Student Teaching Reflections

Lessons from student teaching

Classroom management

1. New teachers struggle to be direct. Learn what you want, then tell students what to do. Practice saying things like “I need you to put your phone away and pay attention” because it can feel unusual the first times you are in a role of authority. 

2. Avoid negotiating, compromising and undermining yourself when instructing students. Never say things like “you’ll need to know this for the test” or “if you pay attention for two more minutes maybe we can skip the next part.” 

3. Be wary of small things students do to test you. If you let them get away with minor things they will devolve into bigger things. It’s better for everyone to be clear about expectations at the start with the minor infractions. It is easier to correct something minor for you and the student.

4. Provide feedback when whiteboards are what you want and what you don’t want. We had issues with clarity and students writing instead of drawing. 

5. Students being noisy can wear on you mentally. It helps to pause, think about exactly what you want them to do, why they aren’t doing that and be persistent in communicating. 

6. There are 3 ways to engage someone’s attention. What your showing them can be engaging (content), you can be engaging (teacher) or they can talk (student). Work in all three of those.

7. When you are new, content is a struggle. So rely on your personality sometimes to help students focus. 

8. If students aren’t focused have them write something.

9. Move students’ seats around every unit so they do not stagnate into cliques. 

10. Measuring student infractions can be helpful for giving specific feedback. This should not be used to shame, just for information and to avoid bias.

11. Avoid getting in a trap where you always yell at the whole class. You can tell the whole class once. After that you should be talking to the individuals who are making infractions.

12. Some teachers have the expectation that all 180 students will behave and learn perfectly. Then they get upset when things don’t go according to plan. This is unrealistic and you should be mentally ready for deviations. Expect them. 

Grading

1. When students anticipate quick feedback, they work harder and produce better quality work.

2. Don’t make comments on student work, it’s ineffective use of your time and instead share feedback with all of your students 

3. Grading is exhausting. I try and set up my grading into chunks so I get some positive feedback when I finish a chunk. 

4. After grading a test is the best time to reflect on your teaching for the unit

5. Learn how to stay ahead of grading so you minimize questions from students and parents. Up front communication and timeliness will save you time. 

Teaching philosophy

1. Students are often put into diverse settings in a classroom with no instruction or guidance from adults. You are responsible for teaching them about how their perceptions can undermine their interactions with others. 

2. It is hard to teach. Often when we seek the easy way in teaching there is a transactional cost. If you use grades to keep students quiet, they will be quiet but you undermine their learning and your grading system’s integrity. It’s better to teach them to be quiet, but it’s also more work to do what’s right.
3. You can’t always do everything correctly in teaching. You should work towards it, but know that it’s ok to take some shortcuts.

4. When teaching goes well it’s awesome. Having students engaged and learning is a great feeling. Don’t ever forget how challenging and awesome teaching is.

5. It is totally acceptable to be kind to students even when they frustrate you. 

6. Try something new a minimum of four times a year. If it doesn’t work well, be glad you know.

7. You should be critical of your teaching, but you shouldn’t take it personally. As a new teacher you want to improve, but not in a toxic manner where you feel bad about yourself. The teachers you surround yourself with can influence this quite a bit either way.

8. Defeatist language is bad. Don’t let students say things like “I don’t know anything” or when you ask which problem was hard they say “all of them.” Correct them when they do this or it harms the whole class.

9. Learn to identify what the problem is and what the solution is. If students aren’t focused, your good teaching doesn’t matter. It’s always better to stop and redirect. 

Chemistry content

Unit 1 Measurement, mass and volume

1. What is the physical interpretation of the slope? What would a “for every” statement be for it? What are the units for the slope?

2. The slope of the y=mx+b for mass vs. volume can be used as a model to predict masses and volumes. The slope gives us some information about the particle level difference between substances with different densities.
3. Measurements are not numbers, they are ranges. The rules for rounding answers that stem from measurements are specific to maintain the appropriate level of uncertainty. It is helpful to show students examples with ranges (IE 6x4 = 20 but 6.0x4.0 = 24). The analogy of having about $5000 and finding a quarter, now how much do you have?

4. Students have bad ideas about particle spacing for solids, liquids and gases from illustrations in middle school. It takes a lot of effort to break these down in spite of clear cut evidence. 

Unit 2 Gas Pressure

5. There are direct/inverse relationships and there are directly/inversely proportional relationships. The distinction matters a lot. 

6. Sometimes gas particles collide more frequently, sometimes they collide more frequently and with larger collisions

7. All particles move all of the time. Evidence for particles in solids moving can be how solid objects feel cold and hot based on how fast the particles vibrate against your skin particles. 

8. Splitting up gas pressure demos into time segments greatly enhances your ability to dig into what’s happening. Look in particular for small amounts of water leaking or subtle volume changes 

9. Students get confused when you change three variables at once (PVT) because they overthink things. Keep them focused on two changes at a time, and towards the unknown variable. 

10. For the mason jar demo the small amount of water leaking opens up the discussion to higher levels

11. For the balloon in the bell jar demo ask how the pressure in the balloon changes 

12. For the can crush or balloon in flask, ask whether the pressure in the open flask while boiling is higher, equal or lower than the air pressure in the room.

13. For some demos, the change in temperature (kelvins) is insufficient to explain the magnitude of change (can crush, balloon in flask) n and V might also be changing

Unit 3 thermo

1. Heat is a term that meaning has become too diffuse. Use thermal energy instead to get better understanding. 

2. For specific heat capacity, students will mix up Q with C so its important to use their units to differentiate what they are. 

3. Heating curves are a struggle and students need more than just a curve with water. It helps to talk about slope and length of phase changes and how they can change.

4. Use blocks of various masses and temperature changes to test whether students understand specific heat capacity.

Unit 4 elements, compounds, mixtures

1. Volumes of gases can give information about what a compound might be, what can be done with solids?

2. Sometimes when we don’t know something, we can just assume something and see if it works
3. If a rock has the same % of each element no matter the size or source, that indicates whether it is a compound or a mixture

4. Separating mixtures can be done via distillation (boiling points/stickiness of particles), filter paper (particle size vs. filter hole size) or chromatography (stickness relative to the stationary phase).

Unit 5 moles

1. When teaching moles, the molar mass can be represented as a for every statement, a conversion factor, a means to compare amounts (if 18.02 g is 1 mol, 84 g must be more than 1 mole), it can be represented using pictures and it can be used as a relative mass.

2. Students that don’t know how to convert actually don’t understand what the molar mass means. 

3. When students struggle with math, it helps to add more units and labels in. It’s harder initially but helps them move past basic manipulations into what they are actually doing and using. 

Cognitive Science

1. The amygdala can have a big impact on learning. If students are angry or in fight or flight mode the ability to learn plummets. If students are happy they have stronger connections to what they are learning. This is why we easily remember movie quotes and songs. 

2. Asking students what they learned at the start of class gives them a chance to reflect and will help them do better in their other classes. If you do this consistently, they will work harder to remember other lessons. 

3. Students can’t learn when they are frustrated. But you also should not interfere with their learning to reduce frustration.

4. Don’t start worksheet problems with your hardest problems. Start with the easiest ones and let them figure things out without samples from you.

5. People believe things if you offer a reason, even if the reason is nonsense. They just hear that there is a reason (copy machine experiment)

6. Feedback should be more work for the student than for the teacher.

Discussions

1. Discussions are enhanced when students work towards finding out what they know instead of seeking an answer. Seeking an answer leads to limited participation, frustration and racist/sexist beliefs. Students that can practice starting with what they know learn more effectively with less frustration. 

2. It is imperative that students learn to put effort into their whiteboards during unit 1. They should use color coding, they should measure carefully, they should follow all instructions, they should think about what they’re doing, their particle diagrams should be clear what the intent is.
3. Whenever possible, call on students instead of taking volunteers. Volunteers show that you care about getting the right answer from someone. Cold calling shows that you want to know what a student is thinking. Use dice and a seating chart to find a random student.

4. You’re always talking to the whole group even when you’re talking to a single student when you’re in a circle. Project and be loud.

5. Discussions are very hard to lead when you’re new to teaching. You can get better by planning questions as you observe what students put on their boards. Find errors, unique representations, mathematical variations and start writing down questions to ask.

6. Learn to pause so students talk more. 

7. Phrase your questions so students can opine rather than be led. It’s better to ask, how small is 0.001 cm and see what students come up with than to ask “Do you feel like 0.001 is one of the smallest things you know of?” 

8. Talk about things you’re passionate about. Bring up past experiences and memories. They help increase learning retention and forming neural pathways.

9. Slow students down when they talk about similar topics. Mass, volume and density are all different but related. This means students will often substitute one when they mean another. 

10. During discussions you want to push back against student ideas to force them to think more, but you want to push back against the idea not the student. To do this you want to speak to the entire class and not interact too directly with a single student.

11. Don’t do thinking for students, but it’s good to frame what we’re discussing to focus the attention and reduce the cognitive load.

Miscellaneous

1. At Open House talk about what you’re passionate about. Don’t just give a presentation on mundane details but talk about some of your favorite things. 

2. Strategies to learn students’ names. Write down pronunciations on a seating chart so you don’t have to ask repeatedly or feel uncertain later. Put in a grade for students. Use retrieval practice when students are working. Use their names when you talk to them. 

3. Don’t answer student questions during the test. They can figure out the answer from the information on the test. By answering you are either being unfair or you are cementing in a wrong thought. Better to always shrug and explain ahead of time why you won’t answer.

4. It’s good to have a list of things you’d like to talk with students about that take 5-10 minutes for when you’re ahead in one hour (cognitive science, anti-racism, specific scenarios in school)

5. When you leave sub instructions that involve whiteboards, have students sent a photo to your email or twitter account so you can see how they’re doing.

6. Prepare for interviews by making a list of things you want to say (student situations, student work, specific lessons, books, philosophies)

7. During conferences, be wary of shouting praises for parents who might be having a rough conference nearby you.

8. During conferences, lots of parents just want to know that their child is happy during class and what they are like. 

9. Don’t criticize yourself to put yourself down. Only do criticisms that are productive.

Questions to ask

QTA 1. What would a measurement that was on a 10.00 cm line be written as?

QTA 2. A block of wood floats in water, what will the same block that has multiple holes drilled out do?

QTA 3. How do measurements or significant figures differ from numbers in math class?

QTA 4. #2 and #3 on worksheet 3, does a larger density imply more particles in the same space, bigger particles (or both)?

QTA 5. Can you show me a whiteboard that highlights what you’re explaining. This came in handy for when students explanations were unclear or confusing.

QTA 6. what makes Fierce cologne particles move the way that they do?

QTA 7. Does the pressure increase from more collisions, bigger collisions or both? 

QTA 8. What makes the particles move? If particles collide, what does that imply about their motion?

QTA 9.  Which is hotter, a teacup of boiling water or a bucket of warm water?

QTA 10. What is a compound and how is a mixture different?

QTA 11. Can water ever not be H2O? Could it be H3O? 

QTA 12. Do we have more or less than 1 mole?

QTA 13. What does the number 22.99 mean for Na?

QTA 14. What does the number 18.02 mean for H2O?

QTA 15. If there is 1 mole of CaCO3, how many total atoms and O atoms are there?

Weaknesses of Milam (find someone else to learn these from)

Weakness 1. I am not good at organizing the physical layout of the room. I don’t have a space for everything and I don’t throw stuff away frequently enough. 

Weakness 2. I am off topic too frequently and this detracts from my lesson timing.

Weakness 3. I’m arrogant. It’s getting better, but it’s still not good. 

Strengths of Milam

1. I see the good in all kids. I don’t let their mistakes define my perception of them.

2. I can anticipate what students don’t understand and ask good questions that allow them to do the same.

3. I reflect constantly about everything.

4. I’m creative and have fun at work.

ChemEd 2019

I just returned from ChemEd 2019 and I could not be happier. I had a four hour drive to think about the conference and about teaching. The complexity involved in teaching is overwhelming at times. But as I improve in teaching the complexity becomes such a joy and conferences are a huge source of that emotion. Being around some of the best chemistry teachers in the world is so intellectually stimulating to me.

Teaching is complicated. You have to understand some information, deliver that information to a novice learner and work towards their brain changing in a meaningful manner. Their brains will filter much of that information and that which does arrive successfully runs the risk of becoming forgotten. Racism, sexism and other power structures can affect both the delivery and reception of that information. Emotion and the amygdala can also interfere. Between the cognitive science and the sociology there lies chemistry. Chemistry is a beautiful subject to teach, but it is also incredibly complex. So teaching is the intersection of all of these things. A teacher has to be able to account for all of them with a collection of students that vary considerably in their initial understandings and knowledge that they can use to make new connections. There is no limit to how far you can push your cognitive limits as a teacher.

So I feel that as my preparation and experience improves, I am getting to a point where I can effectively navigate all of these. But it’s hard. And the many cycles of preparation, teaching and reflection are needed to become masterful at teaching. The ChemEd 2019 conference had so many teachers that were brilliant. To just watch them teach us was amazing. It felt like the concept from the book “Inner Game of Tennis.” My system 1 was just learning without my conscious mind interfering. But in addition to the teaching technique, there was also an abundance of creativity. An artistry or uniqueness that I loved watching and dissecting. 

My favorite part of teaching is this vast combination of cognitively demanding tasks that all require improvement. I think that teaching is the ultimate cognitively demanding profession and we talk about this too infrequently. I appreciate the sheer difficulty of doing this well and so I am incredibly happy when I get to observe someone doing this at such a high level. I find it so impressive when someone can combine so many tasks but also add in creativity. Being able to reflect and critique things afterwards with a group of teachers is the best. I also feel that the presentations have changed in the last few years. The level of elite teaching has stretched so high and I wonder if it would be fruitful to consider intentionally pushing for a localized arrangement of elite teachers to see what could be accomplished. I wonder what we could do if we intentionally arranged a cohort of teachers and gave them a working environment that was modeled after a conference like this. 

Sometimes when we teach we repeat things so frequently that complicated concepts become algorithmic and automatic. Some refer to this as saying I learn the best by teaching. But as we shift teaching into responding towards initial student models the cognitive demand becomes so much higher on teachers. It’s not just a transfer to long term memory of phrasing or algorithms. It is that deep thinking that is challenging and rewarding. And that means that the intellectual stimulation also rises with it. And I love it. I know that many avoid recommending the teaching profession, but I can’t think of a better job. There is nothing that I could do that push my thinking more than teaching does. And some of the new educational pedagogy provides such an opportunity to push yourself in ways that have not existed before. To me, the conference felt like I was surrounded by people who derived the same joy that I felt. I hope to be back at one soon.

Grass Clippings Biochar experiment

Today I tried an experiment with grass clippings where I heated the grass in a covered pot to convert the clippings into charcoal. This conversion is called biochar. The idea is that by turning the carbon in the organic material into charcoal the charcoal can be buried and prevented from gradually turning into carbon dioxide or methane. 

Figure 1: 1.8 (+/- 0.2) pounds of Dried out grass in a 5 gallon steel pot

My initial test run involved leaving the grass clippings in a pile in the yard for a week. This dried them out which removes water from the grass. I assume this will lead to more efficient and effective conversion into charcoal. I think that this also allows me to produce more charcoal as I get more organic material into the pot. It did not rain for about a week, so the grass was very dry. I forgot to take an initial photo, so Figure 1 is actually a refill after I ran my initial sample.

Figure 2: Grass clippings being converted into charcoal by heating with limited oxygen

You can use charcoal to heat the grass, but that probably eliminates the whole point of carbon capture. I picked up sticks in the yard and after a week I had enough to make a reasonable fire. The sticks will eventually turn into carbon dioxide anyways. It would be best if I could cover the fire a bit more to limit thermal energy that does not move into the pot. 

Figure 3: Grass clippings after an hour of burning

After about an hour I peeked inside. There was charcoal, but it was mostly at the bottom. I stirred the mixture a bit to try and move the grass to the bottom. At this point there was an odor coming from the pot that started to get worse. 

Figure 4: Grass clippings after about 4 hours

I did not have to continue heating much because the hot coals were effective for a while. I think that the grass converting to charcoal also produced some thermal energy increases that continued the process. 

Figure 5: Bury the charcoal in the ground

Once the grass has been converted to charcoal you can bury it. If you bury grass clippings they will decompose and turn into methane and carbon dioxide. But charcoal should remain as charcoal for quite some time. 

I ended up with 1.2 (+/- 0.2) pounds of coal. My son was mildly excited that we managed to do a real life Minecraft experiment as well. The beauty of biochar is that you’re using the grass to absorb carbon dioxide from the air and then sequestering the carbon as coal. If you mow and let the clippings sit on the lawn, the grass will decompose into carbon dioxide. If you use clippings in a compost pile the clippings will also degrade. The conversion to charcoal is the key to a more permanent removal. 

Some potential flaws are that burning fuel to capture the carbon is counterproductive. I went with sticks to avoid this. But I also bought the pot and the production of the pot and shipping probably contributed more carbon emissions than I saved. The biggest problem is that this needs to be scaled up a bit to really be effective.

Inspiration for trying this came from the book "Whole Earth Discipline" and this blog post https://www.instructables.com/id/Capture-CO2-with-Lawn-Trimmings/

Daily student recaps

On a Saturday in late fall we held a follow up to our modeling workshop. One of the participants brought a colleague along with her. During one of our discussions she mentioned that she had been having students do a daily recap of the previous lesson. I thought the idea was brilliant and so I started having my IB chemistry HL class do it. I recently expanded the recaps to my chemistry classes. There are multiple benefits to doing this and I wanted to put them together and encourage teachers to try using this tool in your own classes.

1.  Students listen differently to their peers.

When I talk, the students trust me to say “correct” things about what we are learning. When a student is explaining that trust is not there. This causes students to listen differently with a more critical approach. If a student says anything that is slightly wrong or even if the letters they write are slightly misshapen they notice immediately. This type of critical listening is very valuable for student learning. They’re connecting topics and ideas and evaluating whether they fit or don’t. They should do this when I speak. Pointing out to them this discrepancy can be helpful for pushing their learning to a higher level.

2. What I think students know and what they actually know are frequently different.

Being able to see what a student took from your lesson is helpful. Sometimes teachers get wrapped up in the world of “But I told them once, they should understand it!” Spending time listening to students every hour to start things off builds a much better perspective of what they are learning instead of what you are teaching.

3. More student voice

At the start of this year I was nervous to call on quiet students during discussion. In the past students had given feedback that they would participate but that talking in front of everyone terrified them. It was a mistake to listen to that feedback. It created an unhealthy class dynamic where students sought out correct answers instead of focusing on what they currently understood. It pushed the idea that there are smart chemistry students and dumb ones. It was also racist and sexist in that some races and gender combinations were heard from more than others.

However, this is a concern for students and it needs to be handled well to be successful. When students say “I don’t know” during discussion, you’ll want to emphasize that the solution to not knowing something begins by starting with what you do know and building connections to those ideas. Frequently teachers undermine this by making statements about “being happy about mistakes” or “mistakes are opportunities to learn”. Instead it’s important to show students how to cycle through learning something new by seeking out a starting point of what a student does know and how to evaluate possible explanations, logic and evidence to build towards the new learning objective.

It is important not just to say this, but to keep a healthy approach as students do the recaps. Many are nervous but I see a lot of that disappear as I point out the good points of their recaps. As they realize the intentions of finding out what they know they produce more honest recaps. I would also like to say that I am frequently surprised at students that I would expect to struggle with a recap because they are quiet. These students are perfectly capable of doing an excellent recap and hearing from them improves their inclusion in the classroom.

4. Spaced practice

Spaced practice is the opposite of cramming. In cramming a set of ideas is repeated until familiarity sets in. In spaced practice the learning is split up so that forgetting occurs between the intervals of learning. The research strongly supports spacing practice. By allowing students to forget and then re-learn the material the impact on the brain is substantial. Doing a daily recap allows students to forget part of the material and then relearn it the next day. This leads to less forgetting and also better understanding.

5. Reflection

Students know that the next lesson will involve a randomly selected student giving a recap. When two or three minutes are left in a lesson the students can then reflect on what they learned and what they would present if they were to be selected the next day. This can help them evaluate and organize the learning.

This is a new technique to me but the value is already immense. I have thoughts on how to modify the technique such as having two students selected. One gives the recap and the other supplements additional ideas. The time varies because most students will talk for 5-6 minutes and not realize they had talked so much. Some teachers might elect to tell students the day before who will speak (which could be an issue if there is an absence). I roll dice to determine who will speak and they get no prep time to pull things together. Currently students can bring notes with them but they are discouraged from using them and not allowed to just write what their notes say. If they get stuck they are encouraged to ask questions to other students.

Kroger ads are over the item limit for the anti-science express lane

Going grocery shopping can be quite obnoxious for a chemistry teacher. It’s not just the chemical-free labels but rather an overwhelming amount of misleading and deceptive marketing. It is a stark reminder that there are relentless forces pushing back regardless of how hard I work to teach science, evidence-based thinking and chemistry knowledge. For every time a student learns how to predict the products of a chemical reaction they will be inundated with non-GMO labels. Every particle representation that pushes their thinking will be countered by claims that only ingredients with names that can easily be pronounced are used.

These marketing schemes cause a widespread distrust for many things like aspartame, vaccines, MSG and other items that have had false data perpetuated by public hysteria that lacks any evidence. The impacts of these cause a rift between environmental activism and environmental science. And I understand that people do not always have access to trustworthy sources and the risk of getting scammed an extra few dollars is less worrisome than the false alternative. So while I wish more people would buy food that is better for the environment, better for the health of farmers and not actively trying to scam innocent people out of money, I understand why that takes time to transition.

But I am less forgiving of the advertising for those that are aware of these marketing scams like the non-GMO project that help perpetuate fears among consumers just to profit off of their fear. Companies with the resources and knowledge to do the right thing and educate consumers get far too little criticism when they choose instead to push fear-based rhetoric. The following two advertisements are from Kroger’s Simple Truth brand and the second I heard on the radio one day and it infuriated me.

Ad 1 “We’re proud of what’s not in our food, like GMOs (disgusted tone)” https://www.ispot.tv/ad/dlAO/simple-truth-were-proud

Ad 2 “Free from GMOs and free from things you can’t pronounce”

https://www.ispot.tv/ad/IqtV/fred-meyer-simple-truth-products

I wrote about how the advertisement made me feel and received a reply that showed that Kroger both did not read my comment but also apologized for my confusion rather than address their deceptiveness. Their response is Figure 1 found below. Several response emails were redirected with claims that my concerns would be forwarded to marketing and I couldn’t help notice that Kroger was perfectly content to explain how their food was non-GMO initially before they took time to understand my complaint. But once they were aware of everything the evasiveness grew.

Eventually I received a direct response and explanation (Figure 2 below). While I appreciated an actual response I still feel that Kroger is both disingenuous that they have no knowledge of food systems and farming and are merely responding to consumer requests. The advertisements clearly show they are pushing consumers in a particular direction both with their tone, phrasing and the pronounceable ingredient comment in ad 2. However, I also have hope that they will respond. While Kroger was avoiding my emails I looked through their social media and found a brilliant response where an employee took the time to thoroughly explain pesticides, organic pesticides and more to a customer that appeared to not be aware (Figure 3 below).

So if you are a science teacher, an environmentalist or someone who’s just tired of having the dumbest possible labeling shoved in your face everytime you walk into a grocery store, please consider sending Kroger a message letting them know you would like to see more pro-GMO marketing, more educational labeling and fewer chemophobic messages. If you'd like to learn more about GMOs here are some helpful links. Ingredients in a banana can be found here. If you can pronounce it you should eat it meme.

Figure 1: Initial email response from Kroger after my complaint that their advertisements promoted anti-science

Figure 2: Email response from Kroger after I asked for a medical condition that would be positively impacted by a non-GMO diet

Trying to be a less racist teacher

I had a moment several years ago where I was reading about a terrorist attack where someone had shot and killed people and based on the race of the shooter media had begun reporting about mental illness.  Reading the response immediately brought to mind that I had done the exact same thing when I was a new teacher at my first teaching job. I had had a white student go on a swearing rampage and storm out of the classroom.  I remember thinking that he had lost control of his emotions. Later in the year a black student had a similar although lesser violation. This time I asked two other teachers what I should do in response and they both told me to write a referral.  I did and when I talked to the student he literally told me what I was doing was wrong. And his rationale bounced right off of my dense head. No I thought, I can’t be racist I thought. I’m a good person, I’m a teacher. I asked two other teachers.  The other student was different because they had a documented issue. I dismissed his comments and followed through. In retrospect, this student was probably used to getting the short end of the stick and this was a common experience for him. And I had no idea until years later that I had been in the wrong.  

Since then I’ve been working at trying to make sure that I would not fail another student because of their race and also trying to elevate talented students that get overlooked because of their race.  It has been a surprisingly uneven journey were I have learned a lot but often at the expense of my students. When I messed up I would always try to apologize and reflect on what I should have done instead.  Here are some lessons that I’ve learned to this point.

1.  We often present racism as something that black people need to fix instead of white people.  In the above scenario I am the racist. I had no ill intentions and if I could do something to fix what I did I would in a heartbeat.  I feel awful about it. But instead of recognizing our own role we tend to shift race onto minorities and onto students instead of white people.  I was confusing not being a bigot with being unable to be racist. And that confusion is common and it is very counter productive. I was the one with the problem and I missed that because of my ignorance.

2.  Everyone is racist.  It’s not a binary system where you’re racist or you are not racist.  It’s a spectrum like autism and everyone is somewhere on the spectrum.  One of our biggest problems is that people confuse racism with bigotry. Being a bigot means that you don’t like a person because of their identity.  Being racist means that you contribute to the construction of racial structures where people of a minority group become linked with no evidence or rationale.  This happens frequently. We all do this. When a student is loud they are being disruptive but when a black student is loud they are being loud because they are black.  Teachers tend to notice the black students being loud even if the decibel levels are comparable.

A racist comment I read once was a lady saying that she isn’t racist and she makes sure to teach her children to treat everyone equally.  This doesn’t come off as racist to many people but it is because what the person is doing is reinforcing the idea that black people are all one group.  She’s not telling her kids we treat everyone equally when something arises with white people, only when black people are involved does this phrase manifest.  That distinction causes black people to become linked when they are just individual people. The reality is the more you ignore race the larger your racism impact becomes for most people.  

3.  There are methods to be less racist or more anti-racist.  The biggest thing that I’ve learned to do is to always pause.  Your brain uses two systems to work, one is automatic and the other involves thinking.  If you have positive intentions but negative impacts, it’s frequently due to automation.  So when you are about to discipline a student, you need to pause and determine if this is an automated trained response where you are being unfair or if this is a reasonable course of action.  In order for this to work you have to be honest with yourself and for many that is a challenge.

My favorite compliment I ever received was at conferences a parent had come in even though their child was doing very well in the course.  She just wanted to let me know that her daughter had told her that in every class she took she always felt like the “muslim girl” but in my class she was just a normal kid.  This should be one of our primary goals. Our students are not free in our schools to be themselves. We should be looking for opportunities for our students to be free from their race and this doesn’t come about by ignoring race.  This also doesn’t come about by treating racial disparities as a problem for black students and not for white students.

A good way to improve your thinking is to try hard to analyze white people for a length of time.  Every time you talk to a white student try and pause and evaluate if you are doing so differently because of their race.  Are you asking them a harder question that requires more independence because they are white? Are you asking them about academics or social things instead of athletics because they are white?  Were you standing closer in proximity to them because they are white? At first it is very odd, but I think we secretly do this for black students and that differentiation is perceived by the student whether the teacher is aware they are doing it or not.  And it makes an impact. If you’re skeptical you can start by taking an IAT here.  

Becoming less racist is not something you can accomplish without effort.  But if minimal effort is the best you can do, listen to other people who speak honestly about it.  If you can find someone to follow on twitter, or read a book about race. Without critically thinking and reflecting you’re unlikely to change enough but do something.  

4.   We don’t listen well.  I had gone to a professional development session.  It was for white women to talk about their role in racism under the pretense that white women often escalate tensions as men feel a need to protect them.  I didn’t want to intrude on the session so I decided to go, but sit in the back and not comment the entire time. During the session as people offered up ideas and comments one of our black teachers started to talk about our district.  My ears perked up. This is exactly what I wanted. I wanted the expertise of someone who lives this every day. We don’t have a lot of black teachers and so not only does she have her own experiences but also a lot of black students confide and trust in her so she is incredibly knowledgeable.  And yet the second she finished speaking another teacher said that they disagreed and they felt that we were doing a great job with race. Another teacher confirmed this and I watched the room completely miss what was said. Later I was at a different PD session and a black professor from Michigan State was working with us to help us. A teacher asked the most inane question and he was so patient with her. When she first spoke I felt the urge to chastise the question but instead he listened to her, met her where she was and tried to help her in spite of her question being what I considered to be dismissive of his efforts.

I hear a lot of teachers claim that students play the race card to get out of trouble but the evidence I see would make this incredibly rare.  And that doesn’t mean that you won’t be supported by others in your claim it just means that you are likely wrong. As a teacher I watch white students perform infractions constantly and get away with them.  I listen as administrators tell me about parents who obstruct discipline for their white children in spite of clear evidence of rule violations. But our perspective is the opposite and that is dangerous. If you don’t know the statistics but assume they benefit black students you are wrong and contributing to a racist narrative.  

5.   We are too comfortable with our racial disparities.  If white students started to achieve less than black students we would work tirelessly to make sure we were being fair.  When black students struggle we consider this the norm and make ceremonial efforts at mitigating the damage. Part of this arises because people think that they are special and that others are the problem.  But we all share this burden and it’s time we put together a more concerted effort. Psychological evidence shows that teacher expectations have a massive impact on achievement. We know of the study where random students were given a gifted label and then outperformed their peers.  We know of the blue eyes, brown eyes study. And yet when we see these same results in our classrooms with consistency we can’t reflect on what we do to contribute to the problem.

One of the solutions is that each teacher needs to think hard and reflect and work on being more anti-racism and less racist.  The other is that we need teachers to anticipate that students are going to come with deficits and have a plan to help students achieve even if they start out behind.  As a chemistry teacher lots of my black students struggle and there are methods for them to still be successful if I put in the effort to give them opportunities to catch up.  But if I give a math pre-test on day 1 to scare struggling students out of the class to make my job easier then that’s not going to happen. If I don’t give students current cognitive research strategies and instead tell them they need to work harder or study more when they’re scrambling to keep up as it is they aren’t going to be successful.  It’s not your job to set out a set of parameters that negatively impact one racial group over the other. It’s your job to figure out methodologies that allow students to succeed. And it will take more effort to do that and it is worth the effort to do so. When you tell 9th graders that in order to be a chemistry student you need to have done X by the time you were fourteen years old the students you are most often restricting are black students who may very well be on a path to being a chemist but need more time to get there.    

But a huge part of your job that also is important is that we need to not have students going into teaching (or other professions for that manner) without a strong understanding of race and racism.  There were people who could have taught me about racism before I failed that student and they didn’t. I think that I would have been receptive to the conversation even if it was critical but I never got the chance and someone else paid the price for that.  We need our white students to not leave school thinking that diversity doesn’t apply to them. We had a professional development session once and the speaker asked us to name white people that had been supportive of civil rights for black people. I knew of none and I knew that I was not on a path to be on that list in the future.  We teach that white people are the cause of racism but not the solution and shifting that focus goes a long way towards being successful at reducing racism towards our children.