The Parts of speech and grammar instruction

A few months ago I came across a Pinterest post linking to an article about students not retaining the eight parts of speech. How many English teachers have lamented this fact? Time and again in meetings and breakrooms and even during dinner and drinks, we teachers vent about our students not retaining grammar concepts and especially the eight parts of speech. Why is it that even my high schoolers, juniors and seniors, could not describe what an adjective is or does? Why does the function of an adverb, which has its function in its name, elude them?

English language instruction has undergone many changes over the last century. We are still embroiled in the debate between phonics versus whole language approaches, and we love to debate the use of the Oxford comma. Many people tout themselves to be Grammar Nazis, boasting an above-average knowledge of English grammar, yet they are far from understanding the intense complexities of our mess of a language.

Students don't fail to learn basic grammatical concepts because they aren't taught or reinforced; there is a multi-pronged issue in the way that grammar is taught in schools that keeps them from making connections between the concepts and their bigger-picture function.

Grammar concepts are typically taught through rote memorization and identification. Students are taught what the eight parts of speech are and are then taught to identify them in use in various sentences. Many students can shoot off the names of various parts of speech but they can not recall their function. This is due to them being taught and recalled in isolation. While students must memorize the names and purpose, much like multiplication tables, they must also apply this knowledge meaningfully in the analysis of written language.

Many students can identify a noun in a sentence, and even tell you that a noun is a person, place or thing, but they can not tell you what that noun's function is. In language, this is called "case". Grammatical case denotes what a noun's function is in a sentence. Although English borrowed many grammatical structures from German, it also abandoned many parts of those structures that made them make sense. In English, we only use cases for pronouns: we identify the difference between a subject pronoun, an object pronoun and a possessive pronoun. But we do not teach this in school. This leaves students knowing the name for a word, i.e. that "run" is a verb, but they can not tell you what its function is within the sentence. This is why the names of parts of speech are easily forgotten. It is not meaningful for a student to know that, in the sentence "Johhny threw the ball to Michael", "Johnny", "ball" and "Michael" are nouns, "threw" is a verb and even that "to" is a preposition. A student really needs to know that Johnny is the subject, the actor in the sentence, and this will tie into bigger concepts like identifying key details, main idea and even writing a summary.

 Herein lies the real issue: students' ability to write effectively and to analyze written texts effectively.

Research on the effectiveness of explicit, isolated grammar instruction focuses on either the ability to recall information or overall writing ability (which has more to do with the ability to structure your thoughts than grammatical use).   However, curricular standards, standardized tests and workforce needs dictate that citizens be able to do more with written language. Ultimately, teachers are trying to get students to be able to analyze an author's meaning when reading a text, something that all of my students have struggled with because their knowledge of language is limited, and to be able to write concisely and with clarity. We can not clearly express information if we do not understand that the placement of a prepositional phrase clarifies the meaning of the sentence.

So, while many articles call for the removal of explicit grammar instruction, it is not the explicit instruction that is the problem; it is how it is being done.

Much like with arithmetic, students simply must memorize certain facts, like the multiplication table. They then use these facts and their understanding of them (multiplication means adding groups of quantities together) to apply to math concepts (algebra, calculus, geometry, etc). Rather than having English teachers teach the same concepts over and over from elementary on through high school, the vertical scale should move from introduction and memorization of concepts to application. A sixth grader should not still be identifying nouns and adjectives in a sentence; they should be analyzing how an author uses words to make meaning to the reader, and how they, as writers, use these words to express their own ideas.

What's a way this can be done? 

While many people abhor sentence diagramming, it should be an important rung in the ladder of language development.

Many resources support that sentence diagramming is the bridge between explicit grammar instruction and reading and writing.

"Diagramming isn’t an arcane assignment designed to torture the student. It forces students to clarify their thinking, fix their sentences, and put grammar to use in the service of writing—which is, after all, what grammar is for."

https://welltrainedmind.com/a/why-diagramming-matters/?v=7516fd43adaa

"Burns Florey and other experts trace the origin of diagramming sentences back to 1877 and two professors at Brooklyn Polytechnic Institute. In their book, Higher Lessons in English, Alonzo Reed and Brainerd Kellogg made the case that students would learn better how to structure sentences if they could see them drawn as graphic structures."

https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2014/08/22/341898975/a-picture-of-language-the-fading-art-of-diagramming-sentences


"...diagramming sentences requires students to use critical thinking, a skill the Common Core prioritizes. In that respect, the practice is in line with CCSS goals."

Do sentence diagrams have a place in the Common Core?

https://brighted.funeducation.com/News/Common-Core-State-Standards-News/do-sentence-diagrams-have-a-place-in-the-common-core

Common Core and many state standards have encouraged curriculum writers to change their approach to instruction in ways that develop deeper understanding and build stronger critical thinking. Where elementary math curriculum includes instructional strategies such as using number lines to give a visual to numeracy, arrays for deepening understanding of multiplication, and drawing to create visual representations, English curriculum stands to make similar adjustments if we want our next generation to have the skills necessary for the high cognitive demands of our tech driven world. 

Louisiana Parish Superintendent Salaries

There has been quite a bit of buzz lately regarding the salaries of New Orleans CMO leaders. Attention has been turned to the profit that can be made off the heads of children in New Orleans and other cities who are making the move to having more charter schools. However, it turns out that education leadership in Louisiana is where it's at, not just New Orleans. Our state superintendent, John White, makes $275k- more than the average state superintendent in the U.S., despite Louisiana hanging steady at 48th in the nation in education. So it is no surprise that his parish superintendents are worth as much.

In the spreadsheet below, the yearly salary is listed for every parish superintendent in the state. I  sorted it by school performance and highlighted superintendents who make over $120k by score. There are 11 superintendents making over $120k and running "A" districts, but 7 of them are serving fewer than 10k students.
I had to ask why is the superintendent of City of Baker, who services fewer than 2k students and has a "D" rating, make more than the superintendent of Richland who services twice as many? Why is the superintendent of Orleans, who does not actually direct run ANY schools, make almost $200k? THREE of the SEVEN superintendents making over $200k (not counting Orleans at $193k)are running C districts. In a state that performs below nearly every other state in the country.

It's about time to demand better from ed leaders for the sake of the children.

Louisiana Parish Superintendent Salary sorted

What's the difference between an "A" and "B" School?

Culture Shock and the myth of School Performance Scores

Through conversations with parents and teachers in the New Orleans metro school districts I have found, time and again, that we find ourselves referencing School Performance Scores, or Louisiana SPS. It seems like a sensible reference point; standardizing the way that schools are graded, like students, across the state. It is a Grade that parents refer to when selecting schools in New Orleans, searching out the "A" schools or attempting to determine how well their familiar and neighborhood schools are achieving. But there is a lot hidden behind the SPS.

The L.A. SPS Score scale has changed in recent years, having gone from a 200 point scale to a 150 point scale. However, many people do not know this, or that it was even at 200 points. Many parents, especially, conceptualize the scale like they would a school scale- out of 100 points.  Because of this, perception about what an "A" and "B" school is may be skewed in the school's favor.

What are the scales? Louisiana has them and information about how they are calculated here. An "A" School is 100-150 points; a whopping fifty point scale. A "B" school, however, is only 85-99 points- a mere 14 points. The range for an "A" and an "F" school have the largest range- leaving the scores for "B-D" schools wide open. Opening the range at the "A" end allows for more "B" schools despite the fact that they are a full 60 points below the top possible score.

What does this mean for "A" and "B" schools?

There is a vast difference between what "A" and "B" schools actually are.
For people in New Orleans, consider that Ben Franklin High school is a 141.3 scoring "A" school- and Edna Karr High is a 104.3 scoring "A" school. What similarities exist between these schools, making them both "A" schools? What differences exist?

Ben Franklin's average ACT score is a 29- well above college readiness and in the realm of entrance for many of the nation's best colleges.

Edna Karr's average ACT Score is a 20- exactly seated at the level of college readiness and below even the entrance requirement of our flagship school, Louisiana State University.

However, they are both "A" schools in this state.

Where do we observe the difference?

In the culture and demographics of the schools.

Many parents are pleased to send their children to "B" schools, since New Orleans is lacking in "A" schools (but not as many "B" schools, since the scoring scale is tipped at the upper and lower ends). But is a "B" school really just as good?

In New Orleans, an SPS of "B" seems to suggest that some teaching and learning is occurring but it is not the overall culture of the school. Many of the city's "B" schools have issues with drug use, police incident, high suspension rates and, generally, just difficulty in managing students on the campus.

There's definitely some difference in culture.

A friend and former colleague was shocked when I described my experience at a "B" school BEFORE I was employed there. Students walked the halls, skipped classes, left campus, frequently fought, had sex and and drugs on campus. But, by all measures, they were "achieving" just fine.

The students bragged.
Eleventh graders bragged about their 13 ACT Composite scores. They vowed wealth and richness without any skills or business standing to gain it. They said "I've always been on the honor roll!"

Teachers struggled.
The most well meaning teachers attempted to deliver lessons, day after day, to rude, disrespectful and disengaged students.  Students who talked during lessons. Students who copied ever assignment given. Students who Googled quiz questions. Students who refused to turn over cell phones even during ACT testing. Students who cursed out and threatened to fight teachers. Students who refuse to work on anything independently (well, forget that cute little Madeline Hunter lesson plan format and the quaint "I/WE/YOU do lesson format. They would not work alone even when the assignment was modeled for them.). Students who sincerely did not care about and did not want to (and often didn't) attend school.

There is a deep misbelief that Louisiana's schools are improving when they are continually receiving funding and revamping the curriculum to hide the lack of gains and maintain the appearance that strides are being taken to improve the state's success. But where is that money going, when New Orleans "head of schools" have been under fire for making high salaries at low performing schools?

Louisiana calls the SPS calculation system "Accountability" but there's a lot hiding under her skirt. A quick scan of the state's 2017 SPS scores shows low performance, even by our standards, across the board.
Louisiana is not achieving.
Our children in our "high performing" schools are not, either.

The culture of "why can't you just...?!"

Over the years I have observed a phenomena that I didn't understand at first. I observed teachers yelling at students and I didn't understand why. My first teaching year was in kindergarten and it seemed harsh to hear teachers yelling at those oh-so-adorable five year olds, but as I progressed through the years and grade levels, I not only heard it more and more often but occasionally found myself doing it. It wasn't until recently, however, that I realized the tone, frustration and meaning behind the yelling; it's undertones pleaded "why can't you just...?!". It begged of the students, "why can't you just sit still?" or "why can't you just stop making noise?" or "why can't you just do the work?". The yelling wasn't just out of anger or annoyance, many times, but of a deeper frustration that teachers weren't running the classroom that they'd desired. I suspect that this frustration stemmed from culture shock on the teacher's part (something I've written about before) but even veteran teachers and those born, raised and educated in this city have fallen into the pit of yelling at their students.


A recent article by The Cult of Pedagogy explores those moments of breakdown that we all experience and gives some great suggestions to how to manage them.

The article  doesn't, however, address the frustration that comes with the "why can't you just" yell. It is a feeling of despair and momentary hopelessness; it is a feeling of loss of control; it is a feeling of 'maybe I'm not cut out to do this' or even a feeling of not understanding the current experience of the student (s).

The first stage is to know and understand the backgrounds of your students. This isn't something that is often expressed to new teachers or even veteran teachers who transfer to new schools, districts or states. A very good friend of mine had a solid seven years of teaching English in another state under her belt and still experienced this culture shock when she moved to New Orleans. She astutely observed a difference: "In Wisconsin, you have the students' trust the minute that you walk into the room and have to really work hard and screw up to lose it but here, you have to earn the students trust and work hard to get it and keep it".  Many students in this area have unstable home AND school lives, sometimes moving from place to place to stay with various family members and also having a revolving door of teachers over the years, some of whom care and some don't and some who are knowledgeable and some who aren't.  Many time this leads students to push teachers in an attempt to test them and determine if they can trust them. For the teacher, this looks like defiance and disrespect.

Knowing the big picture background is very helpful in developing patience when students are testing limits. Knowing students' individual backgrounds is even more helpful for knowing how to manage the behaviors. A student who is testing their trust in you will need a different approach than a child who may be defiant because his home life is in chaos and he needs to feel like he has some autonomy.
It is super helpful when feeling that "why can't you just" bubbling up to finish the sentence. Give a second to think "why can't you just keep your hands to yourself? Because your brother moved out to live with his father and you are lonely and want someone to engage with." "Why can't you just do the work? Because you didn't understand the directions or the modeling and you're lost and would rather talk to someone than sit alone, unable to work".  It can also help to ask the student these questions and help them be self aware and luckily, the younger they are, the easier it is to help them adjust.

The second stage is for you to be self aware. Much like the article from Cult of Pedagogy, being in tune with out own feelings makes a big difference not only in our work but in our personal lives as well. It is helpful to notice that you are more likely to yell out when you're hungry, or the student has done it four times, or you might be insecure about how a new lesson might go, or if you feel an illness coming on. Occasionally we are triggered more easily at these times and can send a confusing and upsetting message to kids: 'this behavior was acceptable yesterday or last week but now it's not, so I need to work to figure out where the limit of acceptable behavior is'. This can cause even more trouble in the long run.

I have come to know when I am more prone to being easily frustrated and am getting much better at heading it off by telling students how I feel (and this works because of the relationships that I develop with students and the empathy that we have for each other) and they tend to manage themselves even more strictly than I typically do. I have also learned to distinguish between loud voice and yelling.  Sometimes students need to hear a loud, stern voice- this is a voice that asserts your expectations. A yell, however, is loud and asserts that you are frustrated and maxed out and, for some students, that they've won the battle of control over the classroom. We never want the students to win control. Even on our worst days.

Finding ways to keep our patience in tact and still manage students is a tiring but important task that, thankfully, many of us have support in doing.

When does an "A" mean "the best of the best"?

Despite the misconceptions, belief or hope that grades are a trustworthy and reliable measure of success or knowledge, grades have always been subjective and, under the current educational environment, deeply varied. Considering this, how is success determined when the standard of success is actually variable?

Support in and out of the classroom

5/1/16
I was recently talking with a younger, TFA colleague about the struggles and woes of teachers, especially TFA teachers, and he asserted that his friends and TFA cohorts do not need more disparaging information about the LA educational system (that they get enough of that in their day to day struggles) but they need more structure. I asked him what that meant, and he felt that our new, young teachers could use more resources and more structure in the classroom. Despite the many observations by mentors, our youngest teachers still feel ill-prepared and ill-equipped to tackle the academic and emotional hurdles in teaching urban/suburban students.

I began to think of the things that were helpful to me over the years, especially as an English teacher. Some of the things that I developed in elementary and middle school are still effective for running a structured high school classroom. The two major components of this development came in the following areas: behavior management, my time management and academic resources that are appropriate for my students' levels of ability.

Behavior Management was best developed by having very few expectations- only ones that can easily be tracked or documented- a documentation sheet and procedures.
 The First Days of School by Harry Wong is a useful resource for developing these things; however, I found the videos of Chelonnda Seroyer to be more useful and realistic. Wong's work is, like Lemov, designed to be implemented in its entirety but much of it is not effective or is, honestly, a waste of time for our community of kids. I found the following chapters to be most useful:

• Unit C page 85,165- how to teach classroom procedures

Many people quote Wong and Lemov as gospel but my experience with schools who follow the entire book/directives are schools that subjugate its students rather than cultivate them. My current school does neither and the most effective teachers are those who use these elements in part.

Time management is incredibly important in a profession that requires at-home work.  I learned to manage my time on paper; a huge mistake was attempting to just remember all of the things that I had to do throughout the day. One major issue with doing this is that your tasks will change throughout the day (for instance, you may need to call student parents based upon incidences in class, or you decide to change components of your lessons or your weekly plans). I've found the following ways helpful to managing daily responsibilities:

• Keep a copy of your school's academic calendar. On your school's calendar you can also write bill due dates, social engagements, and deadlines. This way you are always aware of when things are due and it can help to prioritize your responsibilities. 
• Keep a "To Do" list in the same place as your calendar. As things pop up during the day, write them down as soon as possible. On your planning period, lunch or afterschool, go through the list and prioritize tasks by amount of time that they will take to complete and most important. 
• What items are a priority? Another colleague stated that she felt she had to prioritize tasks but what tasks she was prioritizing actually weren't pressing. I have found that grades are not a priority every day. This depends on your school's policies and expectations on grades-the more grades that they require, the more pressing the priority- however, if your lessons are not well structured, those grades that you are rushing to complete will not be good.  Pressing priority goes to lesson planning and behavior management follow through, such as phone calls to parents, managing consequences like checking to ensure students attend detentions, etc., and behavior/ participation grades are up to date. Students must know that what they do in class is of utmost importance.
•  

•  Pace your lessons and use a timer. As you are mastering your content area, it is hard to know exactly how long a particular task will take. Letting students linger on tasks that don't take long will suck up your class time and cause your lesson pacing to swell. Conversely, not giving enough time may frustrate students and cause them to lose motivation. Planning adequate independent work time can free you up to assist students and manage small tasks that might otherwise end up with you at home.
• Avoid social media on your down time! We all know that social media is a time suck and creates a wormhole in the space time continuum that will leave you wondering how your entire lunch period is gone or that worksheet that you planned to create isn't done but 30 minutes of your life have disappeared. It is best to power through the day and then have more relaxation and down time when you get home.

Academic resources are deeply lacking in many schools, especially urban schools. Why does this happen?  Many schools choose to cut costs by not purchasing textbooks or not use textbooks because the students are reading two to three grade levels behind. Instead, many schools choose to have teachers find or create their own resources. This is a benefit because it allows every teacher an opportunity to individualize the work for students as well as the ability to customize the work to exactly and only what they are teaching. Great for experienced teachers, not great for new teachers.  How do we find the right resources? Google them! However, you have to know what to look for before you look for it, so I have found the following to help me break down my content and look for appropriate work:

• Go through the standards and find the subskills that are required to complete the task. For English, that means that if we are learning how to edit sentences for fragments, students first need to know what are and how to identify independent and dependent clauses. I would search for middle school-level worksheets or assignments on clauses so that the work is accessible to students. Some great resources for English are: 
• http://www.ereadingworksheets.com/    A plethora of PDF worksheets and answers that are leveled by difficulty
• https://www.teacherspayteachers.com/    You can search by topic and filter by grade level. There are many FREE resources and even more pay resources, many by whole semesters and can be used for your entire course.
• https://laurarandazzo.com/       Teaching strategies and resources. She also has a TPT store with incredible resources.
• http://www.k12reader.com      A variety of resources for all subjects, leveled by grade level. 
• https://www.havefunteaching.com/    
• https://www.superteacherworksheets.com/

How is the loss of the neighborhood schools affecting children's social growth?

 On a sunny, breezy afternoon at the neighborhood playground, my small son walked over to me, dejected, and expressed his sadness that he could not play with anyone because he didn't know their names. He is usually very good about playing with new kids, but on this day it was too much for him to try to befriend children that he would never meet again. Meeting new people is taxing but the only respite is moving into a comfortable relationship after multiple meetings-yet, for my son, that never happens.

My son goes to a Catholic school a few miles away from our home. With the Jefferson Parish and New Orleans schools a mess of failures, his early education could not be chanced. This is the case for all too many families, as New Orleans has the highest percentage of students in private schools in the U.S.; however, the relocation of students from their neighborhood schools isn't due to the mass move to private schools. The growth of the charter management organizations in New Orleans as well as the reinstatement of the Dandridge Order in Jefferson parish meant the dissolution of the neighborhood school in the New Orleans metro area.

In New Orleans there is no unified district in place. The Orleans Parish School Board manages only a small portion of the highest performing schools in the city; the rest are charter run. The majority of the charters, sprinkled around the city, are open enrollment, which means that any child in the parish can attend any school.  The purpose of this is to allow children the opportunities to attend the best schools even if the best schools aren't nearby.

In Jefferson parish the commute exists for a different reason: The Dandridge order. As district leaders noticed the racial imbalance in the schools, they decided to forcefully integrate them. For students this means that if you live in a primarily white neighborhood, you may not attend your neighborhood school because there's already too many white people so you will be bused to another school which needs more white diversity. To some, this sounded like a reasonable solution but in reality it began to destroy the neighborhood schools.
The playground where I bring my son is next to an elementary and middle school that is less than a mile from where we live- but if he went to a Jefferson parish school he would actually go to a school about three miles away. I began to think of how this impacted his ability to make and maintain friends with children he doesn't go to school with.

My wheels began to turn as I considered the bigger picture. How does this school commute affect the social development of children? How does it affect the social development of my high school students? It seemed quite obvious. Children have to work harder to develop relationships that may not last because of the distance.
Anyone who has maintained a long distance friendship or relationship can attest that it can be difficult to stay connected when you are living two different lives. You tell stories that involve different groups of friends; you recount mundane details of day to day life because the other person isn't witness or participant to them; conversations may drag out of desperation for something to talk about. For adults, we may prune away these relationships but for children these social connections are crucial to their growth.

Children spend anywhere from nine to ten hours a day at school (not accounting for after school activities) so they develop their strongest bonds with the children that they are with the most. Yet, they go home and may have friendships with the children in their neighborhood who do not attend the same school. With my high schoolers, this often causes problems. The neighborhood friends see the closeness to school friends as disloyal and rifts occur. It is especially significant for Freshman. Which friend wins out? How do children cope with these rifts? Can they learn to overcome them? It seems as though students frequently choose to cut ties with the neighborhood friends rather than overcome the conflict. Is this move affecting their conflict resolution? Does this commute affect teens need for social interaction via their phones?

In the younger children, are school friendships seen as valuable? If children are not interacting with their classmates outside of school, is there any value in the classroom interactions and if not, do children care less about their conflicts and relationships with their classmates?

Another dimension to this issue is the burden placed on parents in an attempt to maintain out of school relationships. Phone calls, text messages, scheduling outings and even driving across town now become a part of social development. Parents are also responsible for developing relationships with each other in order to do these things. We take on an extra responsibility to get to know people who are not around us; we don't shop at the same grocery stores or attend the same churches or play at the same playground-so parental socialization becomes another task all of its own. Do our children get appropriate socialization when it is the parent's responsibility to make it happen?

There is little discussion or information about this impact on children. The U.S. has been on a mad dash to charter and privatize the school entity without regard for the impact. Education reform has become a beast which feeds on children instead of the superhero who was supposed to save them. The social impact may be small; children will make friends one way or another-but it is worth questioning all of the ways that the destruction of neighborhood schools is adversely affecting children's lifelong success.