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Thinking and Learning through Children's Literature

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Thinking and Learning through Children's Literature

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Tweets by kwamealexander

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Kwame Alexander is a poet, educator, New York Times Bestselling author of 21 books, and recipient of the 2015 Newbery Medal for his novel, T

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Kwame Alexander: Take a Knee - ESPN Video

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The Newbery Medal winning poet delivers a new piece for The Undefeated

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The Power of Yes | Kwame Alexander | TEDxHerndon

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Poet’s novel turns young sports lovers into book lovers

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Poet’s novel turns young sports lovers into book lovers

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Poet’s novel turns young sports lovers into book lovers

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2015 Newbery-Caldecott-Wilder Banquet: Kwame Alexander Newbery Speech

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2015 Newbery-Caldecott-Wilder Banquet: Kwame Alexander Newbery Speech

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Association for Library Service to Children

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2015 Newbery-Caldecott-Wilder Banquet: Kwame Alexander Newbery Speech

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2015 Newbery-Caldecott-Wilder Banquet June 28, 2015 San Francisco, CA Kwame Alexander 2015 Newbery Medalist--The Crossover

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How Novelist Kwame Alexander Hooks Teens on Poetry

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How Novelist Kwame Alexander Hooks Teens on Poetry

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When Kwame Alexander talks, you can sense something irrepressible just under the surface-laughter, maybe, or swagger-dying to burst forth. It's the same vibe the 12-year-old protagonist of his Newbery Medal-winning 2014 novel-in-verse, The Crossover, exudes on the basketball court. Alexander, 48, was a baller himself: "I was No. 1 on the tennis team," he says. "I beat everybody."

Raised in New York City and later Virginia by literary types-publisher dad, English teacher mom-Alexander has produced two dozen titles to date, from a collection of Tupac essays he edited to poetry volumes and children's picture books. , out August 1, is a young-adult novel co-written with the children's author and editor Mary Rand Hess. Using poems as their vehicle, Alexander and Hess follow the travails of 17-year-old Blade Morrison, the scion of a profligate Los Angeles rock star, as he stumbles along a path of self-discovery that takes him to Ghana-to the same remote village, in fact, where Alexander co-founded a real-life nonprofit that provides books, teacher training, and literacy programs for children.

Mother Jones: Many Americans these days think of poems as something to pull out for birthdays, weddings, and funerals. Were you surprised The Crossover was such a slam dunk?

Kwame Alexander: I wasn't. I spent the last 20 to 30 years reciting poetry in schools or performing at open mics in churches and universities. I got firsthand feedback in the form of standing ovations, or fourth-graders asking me to autograph their hands, or people in church saying, "Amen. Hallelujah!" I courted my girlfriend back in 1998 by writing her a poem a day for a year-and she married me!

MJ: She'd better have!

KA: Right? So I knew poetry worked. I figured I was gonna be the guy to remind us that we all love it.

MJ: Solo could be a hit, too. It's hard to put down. It actually kind of made me cry.

KA: Thank you, man. I've been so unsure about this novel because Young Adult is such a different space than Middle Grade. You've got to be a little bit edgier-you gotta get deep.

MJ: I actually thought my son would reject The Crossover because of the poetic form, but he ended up liking it. Do you hear that a lot?
"We expect kids to go straight from Shel Silverstein to William Shakespeare."
KA: All the time. We expect kids to go straight from Shel Silverstein to William Shakespeare. There needs to be a bridge of relatable, fun, rhythmic verse that gets kids to cross over, so to speak, so they can appreciate Mary Oliver and Naomi Shihab Nye and Langston Hughes and e. e. Cummings.

MJ: Are you a musician?

KA: I don't play, but I consider myself a music aficionado. I listen to instrumental jazz when I'm writing. Before I'm headed to do a reading or a talk or a keynote, I'm listening to hip-hop or bossanova to get me in that cool mindset. If I'm on the beach, on a road trip, maybe I'm listening to some country music.

MJ: Wait, country?

KA: Yeah, man! [ Laughs.] Country music is a story. I'm a storyteller.

MJ: Do you think hip-hop has helped make poetry cool again?

KA: Or poetry helped make hip-hop an art form. Poetry and hip-hop are cousins. They're trying to do different things. If you put some Lil Wayne lyrics down on a page, am I gonna be able to read that and say, "Oh, wow, there's some sort of transformation that's happening in my soul?" I think the answer is no. But I don't think that makes hip-hop any less than poetry.

MJ: Judging from Solo, you also know a bit about rock and roll.
"The soundtrack for road trips with my buddies was Genesis and the Police and Tears for Fears."
KA: In the mid-to-late '80s, man, I was a tennis star. The soundtrack for my tennis tournaments and road trips with my buddies was Genesis and the Police and Tears for Fears-that whole '80s rock and new wave stuff really spoke to us. I knew I wanted to pay tribute to that part of my life, the love and the loss and everything that I experienced during those teenage years.

MJ: Did your black friends give you shit about the tennis and the rock music?

KA: Of course! But I had been raised to be confident in my own space. I could move in and out of circles. [The poet] Nikki Giovanni says, "You gotta dance naked on the floor, and people will watch you or they'll go home, but you gotta be confident in it." If I was playing tennis, I was wearing my high-top Chuck Taylors and my corduroy shorts and my cutoff T-shirts while everyone else had white shorts, white shirts, white socks, white sneakers. You gotta be who you are wherever you are. I think that's what Blade is trying to discover.

MJ: Blade's rocker dad is named Rutherford Morrison. Is that an amalgam of Mike Rutherford and Jim Morrison?

KA: Exactly.

MJ: Mike Rutherford stole my name for his stupid band, Mike and the Mechanics. I may never forgive him.

KA: There you go! We went through so many names that sort of epitomized rock, and Morrison was the one that had the right syllabic count. Mary came up with Rutherford.

MJ: I'll have to have a talk with her. In any case, Blade and his sister, Storm, are both named after comic book characters. Were you a comic geek, too?

KA: I wasn't. But I am working on Rebound, the prequel to The Crossover. The main character is the father from The Crossover when he was 12. He's a Fantastic Four and a Black Panther fanatic. So I've been immersed.
"If your father, who is known for carrying around a belt, told you to read a book, you went and did it."
MJ: You come from a bookish family. Give me the dinner table scene.

KA: Literature was at the forefront of our dinner table conversation, our vacations, our chores-my father owned a publishing company and I was in charge of licking envelopes with catalogs to send out. Every Thanksgiving, we traveled back to New York City and my father held a book fair in Harlem the day after. We all worked this fair, selling books. We went to the same Chinese restaurant every Thanksgiving. As the oldest kid, who was forced to read books like Pedagogy of the Oppressed at age 11, I hated books! All these books ended up being good, but I wanted nothing to do with it. The thing that brought me back to a love of literature was I was nerdy and shy when it came to girls, so I began to write poems for them. All of a sudden I was the cool guy.

MJ: How did your dad make you read these books?

KA: If your father, who is known for carrying around a belt, told you to read a book, you went and did it. I've never spanked my kid-I think because in my household you were afraid. If you did something wrong and got caught, you were getting spanked.

MJ: So your muse was the belt.

KA: Exactly. But during my middle and high school years it was the music-the classic rock, the gospel my parents sometimes played, and eventually jazz. I came home from college and discovered in my attic three crates of jazz: Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, Ornette Coleman, Miles Davis-records my father had purchased when he was my age or a bit older. I discovered that he used to listen to "I've Got You Under My Skin" and John Coltrane's "Naima." That was when I sort of fell in love with my dad.

MJ: Yeah, I did notice a sort of "coming to dad" element in your books.

KA: One of my editors says I have daddy issues because I'm always trying to get rid of the dads, or they're not functioning at a very positive level. My dad likes to say he deserves royalties!

MJ: What kinds of books did your father publish?
"We're still dealing with racism," but "I choose to write books about black people where we are normal."
KA: Boring educational tomes that no kid wants to read. Books about history and education, and books that were gonna change the world in a way that he saw fit. Now I go back and look at them, and at the work I'm doing in schools and in Ghana, and I realize I am essentially taking what my father did to another level. How ironic is that?

MJ: When you first went to Ghana, were you kind of thinking, "Hmm, this would make a good setting?"

KA: No. In fact, in the first draft, [that part of Solo] took place in Kenya. Neither one of us had been to Kenya, but I knew Ghana intimately. I'd been hiking there. I'd been in the village trying to build a library. I'd been in the rainforest. Mary said, "Well, Kwame, maybe we're not in Kenya. Maybe we're in Ghana." I sort of pinched myself, like, "Why didn't you think of this before?"

MJ: So, how does one write this kind of book with another person?

KA: We outline it completely. We know exactly what the beginning, middle, and end is. We write a couple poems and try to understand the style. We may write the same poem together, or we may go, "You go do that poem; I'm gonna do this one." Months later, we've got hundreds of poems and we lay them all out on the floor and rearrange them. So the first draft is just like putting a puzzle together. Mary and I are very similar in our writing, and where we aren't, we can channel each other.

MJ: I wanted to touch on race again. The Crossover is really about just being a kid, not about being a black kid. But those things can be hard to separate.

KA: There are places and spaces for black writers to write about race as a central thing. It's important. We're still dealing with the remnants of slavery. We're still dealing with racism on a daily basis. For me, I choose to write books about black people where we are normal. I was raised to believe that I deserve to be in a room just like anybody else. I try to write books like that.

MJ: So what's next for you, besides the Crossover prequel?

KA: Solo was dealing with rock. The next book, Swing, will be dealing with jazz. To complete the trilogy of my tribute to the music of my life, the third book will probably have something to do with hip-hop. [L aughs.] Or country.

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YA novelist Kwame Alexander has daddy issues

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When Kwame Alexander talks, you can sense something irrepressible just under the surface-laughter, maybe, or swagger-dying to burst forth. It's the same vibe the 12-year-old protagonist of his Newbery Medal-winning 2014 novel-in-verse, The Crossover , exudes on the basketball court. Alexander, 48, was a baller himself: "I was No.

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"A conversation between Kwame Alexander, Dorothy Carter Writer-in-Residence and 2015 Newbery Medalist, and his father, Dr. E. Curtis Alexander (GS ’70), moderated by Leonard S. Marcus, historian and author of Margaret Wise Brown: Awakened by the Moon."

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the bank street center for children's literature

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The Bank Street Center for Children's Literature by Bank Street College of Education on Apple Podcasts

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Download past episodes or subscribe to future episodes of The Bank Street Center for Children's Literature by Bank Street College of Education for free.

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Kwame Alexander on Children’s Books and the Color of Characters

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Kwame Alexander on Children’s Books and the Color of Characters

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Kwame Alexander on Children’s Books and the Color of Characters (Published 2016)

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My students all believe I am writing about them. Why is race so much harder for the grown-ups?

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"Excuse Me" from Solo by Kwame Alexander, music performed by Randy Preston

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"Excuse Me" from Solo by Kwame Alexander, music performed by Randy Preston

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"Excuse Me" from Solo by Kwame Alexander, music performed by Randy Preston

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Kwame Alexander on Writing His YA Novel, Solo

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Kwame Alexander on Writing His YA Novel, Solo

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Kwame Alexander on Writing His YA Novel, Solo

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Kwame Alexander on Reader Takeaways from His YA Novel, Solo

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Kwame Alexander on Reader Takeaways from His YA Novel, Solo

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Kwame Alexander on Reader Takeaways from His YA Novel, Solo

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Tweets by MisterMinor

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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

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Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

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Home | Teachers College Reading and Writing Project

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TCRWP offers a variety of professional development opportunities for teachers and school leaders. Learn from our staff developers in a variety of formats, virtually and in-person, addressing a range of topics. We offer single and multiple day events, as well as study groups that meet across the year…

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Why #BlackLivesMatter in Your Classroom Too

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Why #BlackLivesMatter in Your Classroom Too

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I have a simple job. It has two easy mandates.

1. Love children with good teaching.

2. Love their teachers by supporting them with good stuff to teach with.

I work in classrooms all over the world. When there are pieces of your heart in far flung corners of the globe, a powerful kind of empathy grows. When communities hurt, I hurt.

When Trayvon Martin was murdered in Florida, I thought of the children I serve there. I thought of the books they like and the jokes they tell me when I get to town. I remembered his school and his teachers. I thought of his community and especially of his family that has had to find light in the traumatic void his absence creates. On some mornings, when I am particularly sensitive or tired, I can see his classroom. His empty desk haunts my dreams.

When the same thing happened with Mike Brown and Tamir Rice, a significant part of me broke. These names are not headlines or hashtags to me. These were children who read the books my colleagues and I suggested and wrote the essays we asked them to write. These are children who trusted us with their futures. Our system betrayed that trust.

I've worked in schools my entire career. The death of a student or family member is not a new occurrence to me. It is painful every single time. But I heal.

These recent wounds, however, are kept fresh not just by the regularity of these murders, but that they are carried out by agents of the state or their proxies and that they happen almost exclusively to black and brown children, to their siblings, to their mothers and to their fathers.

When educators talk about racism our conversation is often limited to individual acts of personal bias. As long as we don't know any mean or intolerant people, we are complacent in our thinking that these problems are not ours to contend with. Such a stance ignores the systemic complexities of how race is lived in America, on its streets and in our classrooms - and even when there are no people of color present.

Becoming more systemically aware means understanding the kinds of racism that shape our communities, schools, and classrooms, and where we stand in relation to those social forces.

Most people are aware of individual racism. If we choose to talk about race, it is what we spend most of our time talking about, but few understand how it works. There are two kinds of individual racism. The first kind of individual racism is internalized racism. These are all the conscious and subconscious racial biases, prejudices, and blind spots that we all have within ourselves as individuals.

The second kind of individual racism is interpersonal racism. This is what happens when we act out the biases we internalize on others. Most of us are sensitive enough to avoid acting out our internalized racism, but as humans, our biases, prejudices and blind spots are most likely to emerge when we are tired, stressed, late, scared or feel threatened. As educators we are tired quite regularly and stressed daily, so the work of avoiding interpersonal racism is real and significant, but it is not all.

There are also two kinds of systemic racism. The first kind - institutional racism - is the collection of racist policies and discriminatory practices in schools, government agencies, and workplaces that routinely produces unjust outcomes for people of color. These words may be new to us, but as teachers we are intimately familiar with this kind of racism. This is the "achievement gap." This is the testing industrial complex. This is school discipline.

Let's consider this: if there were an activity at school that resulted in the mass failure of kids with green eyes, we would not criminalize the kids with green eyes. We would ask, "What is it about this activity that excludes kids with green eyes?" and we would change the activity. Are we, as members of the education community, willing to do this for black boys who are suspended at rates that are exponentially more in comparison to their peers? What could this look like? If sitting in a desk all day listening to lectures leads to mass suspensions for a specific subset of kids, I need to get with my team and change the activity. To engage in this imaginative work - even if it is messy - is antiracist. It affirms that black lives do matter.

The second kind of systemic racism - structural racism - is the unjust patterns and practices that play out across societal institutions. It is the reality that those suspended black boys miss out on valuable instructional time and consequently miss out on opportunities that lead to college. It is the reality that this boy's earning potential over a lifetime is now a paltry percentage of his college educated peers. It is the knowledge that this reduced earning diminishes quality of life. To be antiracist is to know that all of these things are connected and to know that many of them start in school even when we express no interpersonal racism.

All of our students matter, but in a society characterized by its dogged refusal to treat all kids and their families equally, it is our moral imperative to affirm that black lives matter. If outcomes continue to be bleak for large groups of people, it diminishes the quality of all our lives. When there is massive disenfranchisement fueled by widespread failure and incarceration, the safety of all our communities is compromised.

In our search for solutions, people utter platitudes disguised as answers - we should love one another, I don't see color or race, let's talk more - and all of those things are lovely and important starts, but they alone will not change the systems that routinely produce unjust outcomes. To continue with business as usual, to do nothing, to be "neutral" is a passive declaration of racism because the system that we are most intimately connected with - school - will continue to produce unjust outcomes for people of color. To be antiracist is to be actively involved with the disruption of these systems.

What is our influence, as educators?

What can we do? We cannot reconstruct the world to reflect our views, but we are in a unique position to take action in our classrooms. We can start to disrupt the status quo by asking ourselves questions about our practice, community and curriculum. When I'm working in teams with other teachers, here are some initial questions we use to imagine what our disruption can look like.

1. Safety. In order for students to learn, they need to feel safe. How can I make sure that my classroom is a place where children feel safe and protected? Can I ensure the sustained management of the room while communicating respect (without cultivating fear, embarrassment or teacher dependence)?

2. Choice. Children read more when they feel capable and motivated. How can I create access to reading material that is high interest and appropriately challenges kids? How can I create consistent opportunities to do work that has both meaning and consequence?

3. Voice. When students have a voice, they feel empowered. When so much of childhood is about staying quiet and listening to adults, how can we give students a platform to talk, to write, to share what is important to them? How can we help them be heard by the constituencies that matter the most to them? Who are those people, can we get them to the classroom, and how can we communicate with them?

4. Growth. Learning is not an identical process for all kids; we cannot treat it as if it is. Where are my students now? Honestly. Where can they be by the end of the week? What kind of teaching and practice will it take for them to get there? How can I best facilitate progress - small groups, out of classroom activities, labs, centers, discussions, home visits? How can I measure progress? What tools might kids need in addition to what I have planned so that they may succeed? Do all kids need that tool?

5. Flexibility. Children and communities are changing all the time. What do we need to read to be more responsive to our kids and communities? Who do we need to learn from? What is the best way to share that learning with other teachers? How can we put that learning into action? Day to day, what can this kind of professional growth look like for us?

There is no right answer; rather, it's the questions that help us think about what actions or changes might lead to better outcomes for all of our students, particularly those who are underserved by traditional schooling. Being an advocate for black lives does not mean that I am an advocate against any other lives. When we make the conscious decision to address persisting injustices, this broadens access to justice for everyone.

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Why #BlackLivesMatter in Your Classroom Too

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I work in classrooms all over the world. When there are pieces of your heart in far flung corners of the globe, a powerful kind of empathy grows. When communities hurt, I hurt. When Trayvon Martin...

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Disrupting a Destructive Cycle: How Literacy Drives Social Change

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Disrupting a Destructive Cycle: How Literacy Drives Social Change

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International Literacy Association, Newark, Delaware. 74K likes. ILA is a global advocacy and membership organization dedicated to transforming lives through literacy.

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Cornelius Minor on Being an Advocate for your Students

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Cornelius Minor on Being an Advocate for your Students

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"I think my parents hate me"

That is how a student, who we'll call "Earl," recently started a conversation with his teacher, Cornelius Minor, after class one day. On today's podcast we're talking about advocating for our students with Cornelius Minor. Mr. Minor is a frequent keynote speaker and Lead Staff Developer at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York where he works with teachers, school leaders, and leaders of community-based organizations to support literacy reform in cities. In his work, Cornelius draws not only on his years teaching middle school in the Bronx and Brooklyn, but also on time spent skateboarding, shooting hoops, and working with kids. He's also currently writing his first book for Heinemann.

Cornelius says it best; "we may not have the answers for every situation we face, but we can't choose to do nothing." So what did Cornelius do? How did he advocate for Earl and all of his students? Listen below to find out.

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Also, be sure to join Cornelius Thursday - May 4, 2017 as he co-hosts the #G2Great Twitter chat with Courtney Kinney (@KinneyCourts) on: "Building Classrooms that Reflect the Lives of the Children Who Inhabit Them."

We offer many resources based on the conversation we're having on this episode. Here is a complete list:

See below for a full transcript of our conversation

Cornelius: And that's such a huge question, Bret. Like, when I think about advocacy, that word just sounds intimidating. You know, like, I'm a seventh grade English teacher. I deal in the realm of verbs and gerunds and participles, like that's my realm. So when you throw out words like advocacy, for me, what comes to mind is that Morgan Freeman movie Lean On Me. Everybody wants to be Morgan Freeman, but that guy's got skills. I don't got skills like that, and so how do I, with my regular every day nerdy self, stand up for kids in a big way. So I've really been trying to think about, like, yeah how do I do that?
When I think about Earl, and I think about the struggle that he's having with his parents right now, I don't have answers. I think a lot of times we ask ourselves, what should I do? And when we don't know, we choose to do nothing. I'm just at a point in my career now, even though I'm wildly imperfect at standing up for kids, and even though my advocacy game is in it's infancy, doing nothing can't be an option for me anymore.

Brett: And in this case, it could be dangerous.

Cornelius: And it could have been dangerous. Yeah. One of the things I have with Earl ... In New York City we're mandated first reports. So one of the things that has to ... I teach in Brooklyn, and so any time I sense that a kid is in danger or any time that I hear that a kid is in danger, it is my job per state of New York to call it in and alert a guidance counselor.
Actually, he just told me ... and I know him like I know all the other kids, so I know his writing, but I wouldn't say I had a closely personal relationship with him, but when they came to me and he was like, you know, I had a conversation with my parents this weekend that didn't go well. And I was like, oh, well tell me about it. And he's like, oh, not now, but I want to come to you later. So he came later and he just kind of put it on the table. He's like, you know, I think my parents hate me. And I was like, no, your parents don't hate you. This is a great kid. Athlete, reads every book in the world, keeps a really great writer's notebook. And I'm like, your parents don't hate you, man. If you were my son, I'd be the luckiest dude on the planet. And he's like, no, I'm pretty sure they hate me.
In the way that Brooklyn kids are resilient, he had a sense of humor about it, and then he went on to tell the story about, you know, when I told them that I was gay, they told me that they didn't want me to come back. They gave me a week.
Here's beautiful Earl in my classroom, and he's got seven days left in his house, in his mind. That must be terrifying for a seventh grader. So immediately, I'm like, we got to get you to a counselor. I can hear this, and I want to be there with you. Fortunately for me, the counselor's not too far down the hall. So we walked together down. He didn't feel like sharing with her. And I'm like, well Earl, I'm going to tell her what you told me because we need to make sure that you're protected.
We talked about it and the counselor was like, great, I know what to do. There's lots that we have in place for homeless youth. There's lots that we have in place for gay kids. So she did her counselor thing, but the thing that kept nagging, even though he would have a safe home and even though the proper services were being activated, and people were gathering resources for him, the thing that he kept coming back to with me, is he's like, my dad still hates me. So even though I'm in a safe home. Even though I have food to eat. Even though I'm wearing nice clothes. The man that I care about the most on this planet hates me.
That's something that I can do because at a literacy teacher, I deal in love. I deal in hate. And I deal in story telling. And I deal in redemption. So we sat, and I'm like, dude what do you want me to do? What can we do together? I didn't know it at the time, but that was a really powerful question for Earl. Earl was like, no one's ever asked me what I wanted to do, and how they could work for me. I don't know if you can change my dad, but I want you to show him some of the cool things that I do.

Brett: What is your action plan in that moment? Do you feel you need to run out the door that second? Do you sit down and map this out with Earl? How did you approach that?

Cornelius: At the heart of teacher advocacy, I think the action plan is always listen to the kid. So, I tried to identify what he wanted, and then what I could do to get him closer to that goal. The guidance counselor was already doing a lot. The principal was already doing a lot. And again, I'm the literacy teacher, so I'm like, you know, you want your dad to love you and I can't move that mountain, but again, he was just like, I think my dad will start to come around if he's reminded of all the cool things that I'm doing. I'm like, that I can do. You've written hundreds of stories for me. That I can do. You've read tons of books. That I can do. Your essays are brilliant.
So really, the action plan is to co-create. I think as a reading teacher, or a writing teacher, I'm used to co-creation in small groups. I'm used to co-creation in conferences. I'm used to co-creation in my mini lessons. So, we take what we already know, and we just apply it to the human condition.

Brett: How did that go?

Cornelius: You know, the thing about life is it's complicated. I think it's important to say that happy endings exist in movies, and life has really messy endings.
Earl and his dad are still in a complicated place, but I think the number one thing that it did for Earl is he saw that I was willing to fight for him. I think what's important, is that you engage in the fight, even if you lose.

Brett: What message ... I mean, I'm sure there's a teacher listening to this that is thinking, I don't know what I would do in that situation. I don't know that I would want to step out of the classroom, and I'm happy to speak with the student, happy to have that moment with them in the classroom, but to go beyond that and talk to the parents and try to step in, in that advocacy roll ... What could you tell them to encourage them to take that step?

Cornelius: Three big things have been really helpful for me. A, organizations. The national PTA, amazing. Like, amazing. They have tons of resources to support gay and lesbian kids. They have tons of resources to support teachers who want to support kids. They have tons of resources to help you talk to parents. So the PTA ... amazing. Just knowing that I'm not the only one thinking about this. I think so many times when people come to us, it feels really, like, I am lonely. I am hearing this kid, and I've got to carry this thing. So, even though I'm in a school with lots of other professionals, in that moment, it feels like you're the only one. I'm certain teachers are listening to this podcast thinking that.
Knowing there are organizations. There are also tons of organizations, both locally and nationally, that serve children that deal with homelessness, that deal with depression, that deal with talking to your parents. So, having local organizations has also been really helpful as well.
The second thing that's been really big for me ... and this is kind of a surprise ... but, working with guidance counselors to rehearse hard conversations. I remember leaving after we talked with Earl and Earl went home, the guidance counselor kept me in the office, and she was like, well, you know, you did a good job. Thank you, Mr. Miner. But next time something like that comes up, here are some things that you can do, here's some things that you can say. And then we roll-played it.

So, that you sit with your guidance counselor. We did it in, like, 10 minutes. It wasn't even long. But that she was just like, kids are going to say things, and because now they know you're safe, because Earl has had this conversation with you, these conversations will probably start happening more frequently to you, because now the word is out that you're that person. Knowing that I didn't have to be an expert. That there's a person in my building who can help me was a big thing. I know this sounds silly, but I sit with the guidance counselor from time to time and I rehearse a conversation that I need to have with a kid later on, or that I rehearse a conversation I need to have with a parent later on.
Advocacy doesn't have to be something like Earl's situation. I had to think, we just had parent teacher conferences in New York City, and I have a very assertive father, and I had to figure out, how am I going to tell this guy that his kid isn't doing well. I want it to go well. I want the conversation to be a productive conversation, and I don't want there to be anger. I'm sure there was. So, I went to the guidance counselor, and I'm like, I'm about to speak to a dad and I'm not sure how he's going to take the news that his kid isn't doing well. So can we rehearse that conversation? Another big thing for teachers who are thinking about doing more for children is practice. I know that sounds so, so silly, but I'm an athlete and when I want to get good at soccer, I practice. When I want to get good at skateboarding, I practice. That's my default mode of learning, and so, when I wanted to start having more meaningful conversations with children or families, I just sat in the guidance counselor's office and practice.

Brett: Just to back that up a little bit, too, the more you practice, the more ... if you're uncomfortable with any of these conversations, be it an aggressive person that you're not quite sure how to talk to, or having a conversation that might catch you off guard, or you might not be quite prepared for, the more you practice those conversations with someone, the better, more comfortable you are with it.

Cornelius: Exactly. Exactly. There's a couple of default conversations I just keep in my mind. Like, I have a conversation for dealing with unkindness. So if I'm ever surprised by unkindness, I know what to say, because kids call each other names, they talk about each other's living conditions. Sometimes as the teacher, I feel like I'm surprised by unkindness, and in the moment I don't always know how to stand for a kid. So I'm like, okay, kids call each other names that are unkind. Kids do things that are unkind. I want to always be on top of that, so let me go ahead and just know what I'm going to say ahead of time. I have that in my back pocket, so when it happens now, I'm not uncomfortable or off guard. I know how to, kind of, address directly unkindness. So, that's a conversation.
A conversation like a welcoming conversation is another one that you rehearse. Kids tend to withdraw sometimes. I'm a middle school teacher, so you read the room sometimes, and a kid is having a bad day and you don't always know what to say when the kid is having a bad day. You kind of go, and awkwardly want to cheer him up. You're like, be happy. I don't want to be that teacher. If I look across the room and somebody's having a bad day, I've already rehearsed that conversation. Recognizing that my job isn't to change your feeling, 'cause how you feel is how you feel, but my job is too announce my presences, and let you know that, again, I will fight for you. So, just practicing those conversations.
Another conversation that I practice all the time is how to bring you down. If something happens that surprises a kid, and the kid escalates quickly, how to de-escalate.
The big take-away is that we play for a team. There are guidance counselors in all of our schools who know what to do, and so, that we utilize those folks. That we listen to kids. That the chief architect of progress, the chief architect of happiness, the chief architect of the utopian future that I want for every kid, is the kid himself. The kid herself. That so many times we think we know what's best, but I don't know what's best for Earl. Earl knows what's best for Earl. That I listen to him and honor that is really, really important. So, I play for my team, I listen to the kid, and then I think that I remain flexible and willing to learn as a teacher. Accepting the reality that I'm going to do something wrong some times, but the operative word is that I do something.

A reminder to join Cornelius Thursday - May 4, 2017 as he co-hosts the #G2Great Twitter chat with Courtney Kinney (@KinneyCourts) on: "Building Classrooms that Reflect the Lives of the Children Who Inhabit Them."

We offer many resources based on the conversation we're having on this episode. Here is a complete list:

#G2Great is so excited to celebrate BRILLIANT TAPESTRIES w/ Cornelius & Courtney. Please join us! @MisterMinor @KinneyCourts pic.twitter.com/3R5uFq5Yvb

- Dr. Mary Howard (@DrMaryHoward) April 28, 2017

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The Heinemann Podcast: Cornelius Minor on Being an Advocate for your Students

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"I think my parents hate me" That is how a student, who we'll call "Earl," recently started a conversation with his teacher, Cornelius Minor, after class one day. On today's podcast we're talking about advocating for our students with Cornelius Minor.

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Cornelius Minor on the Over-Engaged Student

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When we think about engagement we almost immediately focus on the student who won't talk or just doesn't engage. But what about the student who is over engaged? On today's podcast we're continuing our series of conversations with Cornelius Minor. Today we're talking about a student he has nicknamed "Prez" short for president of the class.

Mr. Minor is a frequent keynote speaker and Lead Staff Developer at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York where he works with teachers, school leaders, and communities to support literacy reform in cities. In his work, Cornelius not only draws on his years teaching middle school in the Bronx and Brooklyn, but also on time spent skateboarding, shooting hoops, and working with kids. He's also currently writing his first book for Heinemann.

Cornelius says we need to use our teacher superpowers of engagement even with students like Prez, who Cornelius says, tends to take all of the space in the room. Here's Cornelius with more on Prez.

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See below for a full transcript:

Cornelius: Oh my gosh, Prez. Just to kind of talk about Prez, I gotta rewind a little bit and talk about why his name is, Prez is short for President. I had to make him the president of the class, just 'cuz, so many things. But Prez's name is actually David, and one thing you gotta know about Brooklyn, New York, is that Brooklyn, New York, tough guy persona is like a thing. Kids spend a lot of time grooming their inner tough guy. For a kid like David, the name David just doesn't sell tough Brooklyn kid. So I've watched him over these last two years, trying to invent his tough guy persona, but it always comes back to David.
So one of the things that has happened with him, he's the kinda kid, he's all in. So many people they talk to me, they ask me, like, "Oh, I've got this kid who won't talk, or I've got this kid who won't do homework." But David is not that kid. When you talk to me about David, people are like, "How do we get David to calm down and give other people some oxygen?" And that, to me, that's a question of engagement. You know, you use your kind of teacher super power of engagement to bring out the quiet kids, but then you use your power of engagement to kind of democratize the space for those kids who are like all in, like Prez.
My mind goes to this one moment where I was doing this thing on inference, and it's always inference. I feel like inference is the teacher Achilles' heel. I was doing this thing on inference, and it was all about making wild guesses, you know. I was trying to encourage the kids to not hold back on their guesses. You know, you want to make these cool theories, and you want to test out your theories in your book. And man, when I said, "wild guess," he was like, "I got this."
So we were reading, and it was this innocuous story, like Paper Bag Princess. It's the one every workshop classroom does Paper Bag Princess. I'm like, how can this fail? Prez will find a way. So he's making these ridiculous guesses, and I'm like, "Prez, you're guessing about like, dinosaurs and spaceships. We're in medieval times, dude." He's like, "Yeah, you told me no theory could be wrong. Just allow me to test it out."
One of the things is, Prez got going, and people started laughing at his guesses, and right away again, I knew that okay, this is a space that he's beginning to occupy fully. And he shares this space with 31 other kids, so I've gotta be able to give it to other kids. So I spent a lot of time thinking, wow, what can I do for a kid like Prez? What can I do for the kids like Prez in every classroom, who seem to monopolize the air time in that space?
For me, again it comes down to engagement. And there are ways that I can turn the volume up on certain kids in the classroom, and I've been thinking, we haven't talked much as teachers about ways that we turn the volume down. So I've been thinking a lot about turning the volume down. One big thing that comes to mind, and I've been using this over and over with Prez, is one way to turn the volume down but still respect his enthusiasm, you know-

Brett: Because you still want to honor his voice.

Cornelius: Yeah, and his voice is really, really important. But I also want to make sure that voice sits alongside the 31 other voices in the classroom.

Brett: Yeah. How do you do that without then making, going the complete opposite direction, and making him unengaged.

Cornelius: That's the thing, because in communities like mine, and I'm sure as I travel across America, one of the things that we never want to do is, we never want to silence kids. When you think about, and we've been doing a lot of thinking these recent weeks about marginalized people, or oppressed groups of people. Often people will say, "Oh, you know, African Americans," or "Oh, you know, Latinos or Asians or gay kids." Actually as I look across America, for me, the group of people that's most silenced is children.

Cornelius: So I always want to be amplifying their voices. So for a kid like Prez, I want to give those kids like jobs or roles. When we think about the voices that speak the loudest in our society, those voices all belong to people with very specific and clearly defined roles. So I've been thinking, one engagement tool in the classroom is that, and we're well versed at giving kids, "Oh, you're the line leader or you're the this." So I've been thinking, what are the rhetorical roles that are gonna exist in the classroom? And what are the community building roles that are gonna exist in the classroom?
So that's actually how he became Prez. He's the president. His job, as president, you gotta protect your people, man. So there's 31 other kids in this class, and they're your people. I'm going to be talking to your people for 7 minutes a day during my mini lesson, and there are gonna be people in your country, Prez, that don't understand me. So it's gonna be your job to make sure that they do understand me. So if I'm ever saying a thing or doing a thing that doesn't resonate with your people, you gotta let me know.
So that's kind of an invitation to Prez, that he gets to jump in at any time and be like, "Yo, your lesson right now, is missing all my friends over here."

Cornelius: So he can still be his active self, and in a really public way, he's giving me feedback.

Cornelius: And one of the things I'm always thinking about is, I'm a workshop teacher, so this idea of demonstration is not new to me, that you demonstrate. But then I also think about the idea of modeling.

Cornelius: I don't just show you the writing, but I model the person, the character, the kind of man I want you to be, the kind of person I want you to be. So that's really exciting that kids get to see me taking feedback from Prez. It's really actually exciting, because again like everything, he takes that role very seriously. First time he gave me feedback, he like wrote it on a Post-it note and handed it to me, and kind of like slid it over to me. And I'm like, "No, you can say it." He's like, "Well, every time the principal has something bad to say to you, he writes it on a Post-it note." I'm like, "How did you know that?!" You know?

Brett: He's really observant!

Cornelius: He's like, "I know that, because you get a lot of Post-it notes." I'm like, "Oh my God." And so, yeah. But he's gotten really good at doing that. What's funny is, it's doing the work that I wanted it to do, because not just with me now, but he's going around the classroom giving people feedback. He's really grown into that role. Where kids are doing things in the corner, and goes over and he's like, "Let me slide you a Post-it." So just kinda watching him slide Post-its around the room, again, has done something really cool to kinda democratize his voice, and kinda put it in a lane, so that other voices can exist. But then it's also amplified his leadership. It's amplified his personality. That really excites me.
So you have this kid, David, who wants to be a tough guy, and we can use engagement techniques to turn him into Prez. I think that especially in today's political climate, that a kid gets used to being called a president, is really important to me, too.

Brett: So if a teacher hears this, and maybe they're thinking about a student that is very much like Prez in their classroom. But their perception of that student might be different. They might see that student as disruptive. How would you speak to that teacher to say, "Here's what you can do to take that and turn it into a more positive experience, but also work with it? How could we turn that around?

Cornelius: I'm a huge lover of art. I live in New York City, so I spend a lot of time in museums looking at art. One of the things that strikes me is this idea of perspective. That if you stand on one side of the gallery, Starry Night looks one way, but if you stand on the different side of the gallery, it looks completely different. So I always want to ask teachers, just stand on the other side of the gallery.
That you see a kid like Prez and he's disruptive, and he's always interrupting you, and he's always saying stuff. My first urge is to silence. So one of the things that I've been practicing is something that I learned in sports, this idea that you want to calm yourself, center yourself before you make an attempt at a thing. So just, my advice to teachers would be almost three steps.
Whenever Prez is being Prez, because he's gonna do that, the first thing is I calm myself, center myself, and I recognize that it's not about me. He's not attacking me. That's just what he does, man. He talks and he interrupts. So calm myself, center myself.
The second thing is then, try to stand on a different side of the gallery. So what I saw as an interruption, what might he be trying to do? He's trying to contribute. He's trying to clarify. He's trying to question. He's trying to support. And those are all high level critical thinking skills that we want to teach kids.

Cornelius: What's funny is the kids who are doing the most critical thinking, often do it in ways that feel abusive toward us.

Cornelius: Because they're not good at it yet.

Cornelius: It's kind of like, I know this is silly. Old Disney movies, I spend a lot of time watching old Disney movies, because I can't think after so much lesson planning. I don't know if you remember, but that old movie, the one with the fox who was Robin Hood, and he goes around giving all the animals presents, and he gave one of the little animals in one scene, he gave one of these little animals a bow and arrow. And I'm like, "You just gave a little kid a weapon." And in many ways, when we teach critical thinking, that's what it is. We just gave a little kid a weapon. When we think about the progress we want to make as a society. When we think about all the things that we want to fix in the world. Critical thinking is a weapon, and when you give a kid a weapon, you gotta teach them how to use it responsibly.

Cornelius: I think for kids like Prez who learn how to question, what happens is he shows up to class, and he starts using the weapon, and it hurts because I'm the teacher. So he's interrupting me. I'm like, "Okay, he's using the weapon that I taught him to use. Now I just gotta teach him to use it responsibly." So it's that idea of yeah, standing on the different side of the gallery means recognizing he's actually being the kid that I taught him to be, or that I am teaching him to be. He just can't quite use it responsibly yet.

Brett: So how do you then take that work with Prez, and get the other students to sort of join him in that engagement?

Cornelius: Several things. I think one thing is first of all, making it visible. So always thinking that every time Prez corrects me or every time Prez helps me to understand that certain students in the classroom aren't understanding me, then one of the things that I want to do is, I don't always want to call out Prez, but I want to thank him. "Thanks, I needed to know that." Then I want to make it visible how I am changing in front of them, to accommodate his request.
Because what happens is, kids see the power in that, and they start doing it. They're like that. A kid asked my teacher a question in this way, and my teacher changed as a result.

Brett: That's powerful.

Cornelius: When I think about why kids act out, they act out because their conditions are uncomfortable. That's why we all act out. If my couch is uncomfortable, I'm gonna act weird. That's why we all act out. So all kids are trying to do when they act out, is they're trying to create more comfortable conditions. Sometimes when I think about for example, kids like the entropy of the playground. That's comforting for some kids. So if my classroom where I'm teaching verbs today, is uncomfortable, what they're gonna try to do is, they're gonna try to disrupt it. Because that disruptive thing that they do on the playground, that's comfortable, that's familiar. Verbs are not familiar right now, so I'm gonna do the thing that is familiar, so that I'm comfortable.
Getting kids to see that if a classmate did it in this way, and it was effective, I can do it in this way, and it will be effective. So I think the big thing for teachers is how we respond. So not necessarily what we say, because I think so many times we're apt to say, "Oh, don't do that, or don't talk to me that way."

Cornelius: So I want to in a very clearly way, model an appropriate response, and have kids see that if I do a thing this way, he'll not only hear me, but he will change his behavior accordingly. Again, this idea that a classroom is give and take. I think a lot about emotional intelligence, and this idea that we often ask kids to regulate their emotions. But in a shared society, or in a shared ecosystem like a classroom, there's no such thing as singular emotional regulation. It's more emotional co-regulation, where we're all kind of doing this together. So wanting to be able to do that really well with kids.

You can follow Cornelius on Twitter as @MisterMinor and continue this conversation. Be sure to follow our other podcasts with him as well here.

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Cornelius Minor on the Over-Engaged Student - Heinemann

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When we think about engagement we almost immediately focus on the student who won't talk or just doesn't engage. But what about the student who is over engaged? On today's podcast we're continuing our series of conversations with Cornelius Minor. Today we're talking about a student he has nicknamed "Prez" short for president of the class.

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Cornelius Minor: Identifying Won’t Learn and Can’t Learn

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Cornelius Minor: Identifying Won’t Learn and Can’t Learn

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What do you do about the student in your class who doesn't like you? On today's podcast, we're continuing our series of conversations with Cornelius Minor. In his classroom, he's facing the question: how do I recognize what the difference is between "can't learn" and "won't learn" ?

Mr. Minor is a frequent keynote speaker and Lead Staff Developer at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York where he works with teachers, school leaders, and communities to support literacy reform in cities. In his work, Cornelius not only draws on his years teaching middle school in the Bronx and Brooklyn, but also on time spent skateboarding, shooting hoops, and working with kids. He's also currently writing his first book for Heinemann.

As Cornelius says, we all have students who consume our thoughts and keep us up at night. For Cornelius, this student, who we'll call "Daniel," is that worry. And the reason they're at odds seems so simple, but goes much deeper. Cornelius explains more here:

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Cornelius: One of the things that's so powerful about being a teacher, or I guess, so universal, about being a teacher is we all have these students that we think about and can't stop thinking about. Every teacher, I think, if I asked them, they have that one kid that keeps them up late at night, and for me it's Daniel. I've been really grappling with him all week. Daniel's this really interesting kid. I don't know him that well. I see him twice weekly for reading intervention and one interesting thing about Daniel is he's the kid that has just decided that he's not going to learn from me.
And I know how to spot those kids. I've been seeing those kids my entire career, but the thing that makes Daniel different is his opposition to me isn't violent.

Brett: So, this isn't opposition to what you're teaching or to other classes. You have learned that this is opposition directed specifically at you.

Cornelius: Oh yeah, it's personal It's personal. I can kind of laugh about it now, but it's an uncomfortable laughter because you don't want to feel like there's a kid that doesn't like you. So, it's really forced me to confront it and I've had to be braver than I've ever been. I've had to talk to him about it because again, Daniel isn't the kind of kid that's going to break rules. He's not the kind of kid that's going to leave class or cut class altogether. So, there he sits every day twice a week, not doing what I want him to do.

Brett: How do you enter a conversation like that?

Cornelius: There's really no graceful way to enter it. You just kinda of have to slide into the door when you catch an opening, and that's how it was with Daniel. I got a chance to sit with him this week and one of the things that I had mentioned to him, I was like, "Daniel, you know, you're totally capable of doing this stuff. I see you in all your other classes. I see you in after-school. Why is it that you shut down here?" And of course my first three attempts to talk to him were met with silence. And it wasn't-
Brett: So, he wouldn't even respond to you?

Cornelius: He wouldn't even respond. Again, never disrespectful, but just like,"I'm not talking to you dude." And it would be really interesting, because I'd catch him in conversation with another kid, and I'd slide into the door hoping that, "Okay, he's already talking to another kid, maybe he'll talk to me." Silence. I didn't have an "in" until the fourth conversation. I think Daniel just noticed that I wasn't going away. So, I guess to answer your question, "How does one start that conversation?" - with persistence, and where it just felt like I was getting turned down for a date over and over and over and over again. But finally, on the fourth attempt when I talked to Daniel, one of the things that he told me, and he didn't answer my questions directly, he just started storytelling.
He was just like, "Well, Mr. Minor, I don't have a lot of time. I've got three younger brothers. All of them are in elementary school." Daniel's a seventh-grader, all of them are in elementary school. "As soon as school's over, I got to run to school, pick up one brother, get him home and get the other brother after school, make sure the other brother has something to eat." So, he's juggling three kids and I'm thinking like, "I am a teacher and I'm struggling to juggle two kids; my own two children." Here's a 13-year-old who's juggling three kids until 6 o'clock every night, and as we talked there was this clear devotion to his family. I could hear it. It was palatable. I just kept thinking about, "Okay, so a kid this responsible, why is this choosing to not learn from me?
I've done everything I can to be a good teacher. I've read all the books, I've been to all the PD, so why is it that this responsible kid who clearly wants to do well in life, has chosen to not learn from me?" I just listened to him talk. I thought about my class and I thought about the rules and the structure of my class. Daniel said one word that caused me to think. He said, "homework," and then it struck me. At some point early this year, I gave the talk that all teachers give, and I had said to the class that, "You know class, if you're not doing your homework after school, your priorities are in the wrong place." And in that moment, I realized that I had built this vision of success for the classroom, and in that vision of success I had excluded Daniel. Where here's a kid who totally wants to do well, but His priorities are in another place after school. I was like, "Oh my gosh." He didn't help me to come to that understanding but it hit me in that moment and I had to do something about it. I think the scary thing about teaching is we want the best for kids. We want the best for all kids, but sometimes through our innocuous actions we're exclusive. I had said this statement out of pure, good intentions for kids-

Brett: Right. You weren't trying to hurt his feelings.

Cornelius: Exactly. Exactly. So, I asked him ... I was just like, "I noticed that you do a lot after school with your brothers and I realized that I said something that might've upset you a few weeks ago. Is it that?" He didn't even answer "Yes," he just nodded.

Brett: Oh wow.

Cornelius: So, we had this moment where he's saying, "Yeah, you totally offended me," and so, I completely understand why he had chosen not to learn from me and why he had shut down; because here I am, this teacher with great intentions, and I disrespected his lifestyle in a most personal way. Here's a kid who loves his three brothers, who takes his responsibility seriously of getting them to and from school, making their snack, doing their after school, and I told him that, "If you're not doing your homework your priorities are in the wrong place." So, my vision of success was in direct competition with his love for his brothers.

Brett: When you have that moment, where you realize there's this element of trust that you have to rebuild with him, where do you go from there? How do you build that back?

Cornelius: I think that's the eternal question that we ask ourselves as teachers. One question that I've been grappling with, to kind of extend that one, is this idea of what is the difference between can't learn and won't learn? 'Cause here's a kid, Daniel, who if you were to casually glance across the classroom and see him not engage with me and not engage with my content, you would assume that Daniel can't learn. But actually Daniel's not learning, in the context of my classroom, was a conscious choice and that was a choice that he made in self-defense. So, actually, that was the most smart thing; that someone is attacking the way that you live your life and so you decide to not learn from that person or you decide to not ally with that person. In a world of smarts and self-preservation, Daniel had done the most honorable thing.
But then, in a world that values academics, we only know how to see that as refusal to learn or he can't learn. So, I've really been trying to draw a line between, do I as a pedagogue, know the difference between a kid that can't learn and a kid that just refuses to learn? Because the two are not the same and I think that the kid who refuses to learn, is actually exercising a great degree of intelligence. For me, it started with an apology, and I think the hard realization in that is that I had done something that attacked Daniel at his most fundamental level - his love for his brothers. So, my apology really is the beginning of a journey; like that. That's the uncomfortable part about even doing this podcast; that I'm still not in a place with him where it's all perfect yet.

Brett: This is still very fresh. You've just had this conversation with him, and you're in a place where you've had that initial apology but now, what's next?

Cornelius: Now I've got to do the work. And I think that that's the beautiful thing about being a teacher; we've got many, many days in the school year and so, every day I show up has to be a day where I not only talk about my loyalty to Daniel but that I demonstrate it. Both in words and in actions.

Brett: What do those actions look like?

Cornelius: I think for me, I've had to really explore first what are the reasons that might cause a kid like Daniel to shut down. That's been really hard for me to think about, but then I've kind of ... I think in my mind, got it down to a few things. I think I'm ... Of course Daniel shut down because he felt personally attacked. So, when I think about the kids in my classroom who would choose to not learn, I ask myself, "Have I done anything? Has this institution done anything that causes kids to feel personally attacked?" Also, I feel like kids might shut down or might choose to shut down whenever they feel some kind of institutional discomfort.
That discomfort might be from me and my colleagues, that discomfort might be from peers, but I have to ask, "Is there a source in the school of some kind of institutional discomfort?" Then, once I figure those two things out, then I get to decide what I'm going to do about it. In the case of Daniel, and I think in the case of most students, I've got to, of course, own the personal attack and work to remedy it. So, in my innocuous way, talking about homework really is not okay in the world of a kid like Daniel. So, how do I be more inclusive? I think that that apology has to start with a level of demonstrated inclusivity, and then I have to actively be removing institutional barriers for kids.
Once I find wherever that institutional discomfort is, if it's in my homework policy or if it's in the way that kids sit together and the way that I group them, then I've got to remove those barriers immediately. And the removal of those barriers has to be public and intentional. The kids have to know that. "Hey, this thing exists in this classroom, and in my case, this homework policy exists in this classroom, and for some of you that homework policy is not okay so I'm changing it." A kid like Daniel has to hear my apology but then see me publicly changing the thing that impacts him adversely.
I think that's not ... I'm not going to win him over tomorrow, and I think that that's the thing. I think a lot of times I go to teacher PD or I read teacher books and I feel like, "Okay, if I do this thing, I'm going to win Daniel tomorrow." I think the reality of it is that, you can do one thing to lose it but then you got to build it back up. So, in many ways it is a relationship. That's like when you mess up in a relationship, you apologize but then you work. But we as teachers are in a lucky position because we have opportunities every day to do the work, which is really beautiful.

Brett: Well, and you were curious, as you always are.

Cornelius: Yes, yes.

Brett: So, you're putting the invite out there. You're saying if anybody's listening to this, if another teacher's listening to this and maybe has a piece of advice, you would encourage them to tweet you with some ideas?

Cornelius: That would be amazing. I think this is a thing that we as teachers can suffer through in silence; that no one really wants to talk about the kid in your class that doesn't like you. Or, we always make it about the kid. We're like, "Well, that kid cut class," or, "That kid showed up five minutes early or five minutes late," but we never want to make it about us; "Here's what I did that might have set that kid off. "Help me work through this." I think one of the things that I'm really on about right now is, really thinking about that, because those are the kids who end up getting less from our classes.

Brett: What is the takeaway that we can learn from this? That we could look into ourselves ... 'Cause it's not easy to look at ourselves and identify that. So, what did you go through that led you to the place that you went, "No, this is me. This isn't anything else. This is on me"?

Cornelius: I think that as teachers we're lucky because we're humans first. All of us are in relationships outside of school and I think that teachers are a really beautiful kind of people, a really beautiful breed of people, because in our relationships in life we know how to take ownership. We know how to apologize. We know how to work through difficulty, but sometimes our teaching ... where we're most vulnerable. That's where it gets hard. So, for me, it's been an active, aggressive transfer.
Grant Wiggins talks a lot about transfer, like ... "How do I take this skill that I know in one area of my life and apply to this other area of my life?" So, in teacher terms, I've really ... One thing I believe is that, as teachers we already have the answers. It's just a matter of creative transfer. So, I've really been thinking about, "Yeah, where are the areas in my life where I've totally messed it up?" I really apply what I've learned from those situations to the work I'm doing with kids like Daniel.

Cornelius is genuine in his request for feedback from you. He'd love to know your thoughts. You can follow Cornelius on Twitter as @MisterMinor and continue this conversation. Be sure to follow our other podcasts with him as well here.

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Cornelius Minor: Identifying Won't Learn and Can't Learn - Heinemann

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What do you do about the student in your class who doesn't like you? On today's podcast, we're continuing our series of conversations with Cornelius Minor. In his classroom, he's facing the question: how do I recognize what the difference is between "can't learn" and "won't learn" ?

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Feedback can sneak up on you in the most unlikely of places. For Cornelius Minor, it came from a former student at a laundromat. In our continuing series of conversations with Cornelius Minor we're talking about the importance of feedback and love in the classroom.

Cornelius is a frequent keynote speaker and Lead Staff Developer at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York where he works with teachers, school leaders, and communities to support literacy reform in cities. In his work, Cornelius not only draws on his years teaching middle school in the Bronx and Brooklyn, but also on time spent skateboarding, shooting hoops, and working with kids. He's also currently writing his first book for Heinemann.

On a recent Saturday morning, Cornelius bumped into a former student while doing his laundry. As Cornelius explains, the meeting quickly became a lesson on feedback and love.

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Full transcript below:

Cornelius: I ran into this kid, Nate, in the laundromat. If you know anything about Brooklyn, none of us have washer/dryer in our apartments. All of Brooklyn goes to the laundromat on Saturday morning, and you're just hanging out.
Nate comes in, and Nate, he's like, "Yo. It's Minor." He ran over to me, and he said in his excited, Nate way, he was like ... by the way, Nate's in his 20s, so it's been a while. He comes in, and he's like, "You know, man ... I just want to tell you, man. I love you and I love what you did in the class."
I'm thinking to myself ... if you can imagine, this kid is tattooed up, he's tough guy, and Nate wasn't the kind of kid then that talked about love, and he certainly didn't look like the kind of kid now that would be in a laundromat talking about love, and so it really struck me when he used the work love.
I'm like, "Well, thanks. I'm here waiting on my socks, so if you want to hang out, we can hang out, because I got 42 minutes left on the dryer." He's like, "Let me tell you what I loved about your class." He's just like, "What I loved about your class is when I came in, you were teaching something, and you were teaching this way where you would name the things, and you would have us try the things, and when I came in and it didn't work for me, you changed it."
That got me thinking. I was like, "Woah." Nate, the way he read love wasn't emotional. The way that Nate felt love was ... "This guy needed to do a thing for me, and he did it." That just got me thinking, I was like, "So, how am I loving the kids I'm with now? How am I loving the teachers that I'm with now? What does love look like? Especially if I only got 42 minutes."
I was like, "Well, I don't know the answer to that question, but maybe Nate knows." I asked him to keep talking, and Nate got real specific with the things that I did 10 years ago made him feel loved. Going back to that one thing, he was just like, "Yeah. That you were always willing to change the class if it would help me to learn better."
He's like, "We saw you doing that, and sometimes it was crazy, and sometimes we didn't know why you changed it, but after a while, I knew that you must have changed it for some kid, or for one of us." I think the first way that we communicate love in any classroom space is that kids need to know that if what I'm doing aint working, that I'm willing to change it.
That idea of flexibility, that this curriculum is not written in stone, it's malleable like clay. This curriculum will take the shape of the container that I put it in, is really, really important.
Nate went on to talk about ... he was just like, "You know, you were really funny. You used to tell jokes, but then you knew when it was time to get serious. You also knew when it was time to listen to us." As he kept talking, I realized that the second thing that really qualified love for Nate was that love is not just in the what I teach, and the passion that I bring to it, but it's in my positionality and the rapport that I build with students.
That's something that we know, but then to hear a kid say that, "Yeah. The way that you talked to us, the way that you helped us to see you and see the content, I knew that you loved me." That's a cool thing. One of the things that I'm always thinking about now that I work with teachers, is what specifically does a teacher have to do to achieve that kind of rapport?
This is all Nate. This is not me. Again, I'm sitting waiting on my socks, and so I'm just asking this dude to tell me. One of the things that he said was that "you always asked us how we were doing, or you always asked us about our lives, and then you would bring it back up later on-

Brett: Oh, wow.

Cornelius: ... or if a lesson had a certain part to it, you would talk about how 'Oh. This part of the lesson, it's Nate's part of the lesson.' You would name parts of the lesson after us if you knew that we would be good at that part. Or you would name parts of the strategy after us."
I do remember. There would be certain charts in the room and it would be Nate's chart, or Sam's chart. He's like, "Why'd you do that?" I'm like, "Well, cause I knew that would be a strategy that worked for you, so I'd put your name on it."
He's just like, just that idea of ownership. Another thing that teachers can do really specifically to really get at that rapport, that positionality, is to ask the community to invest in the classroom. He was just like, "You always used to ask us what we wanted in the classroom." He brought back up ... I didn't even remember I had this ... I'm a huge music fan, all the kids, of course, love music and I have snobbish taste in hip-hop. The kids, they like whatever's on the radio, but my tastes are more refined.
He was just like, "But you would put up the posters that we wanted." He was like, "I remember you had all your grown up hip-hop groups, but then you put up ..." There was this idea that they got to bring parts of themselves to the community in a very physical way, that the poster of the group that I like is gonna go next to the chart that I'm gonna use for writing. He's like, "Yeah. That's really, really important."
Those little things ... there's so much we could be talking about, building rapport forever, but he's like, "Yeah. Those little things really spoke to me." What's interesting is that he had so much to say about love. He talked about teaching, and it's funny to hear a non-teacher who had you as a teacher talk about teaching. He tried his best. He was like, "You used to talk like this," or "You used to say things like this."
We're all in the laundromat, and of course, now everybody's looking, and I'm trying to discreetly take my underwear out of the dryer without Nate seeing it. All of this is happening around us, but as he's talking about teaching, he was just like, "Your teaching is really clear." He cited some specific lessons, but he was like, "I always felt like I knew what you were trying to say, and it never felt like you were trying to kill me with your words, or kill me with [inaudible 00:05:35]."
This idea that yeah, I may be talking about a complicated thing like theme, or I might be talking about a thing like symbolism, but how do I talk about it in a way where it doesn't feel to kids like I'm trying to kill them with my words?

Cornelius: We've been talking ... one of the things that keeps coming up is this idea that it's not necessarily what we say that kids take away, but it's how we make them feel... that they take away. I can't imagine a kid sitting in a classroom and feeling like, "The teacher's trying to kill me with their words." Just that reference to language as possible violence really scared me. I was really happy to hear Nate say that, "Yeah. Your words were always simple, and clear, and I understood them, and you would help me to understand."
Then I go back to, "Well, what does clarity mean for a teacher every day?" if I'm trying to do that, and I think, for me, clarity means showing. That I can't just say a thing, that I got to show it. Anytime I am teaching a kid something, I want to make sure that I'm demonstrating that thing in front of them, where I'm going to make sure that I'm holding it, and I give them an opportunity to hold whatever it is, or I'm giving them an opportunity to try the concept.
Then that kind of clarity also leads me to Wiggins' idea of transference ... that again, I've got to make sure that whatever I teach sticks to the kid. I can teach a thing and watch a kid do a thing, and then change the context, and then watch a kid do the thing again in a different context, just to ensure that that transference happens. That little extra teacher step that like, "Yeah. I love you because I'm clear, and because I want to make sure that what I have taught you, you can do it in multiple contexts.
I think, and I don't know if Nate would ever say this, but I think one of the things that happens is that kids lose trust in our teaching, because when they try it in different contexts that are not the classroom, it doesn't work.
It's one thing to teach in a sanitized environment like a classroom, but then when I got to take this writing strategy on the road, or when I got to take this reading strategy on the road, if it fails me, that erodes the trust I have in my teacher. Then I've got to be able to say, in the classroom, while we're in this safe, sanitized environment, I'm going to teach you how to do this thing safely, and then I'm gonna mess around with the context and introduce some trouble, and see if you can do it again while there's trouble present.
It's really speaking to kids in those clear ways. I think that can go miles in a classroom. The last thing that really stuck with me from what Nate said, and this is the thing that I continue to think about right now ... I'm actually about to start a new unit with a group of teachers and some students, and Nate talked about the idea of feedback. He didn't name it as feedback, but he's like, "Man, you used to talk to us. Remember when you used to come to the desk and talk to us?" I'm like, "Yeah. I remember when I used to do that."
It's just funny that he remembers my conferences in that way. "Remember when you used to come to the desk and talk to us?" The idea that ... so many times, we conflate feedback and grading, and those two are not the same.

Brett: That's true.

Cornelius: That me, marking with my pen at the top of your notebook, or at the top of your page, doesn't mean that I've given you feedback. That the work we ask kids to do requires so much public sacrifice, that my feedback has to match that emotional effort. It can't just be a number scrawled across the top of a page.
I've been thinking a lot about how I put feedback in conversations, and then I figure out how to record those conversations, either through conferring notes or use of technology. I think if a teacher is to communicate love in 42 minutes, one of the ways that we gotta do that is by embracing feedback. Embracing feedback that feels social, and connected to the kid, and specific, and timely.
I'm thinking about ... "Nate, the way that you did this thing right here, where you added all of these cool noticings about the character's emotional state, you just noticed when he switched feelings after his mom left. That attention to detail really makes you a strong reader, but beyond that, I now know why people love you so much, because it probably makes you a strong friend."

Brett: Do you think that feedback ... we need to work on that as teachers, amongst each other first, so we can get ourselves to a good place where we're doing better with our own feedback, so that we can do better giving it to our students?

Cornelius: Sure. One of the things that every time people think about should we do this thing as teachers before, an immediate before. I think sometimes we get caught up in the preparation as teachers, where I am certainly a member of the cult of preparation, where it's much easier to prepare for a thing than to actually do the thing. I want to make sure that if we prepare, we practice feedback, that we do it two minutes before class starts, and then we go do it, we go try it.
I don't want to ever sit in a staff meeting, or in professional development, where I'm practicing feedback that I never deliver. If I'm in professional development, I'm practicing feedback, I want to be able to give the feedback next period. Or if I'm in professional development, and I'm practicing feedback after school, I want to be able to give the feedback tomorrow morning so that the turnaround is really quick.
I often think about ... I'm getting, trying to get good at so much stuff right now. I think as I grow older, I see more. I'm realizing that my teaching has to shift as a result of what I see. That I practice a thing, and then sometimes I invite other people to come see me. Not even in a formal kind of way, but like, "Hey, Brett. You're in the building today, can you just come through? I just need you for five minutes. I want you to watch me do this thing. I think it might be cool."
Just having that kind of rapport, that's really helped me to build my love skillset, I guess. When I'm thinking about the things that communicate love, according to Nate, it's this understanding that we can build classroom experiences around children. This idea that we can do really deliberate relationship building, the notion that we might engage in really clear and transferrable teaching, and then finally that idea of feedback.
If I were to take those four things, that could be a totally cool agenda for practice. That I might take those four things, and I might study them in PD really fast, and then go do it, or I might invite a few friends over, and then do it in a classroom.
One of the things I've been doing with my iPhone is ... I know this is crazy, but I've just been videotaping myself. I go right into selfie mode and I do a thing, and then I videotape myself, and I just watch it. I let kids know what I'm doing. I think kids really respect when their teacher is trying to get better.
There was one day where I had a staff developer come in and watch me teach, and she was giving me live feedback, and I was really embarrassed at first, cause I was like, "Oh, man. The kids are gonna see that I'm getting feedback from my friend, and they're gonna think less of me."
As soon as she left, they were like, "You're trying to get better for us?" I thought that that was a really cool way to see it, that they all were like honored... that I was trying to get better for them, and that's exactly what we want to do. Yeah, loving people is messy. It's messy outside of school, it's messy in 42 minutes, but I think those four things, or at least Nate thinks that those four things are the things that really stuck.

Brett: I think Nate might have a future as a teacher.

Cornelius: Possibly. I'll tell him next Saturday. Yeah.

Be sure to follow Cornelius on Twitter here. You can hear more of our podcasts with Cornelius here.

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Cornelius Minor on Feedback and Love - Heinemann

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Feedback can sneak up on you in the most unlikely of places. For Cornelius Minor, it came from a former student at a laundromat. In our continuing series of conversations with Cornelius Minor we're talking about the importance of feedback and love in the classroom.

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Mirrors Matter: Using Culturally andLinguistically Responsive Literature to SupportLanguage and Literacy Development

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Mirrors Matter: Using Culturally andLinguistically Responsive Literature to SupportLanguage and Literacy Development

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home | Kids Like Us © 2019 | your place for urban children's literature

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Author Interview: 'More Mirrors in the Classroom'

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Author Interview: 'More Mirrors in the Classroom'

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Education Week - Classroom Q&A With Larry Ferlazzo

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Jane Fleming, Susan Catapano, Candace M. Thompson and Sandy Ruvalcaba Carrillo agreed to answer a few questions about their book, More Mirrors In The Classroom.

Jane Fleming is a reading specialist and co-founder of KIDS LIKE US, a nonprofit organization dedicated to research, professional development, and advocacy around teaching with culturally relevant texts.

Susan Catapano is professor and international coordinator in the Watson College of Education at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington.

Candace Thompson is an associate professor in the Watson College of Education at the University of North Carolina, Wilmington.

Sandy Ruvalcaba Carrillo is a resource teacher of English learners on the Southwest side of Chicago with 17 years of experience in education.
LF: Jane, Susan, Candace & Sandy:
Culturally relevant teaching draws on student's cultural and linguistic knowledge as a foundation for effective instruction in school. Essentially, it is instruction that is designed to use students' experiences to support their learning. In "More Mirrors in the Classroom" we describe how educators can use culturally relevant texts as a tool to increase the effectiveness of literacy instruction. Multicultural education scholar Rudine Sims Bishop talks about books as "mirrors" and "windows." Mirrors are books in which children can find themselves, their families, and their communities reflected and valued, while "windows" help us develop understandings about the wider world. Through "More Mirrors in the Classroom," we're hoping to help educators better understand the powerful role that "mirrors" can play in supporting children's reading and writing development. Here's an example of what this can look like. Some of our teacher partners recently discovered the book, "Niño Wrestles the World" by Yuyi Morales. It's a terrific story about a young boy who, while playing with his toy wrestling figures, imagines that he is a world champion Lucha Libre competitor. One by one in his imagination, Niño defeats luchadores drawn from Mexican folklore - The Mummy of Guanajuato, La Llorona, El Chamuco. When these teachers, who work in a predominantly Latino neighborhood in Chicago, shared "Niño Wrestles the World" with their primary grade students, the level of engagement went through the roof. The children knew a lot about lucha libre, the Mexican professional wrestling tradition and cultural phenomenon, and they had so much to discuss. They went home and asked parents and grandparents to remind them of the folktales represented by characters in the book, and they came back to school wanting to share those stories with their teachers and classmates. Recognizing the cultural relevance of this text for their students, and the enthusiasm for learning it generated, the teachers decide to build an instructional unit around this content, reading fiction and nonfiction works about lucha libre, researching Latino folklore, and comparing versions of tales from different regions. Children then wrote their own versions of "Niño Wrestles the World" that incorporated their own characters but utilized the onomatopoeia and graphic format of the original mentor text. The class also worked with the art teacher to help students create their own paper mache versions of lucha libre masks, designing them to capture the essence of the characters they created. In the teachers' words, the student work that came out of that unit was "phenomenal" - like nothing they'd ever seen before. To be clear, these teachers are designing standards-based language arts instruction. They are teaching students how to comprehend and analyze fiction and nonfiction text, how to write narrative, informational, and persuasive pieces, how to use a mentor text to identify and practice various elements of writing craft, how to compare, contrast, and synthesize information from various sources, etc. The difference is that they've grounded that instruction in what students know, inviting children to bring their whole selves to school and allowing them to use their background knowledge and experiences as assets in learning to read and write.
You introduce the book as a way to support culturally relevant teaching. Can you share a summary of what CRT looks like and why you think it's important?
Jane, Susan, Candace & Sandy: We draw on Vanessa Irvin's work in defining urban children's literature as "books that recreate scenes and activities that realistically occur in daily life for children in the city." They reflect the racially, ethnically, and linguistically diverse communities that make up our nation's cities. Characters often reside in multi-unit buildings or in homes including multiple or extended families. They may rely on public transportation, or walk to shop in nearby delis or bodegas. Their blocks may have sidewalks, and traffic, and brownstone steps, rather than expanses of private yards and green space. The topics addressed in urban literature are realistic, sometimes revealing challenges that many urban public school students face. Characters in some books may experience economic hardship or concerns adjusting to a new culture or learning a new language. But like all kinds of children, they also treasure their families, enjoy exploring their neighborhoods, and get into typical, playful mischief with friends. Informational texts might feature people of color who are accomplished in diverse fields and industries, as well as books that feature urban architecture or urban ecology to provide a familiar foundation for learning new mathematics and science concepts. There are two important roles that urban children's literature children plays in culturally relevant teaching. First, urban children's literature can serve as a bridge to learning new content and mastering reading and writing strategies. All readers use their background knowledge, familiar schema, and experiences when trying to recognize words and make sense of texts - the same is true for young learners in city schools. But because published curricula are typically geared toward a national, middle class audience, very few of the selections we typically use for reading and writing instruction draw on urban public school students' experiences. For example, trying to teach city kids how to visualize or make inferences while reading a book about camping out in the country is pretty challenging. Our research shows that when teachers supplement the curriculum with some more relevant text selections that allow children to bring what they know to discussions about content, this often results in "unlocking" students' potential - student interest and engagement increase, oral language and writing productivity increase, and students' depth of comprehension increases. We're working hard to help teachers understand the importance of culturally relevant texts in reading and writing instruction and to get more "mirrors" in the classroom. Another really important role that urban children's literature plays in culturally relevant teaching is that the materials can serve as a connector between teachers and children. Most urban public school teachers do not live in the neighborhoods in which they teach. They've also often grown up in very different environments from their students, so teachers and children don't always have a lot of lived experiences in common. Many of our teacher partners have described how urban children's literature has opened up conversations with their students, helping them learn more about each other and deepening the strength of their relationships. Getting to know their students better then helps teachers plan even more relevant instruction. In addition, when teachers use literature that engages students and draws on their experiences, they often find themselves surprised by the high level of critical thinking that even young children are capable of. This often changes their perceptions and raises their expectations for their students. One specific example that comes to mind is when a kindergarten colleague of ours decided to try out the book "Something Beautiful" by Sharon Dennis Wyeth in a unit on community. The story is set in a neighborhood very similar to the one this school is in on Chicago's west side, and by the teachers' own admission, their students don't often see their neighborhood reflected in children's books. After reading "Something Beautiful," this teacher reported that "you could have heard a pin drop during that read aloud" because the children were so focused on the story. In the discussion that followed, she described how children were super-engaged in the conversation, making what she called "profound connections" and building on each other's ideas. The way children responded really changed this teacher's view of what her young learners were capable of when they could draw on their experience to make sense of the text. LF: Jane, Susan, Candace & Sandy: Pre-packaged curricula are typically written with a broad national audience in mind, so often there are few urban children's literature selections included. In general, we can't expect that a publisher will know who our students are and design a language arts or social science curriculum that is perfect for them. That's our job as educators. Rather than looking for a "perfect" curriculum, we encourage educators to review the curricula that are being used for reading and writing instruction in their schools and to consider carefully whether the text selections include a balance of mirrors and windows that can engage students with the content and support them in using their experiences as a foundation for learning new things. When there are gaps, we work with teachers to use the KIDS LIKE US website and other sources to find books that may be good additions to their units. We don't expect teachers to design curriculum from scratch, but we can view published curricula with a critical lens and supplement some text selections to design instruction that is potentially more culturally relevant for our students. Once teachers see how their students respond and what kinds of texts resonate with their students, they often get ideas for creating units like the one inspired by "Niño Wrestles the World" described above. An important factor is that we also need administrators to provide teachers with some professional leeway to make these kinds of instructional decisions. If administrators expect teachers to adhere super-strictly to the text selections included in their published curricula, they won't get very far in designing more culturally relevant instruction for their students. Trust that teachers know the children in your school, try supplementing some recommended texts with others that may be more culturally relevant, and look for evidence of increased engagement, high-level collaborative conversations, deeper comprehension, and great writing productivity amongst your students.
LF: Jane, Susan, Candace & Sandy: We recommend teachers begin by reviewing their current curriculum and their classroom library collections with their students and families in mind. Ask yourself the following questions: Does your core curriculum include many literature and informational text selections in which your students can see themselves, their families, and their communities reflected and valued? What proportion of books in your classroom or school library include characters that share your students' culture, language, and community context? Does your collection reflect your students in realistic family, community, and friendship stories, or are the majority of multicultural selections limited to the study of history, holidays, or world cultures? Educators can utilize the KIDS LIKE US website and other online resources shared there to find books that might be good additions to their curriculum and to curate high quality, culturally relevant collections for their students. We're gradually adding more and more books to the site, and soon we'll have recommended text sets posted that align with common language arts and social studies themes. We also encourage teachers to engage children, family members, and others in the school community in reading and reviewing books to help assess cultural relevance and authenticity. Their feedback and insights will help teachers discover books that might resonate most with children in their communities. Teachers might then identify unit themes that these books can connect with, and gradually build more mirrors into the curriculum. This doesn't have to happen all at once - we know this takes time. Consider starting with one upcoming unit and taking a few minutes to reexamine the text set to see if any of your current selections are potentially culturally relevant for your students. If not, try one or two new selections, and watch how students respond. I particularly liked your "Getting Started" chapter. What are one or two actions you think teachers can do right now if they want to begin using literature in a CRT framework? Many schools use pre-packaged programs for literacy instruction. Are you aware of any that promote the kind of pedagogy you're promoting in the book? What do you recommend that teachers do if they are stuck with using these programs that don't support CRT?
LF: How do you define "urban children's literature" and what is its role in culturally relevant teaching? Can you share one or two specific examples of what it can look like in the classroom?

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Author Interview: 'More Mirrors in the Classroom'

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Jane Fleming, Susan Catapano, Candace M. Thompson and Sandy Ruvalcaba Carrillo agreed to answer a few questions about their book, More Mirrors In The Classroom . Jane Fleming is a reading specialist and co-founder of KIDS LIKE US, a nonprofit organization dedicated to research, professional development, and advocacy around teaching with culturally relevant texts.

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The Poetry Friday Anthology® series helps teachers and librarians teach poetry easily while meeting the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), and the Texas TEKS for English Language Arts (ELA)/Poetry and Science & Technology. Celebrate Poetry on Fridays-and any day-with The Poetry Friday Anthology®!

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HERE WE GO: A Poetry Friday Power Bookfor children, tweens, and teens, features 12 PowerPack sets that combine: 1) diverse anchor poems; 2) new original response poems and mentor poems by Janet Wong; 3) PowerPlay prewriting activities; and 4) Power2You writing prompts.

The twelve anchor poems for HERE WE GO were written by: Naomi Shihab Nye, Carole Boston Weatherford, Joseph Bruchac, David Bowles, Ibtisam Barakat, Eileen Spinelli, David L. Harrison, Kate Coombs, Robyn Hood Black, Michelle Heidenrich Barnes, Renée M. LaTulippe, and Margaret Simon. Their poems are joined together with twenty-four new poems by Janet Wong that form a story featuring a diverse group of kids who are concerned about social justice and work together to fight hunger with a walkathon and school garden. Sylvia Vardell's inventive PowerPlay activities make it easy for writers to get inspired, while her Power2You writing prompts extend the learning. Vardell also created extensive back matter resources for readers and writers. A ges 8 and up.

Note: This is the second book in the Poetry Friday Power Book series and was selected for the NNSTOY Social Justice Book List. Book 1 in the series, You Just Wait: A Poetry Friday Power Book, was published in September 2016 and was selected as a 2017 NCTE Poetry Notable.

"This interactive book and the abundance of resources provided will motivate students to take action through words and ideas to make their world a better place- a must have for today's classrooms." -Lynne Dorfman and Rose Cappelli, Authors of Mentor Texts, Nonfiction Mentor Texts, and Poetry Mentor Texts

" I absolutely love this book! The invitations are inspiring and offer opportunities to think about the world and respond both personally and critically." -Mary Napoli, Associate Professor of Reading, Penn State Harrisburg

"This book will allow all sorts of emotions and thoughts to bubble forth, including difficult and painful ones . . . and that will be a source of healing." -Ed Spicer, Educator and literacy expert

"Really glad and excited that this book will be in the hands of young people." -Jeana Hrepich, Core Faculty, Antioch University Seattle

You Just Wait: A Poetry Friday Power Book for Tweens & Teens

YOU JUST WAIT: A Poetry Friday Power Book for tweens and teens, features 12 PowerPack sets that contain five elements: 1) a PowerPlay prewriting activity; 2) a previously-published Outside Poem (in this case, from The Poetry Friday Anthology for Middle School); 3) a new original Response Poem; 4) a new original Mentor Text poem; and 5) a Power2You writing prompt. PowerPacks = a fun and inspiring approach for a wide variety of readers and writers. Curious? Take a look!

The twelve Outside Poems from The Poetry Friday Anthology for Middle School (an NCTE Poetry Notable) were written by Robyn Hood Black, Joseph Bruchac, Jen Bryant, Margarita Engle, Julie Larios, Carmen T. Bernier-Grand, Charles Ghigna, Avis Harley, Amy Ludwig VanDerwater, Charles Waters, and Virginia Euwer Wolff. The way they are joined together here with twenty-four new poems by Janet Wong, they form a story featuring Paz, an Asian-Latina soccer player with dreams of stardom in college, the Olympics, and ultimately the World Cup; Lucesita, her feisty movie-loving cousin; and Joe, an older brother with dreams of the NBA. Sylvia Vardell's inventive PowerPlay activities make it easy for writers to get inspired, while her Power2You writing prompts extend learning. Vardell also created extensive back matter resources for readers and writers.

What People Are Saying about YOU JUST WAIT:

"Imagine a completely original way of writing verse novellas . . . Janet Wong and Sylvia Vardell have once again broken barriers with their bold, innovative approach to teaching poetry. I am thrilled to be included!" - Margarita Engle, Newbery Honor-winning author of The Surrender Tree

" YOU JUST WAIT is a must-have resource for middle-school teachers, the perfect invitation for teens to explore text-to-self connections through poetry. Comprehensive tools for implementation accompany excellent Poetry Friday selections, and Janet Wong's brilliant connective tissue provides wonderful mentor pieces." - David Bowles, Pura Belpré Honor-winning author of The Smoking Mirror

"Great spirit! Great fun! Let's write!" - Pat Mora, Author of Dizzy in Your Eyes: Poems about Love; Founder of Día: Children's Day, Book Day / El día de los niños, El día de los libros

"Every poem tells a story. Every page invites connection. Young readers will find their fingers itching to respond to these verses and to add their own poems and stories." -Carol Jago, Longtime English teacher & Past President of the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE)

Hooray for holidays! The Poetry Friday Anthology® for Celebrations features poems in English and Spanish by 115 poets for 150+ holidays and celebrations, including: Random Acts of Kindness Week, Children's Book Week, World Laughter Day, National Camping Month, International Literacy Day, Global Hand Washing Day, and more! It's available in a Teacher/Librarian Edition and a Children's Edition. Check it out at PoetryCelebrations.com! (And listen to a FREE audio sampler at SoundCloud featuring 35 poems from the book read by David Bowles & Friends!)

Poets include: Jack Prelutsky, J. Patrick Lewis, Joyce Sidman, Margarita Engle, Marilyn Singer, Nikki Grimes, Alma Flor Ada, F. Isabel Campoy, Ibtisam Barakat, Uma Krishnaswami, Francisco X. Alarcón, Linda Sue Park, Jane Yolen, Kenn Nesbitt, Jorge Argueta, Grace Lin, Joseph Bruchac, Douglas Florian, Laura Purdie Salas, Carmen T. Bernier-Grand, and 95 others. See our terrific list of contributors here!

Target audience: PreK - Grade 5; for Public Librarians, School Librarians, K-8 Classroom Teachers, Reading Specialists, and ELL Teachers, and Children (ages 4 and up). Available in a Teacher/Librarian Edition and a Children's Edition; order at Amazon or QEPBooks.com!
"A bubbly and educational bilingual poetry anthology for children." -Kirkus "If you are looking for Spanish language material to use with children in class or at home, you are going to love this book!... I guarantee you will find material to fit your curriculum." -Spanish Playground

Poetry + the Common Core (CCSS)

On Poetry Friday and any day: Integrate the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) for English Language Arts (ELA) into your curriculum with poetry. Poetry allows you to start small. You can address CCSS requirements in just five minutes with The Poetry Friday Anthology ®!

These editions of The Poetry Friday Anthology® are tailored to the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) for Poetry. Poetry allows you to start small; address the Poetry TEKS and prepare your students for the STAAR in just five minutes every Poetry Friday!

The Poetry Friday Anthology® for Science was designed to align with the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) as well as the science standards of individual states, so the Teacher Edition and The Poetry of Science: The Poetry Friday Anthology® for Science for Kids can be used nationally. For Texas teachers, The TEKS Guide is a supplement with charts that show connections to the Science TEKS, Technology TEKS, and Poetry TEKS at a glance.

A NEW COVER for the Teacher/Librarian Edition!

NEW! An illustrated KIDS edition with 30 Bonus Poems!

"A treasury of the greatest science poetry for children ever written, with a twist!"

"If you only buy one book this year, this is the book you should buy. "

"Vardell and Wong have again provided an outstanding resource for classroom teachers!"

-IRA's Reading Today

"You will find information and guidance for linking poetry to the Common Core State Standards or the TEKS . . . This is a lot of resource and professional development for $29.99!"

- The ALSC Blog

Looking for an e-book? Many of our books are also available in e-book editions. You can load an e-book onto a large screen or Smartboard for the whole classroom to see, or download our e-books on your iPad or other Kindle/compatible device.

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Pomelo Books | Publisher of The Poetry Friday Anthology Series

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The Poetry Friday Anthology® series helps teachers and librarians teach poetry easily while meeting the Common Core State Standards (CCSS), the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS), and the Texas TEKS for English Language Arts (ELA)/Poetry and Science & Technology. Celebrate Poetry on Fridays-and any day-with The Poetry Friday Anthology®!

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Books & Poems

Writing Poetry

Biography

Janet Wong was born in Los Angeles in 1962. She was the daughter of a Chinese father and a Korean mother. While growing up in California, she enjoyed watching TV with her dad, playing with her friends, catching lizards, and riding her skateboard. There were no early signs that Janet would become an author or a poet. In fact, she hated poetry in elementary school because of the way it was taught. And she wasn't much of a reader either - she found reading to be too quiet and lonely.

At the University of California in Los Angeles, Janet Wong studied history. She later earned a law degree from Yale and spent the next four years practicing law. While working as the Director of Labor Relations at Universal Studios, Wong realized that she was unhappy in her line of work. One day, as she was shopping in a children's book store, it struck her that what she really wanted to do was write books for children. After discussing it with her husband, Wong quit her job, started writing, and quickly piled up rejection letters. While taking a writing class, Wong realized that poetry, her least favorite genre in elementary school, might in fact become her most successful genre as a writer.

Janet Wong sold her first book of poems, Good Luck Gold, eighteen months after she quit her job as a lawyer. Her courageous career change later became the subject of a segment on the Oprah Winfrey Show called "Remembering Your Spirit". Some of Wong's books, like Apple Pie Fourth of July, explore the tension between having immigrant roots and wanting to be accepted as an American. Other books playfully address topics with which Wong has less direct experience, such as yoga and dumpster diving. In addition to writing, Janet Wong visits classrooms and speaks at conferences.

Janet Wong lives with her husband and son in Princeton, New Jersey.

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Janet Wong was born in Los Angeles in 1962. She was the daughter of a Chinese father and a Korean mother. While growing up in California, she enjoyed watching TV with her dad, playing with her friends, catching lizards, and riding her skateboard. There were no early signs that Janet would become an author or a poet.

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Pets & Poetry by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong

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Pets & Poetry by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong

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As we watch the news reports of the impact of hurricanes, flooding, and storms across our country, we're united in our concern for neighbors or strangers affected by these disasters. Scenes of help and rescue are inspiring, and glimpses of pets reunited with their families are heartwarming and reassuring. At times like these, the beloved animals in our lives bring us such comfort and healing. And many psychologists and therapists are beginning to see the value of contact with animals for people of all ages, including children in classrooms and libraries. Therapy groups have used animals to motivate and comfort students for decades, but lately we've noticed more stories about reading to a wider-than-ever variety of animals-and even sleepover parties for stuffed animals at public libraries.
Pet Crazy
Our latest creative writing venture focuses entirely on pets and the special bond we have with the dogs and cats (and other animals) in our lives. It's entitled Pet Crazy: A Poetry Friday Power Book, the newest in an interactive poetry-reading-writing series that features twelve PowerPacks of poems + activities with anchor poems by Kristy Dempsey, Helen Frost, Janice Harrington, Eric Ode, Laura Shovan, Eileen Spinelli, Elizabeth Steinglass, Don Tate, Padma Venkatraman, April Halprin Wayland, Carole Boston Weatherford, and Tamera Will Wissinger. Those anchor poems are woven together into a story with twenty-four response poems written by Janet Wong in the voices of three child characters-Ben, Kristy, and Daniel. And each PowerPack begins and ends with playful game-like activities that invite children to think, respond, and write.
Sample Poems
Here are a few poems from Pet Crazy: A Poetry Friday Power Book that you can share to get young readers and writers thinking about the pets and animals they love and how sharing a book together can be a fun and meaningful activity-especially during tough times. Elizabeth Steinglass's anchor poem "Book Hound," an acrostic poem about reading to a dog, is followed by the response poem "READING" by Janet, in the voice of Kristy, about a Reading Rabbit.

Those two poems are followed by "WRITING," a poem in the voice of Daniel that serves as a mentor poem for a Power2You writing prompt so that aspiring writers can also try creating an acrostic poem of their own. Each of these poems helps kids think about how sharing a book with an animal (a pet or a stuffed animal), can be a fun and reassuring activity.
Reading to Animals
Is your school or library ready for a furry, four-legged, finned, or flapping "reading buddy"? Could a stuffed animal on your bookshelf inspire students to read-and write-more confidently? If you would like to investigate whether a therapy animal program could work at your school or library, here are some websites from Pet Crazy that provide an overview of programs that might be available-or could be started-in your area. Check with your local library to see if they already have programs like this up and running. (See Internet Resources for website addresses.)
LibraryDogs.com
This site provides many photos and tips on how to get started, including a "Responsible Dog Owners Pledge with a test that will help families understand the requirements of a therapy dog.
R.E.A.D. Program
The Intermountain Therapy Animals R.E.A.D. (Reading Education Assistance Dog) program is a central resource with a useful bibliography of professional resources on therapy animals and reading achievement.
SitStayRead.org
This is a program in low-income neighborhoods in Chicago with trained volunteers and Certified Reading Assistance Dogs; one unique element is its poetry-specific program "Poetry Pals."
Tail Waggin' Tutors
Therapy Dogs International has a model program described at their website.
Visiting Pet Program
The Visiting Pet Program, based in New Orleans, has a prominent "Reading to Rover" project and has been in existence for 30+ years.
More Pet Poetry
We've also featured pet poems in our other books in The Poetry Friday Anthology® series and in the Poetry Friday Power Book series. For example, in our first book, The Poetry Friday Anthology (K-5), there are wonderful dog poems like "Good dog! Bad dog!" by Jeannine Atkins, and "Spotty's Tongue" by Betsy Franco, clever cat poems like "My Porcupine is Feeling Fine" by Kenn Nesbitt, and even a poem about pet fish in "Fish" by Joy Acey. In The Poetry Friday Anthology for Middle School, the heartbreak of losing a beloved pet is beautifully conveyed in "For Bucky (Who Vanished Nov. 1 Without a Trace)" by Naomi Shihab Nye and in "He Was So Little" by David L. Harrison. Even in The Poetry Friday Anthology for Science, poets share their experiences with pets (with a science twist) in poems such as "A Dog's Hypothesis: Zoey's Guide to Getting More Goodies" by Susan Taylor Brown or "The Lion and the House Cat" by Mary Lee Hahn. And of course there are many special days to celebrate our love for our pets and animals in The Poetry Friday Anthology for Celebrations, such as National Bird Day (January 5), National Pet Week (first week of May), and National Guide Dog Month (September) with special poems by Margarita Engle, Eric Ode, and Stephanie Calmenson. You can find twenty more pet poems from The Poetry Friday Anthology® series in digital poetry postcard form on Pinterest here: https://www.pinterest.com/pomelobooks/poems-about-animals-and-pets/

Pets are a popular topic for many poets who write for young people and you can locate many pet poetry collections at your local library. For example, look for these pet poetry books to share with the kids and pets in your life:

Oh, Theodore! Guinea Pig Poems by Susan Katz (Clarion Books, 2007)

Every Day's a Dog's Day: A Year in Poems by Marilyn Singer (Dial, 2012)

Won Ton; A Cat Tale Told in Haiku and Won Ton and Chopstick: A Cat and Dog Tale Told in Haiku by Lee Wardlaw (Holt, 2011 and 2015)

The Pet Project: Cute and Cuddly Vicious Verses by Lisa Wheeler (Atheneum, 2013)

Whether we're reading about interesting animals or sharing a favorite book with a beloved pet, there's a special kinship between humans and animals that teaches us about companionship, loyalty, responsibility, and love. Poets capture those moments and emotions in special ways that beg to be shared.

Here's another pet poem from Pet Crazy just for fun. See if you can decode it!

One last thing . . . a GIVEAWAY!! If you'd like to have a chance to win a Reading (and Talking) Rabbit for your classroom or library: reblog, tweet, or mention this post on Facebook. Tag us (@PomeloBooks) if you can-or let us know in the comments where you shared this post-and check Sylvia Vardell's Poetry for Children blog [link: https://poetryforchildren.blogspot.com] next Friday, September 15, to discover the winner!! [Reading Rabbit link: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B009JQNB3Y/ref=ox_sc_sfl_title_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A3K56N2H9D8FMC]
CHILDREN'S BOOKS CITED
Vardell, S. & Wong, J. (2017). Pet crazy: A poetry Friday power book. Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.
REFERENCES
Katz, Susan. 2007. Oh, Theodore! Guinea Pig Poems. New York: Clarion Books.

Singer, Marilyn, 2012. Every Day's a Dog's Day: A Year in Poems. New York: Dial.

Steinglass, E. (2017). "Book Hound." In Vardell, S. & Wong, J. (2017). Pet Crazy: A poetry Friday power book. Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.

Vardell, S. M. and Wong, Janet. Eds. (2012). The poetry Friday anthology K-5: Poems for the school year with connections to the Common Core (or TEKS). Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.

Vardell, S. M. and Wong, Janet. Eds. (2013). The poetry Friday anthology for middle school: Poems for the school year with connections to the Common Core (or TEKS). Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.

Vardell, S. M. and Wong, Janet. Eds. (2014). The poetry Friday anthology for science: Poems for the school year integrating science, reading, and language arts. Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.

Vardell, S. M. and Wong, Janet. Eds. (2015). The poetry Friday anthology for celebrations: Holiday poems for the whole year in English and Spanish. Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.

Wardlaw, Lee. 2011. Won Ton; A Cat Tale Told in Haiku. Ill. by Eugene Yelchin. New York: Henry Holt.

Wardlaw, Lee. 2015. Won Ton and Chopstick: A Cat and Dog Tale Told in Haiku. Ill. by Eugene Yelchin. New York: Holt.

Wheeler, Lisa. 2013. The Pet Project: Cute and Cuddly Vicious Verses. Ill. by Zachariah OHora. New York: Atheneum.

Wong, J. (2017). "Daniel: WRITING." In Vardell, S. & Wong, J. (2017). Pet crazy: A poetry Friday power book. Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.

Wong, J. (2017). "Kristy: READING." In Vardell, S. & Wong, J. (2017). Pet crazy: A poetry Friday power book. Princeton, NJ: Pomelo Books.
INTERNET RESOURCES
Intermountain Therapy Animals R.E.A.D. (Reading Education Assistance Dog). http://www.therapyanimals.org/Research_%26_Results.html

Jimison, R. (2017). After a night at the library, stuffed animals help kids read. Retrieved from: http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/28/health/stuffed-animals-reading-study/index.html

LibraryDogs.com. http://librarydogs.com/what_dogs_know.html

SitStayRead.org. https://www.sitstayread.org/programs#poetry-pals

Tail Waggin' Tutors (Therapy Dogs International). http://www.tdi-dog.org/OurPrograms.aspx?Page=Children+Reading+to+Dogs

Visiting Pet Program. http://www.visitingpetprogram.org

Sylvia M. Vardell is Professor at Texas Woman's University and teaches children's and young adult literature. She has published five books on literature for young people, plus more than 25 book chapters and 100 journal articles. Her current work focuses on poetry for young people, including a blog, Poetry for Children. Her favorite pets are dogs and she's had three of them (Luther, Yenta, and Caesar, each for many years), as well as Leonardo the tortoise, and Pecky the parakeet.

Janet S. Wong is a graduate of Yale Law School and a former lawyer who became a children's poet. Her work has been featured on The Oprah Winfrey Show and other shows. She is the author of 30 books for children on identity, chess, creative recycling, yoga, and more. She has had dozens of pets, including birds, fish, a frog, hamsters, lizards, turtles, a cat, and favorite dogs named Bernadette, Coco, Nissa, and Angel.

Together, Vardell and Wong are the creative forces behind The Poetry Friday Anthology and Poetry Friday Power Book series.

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Pets & Poetry by Sylvia Vardell and Janet Wong

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As we watch the news reports of the impact of hurricanes, flooding, and storms across our country, we're united in our concern for neighbors or strangers affected by these disasters. Scenes of help and rescue are inspiring, and glimpses of pets reunited with their families are heartwarming and reassuring.

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Voices from the Middle Podcast, Vol. 24, Episode 15

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This episode features the second installment of Teacher on the Street. Our teacher correspondent Alex Corbitt speaks with Sara Ahmed, Cornelius Minor, Jennifer Ochoa, Jason Griffith, Priscilla Thomas, and Matt Homrich-Knieling to explore innovative ways to center student voice and choice in the classroom.

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ERIC - One Indivisible Day: Teaching for Social Justice through Literature, School Library Media Activities Monthly, 2008-Apr

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A day-long symposium in June 2007 by the Center for Teaching through Children's Books and the National College of Education Office of Partnerships at National-Louis University (NLU) convened for the purpose of immersing the professional community in the goal of teaching for social justice through literature for children and adolescents.

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Indivisible Poems for Social Justice - Paperback

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Discussion Guide Teachers' Notes Look Inside *Reviewed by Booklist, School Library Journal, Library Media Connection, Teacher-Librarian and many more! *Selected as Cooperative Children's Book Center Book of the Week and on their 2014 Best of Year list! Anthology including over 50 works of poetry by 20th century writers on issues related to social justice.

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Indivisible: Poems for Social Justice Book Group Discussion Guide By Maureen Smith

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Indivisible: Poems for Social Justice Book Group Discussion Guide By Maureen Smith

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Toby Rajput, National Board Certified Teacher,(renewed 2012), directs the School Library program at National Louis University and is the Children's and Youth Literature Librarian for the University and for the Center for Teaching through Children's Books.

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Media Resources | Holiday Books 2016 | NLU

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The interactivity of these books fosters children's imaginations through shared reading, fold-out pages, hands-on activities, vibrant illustrations and more. The books encourage face-to-face interaction while creating a healthy sense of balance with the influx of videos and technology children use today. Getting children to learn and laugh with their caregivers nurtures their emotional intelligence.

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ERIC - Questioning Your Collection, Knowledge Quest, 2009

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School librarians serving diverse learning communities, such as the Chicago Public Schools, have always been aware of the need to seek out multicultural books as "mirrors [that] let readers see reflections of their own lives; windows [that] let them see others' lives."

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Uploaded by Mikki Sherwood on 2014-04-03.

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Children's Books in Children's Hands: A Brief Introduction to Their Literature, Pearson eText with Loose-Leaf Version -- Access Card Package, 5th Edition

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Add to Cart Children's Books in Children's Hands: A Brief Introduction to Their Literature, Pearson eText with Loose-Leaf Version -- Access Card Package, 5th Edition

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Striving for International Understanding Through Literature

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Striving for International Understanding Through Literature

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Striving for International Understanding Through Literature

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In the 21st century, our students increasingly communicate, connect, collaborate, and interact with diverse cultures and traditions around the world, so they need to develop global literacy. This department...

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What Works Well Where When? How Various Qualities of Digital and Print Picture Books

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What Works Well Where When? How Various Qualities of Digital and Print Picture Books

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Junko Yokota - ‘What Works Well Where When? How Various Qualities of Digital and Print Picture Books

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Junko Yokota's keynote during the International Research Society Children's Literature conference 2013 in Maastricht. 'What Works Well Where When? How Various Qualities of Digital and Print Picture Books Shape Reader Response'.

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Explore this photo album by Center for Teaching through Children's Books National-Louis University on Flickr!

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Five Steps to Launching a Schoolwide Social Justice Movement

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Five Steps to Launching a Schoolwide Social Justice Movement

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First Person

Last week, I sat in on a meeting about the reading intervention program in one of the several schools that I support through my work at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York City. We have more kids on our caseload than we can serve this semester. Many of those public school students, who "need" reading intervention, are brown or poor.

Our staff knows that literacy is not just a matter of meeting standards in a community like ours. For many of our students and their families, literacy is the difference between a full stomach or an empty one, employment or prison-even life or death.

But because of lack of funding and too many students, we were tasked with deciding which kids we would meet with in groups instead of meeting in pairs or in one-on-one settings.

Each change to our roster felt wrong, leading to another conversation with another black parent: "Here's why I'm giving your kid less than what they deserve..."

I tried to think about how my own black parents would have responded to such a conversation about me. And I thought-not for the first time-about how I love teaching, but sometimes, I wonder if my profession loves me back.

We Need to Stop Being Patient

There is a very specific and enduring kind of trauma associated with being a black educator in a system that does not serve black and brown children and their communities equitably.

I've been an educator since 2001, and each year that I mature, I grow more ill at ease with the way things are. We speak of school segregation, literacy rates, inequitable funding, and school discipline as if these issues are natural law. They are not. These issues are a direct result of practices that we have inherited and of those that we perpetuate.

I'm finding it harder to mask my concern behind the pleasantries required to socialize one's way through a teaching day. My conversations have become uncomfortable because of the weight of all that I have seen and all that concerns me. I have been on a nonstop odyssey to learn what I need to know about inequity in order to address concerns of it.

Throughout my career, I've been so energized by the teachers who have made equity and justice integral parts of their classroom practice by changing their practices. I've learned from them. I've shared their stories so others can learn from them as well.

But the responsibility for change doesn't lie with individual teachers alone. One teacher working toward equity makes a difference. Six teachers working toward that goal makes an even bigger one. But a whole school working together? That's a revolution.

We Need to Address Inequity Together

I keep thinking about something Nikole Hannah-Jones, an investigative reporter for The New York Times Magazine, says frequently: The system isn't broken. The system is operating exactly as designed: "to deliver separate, but not equal, educations to black students and white students."

It's this kind of systemic inequity we need to dismantle.

When I name systemic racism, people often reply, "But, Cornelius, I'm an English teacher. I can't do anything!" or "Cornelius, I'm white, and this work is uncomfortable for me!"

When we teachers feel powerless or uncomfortable about curriculum or classroom practices, we study. We read. We practice.

We already have tools and protocols in place that allow us to create powerful, schoolwide literacy practices like independent reading or small-group instruction. We already know how to brainstorm and test ideas. We already know how to collect data and use it to improve. Here are five ways we can use the same tools and approaches to create powerful schoolwide movements toward justice:

1. Name the problem and find the possibilities. The kind of systemic racism that permeates our schools does not wear a hood or hurl insults. Though it looks different in the context of each school, it most often resembles curricula and pedagogy that is not culturally relevant. School-based racism can also surface through discipline and suspension rates, gifted placement, tracking, hiring practices, resource allocation, access to services like counseling or conflict resolution, or the curricular denial that people of color even exist or have contributed to humanity. Sometimes the systemic problems we face appear "normal," and it can be easy to overlook them. Social justice work is not just about seeing the problem, but about seeing the possibilities for solutions.

2. Educate yourself. The solutions that we seek can feel out of reach. Library cards are free, so let's use them. Let's read widely about how other groups of teachers have made change. Let's discuss what we're learning with each other. Let's invite our students, their parents, and community members into the conversation and really listen to what they're saying. After reading and talking, we can decide what equity looks like in the context of a classroom, a grade, a team, or a school.

3. Develop a plan of action. Start by taking inventory of staffing resources. Think about the best people to involve and in what capacity. We need leaders who will encourage and support this kind of get-your-hands-dirty innovation. How can we maximize our time and energy? What's the best application of budget? How will we sustain the efforts across the school year?

4. Don't be afraid to make mistakes. The best way to demonstrate commitment to social justice is to actually do something about it-over and over again. Don't get derailed by missteps and mistakes. This will not be a one-size-fits-all approach.

5. Reflect and recommit. Celebrate successes, and take note of what worked. Turn what didn't into opportunities for learning. Go back to other teachers and leaders and ask them to evaluate efforts. Repeat steps 2-5 as many times as it takes to eradicate the problem named in step 1. Equity is a goal we may never reach, but it's one we should never stop aiming for.

The status quo narrative that systematically denies access and resources to black and brown children (while fooling their white peers to believe in their "right" to have what others have been denied) and then demonizes them for not achieving is one that we don't have to lament anymore. We are teachers, and though we did not build this system, we exist in it. As such, we are complicit.

Change can be more than platitudes, maxims, or social media posts. It can be real and sustainable. And it can start with us.

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Five Steps to Launching a Schoolwide Social Justice Movement

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First Person Last week, I sat in on a meeting about the reading intervention program in one of the several schools that I support through my work at the Teachers College Reading and Writing Project in New York City. We have more kids on our caseload than we can serve this semester.