Tag: thirsty horses

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October 11, 2019

  By 2019-2020

WIP GAP: Today’s the Day

Today is the de facto date for progress reports, so you have been asked to complete a work-in-progress grade abatement profile score report — what you now should recognize as a WIP GAP report. The guide to these scores is available here:

WIP GAP Explained

The form you must fill out is available here: https://forms.gle/FM5aZbDR8Stgfk6v8. You’ll need to be signed into your Brewster account to access it. What you’ll find is a stripped-down version of the formal GAP report.

As always, this kind of self-assessment requires you to weigh evidence honestly and objectively. It is “collective human judgment informed by evidence,” as Tony Wagner calls it: a collaborative effort to validate your progress, hold you accountable for any missteps, and give you direction moving forward.

You can mark the assignment on Google Classroom as done when you’ve completed the report. Alternatively, you can create a document there to start a discussion about your progress. That is strongly encouraged! The more you invest, the more successful you will be.

In fact, you are also strongly encouraged to ask questions here, in the comment section of this post, about your progress. Those questions will benefit others, and what benefits them will also help you.

It might be most helpful to read some of the testimonials about this makerspace that are available online:

This makerspace approach to your learning is highly effective for 95% of students, but 100% is more than possible. If you find yourself in that 5%, start a discussion. Ask questions. Invest in the space, and it will pay off, because it always does.

Remember that a lack of communication and honesty is what kills any relationship. Your integrity is as much a part of your learning profile as any other skill or trait.

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Cuckoo’s Nest: Weekly Assignments

  By English 11 Regents (2018-2019), Literature (2018-2019), Triage

One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest

March 18, 2019: Read on for updates to our study of the novel, One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, in English 11 ICT.

Overview of the Novel: Parts 1-4
  • Part 1 — Pages 3-145
  • Part 2 — Pages 149-201
  • Part 3 — Pages 205-258
  • Part 4 — Pages 261-325
Reading Assignments
  • Due Tuesday, March 19 — Pages 3-41
  • Due Friday, March 22 — Pages 42-75
  • Due Friday, March 29 — Pages 76-158
  • Due Friday, April 5 — Pages 159-258
  • Due Friday, April 12 — Pages 261-325
Writing Assignments
  • Due Monday, March 25 — Response to Pages 3-75
  • Due Monday, April 1 — Response to Pages 76-158
  • Due Monday, April 8 — Response to Pages 159-258
  • Due Monday, April 22 — Response to Pages 261-325

Note that the final writing assignment is due after Spring Break.

On each Friday, when a reading assignment is due, you will write an in-class response based on the assigned reading. You will then type that response over the weekend and submit both the handwritten and typed writing by the beginning of class on Monday. Work handed in after the beginning of class will be considered late, and all insufficient or incomplete work will factor heavily into your GAP scores.

Mondays will still be reserved for sustained, silent reading.

A Thorough Explanation of These Changes

Copies of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest were distributed before the February break. For the next few weeks, we balanced essay-writing assignments with essential questions related to the novel. Finally, you were given a daily calendar for the rest of the year and a streamlined process for choosing between the assigned novel and a work of equivalent literary merit.

This was a massive amount of preparation and planning. It was meant to give you choice and freedom. Consider the updated makerspace FAQ or this recently published overview of a makerspace: It takes much more work on your teacher’s end to give you choices, because we are essentially creating 32 separate lessons for 32 individuals.

Consider, too, the transparent attempt this year to focus first on skills, and then to build from shorter nonfiction and fiction to several canonical novels. This gave you time to build stamina and develop good habits, and it opened up the possibility of choosing to read over being forced to read.

We even showed you extraordinary empathy and patience by studying, through close reading and discussion, the nature of your struggle with akrasia and self-control. That was back in October, and we’ve returned to your need for self-regulation and self-discipline over and over again.

As a class, you’ve recently failed to demonstrate self-control. You’ve failed to follow directions and take advantage of the opportunities given to you. As a result:

  • Your freedom to choose what to read is revoked.
  • The choice-related assignment that was originally due on Wednesday is now null and void.
  • You now have assigned seats and group members.
  • You will not be given Fridays to work on your 20% projects.

You should work on your Pareto Projects on your own time, carving out 20% of your schedule elsewhere. You are still responsible for the project itself.

Instead of your projects, you will now spend every Friday writing an in-class response on the assigned pages from One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. You will then type that response over the weekend and submit both the handwritten and typed writing by the beginning of class on Monday. Mondays will still be reserved for sustained, silent reading.

You will still do the reading and writing assignments outlined for Tuesdays and Thursdays. The next two are a narrative response based on an essay, “Learning to Lie,” and a character analysis response based on One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. You will still do silent, individual Regents Exam prep every Wednesday. The only difference will be your assigned seats and groups.

We will update the daily calendar in the next few days to reflect these changes. We will note reading assignments there, too. You may ask questions in the comment section below.

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Notes on Your Progress

  By English 11 Regents (2018-2019)

Provisional GAP Scores

Before you move into the silent, sustained reading that will occupy your time for the next few class periods, be sure that you’ve seen the update to Infinite Campus. Load that in a separate window, if you need to. Take a look at what we’ve posted under GAP2C: Q2C Profile.

This is a provisional profile score. Provisional, as you know from this post on the provisional moratorium on cell phones, means “temporary, precautionary” — so this is a score for the time being, and one that is designed to warn you. We’ve used provisional scores before.

This particular score represents the appropriate profile for your work on January 2 and January 3. It includes the progress you’ve made toward revising your Pareto Project self-assessments, which were due over the break, and the progress you’ve made toward analyzing a short story through the provided handout. It also reflects your in-class focus and feedback, as always.

First, consider the self-assessment of your Pareto Project. Take a look at this:

Pareto Projects: Final Self-Assessment

That was posted on December 7, after three months of weekly work on a project of your choosing. The timeline and background are reposted there, but the central assignment is the two-part self-assessment. You had three weeks to write insightfully about what you learned. As it says there, on Google Classroom, and on the printed copies of the assignment:

It is being posted now [on December 7] so that you can organize the next two weeks around this kind of thinking. You must pay attention to yourself and your peers as we share the results of your Pareto process. This assignment is how you derive insight from that attentiveness, and it will help you set up the next passion-driven project you do.

When you came back on January 2, you were given a second chance to do this right. Three months of work, three weeks to think critically — and then another three days to provide some insight.

Here’s the data we have that led us to post a provisional GAP score. First, we have when you most recently accessed the required Google document. We can record the students who didn’t touch their work for two days. We can see each iteration and revision.

We also have the Google Form, which tracks entries and edits. We know who didn’t touch that for two days. We can see the extent to which you were working.

And we have whatever else you produced between December 7 and, now, January 3: all the documents, feedback, notes, etc., that you gave us, we compiled through observations, and so on.

The same thing goes for the revamped version of your short-story analysis. That was due on December 21:

English 11: Narrative Writing + Literary Analysis

It was posted on December 10. We bumped the final, emulative exercise — the writing of your own story — to Q2C:

A simplified worksheet, time in class to do it, and the option to write your own story or use a provided one.

We can also see what you accessed on 1/2 and 1/3 for this assignment. We can see what you typed. We can document that only 11 students opened up the new document to work on it over two days, and we observed only three students write by hand on the printed version. We can even see how many people view the instructional posts.

We’re waiting to give you feedback, too. If you write anything all, we can help. Case in point:

It is irrelevant to this feedback that the deadline for this short story analysis is tomorrow. Our course is always about the process — about a process-based form of feedback and focus on growth. It’s about what you do, each and every day, not whether you might be able to — might be able to — rush through an assignment at the last minute and do it well. It’s about every choice you make, and how, sometimes, those choices show us a sudden and clear picture of who you are:

Dürer’s Rhinoceros

We watched you gossip, play games, scroll social media, etc., every time we moved to help another individual or group. Some of you, at least, chose not to work. And we’ve been over this: You always have something to do. Today, a few hard-working students had finished their work, so they were asked to read this and give us some feedback:

Clarifying Grade Abatement

You also had feedback to process from January 2. GAP scores for Q2B were held in abeyance until we’d talked face-to-face on our first day back. Those scores, too, are powerful indicators of what you need to improve immediately, and you are always meant to unpack and process them.

Hence these provisional GAP scores. With enough hard work, you can improve them. Growth is rewarded. Self-awareness is rewarded. Amenability is rewarded. Focus on that.

If you have general questions, ask them below, where we can answer them for everyone’s benefit. If you have a question about your individual circumstances, send us an email or speak to one of us in class.

A Horse to Water

  By English Regents Prep (2017-2018)

Click the image for an explanation of the idiom, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.”

NOTE: This is a post for students in P1 Regents English Prep only. If you’re in RE11 or AP11 and you’re reading this, you’re going to be very confused by the end of it.

I’m moving instructional posts for our Regents English Prep class from Google Classroom to this website, because I need more space to talk to you. For now, the comment section will be locked; if you have questions or concerns, send me an email, or use the comment section of Google Classroom.

Read this post carefully. A photocopy will be made for you, but the purpose of using this website is to give you anytime/anywhere access to instruction. The word for this is interstitial: occupying the space between other structures. Read when you can, as often as you can.

Practice Exam Adjustments

Back on September 10, you began the Aug. ’17 Regents Exam:

Aug. ’17 Regents Exam – Google Drive

Practice materials for the Aug. ’17 ELA Regents Exam. Includes scored exemplars, multiple-choice answers, and printable rubrics.

My original intention was to divide and conquer. You would complete each part, receive a score, and then analyze your performance. I hoped to return your scores with each assignment. There has been so much missing work, however, that we need to adjust. Look carefully at the spreadsheet below:

[pdfjs-viewer url=”http%3A%2F%2Fsisypheanhigh.com%2Fmalachite%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2F2017%2F10%2FCopy-of-Aug.-17-Regents-Exam-Responses.pdf” viewer_width=100% viewer_height=600px fullscreen=true download=true print=true]

 

You can also load this document in a separate window by clicking here. You will need your student number to locate the row with your scores for each part of the exam. Note the use of weighted scores for Part 2 and Part 3, plus the conversion chart that produces the final scale score.

If you see blank boxes, I do not have those pieces from you. You need to go to Google Classroom, find the assignment for each part of the practice exam, and then complete it. I will do what I can to save us time — by going through and counting up your multiple-choice score, for instance — but the quickest way to see your predicted score is to submit your work digitally.

Skinner Boxes

Once we have a score for your exam, I will work with you on a regimen that gets you ready for the real thing. We will start with a test called the SRI. It measures a few key aspects of your reading abilities, and we can use it to assign you articles and even books that will improve your close reading skills. Then we will study test-taking strategies, multiple-choice strategies, etc, in small groups and individually.

These first two months have always been about establishing that kind of baseline. As the cliché goes, this is a marathon, not a sprint, and your grade will continue to reflect this. Grade abatement makes this clear, but I can make it clearer still: Do every formal assignment, and when you’re done, ask for something else to do; stay busy during every class; take another crack at a timed essay or multiple choice passage every few weeks or so; and then, barring disaster, you will see a 95 or 100 in Infinite Campus.

Here is the grade abatement handout:

Grade Abatement Profiles with Universal Skills/Traits

And here is a guide to how critical in-class focus and feedback are to your success:

These are posted around the room, as well. The main requirement for success is productivity during the class period, as you can see. There shouldn’t be much need for homework.

Now, a few notes on how you are currently performing:

First, students who scored an 80 or higher on the Aug. ’17 exam probably do not need the focused test prep of this course. If you are in this group, I have already reached out to your guidance counselor to start the conversation about remaining in here. I will reach out to you and your parents next. The goal is to give you the resources you need in an environment that helps you, and someone with a 94 on a practice exam is likely to be frustrated by the requirements of this class.

That group is relatively small, though. The second group is a little larger, and includes students who are working hard but still struggling to finish the practice exam. This group can take its time, and I’ll help you work on strategies as you finish. If you finished and scored low, you have plenty of time to improve. The goal is the real exam in January and/or June. We’ll focus on self-efficacy, self-awareness, and all sort of non-academic skills and traits that will help you.

The last group has a different concern: You aren’t doing the work, and you aren’t trying to do the work. If you know that is the case, and no penalty or benefit has changed your mind, you need to be honest about that with yourself, your parents, and your guidance counselor. Everyone who cares about your success hopes you make a different decision, but we can’t force you. You’re far too old for us to have a bring-a-horse-to-water debate.

Remember that almost all of you in this third group are taking an English class other than this one, and in that class, you will do a significant amount of Regents Exam prep. All English classes, regardless of the amount of explicit test prep assigned, teach the skills and traits you need for the ELA Regents. And in those other classes, you will be forced to make better choices. You need the credit to graduate.

This course is not required for graduation, and it will only help you if you invest in it. It cannot be a study hall. Treat it that way, and you may be forced to explain yourself repeatedly to administration, counselors, parents, etc.; you definitely will fail; and there won’t be any increase in your ability to do well on the real exam, whenever you take it.

In other words, for those of you in this third group, this is one of the only opportunities in high school you have to stop being a rat in a Skinner box. You can leave the cage, if you absolutely know that you won’t do the work. Again, the people who care about you hope you make a different choice, but we also hope that you see the need for the classroom environment to be conducive to the second group mentioned above — the students who need help.

To recap:

  1. If you scored high on the practice exam, you won’t benefit from staying in here. This is Group #1.
  2. If you are struggling to perform well, but working hard, this is the course for you. This is Group #2.
  3. If you refuse to do the work, you won’t benefit from staying in here. This is Group #3.

Figure out where you are, talk to me about your next steps, and let’s make some important decisions together.