGERS as reported in the study:

• When a high value added teacher joins a school, test scores rise immediately in the grade/subject taught by that teacher (and only in what is taught by that teacher), and falls if/when that teacher leaves.
• On average, having a high value-added teacher for one years raises a child's total lifetime income by $9,000.
• All else equal, a student with one excellent teacher for one year between fourth and eighth grade would gain $4,600 in lifetime income, compared to a student of similar demographics who has an average teacher.  
• The student with the excellent teacher would also be 0.5 percent more likely to attend college.
• Replacing a poor teacher (whose value added score is in the bottom 5%) with a teacher of average quality would generate lifetime earnings gains worth over $250,00 for the average classroom.
• Controlling for numerous factors including students' backgrounds, the researchers found that the value-added scores consistently identified some teachers as better than others, even if individual teachers' value-added scores varied from year to year.
• Students with top teachers are less likely to become pregnant as teenagers, are more likely to enroll in college, and are more likely to earn more money as adults.

In short, this study details lifelong impacts that variations or differences between really good and really bad teachers have on children.  And, while we can all point to pivotal teachers who opened our minds and  various life-line doors -  the fact that this is now backed by economists and with future income studies... is enormous - as are the ramifications for defining, evaluating and using value-added teacher data.

With all this in mind, I would like to thank the following teachers for having had such an impact on me and or on my kids. [Please leave your own acknowledgements in the comments.]

My very special thanks to:

•  Mr. Benami - my high school science teacher who saw through the quiet girl in class, encouraging me to think, grow, and participate.  He set high but realistic goals for me to reach and as a result I have always loved science.
• Mrs. Gross and Mrs. Pfiefer - my middle school social studies and science teachers who also saw and encouraged my potential WAY before I did.
• Mr. Sandomir -for understanding my son, validating his feelings, comments and intellect, and for challenging him to write poems and prose that still touch our hearts.  Mr. Sandomir, when teaching Phillip Pulman's His Dark Materials books told his 6th grade class that they were based on Milton's Paradise Lost.  My son was so taken, he read Paradise Lost (NOT your average 6th grader independent reading) and still talks about it.
• Mrs. Teig - THE BEST math ... ever.  She was tough, demanding and relatively unflexible in her demands.  A bit like Mary Poppins, she would bake and bring wonderful candies and patries to school and nurture each of her students reinforcing their accomplishments and risk-taking while restructuring their mistakes and steps backward.  ALL her students felt her love. Her 5-8 grade math classes put my daughters at the top of their high school math classes to the point that their school had to set up special accelerated math groups for them.  One daughter is now a middle school teacher, the other, having majored in math and physics in college is a materials engineer. 

And, for all those aspiring to be these 'value-added teachers', here's some sound advice:

Thanks again to you all - please don't forget to tell us about your value-added teachers in the comments!