Teaching the teachers
MAIN: Teaching the teachers
Saturday, April 12, 20081
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NORTHAMPTON - "Miss Walton! Miss Walton!" Almost all the 18 second-graders in Robbie Murphy's classroom at the Smith College Campus School had their hands in the air, eager to answer the math question posed by their 28-year-old student-teacher, Anna Walton, who had a smile to make the day begin. It was clear they wanted to please her, to make her happy, to bask in that smile and feel good about themselves.
But Walton's eyes were scanning over the circle of kids on the rug before her, just as interested in those not raising their hands as those who were.
From her years in the Ada Comstock program for nontraditional students at Smith College, and her own life experiences, Walton's powers of observation have been honed.
"I knew who would get it right away and who would not get it, but not say so," she said.
Helping the ones who don't get it is what gets Anna Walton out of bed each morning. She was born to teach. It just took her a while to realize it.
Walton is in the middle of a semester-long stint in Murphy's classroom that began in February and will continue into May.
Student teaching consists of 12 hours of classroom time per week for two semesters, some 400 hours, plus a summer preparation program, most completed in an undergraduate's senior year. They'll also spend one to two hours a week planning lessons with cooperating teachers and generally picking their brains. Prospective elementary school teachers like Walton are required to spend semesters in two different grade levels. Smith sends out about 25 students per semester into area schools, mostly in Hampshire County.
"It's a difficult apprenticeship to become a new teacher," said Jack Czajkowski, director of teacher education at Smith, "and experience matters. They will meet with parents, design lesson plans, anything you might expect in a classroom. They will be observed by Smith supervisors, their performances recorded on videotape. But it's done in the spirit of coaching, with a lot of reflective development."
Student teachers combine initial observation with actual teaching, but the teaching part comes very early on, according to Czajkowski, a little bit at a time, in what is known as "graduated responsibility."
"A student teacher may take on seven in a reading group, but not the whole class. It gives them a chance to get comfortable before taking on a little more," he said. "How quickly that responsibility is given is negotiated with the teacher in charge."
Rules differ from district to district, but in some cases, student teachers are left in the classroom without the watchful eye of their mentors.
"That usually happens late in the experience, at the end of the semester," said JFK Middle School Principal Lesley Wilson, whose school generally has three or four student teachers in the building. "The teacher in charge will let them know where they are. It can be really positive."
So, while Walton spends a good part of each day with kids in a classroom, she's spending the rest of the day managing a full 16-credit course load, taking courses in adolescent growth, educational psychology, and how children learn to read, along with specialized courses in special education.
"You might get something out of a class on Tuesday and put it to direct use on Wednesday," said Czajkowski.
The need for qualified teachers is great, especially in the southern and eastern parts of the state, said Czajkowski. "Cities and towns offer retirement incentives. An estimated 4,000 teachers out of 80,000 statewide are expected to retire this year," he said. "There's also a great turnover among teachers, with 30 to 50 percent leaving after five years."
And people are answering the call. Last year, 800 people took the teacher-certification exams.
This year, in Northampton public schools, there are an estimated 25 student teachers in classrooms around the city.
This is one student-teacher's story.
A circuitous route
Anna Walton started out playing the cello, played it all through her years at Martha's Vineyard Regional High School, and once shared a stage with James Taylor in a 1997 concert.
"It was just for one song. He was looking for someone to play the Yo Yo Ma part and my teacher recommended me. He was great to work with."
That fall, she lugged her cello to the University of Massachusetts as a music major, but quickly became disillusioned. The 8 a.m. cello lessons made her question her chosen path. "I realized I loved music, but without getting a degree in it."
Walton dropped out and went home. She got her first taste of the classroom when she assisted for a semester at a Montessori school.
But before she could process the experience, and decide how that might fit into her future, Walton was off again, with her cello and duffel bag, moving to New Orleans with her best friend in the fall of 2000, where she worked for several years in a French Quarter praline shop. She went back to school in January 2003 at the University of New Orleans, then spent the following year as an exchange student at the University of Innsbruck in Austria. On her way back to New Orleans in 2005, Hurricane Katrina hit. Her apartment house and belongings were destroyed, and, of course, the college closed. A shaken Walton decided to slack off for a while at her parents' to get over it. But her brother James called from London, and in a torrent of tough love, told her to "get back out there and buck up!"
She enrolled at Smith College, taking classes in environmental ethics, early childhood development and comparative education. She even took one on geology and natural disasters, what she calls "therapy through technical knowledge."
A post-Katrina agreement that Smith and many other schools made was to not keep the guest students once the schools were back in session. Walton took a semester off, disassociating herself with New Orleans in the process, and then returned to Smith as an Ada Comstock scholar in the fall of 2006, devouring every credit required to be an elementary school teacher.
Her student teaching began last semester in the Center School in Easthampton with Ellen Lowell's third grade class, and continues this semester at the Campus School with Robbie Murphy's second-graders. Where students do their practice teaching is based on many variables, said Czajkowski. "Personalities figure in the match, but it's mostly a matter of a teacher's interests," he said.
Czajkowski said that one student was placed in Leverett schools this year because that's where she's from. Requests for placements are generated from the college's end; principals then send out notices to faculty, determining which teachers might be interested in taking someone on. Murphy says yes a lot.
Murphy and Walton teach Investigations, a system of math instruction, where students look at numbers from many different angles, use their deductive powers to arrive at answers, then explain how they got there. As the walls shuddered from students upstairs coming in from recess, Walton asked a lot of questions, posing things in different ways. Understanding the base 10 number system and how to add 10 to a one-digit number were the exercises for the day.
"Franco had 62 pennies," said Walton. "If he trades the pennies for as many dimes as he can, what would that look like?"
After working out the problems on a sheet, the students all met back on the rug and defended their findings.
Asking one girl how she arrived at the answer, the girl pointed to her head.
"I know you did it in your head," Walton smiled, "but now you need to draw a picture. Pretend you're explaining it to someone who doesn't get it."
"She unfolds a beautifully sequenced lesson," said an admiring Murphy. "She's making learning delightful."
Murphy does not hover over her younger protege and scrutinize her every move. The women treat each other as trusted colleagues; when the group splits up to work out problems on study sheets, Walton gives a child some private instruction in one corner of the room, while Murphy does the same in another.
Walton spent the first couple of weeks observing Murphy, taking extensive notes on the kids, watching their social patterns, getting a feel for classroom rituals. "I think that even the most well-behaved class is going to test you a little the first time you fly solo, see if they can get away with doing things the lead teacher wouldn't let them do," said Walton. "I had a couple of minor power struggles but was pretty satisfied with the way I dealt with them. I kept my cool. It made me really evaluate my management style, but it also made me more confident."
Murphy called her protege "curious and reflective."
"She's fascinated by theories about teaching and learning, aware that it's a very nuanced profession," said Murphy.
The kick that Anna Walton seems to get out of teaching can be seen on Murphy's face, too. "I'm lucky to have found what I love," said Murphy, now in her 18th year in the classroom.
But teaching can be highly stressful, with a burnout factor than can dampen the zeal of the most idealistic. Walton realizes that, but puts it in perspective. "You've got highs and lows," she said, "but every day is different. I could see myself doing this for 20 or 30 years."
Walton will graduate this spring with a double major in education and general studies, which include completed courses in math, literature, science and history, along with child development, curriculum and instruction, and philosophical foundations.
She has been offered a coveted fellowship at Smith for next year, where she'll work toward a master's degree and do another year of student teaching at the Campus School, this time for 16 hours a week.
There are three state-mandated licensure tests - in Communication and Literacy, General Curriculum, and Foundations of Reading. Walton has already passed two, but will probably put off taking the third until next year.
Walton is acutely aware of the ongoing discussions on the school budget in Northampton and the prospect of teacher layoffs or school closings. "People don't understand what goes into it and how important teaching is. I think teachers are valued, but nobody wants to pay higher taxes."
But for right now, Anna Walton is enjoying every minute of her burgeoning career, glad that she came to it late. "I'm more confident, very settled at 28. I'm taking charge of being myself."
As for where she'd like to teach, Walton admits to some uncertainty.
"Maybe I'll just wait for a job offer."
Bob Flaherty can be reached at bflaherty@gazettenet.com.
