Going to Museums with Kids

With it being summer break, I've been enjoying some time not thinking about school so much, and just took a short but enjoyable vacation to New York City. Being a teacher, however, I couldn't help but make some certain observations while visiting some of the museums.

I went to a few museums while in NY, and at two of them (Ellis Island, and the MoMA) I was there during peak visiting hours, when a lot of parents were visiting with their children. I noticed two trends among these children: those that were interested and engaged in the exhibits, and those who showed no desire to be there, and were running around screaming.

With the latter of the two trends, I do not blame the kids for their behavior. I also hesitate to blame the parents. But what I do believe is happening in this situation is the parents mean well by trying to expose their children to art/culture/history, but what they have failed to do is adequately prepare their children for the visit. In addition they seem to be clueless as to how to keep their kids engaged in the exhibits at the museum.

Merely forcing your kids to go to a museum with you is not enough to keep them interested, and you would have been better off trying to find a sitter or daycare to take them to while you explore the museum on your own. Otherwise, not only will your kids not enjoy the visit, but you won't either--you'll be too busy trying to control them! But taking kids to a museum does not have to be a recipe for disaster. In fact, it can be done very successfully. You just have to go about it the right way.

Every time I take my students on a field trip, we spend several days (and sometimes weeks) ahead of time preparing for it. Any good field trip will, of course, supplement the curriculum. So by preparing your students for a field trip, you are not taking away from any instructional time at all--you are actually enhancing it. For example, before I took my class to the art museum, we spent some time looking at the art museum's website and discussing some of the art we would be seeing. When we took our field trip, the tour guide was very impressed with the fact that many of my students were able to recognize some of the art we looked at, and explain what was important about it. The students were far more interested and engaged in looking at the art because they became excited when they got to make connections to what we had done in class. They like to show off!

Another example is our field trip to see The Nutcracker. Before we go to The Nutcracker, I always read my students the story. We listen to some of the music and try to predict what part of the story relates to different pieces of music. We talk about how the story will be told without words, and how movement, music, and the costumes can be used to tell a story. I always tell the students, too, that after the field trip we will be comparing the book that we read with the ballet version, which ensures that they will pay attention during the show! We talk about proper manners in the theater, and we let the students get dressed up in their nicest clothes. We have always received compliments about the behavior of our students every year we go. By the way, the students at my school are low-income to lower-middle-class, and include a large ESL population, so this works for any child, not just the ones from "rich" or "privileged" families.

Parents can do the same with their children in taking them to museums. I noticed one mother at Ellis Island had picked up some activity pages for her children. It was like they were on a scavenger hunt and had to find the answers to different questions. She didn't just send her kids off to do it on their own, though. She worked with them on it and talked to them about the exhibits, helping them find the answers. Her kids were very well behaved and seemed interested in what they were looking at.

At the MoMA, I saw a father taking his son around, and talking to him about each painting. For example, when they were in the Jackson Pollock room, the father explained to the little boy how Jackson Pollock created his artwork. The boy was really excited about this, and really enthusiastic about all of the paintings. He was also really well behaved, and he was probably about 5 years old.

Also at the MoMA, I saw two girls who were a little older (about 10 years old) looking at different photographs together. They didn't have an adult right next to them, but they were well behaved. Their parents had given them one of the audio tour sets, and they were enjoying looking for pictures that had a number next to it, so they could put the number in the audio tour and listen about it.

I like to think that these parents also talked to their kids about the museum visits before the trip, as well as after the trip. If you're not sure how to do that, it's easy these days to find websites for the museums, and most of them have a page just for kids. You can also go to the library and find picture books that are related to what you will be seeing. Any time you can spend both before and after your visit talking about what you saw will not only help your child have a better experience, but you will also enjoy your experience more. You will find that you can do more than just visit amusement parks when you go on vacation, and your kids will walk away from the experience with so much more!

Things Banned from Schools

I thought this video was funny. It talks about different things that have been banned from schools throughout the years.

I remember when I was in elementary school, some things that were banned were slap bracelets and the game "mercy." Both of those have a legitimate reason for being banned: they can hurt someone and slap bracelets were just distracting to begin with. I think Red Rover may have been banned as well because too many people got hurt.

It seems like most of the things banned from the school where I teach are dress code-related. Mohawk haircuts, for example, are against dress code. I still haven't figured out how we are supposed to enforce that, though, and since I don't find mohawks that distracting to other kids in the class anyway, I don't really bother enforcing that rule. Also, do you remember those shoes that light up whenever you hit them? Well, now they have shoes that are similar, except instead of lighting up, they play Hannah Montana music. Now those really are distracting! Sometimes there isn't much I can do about that, either, if the office doesn't have an extra pair of shoes that fit the kid.

Can you think of anything strange that was banned from your school when you were a kid? Is there anything strange banned from the schools where you teach?

"Can we have class outside?"

Once again, thanks to my online child development class for giving me the inspiration for this blog.

My instructor posted this video on a discussion forum and asked us to watch it and then discuss how it relates to child development. Please watch it before reading any further.


First, how does relate to child development? Well, to be brief, many child development theorists (Rousseau, Montessori, Schachtel, etc.) felt that children need to learn from their own experiences. In other words, they aren't going to understand something as well when they read about it out of a science book as when they actually experience it. Also, these theorists believed that children need to be allowed to explore and run around. Sitting at a desk is not natural for a child. Running around outside is. Therefore, teaching kids outdoors is more developmentally appropriate than forcing them to sit and learn something out of a text book.

This leads me to my next point. As someone who spent many summers at Girl Scout camp, both as a camper and as staff, I immediately thought of my camp experiences when watching the video. Then I started thinking of behavior of children at camp versus behavior of children at school, and I felt like we had fewer behavior issues to deal with at camp then we ever have at school. While many factors affect this (adult/child ratio, demographics of the children, etc.) I think a major contributor is the environment. When kids are at camp, they are allowed to run around, talk loudly, explore a little bit, and enjoy themselves. At school, children are inside and have less space to move around, have to keep their voices quiet, and some teachers don't let them move around at all! The same kid that acts up at school (you know, the class clown) would probably be a favorite of the camp staff just because a camp environment is more developmentally appropriate for that child. Even in classes like mine where I try to keep my kids as active as possible and do as many hands-on activities as I can, there are still kids who would just benefit from being in a space where it is ok to move around more and just be a kid! I do think it is important for schools to get kids outside more, instead of confining their classes to the tiny space inside four walls. I just wish there was more support from administrators and "the powers that be" on this.

Hey, even graduate students sometimes benefit from having class outside!

What Rigor REALLY Means...

Today I went to a 6 hour professional development session. The topic? Rigor.

Now you may think, "How can anyone talk about rigor for 6 hours, and how exciting can that be?"

To be honest, those were my thoughts going into the training. Part of my skepticism probably came from the fact that I wasn't too thrilled about getting up early once again this morning. Seriously, it's my second full week out of school, and I've only been able to sleep in twice? However, I ended up enjoying the training and actually ended up getting a lot more than I thought out of it (and I don't just mean the delicious lunch, which was 3-courses and included chocolate cake).

The presentation was by Dr. Barbara Blackburn, who has written several books including Rigor is Not a Four-Letter Word. If you ever get a chance to hear her speak, I definitely recommend it. She is not just some researcher that is out of touch with anything that goes on in schools: she has actually been there, and taught at all grade levels. So the advice she gave us wasn't just some ridiculous concept thought up by some person that has never stood in front of a classroom of children before--it actually works!

What she wanted us to understand from this session was that rigor does not mean giving kids more work, or grading harder, but getting them to think more deeply about subjects, and giving them the support they need so that all students are actively participating in lessons. Her definition that she gives in her book is this:

"Rigor: creating an environment in which each student is expected to learn at high levels; each student is supported so he or she can learn at high levels, and each student demonstrates learning at high levels" (Blackburn, 2008).

Basically, the focus is on quality, not quantity. Strategies that she suggested for increasing rigor are things many teachers probably already do, but just don't realize that it does increase the rigor of their instruction. For example, having students give a thumbs-up or thumbs-down to answer a question, so that everyone is engaged. Have the students create review questions for Jeopardy games instead of the teacher creating all of the questions. If you give true/false tests, don't just let the students answer with true or false: have the students correct the false statements to make them true. Do a "Think-Pair-Share" and have students share out to the class what their partner said. Simple gestures like this increase rigor by making students be involved in learning and by getting to think more deeply about their learning.

Something she said that got me to thinking is that in order to increase rigor, we must raise our expectations for all students. As teachers, of course we will say that we have high expectations for all students, but do we always demonstrate it? As they say, actions speak louder than words. Blackburn said that in order to show students that we have high expectations, we need to make sure we are asking high-level questions, only accepting high-level responses, and using supportive rather than dismissive language. I think something I would like to pay attention to in my class next year is what sort of responses I allow from my students. Am I allowing them to answer with just one word? If so, I need to work on encouraging them to think deeper and help them expand their responses. I want to raise the bar for my students next year and get them to the point where they can give meaningful answers to my questions. I also want to work on using more techniques to make sure all of my students are involved and engaged in each lesson, and that I'm not just calling on the same people all the time.

If you want to know more about what Dr. Blackburn says about rigor and some of the techniques she suggests to increase rigor, then go to her website (www.barbarablackburnonline.com) or read one of her books. Better yet, go hear her speak!

What do you do to increase rigor in your classroom?

Montessori on Language Development

Since I'm taking a class on child development right now, I have been doing a lot of thought on how different child development theories relate to the kids I teach. I have found some theorists' ideas more interesting than others, and I would like to share some of my thoughts about the ones I found interesting. Today I would like to share some thoughts about Maria Montessori.

In particular, Montessori found that children learn how to read and write the best at about 4 years old, and that if the child does not begin learning to read and write until 6 or 7 years old, he or she will have a more difficult time with it. I think this explains a lot about why some children in our classrooms have no difficulty reading, while others find it to be a big struggle, even if they are not identified with learning disabilities. When I think about the children in my class last year who have the most difficulty reading and writing, these are also some of the same children who have less support at home in terms of education and probably did not begin learning to read or write until they entered kindergarten (which, according to Montessori, would be past the optimal age for learning how to read and write). It also makes me think of my ESL students who don't even begin learning English until they are already about 6 or 7 years old. It's no wonder it is so difficult for them, since the sensitive period for learning language has passed!

So I would like to make a plea to anyone with young children--please introduce literacy to your children before you send them to kindergarten. This will make reading and writing so much easier and more enjoyable for them than if you wait and let the kindergarten teacher teach them to read from scratch. I don't have any children of my own right now, but when I think back to my own personal experience, I know my parents read to me every day, and that I had all kinds of books available to me throughout my childhood that I would pick up and read. I also went to preschool, so I am sure that helped a bit as well in my language and literacy development. I read my first chapter book when I was in 1st grade. It saddens me to think that some students I have had as 3rd or even 4th graders still aren't ready to read chapter books. I have to wonder, if their parents had read with them at an early age would they be better readers?

Has anyone had any experiences with Montessori education? What do you think on her ideas on language development? How can teachers of older children ease the process of learning to read for students who are past the sensitive period of language development already?

Welcome!

This is my first blog ever, and so bear with me until I get the hang of this.

I'm an elementary teacher, and I just finished my third year of teaching. I taught mostly third grade so far, and next year I will be teaching second grade for the first time! I am very excited about it, and despite the fact that I just finished my first full week of summer vacation, I am enthusiastically planning a bunch of stuff for next year already!

Anyway, I got the idea of starting my blog from on online graduate class I am taking. In that class, we are supposed to write a blog about our learning two times a week. I decided that I really liked sharing my thoughts and ideas about teaching with others, and that it would be fun to try starting a real blog where I could continue to share my thoughts.

I'm hoping that in this process someone might actually find my thoughts helpful to their own teaching, or may also be able to share ideas with me through comments.

So, here we go...