how to take down a teacher in the ottawa district schhol board (sic)

The title was the search engine term used by one reader who reached my site.

Wolves taking down an elk (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It made me start thinking about my career with this board and the number of teachers in the board I have seen targeted, or I have been told about by a colleague who saw them targeted.

Here is a partial list of those cases in no particular order.  Some were dealt with fairly; some resulted in a teacher suspension or a teacher being charged.

1. A primary student told a supply teacher that he was going to tell the principal that he (the teacher) had taken down his (the student’s) pants.
2.   Parents decided a junior teacher was too fat to teach physical education and were instrumental in getting her dismissed.
3. Some intermediate girls were annoyed with their poor marks and got back at their teacher by falsely claiming that he had sexually assaulted them.
4. Some intermediate students set up a homophobic web site and showed it to one of their teachers on the assumption that he was gay.  The parents of one of them thought the subsequent suspension was unfair.
5. On two different occasions in the same school two different students lied about two different teachers in two consecutive years.  Instead of investigating, the principal turned each one over to the board which chose to believe the children.
6. A teacher on an exchange on the other side of the world was called by a friend to find out if she had a good lawyer.  Unbeknownst to her, she had been charged with sexual assault by a former student and it was all over the news.  The judge eventually threw it out of court but not before she and her family had been through public hell.
7. Thirteen parents got together in a private home to discuss a new teacher’s math program because A) she said math wasn’t her thing so she wouldn’t be running an extracurricular math program, B) she didn’t always teach from the textbook or assign lots of homework (she was an experienced math, English and social studies teacher).  The principal refused to deal with it.
8. A gifted and imaginative grade one teacher was turned on by the parents and her colleagues in the program she taught in because she (successfully) used whole language rather than phonics exercise books to teach reading.  Her students also learned to appreciate art through an appropriately designed unit on Matisse.  One of her colleagues even withdrew her daughter from the class.  Her principal did not defend her or reprimand the colleague.  She left the program.

Unfortunately this desire is not an anomaly.  There are many students and sometimes parents who want to “take down” a teacher.  If  parents support the students or the administration does not support the teacher, the life of the targeted teacher becomes hell.  Every action, every slip, bad call, ambiguous action becomes open to the worst possible interpretation. 

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Getting Ready for the Teacher-Parent Interview: Part One of Three

UNDERSTANDING THE ELEMENTARY REPORT CARD

 

You have received your child’s report card and on Thursday evening or Friday

 

Report Card, Winter 1903 (Photo credit: Carosaurus)

 

morning of this week you will be meeting with the teacher. If this is the first time your child has received a report card in Ontario, you may have some questions. To save you time in the fifteen minutes allotted with the teacher, I will try to clarify a few things below.

 

LEARNING SKILLS: The Heart of the Report Card

 

report card 1944 (Photo credit: pjern)

 

Teachers take the learning skills section of the report card very seriously. Twenty, even ten years ago, part of a mark in some subjects might have been for homework completion, effort or participation. That is no longer allowed. Teachers may not even take off marks for late assignments. The only place that those issues may be addressed now is in the learning skills section.Learning Skills per report card The nine learning skills are not a frill about non-academic issues but skills that go to the heart of your child’s long-term success in school and probably in the work world. Take a look and ask yourself if these aren’t qualities employers look for when they are hiring or promoting. I have attached the detailed lists of learning skills here so you can see what teachers take into account when they assign a Not Satisfactory, Satisfactory, Good or Excellent to each skill.

 

MARKS: the teachers use levels 1 to 4 for assessment

 

Let’s look at the marks assigned to the subjects. Teachers are required to assess students on a scale of 1 to 4 (I have covered R in a previous post R on the Report Card Does Not Mean F (Failure)). A level 3 is the provincial standard and should mean that the student has successfully mastered the material and skills. The key word here is mastered as opposed to crammed sufficiently to fake it on a test and then forget it. A level 2 means that the student is approaching mastery but needs more practice, time or effort. Usually the student can achieve a level 3 with more work. At a level 1 a student is floundering and unclear on the subject matter or weak in the skills. It is possible he might achieve a level 3, but a lot of help and extra work may be needed. If a student has a number of level 1s, parents and teachers should be prepared to discuss options for the next year such as retention, remediation or an individual education plan. A level 4 means that the student is regularly going beyond mastery in this area. It does not necessarily mean that the student is working above grade level although that is one possibility. Depending on the subject, the teacher might consider differentiating the program for some topics for this student. You might also discover that some of the work has been open-ended, allowing the student to go further in his work. BUT on the report card the marks are not shown as levels. It would make sense for the marks on elementary report cards to be written as levels 1, 2, 3 and 4, but they aren’t. Below is the chart the ministry produced in 1998 instructing the Boards of Education in Ontario about putting marks on report cards. Appendix B: Provincial Guide for Grading

 

Level	Definition	Letter Grade (Grades 1 to 6)	Percentage Mark (Grades 7 and 8)
Level 4	The student has demonstrated the required knowledge and skills. Achievement exceeds the provincial standard.	A+ A A–	90–100 85–89 80–84
Level 3	The student has demonstrated most of the required knowledge and skills. Achievement meets the provincial standard.	B+ B B-	77–79 73–76 70–72
Level 2	The student has demonstrated some of the required knowledge and skills. Achievement approaches the provincial standard.	C+ C C–	67–69 63–66 60–62
Level 1	The student has demonstrated some of the required knowledge and skills in limited ways. Achievement falls much below the provincial standard.	D+ D D–	57–59 53–56 50–52
R or Below 50	The student has not demonstrated the required knowledge and skills. Extensive remediation is required.	R	Below 50

 

CONFUSED?

 

The parent of a student in a grade one to six class shouldn’t be too confused; the A, B, C, Ds of old more or less match up with the new levels and the definitions help. The R makes sense. If your child is in grade seven or eight and you are trying to calculate how they got a certain percentage in a subject, stop! If the teacher followed orders, she assessed him using the 1 to 4 marking scheme, following the definitions listed in the chart and then converted the assessment to the meaningless percentage on the right. You need to remember that the percentage IS meaningless unless you interpret it according to the definition provided by the level.

 

IS THIS LESS CONFUSING?

 

The Ottawa Carleton District School Board tried to clarify things by telling teachers to use only specific numbers such as 52, 55 and 58 for level 1 and so on through the levels. Although it was a tad confusing for parents, that bit was relatively easy to explain. What was more difficult was the 20% spread for level 4 when all the other levels had a 10% spread. This made an A+ worth a heck of a lot more than an A-. Some top students began to feel cheated, especially initially when the top mark was 95%.

 

For More Information:

 

Getting Ready for the Teacher-Parent Interview: Part Two of Three to understand how comments are generated. Getting Ready for the Teacher-Parent Interview: Part Three of Three to reflect on how each of the three parties involved can work on any issues brought up by the report card. R on the Report Card Does Not Mean F (Failure) to understand what an R on the report card means.

 

Ottawa-Carleton District School Board (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

French Immersion: Is It Accessible to All Students?

2012_05_090007 One brain, two minds (Photo credit: Gwydion M. Williams)

Reviewing French Immersion research is like watching a shell game. Under this shell, FI is bilingual education and students benefit from the cognitive gains of being bilingual. If we study the shells a little further, we realise that even if the education were bilingual, the students aren’t. They may become bilingual if they remain in the program until the end of grade twelve but at the age of six or nine or twelve, no one could honestly describe them as bilingual. If students aren’t bilingual before they have completed the education, then they are not receiving the cognitive benefits of being bilingual until then. We will have to explore that in another post.

English: Chart showing rates of bilingualism in Canada, Quebec and the Rest of Canada 1941-2006. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Watch the next shell, ladies and gentlemen: the earlier students start French Immersion the better. The research says otherwise. For the most part there is little difference between the achievement of early immersion students and late immersion students. Most research supports students learning to read and write in their first language before they start to learn a second language. The skills they learn in their first language will transfer to the second; learning the second language is more efficient when an older and literacy experienced brain is being used. Another interesting set of facts to explore in another post.

Sackville EFI Protest (Photo credit: Harold Jarche)

Support for Children with Learning Difficulties in French Immersion is Rare in Most Provinces

Here’s a third shell: everyone can be in French Immersion! Indeed they can, provided they have the same supports that they would have in the regular English program. The truth is that the support varies from province to province and school board to school board. A child with a learning disability should theoretically have support in French from a special education teacher but the truth is that support is rarely there in the same way as it is for children in the English program. The policy on whether French Immersion is for all students is rarely spelled out explicitly; often one has to read between the lines. Let’s look at four Ontario school boards:

English: Chart showing rate of enrollement in French Immersion Programs in Canada, less Quebec 1980-2007. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Ontario’s Peel Board on Special Education Support in French Immersion

The Peel Board advises that FI is open to any child starting grade one, but qualifies that statement with the following caveat:

Based on more than 20 years of experience with immersion programs, we have found some characteristics that are common to successful students in French immersion. These characteristics are indicators to help you to make a good choice. We strongly recommend that you discuss these characteristics with your child’s kindergarten teacher.

A successful student:

is verbal and likes to talk

has strong skills in his or her first language

enjoys books

imitates easily

has a good memory

is confident

is a risk taker

enjoys new challenges

has demonstrated a successful transition from home to school

Pre-screening by parents, with the teacher’s guidance, is a clear indication that the Peel board believes that FI is not for all students and that this determination can be made by the beginning of grade one. The checklist describing the successful student reinforces the expectation that not all children will succeed in French Immersion. One would expect with the caveat above that a child who is not successful in the Peel Board’s FI program might be invited to transfer to the regular English program. It is unlikely that the child would be supported with remedial help or, if appropriate, special education resources. Another Ontario school board is not so explicit in suggesting requirements for success in the FI program, but they are there, nevertheless:

English: Political cartoon. Title: “The next favor. ‘A flag to suit the minority.'” French tricolor is given greater prominence than the Union Jack, and the maple leaf is surrounded by two fleurs-de-lis… (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Ontario’s Grand Erie Board pronounces

The French Immersion program is designed for English-speaking children. Students who possess good first-language skills, are good listeners, self-confident, and motivated, will likely do well in Immersion. 

 Grand Erie District School Board (February, 2009 )                                                                                                                    http://www.gedsb.on.ca

From Ontario’s Ottawa-Carleton Board on FI

The Ottawa-Carleton board explicitly notes that academic ability, economic or social status are not factors in succeeding in French Immersion. It is less explicit concerning the support provided for students in FI who might have learning difficulties:

Academic ability is not related to performance in French language skills. A child’s learning difficulties in reading, writing, or other subject areas will surface regardless of the language of instruction. These difficulties should not normally be a barrier to bilingual education. French Immersion teachers are very aware of children who may be experiencing learning problems and will work with your child to provide the learning support services required (bold & underlining mine) http://www.ocdsb.ca/Documents/OCDSB_Publications/FSL.pdf French As a Second Language Programs fact sheet (February, 2009)

Surely all teachers in this board are conscious of children who are experiencing learning problems. The difference is that the other teachers will not only work with those children, but they can draw on resources such as the Learning Support Teacher and, if the child is eventually IPRCed (identified as having a learning disability), the special education specialist in the school. It is entirely possible that things have changed since May of 2007 when the Special Assistance Team for the OCDSB wrote:

At present, it is clear that children experiencing learning difficulties or who have learning styles which, presently, are not necessarily accommodated in French Immersion programs are clustered in the English track schools which house the special education programs for students with exceptionalities and the English as a Second Language (ESL) students.

The Team, which reported to the Minister of Education for Ontario, went from description to prescription:

…student(s) who are experiencing difficulty in French Immersion … are often demitted quickly and sent from the school where they began their year to another school in the English stream. For some but not all students, the reason for demission from FI is deemed to be the need for Special Education support. This support must be available to all students in the Board regardless of their language of instruction. (bold & underlining mine) http://www.ocdsb.edu.on.ca/Documents/Board/Finances/SATReport.pdf (May 7, 2007)

It would be a reasonable assumption that this last sentence represents the ministry’s policy, but the statement in the ministry’s curriculum document for Extended French and French Immersion is not quite so explicit:

Extended French and French Immersion for Exceptional Students Recognizing the needs of exceptional students and providing appropriate programs and services for them are important aspects of planning and implementing the curriculum. A regulation made under the Education Act requires that school boards establish a committee, called an Identification, Placement, and Review Committee (IPRC), to identify and place exceptional students. When an IPRC identifies a student as exceptional, it must, in its statement of decision, provide a description of the student’s strengths and needs and a decision on appropriate placement for the student. The IPRC can also make recommendations for suitable education programs and services. When an IPRC identifies a student as exceptional, an Individual Education Plan (IEP) must be developed and maintained for that student. The Ontario Curriculum, Ministry of Education 2 0 0 1 French As a Second Language Extended French Grades 4-8 French Immersion Grades 1-8 Page 7

Ontario’s Trillium Lakeland’s Board’s Vision for FI Students

Finally in our sample of Ontario school boards is the Trillium Lakelands District School Board. Their web site has clear statements about their policies on French Immersion:

Our Vision for French Immersion

Trillium Lakelands District School Board supports the French Immersion Program and intends that the program be inclusive and accessible to all students within the Board. The Board also intends that graduates of the secondary school French Immersion Program will be able to communicate and function in French and be able to pursue work or postsecondary education in French.

Trillium Lakelands District School Board (February, 2009) http://www.tldsb.on.ca/pdfs/programs_frenchbrochure.pdf

In simple language, the Trillium board states how good the French of Immersion graduates must be and the board’s commitment to making FI accessible to all students. It is more explicit in its vision than the Ontario ministry. If you teach or have children in this board, please let me know if the TLDSB fulfills its vision or at least strives to! Let us turn finally to another province, Manitoba, for its policies on French Immersion:

Manitoba’s Expectations for Special Needs Services & FI

Curriculum Policy for the French Immersion Program July 2008, 3rd Edition http://www.edu.gov.mb.ca/k12/docs/policy/frenchimm/implem.pdf

4.5 SPECIAL NEEDS SERVICES

Special needs students are capable of learning another language. In view of this, every school offering a French Immersion program must provide the human and material resources to meet special needs requirements (remedial, counselling, and other specialised services), in the same way as schools offering the English program. These services must be available to the students in both English and French.

In other words, plan to provide all the services a child might need before planning a French Immersion program. If a board doesn’t have the resources in French to meet those needs, then an FI program is not possible; it needs rethinking! Compare Manitoba’s direct support for all students who wish to take French Immersion with Ontario’s sidestepping of the issue by describing the IPRC process. To meet special needs requirements for FI students requires money; in Ontario, it may mean using French funding for French instead of redirecting it to (for example) busing. For more on that issue, see my post: Is French Immersion a Money Maker for School Boards?

It is as simple as that. If we can’t provide the same services to students in French Immersion as we do to students in English language programs, then we are creating a ghetto of English language classes with large numbers of students needing special services and the same teacher student ratio as the French Immersion classes. Students fortunate enough to qualify for FI or who have parents who can pay for extra-curricular coaching can remain in an enclave of students without learning difficulties.

English: Dialects of the french language in the world (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Education in Ontario’s Dirty Little Secret

Let me add that this is a dirty little secret within our schools and has been for over twenty years; I have been chastised for accurately describing the English program classes when among colleagues. I was chastised not because I was wrong, but because it was disrespectful of the students and their teachers. I think the conditions those teachers and students work under is disrespectful; the truth is not.

Next post on French Immersion: the province that tried to do the right thing for all of its students and was run over by politics and French Immersion.

English: “STOP/ARRÊT”: bilingual stop sign in Ottawa, Ontario (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

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Another Curious Statistic

A School for Scientifically and Technically Talented Students

            One of my observations as a teacher of regular and gifted middle school students is that almost every parent wants their child to go to university.  They want their children in the university stream in secondary school and will rarely consider that a career in a trade might be an excellent goal.  Students whose intelligence is strongest in their ability to work with their hands are forced like square pegs into the round holes of an academic stream. The parents’ concern is understandable, as the second stream often becomes, in effect, a holding pen for the academically indifferent or inept. Many colleges are now requiring courses from the academic stream as part of their admissions criteria and there is no strong apprenticeship stream.

            The flip side is that many students who should be headed for a university education in math or science by the nature of their talents are often discouraged from taking shop courses.  They are encouraged to focus on the abstract and yet working with concrete materials would give embryo engineers a better understanding of problems they will usually deal with in the abstract.  In fact, in Ottawa, one of the gifted programs is housed in a school wholly without shops.

            The truth is that few people are wholly concrete thinkers or wholly abstract and both aspects of students’ abilities need to be nurtured.  We need a school where both kinds of talents are nurtured and seen as valuable and complementary.

            I propose a School for the Scientifically and Technically Talented.  This school would have a top notch program for the scientifically and mathematically gifted; a top notch program in a variety of trades, leading to an early apprenticeship and top notch specialists in giftedness, learning disabilities and gifted/learning disabled. 

            The reason for the specialists is that it is not unusual for students who have strong gifts in one area to have a learning disability in another.  In fact, the apparently lazy bright student is often both gifted and LD.  Sometimes the learning disability may be severe enough that scores on intelligences tests may appear lower than cut offs for gifted or academically talented programs.  Such students, however, may be extremely talented in specific areas.  This kind of profile is not limited to students with strong mathematical and technical talents, but it is seen frequently in them.  The specialists would help identify learning problems and work with students and teachers to discern ways to help talents flourish in spite of difficulties.

Students would be allowed and even encourage to take some options in an area they find interesting but aren’t sure they could manage.  In those courses, they would be given a peer mentor and extra help after school.  Their grades in those courses would be pass/fail/honours so they could focus on learning,

            Academically oriented students would have access to shop courses all the way through secondary school and if they wished, they could extend their time in school to start an apprenticeship and complete the requirements for university. 

            Students who do not think of themselves as academically oriented would have access to academic courses and support.  If they needed a bridge class to qualify to do an academic course, it would be available.  It would be possible for a student who started as an apprentice to finish with qualifications to apply for university if she so chose.  She could also finish her apprenticeship.

Bridge classes are not a new concept, but few actually exist in reality.  If bridge classes would be too small to justify a teacher, then correspondence classes would be set up for these students with a supervising teacher in the school available to help as needed.  The concept would be much the same as is used in many alternative secondary schools where students work at their own speed to cover the material.

There would be several criteria for entrance to this school: middle school marks, recommendations from shop, home economics or art teachers, an observed workshop in which students created a project out of materials in a set time, recommendations from home room, science, math or geography teachers and an interview.  None of the criteria in itself would block a student from entering the school; poor marks with positive results in every other area might be fine.  Excellent marks with poor recommendations and a demonstrated inability to share ideas and work with others might result in a refusal.

            The school would have the prestige of gifted programs, so parents of less academically oriented students would be more inclined to let their children go there.  The academic students who went there would have the appropriate programs and teachers to develop their talents, too, but they would also have the opportunity to develop complementary hands on skills.

            Concrete thinkers who were uncomfortable with academics would have their strengths nurtured.  Eventually they might discover a need for math or physics as they become more skilled in shop work.  Academic work that relates to the real world might be a great motivator.  Success breeds success and students who might not have done more than drifted through high school may find a meaningful education that will give them a strong foundation for their post-secondary life.

            Co-operative work programs would be a large factor in this school’s life.  Clearly, students in apprenticeship programs will need to spend time in the field practising, but all students would be encouraged to do at least one co-op program, preferably in a field that interests them.  I suspect a little time spent with a real engineer on the job might change a few students’ minds about the charms of that iron ring.  Time in a hospital might make them aware of the different skills and specialties needed in the medical field.

            In short, the concept behind this school would be to get talented abstract and concrete thinkers in science and technology exposed to the variety of skills available to them.  It is also intended to get us past the snobbery that believes academic skills are more valuable that technical skills.  Think of it: both a good surgeon and a good mechanic can save your life.  We want both of them to be skilled and thinking outside the box.

            And if it were in Ottawa, where would we place it?  In the new mixed use downtown school with the condominium above it and the most of the major bus routes (when there isn’t a strike!) running past it.