Memories, Mysteries, and Mice

Getting occasional glimpses into the inner workings of our students' mental machinery is one of the fringe benefits of being a special education teacher. These little moments, where we get to glance behind the curtain of persona and see the neural processes hard at work maintaining this mysterious thing called sentience, these little moments of insight are fascinating, tantalizing, and awe-inspiring. 

Of all things cognitive, memory seems at once both the most mechanical and the most mysterious. Who, exactly, is in charge of prioritizing memories up there? As a child I imagined a librarian, stooped, rushing through the stacks at attention's beck and call, trying to retrieve the relevant information. Apparently, biologists have now begun to identify "engrams" -- precise neurological locations where individual memories have been stored. My librarian's Dewey decimal-determined shelves. 

As a special education teacher I twice witnessed memories miscatalogued as a result of extreme emotional states. First was a twelve year old girl, "Emily", who along with her classmate "Julia" stayed after class with me one day. They were tired, the content was hard, and they were begining to get restless. I negotiated with them (I know, I know): they could take a five-minute break, to be as silly as they wanted, if afterwards they would settle back down to work. 

Understand that Emily and Julia, while peers and similar in personality, were a long way apart, socially. Emily was always just a little bit behind her more saavy friend and struggled to catch up. She had a fairly severe case of OCD and several quirky, if endearing, tics. Julia was also quirky, but in an artistic and socially acceptable way, and she'd been making a lot of friends. I didn't know how the two of them would use their "silly break", but I was certainly surprised when they locked arms and began dancing, spinning, and singing all around the room. 

It was a hilarious, adorable sight and the three of us were barely able to get back to work for all the laughing. Both girls were thrilled to have been so unreservedly childish for a minute with no social consequence and I felt like quite the teacher for letting them do so. After several minutes of giggling we resumed the review and, true to their word, the girls were diligent and working hard. But suddenly, Emily looked up with wide-eyed amazement and said to both of us, "do you remember that time when we hugged and danced all around this room?" 

Julia and I looked at each other and at her. It was obvious that Emily hadn't just mis-phrased her statement. Julia said something like, "uh, you mean, just now?" and Emily got confused. She said she didn't remember exactly when but did we remember how fun it had been? I confirmed for her what Julia had said, that the incident in question had literally just happened, and Emily's confusion turned to embarassment as she realized her mistake. She tried to play it off and we moved on, but I have never forgotten how mysteriously her memory had misbehaved. The best I can figure is that, in the extreme thrill of sharing a fun moment with a girl she admired, Emily somehow shuffled a very short-term memory all the way back into her long-term memory banks (to the back of the stacks), and then struggled to percieve it in the way that we did. 

I would have remembered that moment as unique for the rest of my life even had I not encountered almost the same exact phenomenon about five years later as a chaperone on a trip to Washington, D.C. There I had a student, Katie, who had a meltdown on a street corner. 

There were about ten students on the trip, all with learning disabilities, along with myself and another teacher. Katie had sworn both of us teachers off and was pacing, crying, and screaming on a small patch of grass in the middle of an otherwise busy street corner. She was inconsolable and exhausted, largely as a result of a long day of walking the noisy, smoggy, crowded D.C. streets and a confrontation that had to be had regarding a particularly unappealing hooded sweatshirt which she refused to change out of. Neither myself nor my co-teacher could get much of a handle on the situation, and all of the other students were getting sick of standing around, so I sent the group back to the hotel with Mrs. French and I stayed with Katie's best friend, waiting for her to calm down. 

Without an audience, and thanks to the soothing influence of her friend, Katie eventually did. She came and sat and allowed herself to relax for a minute and then the three of us got an ice cream and began walking back to the subway stop. Once again, all three of us were in good spirits and I was in my usual self-congratulatory mood.  As we turned onto Constitution Avenue, a large motorcade came up behind us. With about a dozen cars and motorcycles as an escort, a large limousine passed. Inside we could see the familiar round head and narrow eyes of former Vice President Dick Cheney. Excitedly we continued onto the subway, eager to tell the rest of the group. This, of course, being exactly the kind of thing you hope to see in the Capital. 

On our way back we stopped in a Walgreen's to replace the offending sweatshirt. Upon exiting the store, Katie, like Emily some years before, stopped and said to us, "hey, do you guys remember that time we saw Dick Cheney in a limousine?" As before, her friend and I were startled by the statement and asked her if she meant what had just happened. As before, with Emily, Katie was at first confused and then embarrassed by what we were saying. As before, it didn't seem like a language disfunction that had set her understanding askew but rather some kind of miscataloguing of the memory into long-term storage while the event was still fresh at hand. 

Are either of these two events scientifically relevant? Probably not, although this article http://nyti.ms/14am4Gk in today's newspaper discusses a recent, related discovery in mice. Apparently, scientists were able to create a false memory in the mind of a mouse by stimulating the part of the brain where a prior memory was held while creating a new one. It's an interesting article, although not quite as bafffling as my encounter with these strange breakdowns in long-term/short-term storage. 

The larger point is that this is what we get, as special education teachers. We get the chance to encounter the human mind engaged in fascinating, complex, and often hilarious confoundments with itself. And we get to love and support the children whose minds are often so involved. And we get to foster the amazing insights and unique abilities that so often acompany those befuddlements. And it's fascinating and it's fun. I wouldn't want to do anything else. 

Perspective Shift

So as you might know, I wound up with a pretty cool job recently.. And it's a job for which I do a lot of blogging about education & disability issues (and work with teachers from all around Central TX), so I haven't been compelled to post on here in a while. But over the holiday I've been reflecting on just how far my attitudes and mission regarding disabilities have had to change.

My position at Region 13, nay my department, is essentially funded by the Individuals with Disabilities in Education Act, 2004 re-authorization. That Act lays out a number of vital points, but the ones that most concern me are ensuring that students with disabilities get: 1. access to the general curriculum 2. in the least restrictive environment possible. These themes, AGC and LRE, are what essentially define what I do with the Region.

Those who know me know that I've spent the past 10 or so years at private schools for students with learning disabilities, designing and delivering non-conventional academic content as a teacher and an administrator. In other words, ensuring that students 1. access an alternate curriculum 2. in a very restrictive environment. (Restrictive here meaning isolated from the general population of students).

And in that role I often found myself defending the isolated environment by the results: our students' self-esteems were enhanced and we helped them access the really vital life skills: goal-setting, self-awareness, proactivity, perseverance and the like. I believed we were serving them well, and I still do.

Now my role is completely different. Now I have to help these square pegs fit into round holes of Texas' public schools. And to do that means working with the teachers and administrators who, by law, have got to find a way to serve these kids in the most mainstreamed environment as is possible and beneficial.

It is different. Disability rights may be the final frontier of the civil rights movement. I think it's also the most complex. And my journey is just beginning.

Schools and the Tragedy of the Commons

 

Are you familiar with a theory called "The Tragedy of the Commons"? It's a scenario that's been played out in societies all around the world. A resource (a piece of grazing land, for example), is owned by the city or the town and shared by the citizens of that town, (ie. shepherds). All of the users have an obligation to steward and sustain the common resource for future use. The "Tragedy" arises when individual self-interest trumps restraint and the resource is depleted, (ie. when individual shepherds overgraze).

The concept has been generally applied to the depletion of shared natural resources: over-fishing, pollution, and so forth. And, of course, the scenario actually was played out on Boston Commons. What I would like to propose is that it may also apply to public education, and if so, in a more subtle way than is typically thought.

A simplified version of the argument for privatizing public education (whether by giving cash vouchers for families to spend at private schools or by giving public funds to private entities in the form of charter schools) is this:

The investment we are making is in this individual child, at a rate of between $6,000 and $9,000 a year. We, the people, must get the most out of our investment by giving the child the best education possible. Whether that education comes from a non-public entity or a public one is irrelevant, since the return we expect on our investment comes in the form of that child's education (ie. career prospects, contributions as a citizen, and general well-being). 

It is a convincing, child-centered argument. Considering our cumulative tax dollars as a "gift" to each person of school age. the argument holds. But considering it as a collective investment of public funds, the argument is short-sighted. What it misses is this:

Public schools, their buildings, grounds, and, most importantly, the people who run them, are public assets. We have an interest in their quality and sustainability, not just for the current generation of students in them, but for generations to come. At a public school, the cost of educating an individual student is also an investment in the system that we ourselves own. 

The equivalent per-student cost, paid to a private entity, does not enhance the value of a common, shared resource (the school and its people). It destabilizes the system by failing to invest in the future. 

"School choice" propoenents argue for the savings to the public through privatizing education. Becaue the state doesn't pay for buildings and grounds costs, the per-pupil cost is much less. As are, on average, the teachers' salaries. But we the People don't get a sustainable physical asset (b&g) out of our investment and nor do we get a sustainable human asset (a community of public teachers). 

Of course vouchers and charters are cheaper -- we the People make the investment one kid, one citizen at a time. We lose the other shared asset, the commons of the school itself. The difference in educational quality had better be profound to justify such a trade-off. I'm willing to entertain that it might be, but haven't been convinced yet.

Region XIII

Education and educational choice are so much in the news right now that I feel like I should have a coherent stance on them all: charter schools, vouchers (especially for special education students), merit pay, high stakes testing, and more. The truth is, I don't really have a clue. As much as the progressive in me shrinks at the private interests that seem to be encroaching on our public education systems, I also know that change is a constant and that those systems need help.

That is sort of a roundabout way of introducing my real news, which is that I have accepted a job with Region XIII, our local Education Service Center.

I will be working with an amazing team of educators whose focus is on improving access to the general curriculum for students receiving special education services. We provide services like professional development sessions, teacher training, classroom materials, and more. So what student population do I wind up supporting? Exceptional learners -- on a very large scale.

I am both very excited and very nervous about this position. The people and the team at Region XIII are extraordinary and it will take my very best work to live up to their standards. My years in private schools have been very rewarding, both in terms of the students I have supported and the parents I have met, but I am very, very excited to be working for the public system.

Read more about Region XIII here. I will continue to offer support to individual students and families through the Exceptional Paths site. And since this position requires me to be more involved in education at the public sector, I will be now using my twitter account: @mwholloway.

-- MH

TV Testing

Got on TV again last night. For a private school teacher, I seem to get an inordinate amount of play on local cable: five appearances in the past two years. Chalk it up to being a squeaky wheel. Of course, the first four were just thinly disguised shill for my former employer. Last night was different.

I took my wife to an event called "The Real Trouble with Testing", sponsored by the Texas Observer and hosted by the activism non-profit 5604 Manor. The panel, led by Observer reporter Pat Michels, talked at length about the nefarious effects of high-stakes testing on the public schools and their budgets. It's a Goliath of a problem, since test-makers and educational publishers have such a loud voice in the legislature. Who is there to fight back against this huge corporate interest?

Granted, I've never worked in the public schools. But I went to public schools, and I know that if 45 out of my 180-day school year had been spent on test review, test prep, testing, and re-testing, I probably would have been unhappy.

Why all the testing? To generate data. Why generate data? To justify spending. And why this kind of spending? Because it takes faith in students to make good teachers, faith in teachers to make good principals, faith in principals to make good superintendants, faith in superintendants to make good school boards, faith in school boards to make good state agencies, and faith in state agencies to make a good federal education system. It's the kind of faith that takes a risk, and risks are bad for job security. Better to make decisions based on data, no matter how easily manipulated or misleading that data is.

So my pull-away quote will probably be something about all that. I also mentioned the only piece of data that really changes society: the drop-out rate. Can't wait to see what Pearson has in mind for that one.

The story should be on YNN next week as a part of a back-to-school series. The talented Jennifer Borget was putting it together but unsure what day it would air. 

-- MH

True Philosophers

The best thing about working with exceptional learners is their natural curiosity. Particularly students with learning disabilities, who seem to be disproportionately eager for knowledge in conversation. Those same kids whose teachers often say he doesn’t want to be here during conventional classroom exercises are the ones who are bubbling fonts of information and ideas during casual conversation.

Why might this be?

Over the years, I’ve come to believe that the experience of missing out on core learning modalities, whether due to reading disability, receptive language disorders, attention disorders, or some other deficit -- I've come to believe that the frustration over that gap in their learning abilities makes them more eager to absorb knowledge in the manner most appropriate to them.

Remember when your parents told you not to go in that room? It’s kind of like that: access denied is access desired. So, instead of the stereotype of the learning disabled student as in need of trade school or vocational learning, in need of a job, let’s think of these students as being sorely in need of knowledge.

Just like everybody else.

The word philosophy is usually applied to a way of thinking (my philosophy of weight loss or the philosophy of our company). This misses out on the basic origins of the word: philos (love) + sophos (wisdom). The philosopher is not the one who has the wisdom, the philosopher is the one who loves the wisdom. And I believe there is all the difference in the world between the two. 



"much learning does not teach understanding" -- Heraclitus

westward, look, the land is bright!

It's hard not to be overly-concerned with outcomes when you're teaching. There is a special, awful, crumbling feeling that descends when you realize that the kids are not getting what you want them to get. My natural instinct has always been to try harder. 

The best teachers recognize what they do and don't have control over. Can we control learning? I'm not really sure. We can present our lessons, our activities. We can motivate and inspire our students. But can we actually control and refine every piece of information that goes into their brains? No. Should we try to? 

No!

 

Great teachers realize that they are in control of the teaching, but only the student can be in control of the learning. And that vast, awe-inspiring process of learning is subtle, complex, and unpredictable. Like the third stanza of the poem below, the waves of our teaching might not always seem to be breaking through into our students' understanding. That's okay, the poet tells us, because we don't know what inlets of growth and development are surging up around us, outside of our power. 

The final stanza is absolutely stunning. The sun may rise in the East-- and instruction might begin with the teacher -- but daylight falls across the earth, and learning occurs in wonderfully unpredictable ways. 

Say not the struggle naught availeth

Say not the struggle naught availeth,
   The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
   And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
   It may be, in yon smoke conceal'd,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
   And, but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
   Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
   Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,
   When daylight comes, comes in the light;
In front the sun climbs slow, how slowly!
   But westward, look, the land is bright!

Arthur Hugh Clough

1849