TEACHER INTERVIEW

St. Johns
May 28, 1992
 
 
 
Q.   Influenced by the head master?
 
A.   I think two things.  My first interview with the head master
     here probably influenced me a great deal because we instantly
     liked each other and he talked a lot about student expectives,
     that we don't expect enough from our students and that's why
     students aren't learning very much in most of our classrooms
     and I completely agree with that so I'd say he set a standard,
     that set a tone in what I was going to teach and the way I was
     going to teach and what I was going to expect from students
     and I actually think that influenced what I do in the
     classroom quite a bit and it continues to do that because he
     is an inspiring person and talks about this kind of thing a
     lot.  We share a mutual distaste for teacher union for the
     kind of apathy that is allowed to continue in classroom across
     the board in public schools and really share a love, a passion
     for reading, for books, for literature, for ideas, for getting
     kids to think and so I think those ideals actually that we
     both agree on probably influence what I do in the classroom a
     lot.  And then the second thing was that before I got this job
     they had me teach a class of 8th graders and they told me they
     wanted me to teach poetry and so I was not given any kind of
     guidance whatsoever.  I had to just prepare a lesson on poetry
     and come in and teach it and I had two English teachers
     observe me who are published poets and it was, you know I
     prepared what I thought was a good sort of introduction to
     poetry but it was clear when I was done that I'd under
     estimated the ability of the kids in the classroom and the
     amount of poetry that they'd actually done and when Don called
     me into his office, this was before I knew whether they were
     going to hire me or not, he asked me what I would do
     differently if I could do it again, and that's what I told him
     I would differently.  He said that's all he wanted to hear and
     again I think it relates to the first story.  I think my
     expectations, Don has always expected me to have very high
     expectations of my kids, my students, and not to under
     estimate junior high abilities and I think that has definitely
     influenced the specific kind of literature that I teach and
     the themes that I deal with in junior high and I think that's
     about it.
 
Q.   Influenced by the Dean of Faculty?
 
A.   O.k.  Well, I guess the Dean of the Faculty pulled together a
     committee this year of people who were interested in
     developing an interdisciplinary program in any area of the
     school and opened it up to all faculty members that were
     interested in doing that and what came out of that meeting was
     the idea that the place to begin is in the junior high.  That
     we have a lot of freedom in developing curriculum and that we
     were going to explore the possibility of first integrating
     history and English in the junior high and what came out of
     that was the plan that we were going to have a three year
     world history program that would begin in 7th grade and end at
     the end of 9th grade that would be coordinated with what we do
     in English and so a big project, a major project has come out
     of that.  Something that I think we're going to do that I
     don't think anybody else has ever done before and that is to
     develop a world history program, three year world history
     program that begins in 7th grade that will include art and
     music and will pull literature from the period as well as
     study themes that I've been able to develop.  I mean its a
     huge creative project and the possibilities of what are going
     to come out of this I think are really very exciting.  It
     provides, we are going to begin, I mean we've already begun
     working on it but Greg Berger and I, who is the person from
     the history department who's going to work on it, they've
     found money for us to develop it this summer, to develop the
     program, the whole junior high faculty are going to
     participate in this once we get it fleshed out, so I'd say
     that is something pretty concrete that came out of just
     basically an idea a few people batting around an idea then
     getting together a committee that was going to talk about how
     we could actually, did we want to do something that would be
     more interdisciplinary on a grand scale?  What could we do,
     where could we begin, what's the most likely way that we could
     be successful, and then to come up with this concrete plan
     that's actually going to go into effect this Fall.
 
Q.   Influenced by Board of Trustees?
 
A.   Yah.  Andy Rush, who is a well known artist who's on our Board
     of Trustees, was head of the education committee, he put
     together a community-wide group last year to study education
     in Tucson and to come up with some recommendations for
     improvement and he's an incredibly creative person.  I got to
     be on the committee.  We pooled our resources and pulled in
     leaders from every aspect of the community, from the
     university, from the medical center, from IBM, you know from
     the world of psychiatry in town, from public school teachers,
     from kindergarten all the way through junior college and the
     university level, we pulled in physicians, it was absolutely
     a wonderful group of people and we met monthly and we defined
     the issues our selves; we set our own agenda.  I felt like we
     made, the discussions were always lively and interesting.  You
     don't come up with anything that's going to change the world
     at the end of something like this, but what, the way it
     effected my daily life was continually brought up big issues.
     What's the best way that you get students to learn in your
     classroom?  How can you be more creative?  How can you deal
     with multiple ways of handling a variety of intelligences?  To
     keep those questions just right at the forefront so that I am
     always figuring out what can I do to do my job better, to get
     kids to be more successful, to really get them to learn what
     I want them to learn.  I'd say that was a daily event.
 
Q.   Influenced by state or federal programs?
 
A.   No.  Absolutely nothing.  I don't think they have any effect
     on what we do at all.
 
Q.   Influenced by North Central?
 
A.   Well, I think the evaluation that we had to do, the self-
     evaluation that we had to do to prepare for their visit, all
     of the questions we had to answer for them, we actually took
     those real seriously in every department.  We spent several
     days and a lot of hours working on those things and I think we
     came up with definitions that were important about what we're
     doing and the way we're doing this.  I think it actually built
     a lot of confidence that we're doing things correctly.  There
     were some, I am trying to think if there was anything that
     came out of that that would have changed the direction of what
     we do.  I don't think so.  You know, I think a lot of that
     dealt with jargon, educational jargon that, you know, I don't
     have a lot of respect for.  The things that were concrete,
     that asked us how do you access what you are doing, you know,
     what's the scope of what you're doing?  I think those things
     were valuable for us just in terms of sitting down and
     figuring out if we are really doing what a college prep
     English department should be doing and I think we came out
     feeling that indeed we are and it was worthwhile in the sense
     that we had some objective standard and somebody from the
     outside coming in and taking a look at what we're doing and
     seeing if they agree that we're doing what we think we're
     doing.  I don't think it changed what I do in the classroom to
     any extent except that there's a significant amount of pride
     that comes from being labeled a college prep school and I
     think the kids actually feel that.  They're real proud of the
     fact that our standards are higher than the average high
     school and junior high and that they really believe they are
     prepared for college when they graduate from this school.  I
     think that's about it.
 
Q.   Influenced by legal or judicial judgement?
 
A.   I don't think so.  I think that people here are very aware of,
     you know, the kinds of things that people have to be aware of
     this year with the whole Anita Hill/Clarence Thomas thing,
     being put on notice that sexual harassment is a serious issue,
     that people need to just be cautious and not do anything that
     could put you in a position where you could be accused of
     that.  I think because people here are sensitive basically to,
     I feel like we're a pretty humanistic group of faculty members
     and widely read and, I think we're aware of judicial decisions
     that may have, I mean, desegregation cases don't really affect
     us but we definitely want to be a racially diverse school, so
     you know, I think those.  We haven't been mandated to do
     anything.  I think that we are just aware of the things that
     are out there that are important that you need to be careful
     of, but I can't think of way that those things are affecting
     what I do in the classroom.
 
Q.   Influenced by parents?
 
A.   Well, I think my work place is shaped to a great deal by
     parents because the kind of parent that we have here is really
     supportive of their child's education and they value
     excellence, they value homework, they support us in all those
     things.  I mean, I don't get people give me, parents give me
     a lot of support in terms of the literature that I choose, in
     terms of what I'm doing in motivating their kids to read, I
     don't ever get a complaint about too much work.  I think that
     no parents influence us because they're sending us students,
     for the most part, who really want to learn and have come from
     homes where education is really valued, where the parents are,
     you know, they really are a great back-up for us and I, they
     don't interfere.  I mean, I'd have to say if we are talking
     about autonomy, I feel like parents leave me along.  They have
     a lot of faith and trust in what I'm doing and I can't think
     of anytime when I've had a parent ask me not to do something
     or to question what I'm doing in the classroom so that I would
     change what I'm doing.  I taught the Holocaust to 7th graders
     this year, I didn't pull any punches, I showed them all of the
     footage you'd expect high school students to view and I didn't
     get any complaints about it.  I told the parents basically I
     trusted these kids' judgement and respected their intellect to
     think that they were going to handle it and there was no
     problem with it.  I deal with pretty controversial things.  I
     oppose censorship, I dole out young adult books that deal with
     hot topics and I've never had a parent here object to any of
     those kinds of things.  I think it has a lot to do with just
     the education level of the parents that I'm dealing with.
 
Q.   Influenced by professional organization?
 
A.   Well, actually the National Council of English Teachers is
     important to me and I'm a member of the American Library
     Association and I do a lot of reading.  I read __________
     professional journals every month and I get ideas from those
     journals.  I order the best books that they publish every year
     and read them and I get, you know, I keep up on what the
     latest is in teaching writing and National Council of English
     teachers is definitely very valuable, I think, in helping
     English teachers keep abreast of the latest research and just
     giving you creative ideas, things that have worked in other
     classrooms and they do deal with junior high level.  They deal
     with different genres, they have great book reviews and I'd
     say actually, you know, the book review sources that I read
     book lists, and things like that are really helpful for that
     also, just to keep me up with the latest in with new and young
     adult fiction.  Let's see if there's anything else.
     Organization.  Definitely not.  I think that's it.
 
Q.   Influenced by students?
 
A.   I feel like everyday my work life is shaped by students.  I
     think that I'm, you know, introspective about what happens in
     my classroom everyday and so I, you know, I watch very
     carefully to see if I'm successful.  What, you know, if the
     kids are engaged, if they're really learning what they're what
     they're supposed to be learning, if they're loving what
     they're doing in my classroom and if there's boredom I'd feel
     like I need to change what I'm doing immediately.  I change
     things on a weekly basis.  I mean, I only plan a week at a
     time so that I can adjust to what has just happened that week.
     I mean where I'm going for the whole year but I'm able to make
     a lot of changes as I go.  Let's see, I give the kids some
     kind of survey at the end of the year that asks questions
     about what we've read, what things they've enjoyed doing, what
     they would do differently if they could do differently, what
     advice they'd give to me as a teacher if they could, and this
     is all done anonymously and that's actually, you know, really
     wonderful.  I mean it ends up, I changed a book that I'm not
     going to read next year because they're responses this year,
     there was one book that seemed that more kids didn't like than
     liked so I'm not going to teach it next year.  There is such
     a wide variety out there that I have to choose from that I'm
     not going to choose something that they all don't love
     actually.  Let's see, I think students change, they affect
     what I do all the time because I want them to love English. I
     want it to be their favorite subject and I am always watching
     for clues about whether or not they're enjoying the writing
     that they're doing and the reading that they're doing and they
     have to, they speak, every student speaks every day in class
     in every discussion that I have, they stand up in front of the
     class at least once a week and read something they've written,
     their writing twice a week for me, so I think I have a lot of
     means of figuring out whether or not they're learning and
     enjoying it.
 
Q.   Creative attempt to improve methods etc. that was thwarted?
 
A.   No.  Absolutely not.  Every creative thing that I've ever
     attempted has been encouraged at this school and people love
     my ideas and I've tried 

 They ended up with an exhibit like a science
     exhibit.  We had a science, or that kind of a fair where these
     things were set up and their work was displayed and that, you
     know, that is not, that is completely out of the realm of what
     I'm supposed to be doing with my curriculum, but everybody
     found real value in me doing it and let me have the freedom to
     try it and it ended up being one of the things the kids liked
     the most that we did this year, and every single thing, we bat
     ideas around all the time and if somebody thinks it might not
     work or that you might do something differently, you know, the
     head of my department will always discuss that kind of a thing
     with me, but she's liked my ideas that I've had up to this
     point, so I'd say that we're really encouraged to be creative
     and that there's nobody out there who is trying to thwart
     that.  No force that I can think of.  Parents don't do it, the
     Board of Trustees don't do it, the Dean of Faculty, head
     master, they all really encourage that.
 
Q.   Is there a concern about test scores in English for high
     school students?
 
A.   I think there's always going to be concern about SAT scores
     because our kids are applying to the best colleges in the
     country and so, if we can improve test scores, that's always
     something that I think we should be looking at actually.  I
     mean I don't think we should
 
Q.   Well, I was wondering if that would influence curriculum
     decisions like the program you described was put in at 7th
     grade was a concern, probably isn't as great as high school.
 
A.   Right.  I think we can do more of those kinds of things in a
     junior high then we can at a high school.  I think that
     actually there still is room for a lot of creativity in
     English in the high school and they've done that because they
     do it with electives that they offer, they can't, in terms of
     choice, I mean you want to teach students how to read
     critically, how to write in high school and you know, we don't
     do that much to prepare kids for the verbal part of the SAT.
     We do something and actually I think we need to be evaluating
     whether or not we're doing enough.  I think we could be
     probably having either, you know we have these L block classes
     that we offer at lunch which are sort of elective and I think
     we could have one, just as an extra thing for kids that want
     to prepare for the SAT that would want to do more intense work
     with vocabulary.  I don't think test scores, I think we're
     really trying to teach kids how to think and I don't think we
     teach for the SAT at all.  I think we'd like to see ourselves
     do a better job of preparing kids for that test.  We don't do
     that much right now to prepare them for it and I think that
     test scores are important and so I think it is something we
     should look at.  I mean, how can we
 
Q.   Preparing for the test is separate from what you teach in the
     curriculum?
 
A.   In terms of strategies, the kinds of things that the print in
     review teaches you how to, you know, when you see a big
     passage that you have to read.  First looking at the question,
     knowing what you're looking for, we don't spend much time on
     that kind of things, sort of simple and I think if we could do
     it economically, not have to spend much time on it but spend
     a little bit more time getting the kids some of those skills,
     I think it would be
 
Q.   I was wondering how freedom with deciding curriculum content,
     how much freedom there could be when there is some
     expectations that these students get into a particular
     colleges.
 
 
A.   Well, you know, I think the way you're creative in English in
     high school has to do with the writing assignments and the
     discussion that you have in classes because we really try to
     teach using the Socratic method, I mean the literature that we
     use in the freshmen year was absolutely, I was driven by the
     literature that we had to get through because it's so intense.
     They first read Egyptian myths, and they read creation, they
     read Old Testament stories, then they read Edith Hamilton's
     Mythology then the Odyssey then Julius Caesar, Once a Future
     King (?), Red Sky at Morning, Mice and Men and then Inherit
     the Wind.  That's a very intensive literature course get
     through freshman year, so there was absolutely no room for
     anything else I did.  In junior high I do quite a bit of group
     work and those kinds of fun projects but I still think we're
     pretty creative in the high school.  You can be within those
     limitations because of the ideas that you're talking about and
     the kind of writing that we do and journal writing and getting
     the kids up in front of the class to present things in a
     variety of ways that they follow that.  So I think in some
     respects it is more structured and each of the teachers has
     their own style, their own way of getting through that
     material, but the kids have to know it, you know so I think
     working within, we have freedom within certain limitations.
     But I don't, I think what we are doing what we're supposed to
     be doing at the college of prep schools in English.  I mean I
     wish we could have them for two periods.  I wish there could
     be a whole other period because the other thing is grammar
     usage, you know, vocabulary.  I mean there is so much that you
     have to get through in the course of the year.  And we're
     really literature intensive and I mean, they not only read
     those books in class but they'll also have books that they're
     reading outside of class and they have to find time for
     _________________________ and there's lots and lots of writing
     that goes on.  There's not the same kind of opportunity to be
     creative in the high school as there is in the junior high.
 
Q.   Failed attempt to influence you?
 
A.   I really haven't found anybody trying to influence me in
     anything that I've done so I
 
Q.   Anything that you have resisted?
 
A.   I resisted teaching Once a Future King because its such a hugh
     book and takes so much time and I didn't think it was an
     important enough book to devote as much time as we do in the
     freshman year to it and we had a lot of good discussion about
     it and actually I ended up feeling great about what we'd
     accomplished over the course of teaching the book but on the
     other hand, the head of the English department has considered
     not teaching it next year also because of the results of the
     dialogue that we had about this book and vocabulary program,
     we've debated whether or not our vocabulary program is very
     good in the 9th grade.  I don't think its very good and I'm
     making changes in the junior high program all the time to try
     to figure out exactly what the best way is to teach vocabulary
     to kids.  So that is sort of a mini debate that goes on and
     there was one other thing that I thought of.  Oh, in the
     freshman year I was also supposed to teach Ethan _________ at
     the end of the year and I just, they wanted me to teach it and
     I didn't teach it and my reasons for teaching it was that I
     wanted more time for writing the last two weeks of school and
     basically, you know, we disagreed, I disagreed with the head
     of the English department on this and he allowed me to do what
     I wanted to do.  I mean I, I, you know, there's a lot of
     support, there's a lot of mutual respect among the people in
     this department.  We do disagree, we don't agree on everything
     but I'd say in the end pretty much people do what they want to
     do.  I don't think we make changes when we see we're not
     doing, I mean I think there is a lot of thought and evaluation
     that goes.  We've asked administration if next year we can
     have the retreat before school starts to look at the whole
     scope and sequence and consider doing some major revision in
     what we're doing.  I pushed for that a lot.  I think we really
     should be improving it all the time and people are pretty, I
     don't know.  I'd say everybody here does want the English
     department to be better and so, there may be ____________ to
     actually get moving and make some changes but people are
     pushing for that around here all the time and so it seems you
     either have to have that kind of attitude or you might as well
     not be here.
 
Q.   What does it mean -- bureaucratic constraints?
 
A.   Well, you know, I'd never make it in the public system that I
     know in Tucson. __________________ which I know really
     thoroughly because there a lot of bureaucratic constraints on
     teachers I think, and it would have to do with curriculum, it
     has to do with the kinds of things you can do with kids, the
     kinds of freedom that you have in taking kids somewhere to do
     something and the kinds of issues that you can deal with and
     the kinds of changes that you can make, in the support that
     you're going to get from administration when it comes to
     dealing with somebody who doesn't want to do work, discipline
     back-up, back-up in what you decide to do as far as discipline
     goes.  People, administration here really believe in the
     teachers and they have a lot of respect in the way we handle
     things that come up and I'm not, and I think because we're
     pretty hard on ourselves, you know, if I blow it, if I make a
     mistake I'm pretty quick to correct it myself.  You know, I
     just don't see it, a lot of those situations as being very
     healthy.  I don't see bad people being weeded out.  I see, you
     know, people who aren't good at doing their job, who aren't
     working very hard, who in both administration and faculty who
     just exist in this system is dead wood and you can't, you
     known here, if I want to work with the history department, if
     we decide that this is something we are going to do, everybody
     is going to have to pull their weight.  They're going to have
     to work hard; they're going to have to contribute.  I don't
     have to worry about somebody not doing that and you know,
     everything, there's no, there's integrity from the top down.
     I would have a real hard time working with somebody where I
     had to play a political game.  Where I didn't trust that the
     person at the top really was himself an intellectual and
     sincerely wanted our students, believed in our students but
     wanted them to be thinking, growing human beings.  You know we
     never really got to the heart, I don't think, of the kind of
     autonomy that I have which is absolutely pretty amazing.  I
     mean I --
 
Q.   What would you attribute that to?
 
A.   I get to design the whole course of the year of what I'm going
     to do in my classroom myself.  I mean people know I've got a
     

 Well, that did it.  He did it in such
     a wonderful manner he passed it on with ___________________
     _______________________ book which was full of essays on how
     to do this, and I think, you know, I grabbed it, I ate it up.
     It changed the way I constructed my exams this year, but that
     kind of advice always comes in a context of somebody who
     absolutely you know he believes what he's saying, he has the
     best interest of all of us at heart and believes that we'll do
     it, that we're very capable and he demonstrates that he
     respects in our discipline and Howard does the same thing and
     Peggy Nickerson, the head of the junior high certainly does
     the same thing.  They're honest with us, if they, you know if
     any of us fall on our faces, they talk about it but it's done
     in such a kind way and coming from people that you respect
     that its not a problem to listen to that and to change and you
     want to be better and
 
Q.   In the example that you gave me about encouraging teachers not
     to use multiple choice, have there been teachers who have
     resisted, accepting that recommendation or making changes to
     that?
 
A.   I don't think so because we all, you know I think a few
     teachers, there's always, you know this faculty is not a young
     faculty.  There's always debate about everything and so the
     science department, for instance said, there is a certain
     amount of objective information that we have to make sure that
     the students know it and in history there is going to be a
     small amount of that kind of information on stuff, and it was
     agreed that "yes, you're not going to completely eliminate
     those kinds of questions, but that's not going to be the focus
     and so I think for the most part, I don't think, no I don't
     think there was resistance.  I think that people said, you
     know, I think he's right.  I think we better take a look at
     the way we construct our exams and make sure that they are the
     best exams you can construct.