“Lucy” (not her real name) teaches in a rural/suburban school district in the western half of Michigan. In 2008 she was teaching Economics and U.S. History. When I entered her classroom in that year, she had agendas up on her board for both of her subjects. There were maps on the back bulletin board. Lucy later told me that the classroom teacher for her teacher-assisting semester had given her the maps and Lucy recommended that all student teachers get as many resources from their cooperating teachers as possible.

The textbooks Lucy was currently using were somewhat outdated so she did not use them very much and had to supplement them as much as possible. Her First Period Economics class of 9th graders started out with this journaling question: “Which economic system do you think are the best? Why?” (Lucy, f.n., 2008, p. 1). This was the first year in which Lucy had her own room. In previous years she taught from a cart and moved from room to room in the building. Her classroom was equipped with a computer and she had her own laptop hooked to projector on a cart. The projection cart was supposed to be shared, but since she used it every day, it stayed in her room. There was a  25” tv mounted to the wall.  Lucy told me that the school was getting new laptops and ceiling-mounted projectors for every classroom. The back counter in the classroom was set up for future computer stations, but there were no machines at this point.

As the class started, the students quietly got fresh pieces of paper from a stack in the front of the room and sat down to journal on the question on the board. Lucy gave a 15 second warning, after a few minutes, so that the students might complete their journaling. She provided a follow-up question before the students began to answer the original journaling question: “What are national services?”  The consensus among the students was that a mixed economy was the best economic system. Lucy reviewed the various other economic systems, while providing examples of their operation in terms and examples that might resonate with a rural population. The class was quiet and attentive as Lucy reviewed and, then collected, the homework. She told me in an aside that this was the first week of the trimester without disruptions. Two weeks ago there was standardized testing and there were some disruptions last week as the classes began their normal operation.

The next part of the lesson involved the students forming groups. Lucy handed out fake money and she grouped the classroom by sections. The students then read an instruction sheet on what they were supposed to do during the activity. Lucy told me that she took the basic two economics courses in her time at GVSU, Micro and Macro Economics. After a minute or two, she gave the class a 1-minute warning to finish up their reading. When the time was up, she displayed a sign on the TV: “Econo Factory”.  One half of the class were “businesses” and the other half were “households” or consumers.  The “businesses” received 10, $100 bills of fake money and the “households” were each given 5 resources. Lucy’s students were very respectful of one another and shared resources when that became necessary.  The businesses were directed to buy resources from the households and the households were directed to sell resources and later, buy “econos” from the businesses.  The students seemed to understand the rules. There were no set prices and market forces were to take hold in the negotiating process.  The activity was graded on participation and there was extra credit for whoever accumulated the most money and the most “econos”. The students were given 15 minutes to buy and sell.

The students immediately got up from their desks after the instructions were completed and started to ‘wheel and deal’. Lucy related to me before the class started that her students had a very weak understanding of basic economics. The “businessmen” very quickly started trading in resources for “econos”. The class was definitely engaged, with all kinds of discussions happening. Everyone was trying to get the best price or make the best deal. There was a 5-minute warning given by Lucy as she circulated around the room, asking questions and prompting students. Lucy gave a follow-up 3-minute warning which prompted a flurry of last-minute deals. One student commented, “If you have $100 left, no one will take it”. He did not make a deal when he could and at this point, he did not have enough money to make a deal for the resources that were left. Lucy gave two more time warnings and then totaled up the results. The winners had collected 10 “Econos” and $1500, respectively. The students handed back the materials for the simulation in an orderly fashion and then Lucy handed out question sheets based on the activity. The first three questions were based on the simulation and the fourth question asked the students to illustrate the transactions which occurred in a circular flow chart. The students immediately went to work, while Lucy put an illustration up on the board to lead discussion once the students finished answering the questions. The flow chart was basically a double circle, with the business flow going in both directions, from individuals or households to businesses and back again. “Good and Services” and “Factors of Production” were written on the circles.

After a 1-minute warning to complete the questions, Lucy handed out a note-taking packet. What followed was a Socratic session where Lucy asked a series of questions based on the simulation and the questions the students answered.

“What do businesses want? Money. What do consumers want? Things—basic needs. What do businesses do with resources? Provide goods and services and then individuals buy them. What do individuals provide for goods and services? Money. Where does the money go? To producers. What do businesses use the money for? Pay for resources. (Lucy, f.n., 2008, p. 4)

At that point in the lesson, Lucy stopped and asked the class if there were any questions about what they were learning and there were none. She might have asked the students to re-state some information so she could assess their understanding, but, at the same time, their actions during the simulation and their answers in the de-briefing showed that they knew what they were doing and why they were doing it. A student made a great comment in displaying her/his understanding of the activity: “One person’s spending is another person’s income” (Lucy, f.n., 2008, p.4). Lucy then displayed on the screen real life examples in explaining what the students just experienced.

Next Lucy had her students read a story about “Andy and Abby Average”^[1]. As the students read, they put information into the boxes on the note-taking packets. The story followed Andy and Abby through a typical day as they bought things, used services, and gave human resources in exchange for factors of production. After summarizing Andy and Abby’s day, Lucy had her students put themselves into the chart. They were given 10 minutes to match their lives with their economic activity. The simulation and the story became their reality. The students immediately engaged in putting themselves into the flow chart. Again, Lucy gave a warning as the time wound down so that the students made the best use of the time available. Overall the class and its activities were well-timed as Lucy made the ultimate use for the time allotted for the period. The last assignment, which potentially carried over into homework, was having the students predict what would happen if the nation’s income decreased by 10% a year. That assignment was as apropos to today as it was during the recession in 2008.

Second period. The assignment due today was a 150 word essay on the topic “Holocaust Response”. Lucy told me she liked 72-minute periods which the trimester schedule offered because she could do simulation activities from beginning to end, similar to the simulation in her First Period class. At the very beginning of her Second Period class Lucy helped a student who was absent the previous day catch up to what the class was doing today. Next, Lucy asked the class what the word appeasement meant. A student gave a good answer, “pacifying an aggressor”. Lucy next asked if appeasement worked with Hitler and the student said “no”.  Hitler went ahead and took the rest of Czechoslovakia and then invaded Poland. At this point Lucy referred back to a prior lesson and reinforced the thought that President Roosevelt did not think appeasement would work. FDR had already assumed the position that force would be the only answer to Hitler’s aggression.  Lucy referred her students back to notes they took in last week’s classes. She then proceeded in discussing and asking questions concerning the beginning of World War II in Europe. I asked Lucy later what sources she used in her slide presentation and she replied that she used multiple sources, not just the textbook. She made great use of an animated map from the BBC which showed the German blitzkrieg^[2].  While the slide presentation was going on, amidst Lucy’s questions, the class took notes on sheets provided. Lucy designed the note-taking sheets based on the fact that she knew the students needed time to process what they were learning. She took the time to ask her students what they wrote down so that she had an informal means of evaluating how they were processing the information.  Lucy then handed out another sheet which tasked the students with processing the notes they had taken over the past two days, yet another way for processing and reinforcing the information the students learned. She gave the class about 7 minutes to complete this work, as she walked around the room, checking the students’ notes and offering help if some of the students were having difficulty. One of the students was having trouble keeping up with the class so Lucy handed that student her remote “mouse” and the student clicked back through the slides and finished the note-taking. It was a simple thing to do, but it displayed Lucy’s consideration of the student’s individual learning needs. Throughout the class, Lucy interwove the current information with past lessons so that her students might make connections to all they were learning about World War II. She did not want her students’ learning to be constructed of isolated bits of information on a day-to-day basis, but, rather, to create an interconnected web throughout the passage of events.  At various times, Lucy stopped the lesson and made a geographic link to the history in asking the students where various countries were located on a map. Lucy had the students use a type of Cornell note-taking method^[3] in processing the information they learned about the various Neutrality Acts passed by the United States’ government in the lead-up to U.S. involvement in the War.

Lucy foreshadowed the next day’s lesson, a debate by three groups concerning World War II based on the Brown University “Choices” program^[4].  She handed out readings from the resource and had her students read and summarize each section. Three short summaries were due the next day so that the students might be versed in the various positions concerning U.S. entry into World War II. I asked her if her students were held accountable for their homework and how many students actually completed the work assigned. She explained that 80-95% of the students completed their work. Her grading system was weighted, with the final grade equaling 20% for tests and 80% for daily work and homework. She estimated that it took her three to five hours a day in grading the work she assigned.

Lucy’s last two classes in her trimester schedule for that day were Economics. She mentioned that one of the resources she used outside of the textbook was the National Council for Economics Education^[5]. Besides the online resources from that organization, Lucy purchased some materials for her own use from the NCEE.

Throughout the day Lucy complimented her students when they provided answers to her questions. Her tone was conversational, but when necessary, and it was not often, she held her students to certain standards of behavior. Her lessons were well-timed, with many warnings for when segments of a lesson were winding down. She was very good at asking questions which constituted basic information retrieval, but then following up with questions about applying that information, especially in how the information applied to the students’ lives.

During this class period, Lucy shared with me that she was emailing one of her students who was traveling in China with a parent. Lucy wanted to make sure that her student was keeping up with school work during the trip. There was one problem when an email homework attachment was censored by the Chinese government so the Lucy had to re-send that attachment, and apparently it got through the censors the second time. It was obvious to me throughout the day that Lucy cared about her students and their learning. She related a story about one of her students who was denied the opportunity to attend the Career Tech Center at the local Intermediate School District because he had failed all four of his core subjects at the high school.  Lucy said that after he was denied entry to the tech program, he dropped out of school.

In order to keep her students busy if they had time on their hands at the end of a class, Lucy assigned review note cards for review purposes. She explained that it kept students busy if they had down time, while providing a good remediation and review tool for them.

I noticed early during the day that Lucy covered her classroom clock up with a piece of paper. If I had “clock watchers” in any particular class, I would cover the clock so the students focused on the lesson versus the time left in the class. The students did not necessarily like that when I did it, but it helped to keep them focused.

The de-briefing for the simulation in Lucy’s last class elicited some interesting conclusions by the students, all couched in their reality of their own lives. One student commented on the competition that appeared once the trading began.  Another student claimed that he/she was “robbed” by allowing a person to take advantage of her/his lack of trading acumen. Another student thought that some people were not too smart with their money.  Other terms that arose in the discussion were “buying and selling”, “good for services”, “interdependency” and “scarcity”.

All of her classes were engaged in the lessons for the day. Lucy was a careful planner and carried out her lessons efficiently, while making sure that her students were able to relate what they learned to their own life experiences. She constantly made connections to previous lessons and constantly checked her students’ understandings as the lessons progressed. Everything she did in her classroom and with her students were hallmarks of a good teacher.

Interview, 2008

Defining Success, 2008

As with many other teachers in this study, Lucy thought there was more to success in teaching than just relating content to her students. She wanted her students engaged in a way that caused them to apply what they learned. For instance, in her Economics class, Lucy wanted her students to take the material and apply it to their lives as they were impacted by the on-going recession in 2008. She thought classroom management was another important factor in success. She did not want one student disrupting the other students’ ability to learn. A large part of classroom management, in her estimation, was establishing relationships with her students, and by that, she meant all her students, including the ones who had a hard time focusing, for whatever reason. She knew it required balance. There will always be a few students who are quick to raise their hands and it is easy for teachers to fall into a rut of just picking on the students who engaged quickly, but not to the exclusion of students who take longer to process their thoughts or students who might be reticent when it comes to classroom discussion.

Lucy thought Grand Valley did a good job of exposing her to many different teaching methods and classroom management styles. She related that she attended a conference with several other teachers who had graduated from other colleges. When the discussion turned toward a particular management style, the other teachers told Lucy that they had not heard of that style before the conference.  Lucy learned the method while in college and was surprised when the teachers told her that their program did not include much about classroom management. Lucy described her management style as a mix of different methods which best matched her personality and that of her students.

Content, 2008

Because of what she currently taught, Lucy had a difficult time applying some of the content she learned in her upper level courses at GVSU. Some of the content that she did apply she had to re-learn because that coursework happened early in her college career. She knew she used content from her Economics classes, to the point that she pulled information and concepts directly from her Macro and Micro Econ classes. She did say that she had to ‘tone down’ some of the college level material for her 9th grade audience.  Lucy said she thought it would be very useful for colleges to find ways to review basic information and concepts toward the end of students’ college careers so the job of re-learning the material for use in the classroom, no matter what level, was less arduous. She also mentioned that while a Social Studies degree did allow a person a broad certification so that they might be employed for various subjects and grade levels, the degree and coursework might be too broad at times. She also made a similar comment as others made, many courses never really “finished”, for instance, recent U.S. history course did not make it past World War II, yet she was responsible for teaching her U.S. class up to the present day, based on the state standards and the state standardized test.

Strategies and Methods, 2008

Again, Lucy thought she was much better equipped with multiple ways for engaging her students in the content than teachers who came out of other colleges’ programs. She talked about encountering a first-year teacher who was excited about using “partners” in his classroom, something that he had not heard of in his college coursework. Lucy said that through various classes at GVSU she had a ready-made tool box of multiple lesson plans which featured multiple teaching strategies and methods. She literally pulled lessons out of a box, maybe with a little adjustment for age group and the culture of the school community, and make direct application to her classroom. On top of that, Lucy was placed in an Economics classroom for her student teaching semester and that experience helped her gain her current job. She also took the advice of her college professors and volunteered for some extra-curricular activities during her teacher-assisting and student teaching experiences. One of those activities helped her build her network of contacts which led directly to finding her teaching position.

When I asked her what Grand Valley did not help in her preparation her immediate answer was Advanced Placement Government. Her word was “overwhelmed”. She survived, but it took a lot of work, not re-learning, but learning new material, information not included in her two basic political science classes within her Social Studies major. Lucy said no first or second year teacher was totally prepared and it was not the fault of their college preparation. There was so much to learn with all the facets of teaching that experience was the greatest teacher, that and much work. Lucy was fortunate that the previous Economics teacher at her school gave her all of his files, but she still had to make his information her own. She admitted that she was still in “survival mode” and was still building her resources and teaching repertoire. She thought that finding quality teaching materials in Economics for 9th graders was very difficult, but there was a huge storehouse of History materials.

As far as gaps in her methods and strategies foundation, Lucy agreed with some of the other teachers.  Her background in working with special education students was weak. She wished she knew more of how they struggled and how she might best help them learn, without having to constantly refer to the special education teachers in her building. She also said that she wished she had more ideas on how to best reach gifted students. Teachers have often simply assigned more work to those students which ends in the retort, “Why do I have to do more work than the rest of the class?” Lucy’s answer was expecting more from the gifted students in the quality of work. They did not have to do more, just process and create answers which better displayed their intellect. She had high standards for all her students, but even higher ones for the gifted students. However, she did not want to make her standards that much higher. Differentiating instruction too much put an onus on the gifted students. She did say that some students in her district were allowed to take upper level classes at an earlier age, like an 8th grader taking 9th or 10th grade math, but basically the only upper level classes for high performing students were Advanced Placement courses. She also mentioned working on the yearbook staff, Odyssey of the Mind and Science Olympiad as opportunities for those students who looked for a challenge beyond their regular classes.

We returned to the topic of classroom management. Lucy thought that if colleges prepared their teacher candidates for awareness of potential problems then that was sufficient. How situations work out in real life vary and to have some scenarios and basic rules of operation work until a teacher encounters the real thing.  Lucy gave one example of a student defying a teacher and then checking on a mental list of actions, like bringing the student into the hallway for a discussion that focused on the incorrect behavior instead of calling the student out in front of his/her peers. In one of the last cases of a behavior problem when I was still a high school teacher, I had a student whose behavior was out of the norm.  I invited the student into the hallway and we discussed the inappropriate behavior. After a short discussion, we re-entered the classroom quietly, but there was immediate murmuring. “What happened out there? What did he say to you? Are you going to the office?” After a few minutes of whispered conversation, it was obvious that none of the other students wished for a private conversation in the hallway.  The affected student was quiet and the class back in focus on the lesson.  Problem solved.

I mentioned to Lucy the interview I had with one of the Houston area teachers.  She had a student that “nuked” in her classroom. He totally “went off”. Her immediate thought was, “I did nothing to provoke this behavior”. She froze as her mind went through multiple scenarios of potential causes for his behavior. As she refocused, she realized the entire class was waiting for her response and as a first-year teacher, that response would help to set the foundation for her classroom management style for the immediate future.  She recovered and took the student out of the room in order for him to regain his composure and then asked what was troubling him. She did not relate to me what happened next, but it seemed like she effectively hurdled the first instance of incorrect behavior in her classroom.

Lucy related a recent experience to me concerning incorrect student behavior and the fine line between outright defiance and a marginal one.  A student who repeatedly came to class unprepared once again borrowed a pencil from her desk. This time she responded by saying that he could not just help himself to her pencils. He tossed the pencil back at her.  He did not throw it.  She saw his action as a test of wills, knowing that the rest of the class was watching what he did.  Lucy took him out in the hallway and the student immediately knew that his behavior crossed the line. They had a discussion about his behavior and returned to the classroom. Limits were set on his behavior. He was not going to toss pencils at her any longer and the class knew that she would not let incorrect behavior stand, plus she thought her relationship with this student was solidified. Her college training established that it was better in acting with preventative measures, rather than waiting until situations escalate.

Lucy also thought that it was very important in filling all the minutes of a class period. “Free time” was time for behavior to get out of control or, at least, start verging on a lack of good classroom control. Thus, she had her students fill out review cards when they had extra time at the end of the class. She also allowed for time at the end of class for the students to start their homework. This “homework time” fulfilled two purposes: one, it served as a reward. “If you finish your homework, you do not have to take it home” and two, “If you have questions as your start your homework, I can help you now, instead of you finding out at home, later on, that you really did not understand the assignment”. Both the review cards and in-class homework time provided positive activities which promoted positive rewards in the future.  Better test scores through study and better results on homework with one-on-one time with the teacher.

Pearls of Wisdom, 2008

Lucy’s first pearl was for future teachers to gather up all the material they were offered by other teachers and professors. Even if a teacher had no idea what subjects they might be teaching before they are hired, better to have a box of potential resources then none at all, or a select group of resources based on what a teacher hoped she/he would be teaching. After student teaching in a high school U.S. History class I did not envision teaching 7th grade U.S. History, New York State History and Geography and 7th Grade English/Language Arts, but there I was and I had resources from my college classes which gave me some basic help in the first ‘survival’ year.

Lucy reinforced the idea of making connections or networking. She knew that the connections she made during her field experience led directly to her job. She encouraged future teachers in getting involved in extra-curricular activities beyond the classroom during their field experience.

Lastly, Lucy said that beginning teachers should not be too hard on themselves. The first few years of teaching are a struggle. New teachers will make mistakes. At one point in her first few years, she told her mother she thought she was going to quit because she did not think she was equal to the challenge of teaching.  I dropped in to see Lucy in 2007 when I was observing one of my students in her building. She looked stressed, but this year she was much more comfortable. Her message was that things get better as teachers gain experience and not to worry too much about the stress of the first few years.

2015

Life had changed for Lucy since I last visited her in 2008.  She was married now and had two children.  She was now commuting from farther away, in part because her new home allowed for more contact with family and daycare. Lucy liked the anonymity of living out of district versus living near or in the community where she taught.  It was a welcome time away from her job.  Technology had changed as well. There was a “turn in cell phones” notice on the board and a computer cart with laptops. Lucy’s teaching assignment had modified as well. This fall semester she was teaching Economics all day long, but she would be teaching Government classes in the next semester. Her classroom was now in the Senior hallway and Lucy described that area of the school as quieter and “not as silly” as the Freshmen hallway she used to inhabit.  Along with the laptops, Lucy was using Google Classroom for classroom assignments and lessons.

Her first period class starting with a kind of brainteaser. There were certain images on the projector which the students had to interpret. The images were fairly basic, but it gave the class a chance to get their brain cells active. One of the images had the word “man” and underneath that word, was the word “board”, which the students were to interpret as “Man over board”.  Lucy had the learning targets for the day on her board as her students started their journaling assignment for the day, which was an analysis of the oil surplus as presented in a news clip from CNN Student News.  The students were a little sleepy, but still responsive and engaged in the activity. Lucy walked around the room during the journaling exercise, monitoring progress and asking questions, such as, “What is it? What is the cause of it? Why does it matter?”  Just as she did in 2008, Lucy made extensions outside of the information provided in the news clip that connected with her students’ lives.

The next part of her lesson was entitled “Economic Enigmas” and the activity started with a “Think, Pair, Share” based on the question: “Why are so many fast food places in the same location?”  Lucy had organized the class into groups of 3, using a random group generator on her computer. As soon as the groups formed, Lucy moved to monitor the groups and answer potential questions. Then, with the help of a document camera, she had the students draw conclusions from separate pieces of evidence. The students immediately engaged in discussion, analyzing the evidence through the lens of their own lives and positing possible conclusions.  One of the students used the term over-saturating in describing fast food locations, displaying a vocabulary not usually found in a freshmen Economics class.  A student was puzzled at first by a quote from Ray Kroc, the man behind the MacDonald’s restaurants, who stated, this is “not a restaurant business—it’s a real estate business”.

As Lucy monitored the small group discussions, she adroitly posed excellent follow-up questions, based on the conversations from each group, at the same time relating her questions and comments to the real-life relevancy of her students’ lives. These were not scripted questions or comments, but creative interconnections to the real-time discussions. All the while, Lucy reinforced to the students that they had to support their conclusions with evidence.

As with my previous visit, Lucy efficiently timed the various activities within her lesson plan for the day, giving timely warnings near the end of the activities and then moving on to the next activity. Her students were engaged in the activities right to the end of the time allotted. There was no down time and very little wasted time.

The last activity in the lesson for the day was an independent writing assignment where the students finished up their analysis of the fast-food business. Some students were able to finish in the remaining time and the rest took the assignment as homework.

Lucy’s classes were one hour long. She explained to me that in three years her school had gone from a trimester schedule to a semester schedule and then back to a trimester schedule. Trimesters are 12 weeks long, with longer class periods and semesters are 16 weeks. The timing and scope of classes makes for differences in planning. While the changes were quick, allowing teachers to remember what trimesters were like, the difference in planning had to have created stress amongst the staff. While it is easy for administrators to make these decisions, I think it shows a lack of understanding about the amount of work it takes in efficiently matching standards to the time allowed.  That kind of planning is not like throwing a switch on and off, as any experienced teacher knows.

Lucy had even further fine-tuned her planning in the intervening 7 years between my visit in 2008 and 2015.  She said she was better at providing warning announcements when activities were drawing to a close.  Her classroom management style had not changed and her students responded immediately when she asked for quiet, as well as quickly and efficiently changing to group work and back again to full class discussion without wasted time and effort.

All through the day Lucy tooled questions based on individual group discussions versus generic questions which are features of pre-planned curriculum. In the process, she engaged the students where their minds were and made relevant connections to their lives. Lucy made further connection to individual student needs as she made the effort in spending extra time with a special needs student sitting near me in the classroom. She checked his understanding of the material and offered various explanations in helping him comprehend and work through the assignment.

Lucy responded to raised hands quickly throughout the day. She still had her ready smile and good sense of humor from 7 years ago, while maintaining her standards of classroom management and control. Her students engaged quickly once her always-clear instructions were given and the tone of her voice was almost always conversational.  Lucy was aware of students in her classroom who needed extra help understanding assignments or encouragement in engaging or completing activities and this only a few weeks into a new school year. It was obvious that she had made the effort in learning about her freshmen students early on.

As with all the visits I made with my former students, I took the opportunity to have lunch with them and their colleagues. The group of teachers during this lunch period were very social. Part of the positive atmosphere amongst the group was a resolution to be happier this year (Lucy, f.n., 2015, p.6).  The teachers planned monthly social events as a way to de-compress or de-stress from their jobs. Lucy mentioned that there had been contract problems in the past, which caused some of the stress. There was a new long-term contract, but Lucy also said that the new salary table, plus increasingly high costs of health care and diminished state contributions to the state retirement system meant less pay in comparison to the salary and benefits in previous years. Lucy also said that she was afraid she was becoming cynical due to changes in “out of classroom” issues; changes in standards, educational reform issues, administrative changes and school politics. In fact, one of the other teachers in this study commented on school politics and wanted to know why there was not more preparation in college for that reality in teachers’ jobs. That person later corrected himself and admitted that circumstances change from district to district and that only experience leads to an understanding of the climate of a school.

As for classroom challenges, Lucy said that the motivation for her to do her best for her students was based on the problems her students faced in life. There were students from broken homes, students who lacked adequate clothing, experienced bad family situations and exhibited anger issues because of the stresses in their lives. That was why establishing relationships with her students was so important to Lucy and the other teachers I interviewed. They were in teaching for their kids.

Throughout the day I seldom saw Lucy sit down at her desk and when she did it was for making tweaks to her lesson plans, based on how those plans were succeeding or not succeeding in each class. She definitely worked hard at matching the lesson to her students and making sure through almost constant movement in her classroom that her students were clear as to her instructions and engaged in the material. It was important to her that the students learned the information, as well as being able to apply the material to their life experiences. One student commented, “We do the same thing every day…all these different things” (Lucy, f.n., 2015, p.8).  I almost laughed at the comment. It was not a complaint. The student was not bored. It was a compliment to Lucy’s dedication in doing her job right.

Interview, 2015

Defining Success, 2015

Lucy broke success down to different levels; success with one student, success with a class and having a successful day. She thought some of her successes were very small, but then build into a successful day overall. She thought her biggest success was in building one-on-one connections with her students. She knew that she might not be able to build those types of relationships with every student, but when a student felt enough trust in Lucy that she or he could share some the problems in their life with her, then that was success. She also agreed that student growth, such as improved test scores was a part of success in the classroom. She did not expect every student to attain an A in her class. For some students it might be simply passing the class when that goal looked doubtful at the beginning of a semester or the year. For other students success might be posing a question, beyond the normal activities or questions in a lesson plan that ignited further curiosity.

Lucy thought college did prepare her for success. She thought she was given the tools and it was her job in figuring out how to best utilize those tools for her students’ success. At the same time, she admitted that defining success on a day-to-day basis was difficult because of the difference between students and classes each day. One of her earmarks for success was establishing the idea of respect. She was not their “friend”. She was their teacher and she had defined rules and expectations that those rules were followed. She did have friendly conversations, but, if, for instance, homework was not completed, there were consequences, whereas a “friend” might let something like that slide. She did not expect that all her students liked her, but she did hope that her students respected her. Her standards and goals were established so, no matter what they learned in her classroom in terms of the content, her students would develop the skills to be successful in life.  She knew that establishing the proper relationships with her students was difficult for her at the beginning of a school year because that was when teachers defined their standards and held their students to consequences if standards were not met or in Lucy’s words, “This is what you can and cannot get away with in my classroom” (Lucy, v.t., 2015, p.2). She thought she learned important classroom management techniques during her teacher-assisting and student teaching semesters which helped lead to her success now.

Challenges, 2015

Moving targets. Lucy felt that teachers were dealing with constant change and when they felt they were reaching the point of incorporating that change, the target was moved or replaced or had two more targets added to it. Figuring out how to move with the targets was her biggest challenge. She knew the big target was educating students. One of the moving targets was the change from trimesters to semesters back to trimesters. Another change was the grading system. Her school changed from a traditional grading model to a skills-based or standards-based grading model.  Instead of percentages the teachers were working with a 1 to 4 scale. She admitted the grading system was new, but she thought the explanations by different administrators varied and needed to be more consistent. She knew the administration was working on becoming more unified in their explanations and definitions, but it was a work in progress.  She thought the new process did, indeed, do a good job displaying student growth, but the implementation was still a bit difficult.  Lucy thought the training and run-up to implementation might have had better guidance. It sounded like the staff only had two days of meetings for the initial break-in.  In contrast, my high school took several years of meetings, in-service and out of school conferences in implementing the change from hourly classes to block scheduling. The district sent teachers to large gatherings featuring experts in the field, in-district in-service by outside experts and then in-service directed by school administrators who coordinated with the previous information. At the same time there were opportunities for staff comments and changes to the plan which allowed for features more consistent to the needs of individual teachers and their classes.

Lucy did say that the district was allowing time for further meetings and conferences during the upcoming year, but that expectation, added to the myriad of other demands on teachers’ time was daunting, and the change in the grading system was not the only new educational reform idea being “rolled out” this year. There seemed to be a disconnect between the amount of time teachers had to do their most important job, teach, and the time necessary for making changes, even needed ones.

Dealing with Stress, 2015

One of the ways that Lucy used in dealing with stress was to leave her job at the school each day. She tried not to leave the building until all her work was completed for the next day of school. She concentrated on her children when she was home. If it was not possible to finish her work at school after a few hours after school, then she waited until her children were in bed for the night in order to complete her work.  She jokingly admitted that her children provided for stress sometimes, but it was different than her school stress, so that was okay.

Lucy admitted that in her first two years she often worked through her lunch time in her room and, even though it was necessary at that time in order to complete her work and be prepared, she thought she needed time at lunch in order to get her mind off her work and enjoy some socializing with her colleagues, even if some of that conversation was work-related.

Motivation, 2015

Lucy said her students kept her motivated to do her best. She looked forward to little successes, enjoying her work with students, enjoying making lesson plans that challenged her students. She wanted to provide a safe environment where her students would feel free to share their concerns about life.  Lucy remarked about one of her students where success was measured on that student’s ability in keeping from exploding every day and storming out of Lucy’s classroom.  Lucy knew that, for whatever reason the tantrums happened, that student needed a place and a person in her life which would help her cope with whatever stresses were producing the severe behavior. At one point this student was confronted with a list of items that students needed for school and the student threw the list. The next day Lucy provided all the things on the list. Her ability in providing some basic needs for her students was her motivator.

Strategies and Methods, 2015

Lucy said she was much better at pacing her lessons than she was at the beginning of her career. It helped her in planning better lessons and helped the students keep on track, which resulted in fewer behavior problems. She also incorporated more technology and that technology use also helped her in differentiating her lessons. An example she gave was the difference in how she presented the idea of entrepreneurship.  When she started her career, she used discussion in defining what entrepreneurship was and how it operated. That method changed. She now gave her students a choice of three different ways they might prepare for the discussion and one of those options was a Ted Talk. The tech-savvy students had no problem accessing the video, finding a supplementary reading and taking a self-assessment quiz. Now the students were doing the research with a Jigsaw method.  Lucy said she found different ways in helping the special needs students learn so that she could differentiate instruction based on a student’s particular needs. Along with the differentiation, Lucy was using more formative assessment which allowed her to remediate student misconceptions with proper feedback before the students were summatively assessed.  Her feedback on practice assignments was not in the form of a grade, but in written comments which improved students’ performance in the end. One her definite changes in her teaching was less direct instruction and more project-based learning. Her students now expected that their modes of learning will constantly be changing.

Evaluation, 2015

Lucy said the administration changed how they evaluate teachers. The standard operating procedure used to be 10 to 15 minute drop-ins. Now it was two, one-hour visits. The administration was instituting the Marzano model. The administration also said they would begin surprise visits, but they soon found out that often the surprise was when they found out the teacher was giving a test that day so the surprise changed to “what day this week does not work for you?”  Lucy said that she had to provide evidence for how she met various standards, which was totally different than when she first started her career. She targeted the change to the change in guidelines set forward by the State Department of Education. Lucy thought the evaluations she had before the change by the state were much more useful for her. The administrators provided more feedback which helped in improving her teaching. Under the new model Lucy answered questions based on the observation and gone was the conversation between her and her administrator, which Lucy thought provided far more insight and feedback than the current system of evaluation.  She did not blame the administrators for the change and said that now their workload had increased tremendously and thus the lack of time to sit down for an hour and discuss an observation. Lucy thought that some of the evaluation guidelines were too generic and a teaching standard which might be helpful to a Math teacher would be almost unrelatable for a Social Studies teacher. She did say that she was given time to react to the comments in her evaluations, but she was not sure if, in the course of rebutting a criticism that rebuttal had any impact on her final evaluation score. She also thought that what she did outside of her daily teaching time should not impact her evaluation.  When she started her career, she had time to sponsor activities, but with two small children at home she did not have the time and she was concerned the lack of after school involvement negatively impacted her overall evaluation. Lastly, Lucy thought the system changed from being a formative experience for helping teachers improve to a punitive one, designed to eliminate teachers, especially when the tenure laws were weakened and reduced state educational spending meant “reduction in force” pressures. Scuttlebutt around her school was the district, due to financial pressures, was searching for ways to eliminate experienced, expensive teachers in favor of younger, less-experienced, less highly paid teachers. Lucy put it this way: it…”takes away from the fundamental idea behind evaluations, I think, to make us better.  Like when we were in college, you guys came and you didn’t say, ‘If you suck, we’re going to kick you out of the college’.  You said, ‘We’re going to help you get better and eventually you will reach this goal’”.

Mentoring, 2015

Lucy’s first response to my question as to whether she had any mentoring when she started her career was, “Not much”.  She said that after a few years at her school, a teacher approached her and said that he/she was her mentor. I asked if the district’s mentors were paid and Lucy did not know, but she did not remember mentoring as part of the extra-duty salary schedule. She related that when a new Social Studies person was hired a few years ago, she reached out and acted as a mentor due to the fact that she really did not have one herself. A plus to the lack of any real mentorship was that Lucy was better at reaching out and helping colleagues. So, beyond a positive evaluation process at the beginning of her career, Lucy did not have anything approaching a mentor and the lack of that type of support probably made the first few years of her career that much more difficult.

Continuing Education, 2015

Lucy started a Master’s program in her second year of teaching. She was 18 hours into her program, renewed her teaching certificate based on those hours and then her family started to grow. As her thoughts turned toward reinvesting in her Master’s, the state and school districts started to reducing the financial reward for a Master’s program so part of her incentive was gone for completing her program. She did say that the district paid for some of the graduate hours, but the amount did not make much of a dent the total cost. Her heart was set of being a classroom teacher and the idea of pursuing a degree in administration (a popular program with many of the teachers in this study) or counseling did not appeal to her.

Instead of a graduate degree, Lucy focused on professional development hours. She felt like she learned more in that way that was useful in the classroom than graduate hours in a program. P.D. required less out of class work and with her teaching and her family responsibilities she did not have the time required for graduate classes and the lack of a direct connection to her classroom. Lucy cited several professional development opportunities which were very useful to her; “Social Studies Can be Spectacular”, “Smarter Balance Assessments” and a MaCUL conference on technology.  The first two opportunities were sponsored by the local Intermediate School District.

In line with other teachers’ comments, Lucy said her district was turning to more in-house professional development. The district offered many different sessions and the teachers chose which sessions most benefitted them and their classrooms. She thought that experience was beneficial.

At this point the district was focused on standards-based assessment so the more recent professional development was based on that information and how to carry it into action. Based on her earlier comments on the initial roll out of the new assessment model it sounded like the district would keep that focus for P.D. for the near future.

Pearls of Wisdom, 2015

“Go to lunch” which really meant, ‘talk to your colleagues so you do not feel isolated and alone’.  She added the caveat that not all of the conversation should be focused on teaching, just to have a way to de-stress and get your mind off your responsibilities from time to time.

Next, she said that future teachers to know what they wanted out of their students ahead of time and then hold them to those expectations. She warned new teachers not to bend the rules they set forth because to back away from standards for behavior would mean students “would walk all over you” (Lucy, v.t., 2015, p.16). After the students understood that a teacher held them to consequences for their actions, it was much easier for a teacher to release some control and have the students control themselves and their classmates. At the same time, Lucy cautioned that a new teacher had to choose their battles carefully. She was involved in a test of wills her first year and realized that the student was much better at the game than she was. She shifted the battle to one-on-one meetings away from the rest of the class, either in the hallway or outside of class time and now there was no audience for a student’s behavior. By making the meetings private, Lucy was much more successful in finding the root of the problem, which often had nothing to do with school or her class.

Lucy wanted new teachers to be fully aware of how exhausting teaching was. The amount of effort to teach all day long with all the different types of students, their learning styles and their problems meant that a teacher needed to really love students and want to make a difference in their lives. She hoped that her students would adopt their own internal motivations for success and lessen her need in providing external pressure. She said that teachers do get the summers off and the pay was decent, but those external motivations would not be enough to carry someone through to success in the classroom. Only the internal motivation to do the best job possible for their students would counter all the stresses and pressures which good teachers face throughout the year. Returning to the topic of having the summers off, Lucy commented that her family liked to take cruises in November, but that was not an option for a teacher. Granted that I coached football for most of my career, but my teaching schedule never allowed for taking any type of trip during the Fall and living in Michigan for the last 20 years and the fall colors here, makes the possibility of Fall color tours during my retirement seem like a great thing to do.

Partially joking, Lucy said that new teachers need to learn bladder control and where the nearest bathroom was located. I was always mystified by the teachers who always had a mug of water or coffee on their desk because I knew the body had to process the intake of liquid and when would I have time to do that? I was told several times during physicals that my blood work showed I was dehydrated and it was easy for me to understand why that was.

Multi-tasking was an important teacher skill in Lucy’s eyes. There are so many demands on time and so much going on in a classroom during a lesson. It is necessary for a teacher to make notes and lists on the run, in order to make corrections to lessons and procedures or suffer the consequences for not changing something that does not work in teaching. She did never infer that other careers required any less concentration or ability to multi-task, but she also did not want to create the impression that teaching was easier than other occupations. I had hundreds of advisees during my teaching career and occasionally I had a student who expressed that teaching was a fallback choice if their first choice for a career did not pan out. I quickly countered that teaching was not an occupation that was any easier than any other job. Sure, the visible time on the job appeared to be different, but most people did not know the real work that good teachers did in order to best serve their students and their lives after school.