In My Classroom
Julian Roldan, Third-Grade Teacher
My whole life pivots on what happened to my family when I was twelve years old. I was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico. After our home was robbed several times in succession, my father announced we would be moving to the United States for better opportunities.
I was thrilled. I had gone to Disney World before, so naturally I thought America would be one big amusement park full of hotdogs and roller coasters. That was not the case when my family arrived in Denver, Colorado. I remember wondering why everything was so brown. My nose and throat felt full of sand in the arid climate. I remember my first day in an American school clearly. I felt awkward and self-conscious, but most of all I felt lonely.
My teacher was warm and welcoming. She took the time during her lunch breaks to pull me aside and ask me how I was doing. It was an opportunity for me to ask questions like what kind of clothes I should wear, how lunch and recess worked, and she laughed as she explained that the students were not pouring white paint on their food, it was actually a peculiar condiment called ranch dressing.
In an effort to make me feel more included, my teacher asked me to stand up in front of the class and share a story about my life in Puerto Rico. I know she had the best intentions at heart, but all this did was embarrass me. I felt as if she singled me out just as I was trying so desperately to fit in. Looking back, I would have loved to share stories about my life with my classmates. I would have told them how much I missed the Cream of Wheat my abuela topped with brown sugar on lazy Sunday mornings. I wished the other kids shared their experiences with me too. I was just as curious about my classmates’ lives as they must have been about mine.
As a teacher now I make a point of sharing my personal stories as a way of connecting and building relationships with my students. It is encouraging for my students to know that once upon a time their teacher was just like them. I too had the same butterflies in my stomach and felt the same concerns new students feel when coming into a new place. It’s powerful for students to know that their teacher was once in their shoes.
Like my teacher years ago, I make sure to check in with new students so they know I care and am there to support them. My hope is that my students can feel their classroom is a safe space for sharing their unique background stories and experiences.
Once I even created an official Welcome Award. At our school, we have two awards ceremonies at the end of each semester. Teachers give out various certificates like art awards and honor roll awards. That year we were faced with a problem. Two students enrolled in our school a few days before the ceremony. Instead of having them sit idle and watch as their peers were cheered for while they received certificates, we whipped up two official Welcome Awards. The new students beamed as their names were called. Both students were able to take home an official award for their family to display on their refrigerator. It was such a success that our school is working on getting Welcome Awards to all new students. Schools might also consider hosting a welcome lunch each month to extend an official welcome.
Teachers and schools need to have plans in place to support students when they enter our communities, but we also need to give consideration to when students must go. When a student leaves a classroom community, often the teacher’s immediate response is to remove all their things, take their names off the wall, and make space for the next student. I urge teachers not to do this. Don’t erase students from your classroom community’s collective memory. Instead, leave their name tags and work on the wall when possible. When students in my class asked why I still had Ronaldo’s name tag up, I said, “Because I miss him and I like remembering all the fun times we had together in class. I want us all to remember him.” It sends a message to the students who stay that everyone is a valuable member of the community.
When a student has to leave our class, I like to send them off with a stack of letters from the class. If our class knows in advance that a student is moving, I send a blank sheet of notebook paper home with simple instructions: “Write a letter saying goodbye to Ronaldo.” The next day I always get back a stack of letters full of kind words and encouragement.
Students in my classroom are missed even when they move without warning. Like when one of my students, Jennilyn, suddenly left. She was an enthusiastic learner, once announcing to me, “Ms. Schwartz, I am going to remind you every day that I am going to college.” After Jennilyn had not shown up for school for several days, our school secretary found out she had just registered to attend another school in a different city. Just like it must have been for Jennilyn, the sudden move was difficult for the students in our class. They missed their friend and didn’t even have a chance to say goodbye.
To respond to this situation, I remembered advice from a fellow teacher, Susana Moening. She told me that whenever a student moved away her class wrote goodbye letters, even when the move was unexpected and the student had already left. Whenever she could, Susana delivered the letters to the student’s new school or home. If she couldn’t locate where the student had moved, she kept the letters waiting in a shoebox in the classroom, just in case he or she ever returned. “Kids need closure when relationships end. It is a teacher’s job to take care of the community,” she told me.
I used this strategy as a way for our classroom community to say goodbye to Jennilyn. The day we found out she had transferred schools, we all took a few minutes at the beginning of class and wrote her letters. I was touched to read how much kindness and empathy my students displayed in their writing. I quickly compiled them and our school secretary sent them to Jennilyn’s new school along with her academic records.
This gave the class a sense of closure and reassured students that if they ever moved away they would be missed. I like to think of Jennilyn, sitting in her new classroom miles away, suddenly receiving a big stack of letters and reading the warm wishes and messages of encouragement from her friends. It’s nice to think that even though she was no longer with our class, she still felt cared about.
4. Transition Mementos
Another way to show a child that they will be missed is to give them a Transition Memento. When a child is dealing with something out of their control, like moving and switching schools, sometimes it helps to give them something they can actually hold on to. Our classroom started a tradition to help students when they were leaving our classroom in the middle of the year.
When Ronaldo left, we gave him a shark’s tooth necklace so that he could be “strong like a shark.” I have seen other teachers print out a photograph of the class for classmates to sign.
There are no rules on what will make a good Transition Memento. It just needs to be meaningful to the class and student who is transitioning. You could give the student a rock from the playground or press some leaves from a tree. A favorite book or stuffed animal will work as well. With older students, creating a Transition Memento could be as simple as taking a class picture.
Whatever you choose as a Transition Memento, the departing student will feel cared about and appreciated. Students who leave your community will have something to hold in their hands as a reminder that there are people who care about them and miss them. This is yet another way to provide a sense of closure for the rest of your students because as their friend leaves, a piece of their classroom community will be carried away with them.
When a student comes or goes in our classrooms, we must remember that the individual student is not the only one in transition. As a new student arrives, we must model and expect welcoming behavior from the other members of the classroom. It is equally important to consider how to make the class feel whole when a friend and classmate has to leave.
If national trends continue, more and more students will switch schools, and the effects are real.
As teachers we must investigate and understand the underlying causes of student mobility both nationally and in our communities. Issues like housing security and job security, though political in nature
, play themselves out in our classrooms every day. They affect our students’ ability to stay in our schools and learn. Educators can be the ones to elevate our students’ stories and advocate for their needs.
Teachers need to deliberately prepare for the effects of student mobility in their classrooms. Each child who enters or leaves your classroom community has a story. It’s up to us to support our students and ensure that transitioning into or out of our classrooms is a positive experience. As teachers, we can’t always control when and why a student transitions to or from our school, but we can focus on what we do control: how we handle each situation. By having strategies ready, we can make students feel welcome and included when they arrive as well as valued and missed if they must leave.
2.
Students and Poverty
Building on Resources and Breaking Down Barriers
My Classroom Community
The first year of teaching is such a trying experience for educators. But ask any of us and we all remember that first group of students with a particular glimmer in our eyes. As I tried to figure out exactly what kind of teacher I would be, I found my thoughts constantly pulled to what I could do to help each of my students pursue their interests and dreams.
One of my students, Chris, was obsessed with all things science. He even introduced himself as, “Hi, I’m Chris, I am going to be a scientist.” Chris’s bespectacled grin would greet me each morning accompanied by an explanation of a homemade experiment or a fact about dinosaurs. While most of my students’ eyes willed the hands of the clock to move faster in anticipation of recess, Chris’s nose was firmly placed betwixt the pages of a book.
As summer approached, I thought of ways Chris could explore his scientific interests, and I had just the right idea. I would find him a scholarship to a summer science camp. With just a few short emails, I secured him a spot in a science-focused summer camp, completely free of charge. I was thrilled.
I triumphantly announced the news to Chris and his mother after school one day. His eyeballs popped way open and his mouth dropped. “You mean I will get to meet real scientists?” Chris’s mother was equally appreciative; her son’s education was the highest priority. Anything she could do, she would do.
After I sent her the details about the summer camp. Chris’s mother called me. She remorsefully explained that Chris would not be attending the science camp. With both parents working all day, it was impossible to drive her son to the camp in the morning and pick him up in the afternoon. It was something I hadn’t even considered, likely because that would never have been a concern for me as a child. My parents could go into work late or leave early if it was necessary to drive me somewhere.
I had only good intentions when I found the science camp, but I was ignorant of the realities Chris faced. Like most students I have taught, Chris was understanding of his parents’ situation, but of course he was discouraged. My insensitivity caused an uncomfortable situation. Chris and his parents were disheartened that he couldn’t go to the science camp, and I felt responsible for their disappointment.
My false assumption that Chris’s family had the resources to transport him every day to science camp was something I definitely had to learn from. I now know that, as a teacher, I need to work in partnership with my students’ families. I learned early on in my teaching career that my blind spots have the potential to cause big problems, even when I have only the best of intentions.
Half of Our Students
Discussing the effects of poverty on students could fill several books, and has. As educators and community members, we need to understand the realities of poverty and its effects in American schools.
The numbers are staggering.
In 2011, 23,544,479 children attending public schools were living in households that met the federal requirements for the National School Lunch Program, an indicator of poverty according to the National Center for Educational Statistics. Statistics from 2013 cited by the New York Times indicate that an even higher number, roughly 51 percent, of all the children who walk into our public schools each morning live in poverty.
With over half of our students living in poverty, it is impossible for teachers to ignore how socioeconomic issues directly impact the learning in our classrooms. Nor is it possible to absolve ourselves of the responsibility of addressing it. Poverty is a complex issue, but teachers cannot leave the work of addressing it to others, because poverty issues are learning issues. Discussions on how to support our students need to take place at every level, from the White House to the street corner and, yes, in the teachers’ lounge as well.
We have a responsibility as teachers to address issues of poverty in order to be truly effective educators. Part of this responsibility is to develop an understanding of the effects of poverty on our students’ physical and emotional health as well as their academic achievement. It is clear that we cannot be effective educators if we do not understand the implications that living in poverty have on a student’s school experience. We cannot develop and maintain authentic, genuine relationships with our students if we do not understand how poverty is affecting their lives both inside and outside our classrooms.
In my own journey to become an effective third-grade teacher, it is not enough for me to have content knowledge and well-developed instructional methods. If my students are to meet every inch of their academic potential, I must understand the barriers to education that exist for them. Otherwise, I run the risk of teaching with unchecked biases. I am proud to say that I work in a school building where so many others have dedicated themselves to the same pursuit.
On the most basic level, living in poverty means the basic needs of a child—love and affection, stable living conditions, proper nutrition, adequate health care, and a good learning environment—are not always being met. Poverty impacts a student’s ability to receive the quality education they deserve, and yet a quality education can lift a student and an entire community out of poverty. This messy, symbiotic relationship between education and poverty is what we educators need to examine.
Poverty, Lunch, and the Minimum Wage
Among the most basic needs of a child is nutrition. We know that children who live in poverty struggle to get adequate quality food. Because of this, the federal government has stepped in to offer this most basic guarantee: that children living in poverty who attend school will be fed. The decision to feed our hungry students has altered the way policymakers measure poverty and changed the way educators talk about poverty.
If education is your field, you have heard the term “FRL.” I hear conversations with phrases like “We are 98 FRL” and “Our school went from 60 FRL to 76 FRL last year.” Educators use these coded sentences as shorthand to describe how much a particular school is impacted by poverty.
FRL means “free or reduced-priced lunch.” So how did lunch become a proxy for socioeconomic status? It all stems from a federal meal-assistance program called the National School Lunch Program, which addresses the clear link between poverty, food insecurity, and learning. As reported by Children’s Healthwatch, “By kindergarten, food-insecure children often are cognitively, emotionally and physically behind their food-secure peers.”
Sometimes we hear students who qualify for FRL or who live in poverty referred to as “low income,” “underresourced,” or “economically disadvantaged.” These euphemisms serve to shield us from the reality that so many students in our country face dramatic challenges. I argue that we need to confront the brutal truth. When our government must step in and provide meals for students, it means those students are living in poverty. We can change the wording, but the reality remains the same.
In My Classroom
Valerie Wintler, School Nurse
My school, Kunsmiller Creative Arts Academy, is unique because our school educates students from kindergarten all the way through the twelfth grade. This allows me, as the school nurse, to watch kids grow up. It also means I am witness to how poverty manifests itself throug
hout a child’s life. Poverty affects our students’ learning in very real ways. One of the most observable effects of poverty is hunger.
Before we started a breakfast program, each day three or four elementary school students would show up in my health office in the midmorning complaining of headaches or stomachaches. Young students have a harder time identifying that the discomfort they are feeling is directly related to being hungry. But, as a nurse, I realized very quickly that these were not symptoms of an illness. In actuality they were the symptoms of hunger. It was causing students to miss out on learning time in their classrooms.
My older students are just as affected by hunger. However, years of living with food insecurity have taught them to disguise their symptoms better. Adolescent students who are experiencing hunger act irritably, feel dizzy, or have trouble focusing—all of which could easily be confused for behavior problems. My high school students do not want their peers to know they are struggling with hunger or that they do not have sufficient access to food. I have heard teens say they just do not want to eat or they just don’t like the cafeteria food rather than admit they simply do not have the money to pay for it.
Many families at our school meet the requirements to qualify for free or reduced-price lunch, but there are still obstacles in their way. Sometimes families do not even realize that the school lunch program is available, but other times the paperwork alone is the challenge. That was the case for Brandon.
He was a common fixture in the principal’s office as a result of misbehavior. One day, Brandon was sent to the office after punching a locker in a moment of frustration. While I treated the wounds on his knuckles, I asked him what he had eaten that day. He answered, “Nothing.”
As I found out, most days he wasn’t eating breakfast or lunch because he didn’t have the money. The fixed income his grandmother, who was raising him, received would have qualified Brandon to receive free lunch, but for many reasons the forms were never filled out. Of course now that I know Brandon does not have stable access to food I make sure that he is fed. I am aware this does not address the root causes of his problem. And, regrettably, I know that American schools are filled with students who have the same story.
I Wish My Teacher Knew Page 4