How Shall We Spend Our Summer Vacation?

Now that the first year of my CATE presidency is winding down, I’m taking time to reflect on the major issues we’ve faced representing English/language arts teachers in the state and the steps we’re taking to address them. While our programs have been impacted by budget cuts and growing governmental intrusions, our enthusiasm for teaching is not diminished. We are dedicated to supporting all who maintain and improve education in our state. We continue to seek ways to communicated timely information to those in the classroom and those on the legislative floor, to those who teach and those who decide what is to be taught.

In order to plan effectively for the second year in this office, I’ve tried to consider the major challenges that confront us in the English/language arts and to help develop ways to meet them. Our main challenge involves our coming to terms with and responding to public perception of the content we teach and the methods we really are using in the classroom. I’ve wondered why these have absorbed so much of our collective energy. So, I began to reflect on my own experiences these past few years and to wonder if others have had similar experiences.

In 1987, I attended the San Diego Area Writing Project’s summer program and learned myriad ways to incorporate writing across the curriculum, up and down the grades. I, like numerous other teachers, returned to the classroom fired up to include more writing in all subject areas. I found that the strategies I learned did open the floodgates of writing and more and more students seemed freed to write for different purposes – to explore, to explain, to express, and even to entertain. Students were freewriting, journaling, peer editing, and publishing as never before.

About the same time, I began teaching students to read and respond to literature in more personal ways – trying out the response theories of Louise Rosenblatt, and the revision strategies of writing process guru Donald Graves. I saw whole language in the elementary schools and young adult literature in secondary schoosl flourish in my school and those of friends in the area. Some of us saw larger numbers of students become excited about what they were able to read and ways they were able to write!

On the other hand, parents desiring to be involved in their children’s education and to assist with their homework could not understand why I, a such “fine” teacher, would return student writing without red inking grammar and spelling errors. These concerned parents and some of my colleagues also questioned the value of the candid new genre of young adult literature that was so unfamiliar to them. Within just a few years puzzled parents such as these began to support politicians who seemed to feel so out of the loop that they questioned the sagacity of in-class teachers and sought ways to determine whether or not we really were doing our jobs of teaching English/language arts. So…the era of wide spread testing emerged which used misaligned instruments that do not test what and ways we now are teaching. (I know I’m being simplistic, here, but keep reading.)

In our maelstrom of jubilation, my public school colleagues and I were caught off-guard. I teach in an independent school and am not faced with the testing required in the public schools, but I’ve felt the heat and heard the concern of my comrades that recent test results do not reflect the increased interest in reading and the ease in writing that we see in our classrooms. We look bad, to say the least. Why hasn’t the public understood that what we are doing is not wrong, just different? Yet what must we do to help critics see what we see and understand what we do?

It’s time for us educators to practice what we teach – communication. CATE has sought ways to encourage English/language arts teachers to sit on state education commissions, to testify before panels that investigate education issues, to write news articles, and send copies of our CATE resolutions to appropriate organizations and decision makers, to attend local school board meetings, and to publish journals that inform about what we teach and why. We believed these actions would illustrate the innumerable positive results we see in the classroom. Apparently, this has not been enough. Classroom teachers still are targeted as the cause for poor performance on instruments the government uses to measure learning.

I’ve used this time to evaluate the criticism by questioning my own practice. Have I abdicated my responsibility of preparing my students to be life-long learners who can read for any purpose, write for any audience? Have I become so enamored with the excitement my students exhibit when I assign easily accessible literature that I resist pushing them on to more challenging classics? Am I so relieved that they are writing something that I don’t hold them responsible for writing well? Am I not insisting that they complete the writing project’s threesome of content, form, and correctness? I invite CATE members to conduct similar self-reflection. Whatever the answers to these questions, it is obvious that something must be done on both sides to attract influential men and women to support our efforts.

Behavior is based on three things: beliefs –what one accepts as fact; attitudes – what one believes to be in one’s best interest; and values – what one believes to be morally right or wrong. Until I can understand the beliefs, attitudes, and values of our critics, and show them how what I teach and ways I teach comply with their conceptions of each, I should not expect change. As President of CATE, I feel compelled to use this summer vacation to learn how our organization can work with decision makers to provide a more convivial, cooperative atmosphere among those concerned with educating young people in California.

If what we are teaching is good and the ways we are teaching are appropriate, what must we do to demonstrate these truths with those who care about education? We can take advantage of the resources from CATE and NCTE to help us develop the language to speak about these issues. In the summer, I usually have more opportunities to read those journal articles I’ve set aside each month. I will continue to set aside money to attend NCTE 2003 in San Francisco and CATE 2004 in San Diego. Both attract educators who are passionate about teaching! CATE 2004’s Convention Chair, Oscar Browne, has chosen a theme based on issues of language, literacy, and legacy. I won’t have time at the CATE convention to present a workshop, but I urge each of you to submit an appropriate proposal for one that addresses these issues. You’ll find further information on the CATE website.

When I step back and look at the past few years, I must acknowledge that the common concern of the policy makers, legislators, and educators is for young people who will take care of our nation and of us in the years to come. It must be our goal, as educators to teach them to read, write, speak, listen and view with open, but critical minds. This summer may be the propitious one for us, the professional educators, to share what we know with those who need to know that we do know that our subject matter and teaching methods are appropriate, effective, and right.