Summer 2004 Leadership NetworkWhat do a newspaper article and photos of a woman, a child, and a fireman on a balcony outside a burning building have to do with teaching, teacher evaluation, and administration leadership?
This recap of the last of three Leadership Network sessions will answer that question, and shed more light on the wide-ranging concerns and probing thoughtfulness that go into creating excellent school administrators.
As ISA Leadership Coach Dr. Sandy Abrams, a former teacher and principal, distributed the materials for the session, she mulled aloud about classroom observation and its purpose—whether for ten minutes or a full period, whether for individual review or to confirm that teachers are teaching to district guidelines or state testing needs.
Of course, what a principal hopes to find, she said, is that the teacher is making learning interesting, and so the introduction of current events, things students are familiar with, helps to involve students.
The materials Abrams handed out included three sequence photos once run in the Boston Herald American newspaper, and an accompanying article by Nora Ephron. Abrams asked her class to look at the photos and read Ephron’s article.
The first photo showed a woman, a small child, and a fireman reaching for a ladder, on a balcony outside a burning apartment. The second photo was shot just as the balcony gave way – the fireman hanging onto the ladder, the woman hanging onto him, the child on the floor clutching at the balcony railing. The third image showed the woman and child falling.
Ephron’s article explored the controversy surrounding the publication of these images. Was it sensationalism for sales sake or noteworthy news? Should the right to privacy that surrounds an individual’s death preclude such publication? Abrams told the class that the woman died; the child fell on her and lived; that the photos were taken by the newspaper’s photographer, with a motor-driven camera; that he began to click away, but when he realized the woman would hit the ground, he turned away. His goal had been to shoot a heroic rescue, not a death.
Abrams asked her class if these photos and article were good classroom materials. Did making learning interesting validate the use of this kind of sensationalism? Was it sensationalism? After all, photojournalism of war coverage shows flag-draped coffins, prisoner-of-war abuse, and we always hear the cry that the public’s right to know comes first. Or should images that are hurtful to government be censored in time of war for their negative bias on news? Is our first amendment right jeopardized by such censorship? Or by the fact that major media ownership is in the hands of a few major players who slant the news to their views?
Darryl Tue, principal at Wyandanch HS, said the photos and article showed the unempowered, and saw the story and the characters as a microcosm of society.
Shawn Hearn, assistant principal, Annandale HS, and army reservist, said newspapers print what ever politics or message the editor wants to distribute, and that the public judges based on what they see.
As several others raised their hands to contribute, Abrams called them into the center of the room to exchange ideas. These principals and assistant principals included Shawn Hearn, Dan Corb (Long Island City HS), Barbara Solomon (Roosevelt HS), Nigel Pugh and Ralph Franco (Queens HS for Teaching, Liberal Arts & Sciences), Nick Mazzarella (Park East HS). Abrams joined them as moderator, and directed those outside the circle to assess the participants, with at least one onlooker assigned to each participant.
The discussion continued.
Franco: “What about the 9/11 jumpers? Some publications showed them falling. Their justification was that they showed the horror of the attack. Yet, what did those who fell and died – what did they think? Knowing it was their last moment alive. Would they have wanted those pictures published? Did their families want them published?”
Mazzarella: “Is it necessary to take it to the end? To show the death? And what about our kids, all this coming at them. Have journalism and violent video games contributed to children not knowing when to stop in their own actions?”
Pugh: “A lot of images kids are exposed to glorify action, conflict, death. There’s a disconnect regarding the consequences. Sometimes we need to be reminded of the consequences—a mangled corpse.”
Franco agreed. “There’s a disconnect between drive-by shootings, gang violence, accidental death, death in Iraq.”
Hearn: “Youth is desensitized. Technology played a big part in that. In the piece we’re discussing, notice how the photographer used a motorized camera. Twenty years ago that technology didn’t exist. It wouldn’t have been possible to take such rapid-fire images. And again, video games. Which leads to another question. Should we limit the development of technology to improve our comfort level? Censor technology?”
Solomon: “Limit the uses of technology for what purpose? The bottom-line motivation proves that we don’t care about desensitization. The other side says that this story and others like it, they’re out there, so what particular lessons do we learn from this story? That there are slums? With shoddy fire escapes? While that first side—the media—generates lots of money from stories like these. And what did the photographer think, intend? He was only doing his job, thinking about photography—angles, shadows, lighting, the ultimate front page shot, a feel-good, heroic story.
Corb: “But why put these photos out there? What’s being accomplished by publishing these—and the Iraq photos?”
Mazzarella: “The publishers and editors put spin on the photos to rationalize sensationalism, trivializing a tragic accident. It’s around. The kids see drive-bys, and suicides, the shock of it makes personal parallels.”
Franco: “Yes, it forces us to think critically, but hiding it from the public is wrong.”
Hearn: “This generation, we are the most intelligent consumers of media ever, and that includes our kids. If you read of one event in three different newspapers, you discern the bias of coverage.”
Solomon: “But that’s the point. People aren’t reading. They’re looking at the photos and trusting their judgments to the photos to form their opinions. Kids see violence. They’re inured to it, they think it’s all right.”
Pugh: “We’re going to get more of it. How about kids with cell phones? You can’t turn the clock back. We have to teach our students to read, and how to interpret this stuff.”
By and large, all agreed that debate behavior was shaped by their peers’ assessment. Participants were conscious of limits—of time and participation. They were courteous. The moderator, it was felt, kept out of it.
Abrams: “Should I have redirected more? Kept you focused on subject more?”
Franco: “Do you feel you kept discussion on track?”
Abrams: “I didn’t have one in mind. A teacher in a classroom setting has an agenda. Not I, not here. I did, however, find it difficult to stay out of the discussion, not to jump in to fill a lull. I wanted the group to own the discussion.”
Solomon: “Which goes to wait time. Sometimes we, as educators, are too quick to call on a student for an answer. Sometimes they’re still thinking, they haven’t had time to formulate their idea.”
Corb: “Would we have stayed on task if you asked more questions?”
Abrams: “What do our students expect from each other in similar circumstances?”
Responses: 1. They don’t want attacks. They expect teachers to create a safe and respectful environment. In time, students take on the role. 2. Students don’t listen to each other. They expect the teacher to have the answers, not their friends. 3. They expect the teacher to repeat or write the important notes on board.
Dina Heisler, principal, Pablo Neruda HS: “What if one person monopolized the conversation? Would others lose interest? What is the role of facilitation, then?”
Abrams: “Good question—for teachers and principals. All right. Now, meet with your assessors to review your participation and how you’d cope with that.”
Next, Abrams announced they would view of a video in which students would perform an exercise called ‘collaborative communication.’ The subject? The same newspaper photos and article just discussed. The room erupted in a quick burst of surprise, and settled down to view critically.
The video participants were twelfth graders trained in this method of critical thinking since the ninth grade. A teacher acted as moderator.
Afterwards, Abrams led them to draw conclusions.
About the subject matter: the students in the video made some of the same observations that ISA administrators made, but not all. The lack was put down to both their lack of life-experience, and the moderator’s lack of input.
That lack brought Abrams to teacher assessment. “If he were the teacher being assessed, how would you have begun the process? In pre-observation conference with your teacher, you know what goals you hope to observe, but what should you both expect? In this video, why and how did the teacher-moderator achieve his goals?”
One principal pointed out that a few student debaters did not contribute, and felt the moderator should have taken a greater part in the discussion, by calling on those students for input. Others said that calling on one student would have put the others into sleep mode. In a classroom situation, when they hear one student’s name called—especially before the teacher ask a question—the others don’t listen.
One principal doubted that the children in his school could perform as well as those on the video. The video’s twelfth grade debaters seemed, to him, a higher-than-average performing group.
The overwhelming majority of the other principals and assistant principals disagreed. They pointed out that these students had been instructed in the ‘collaborative communication’ method for over three years; that the subject matter had been timely, interesting, and so grabbed the students’ curiosity, made them want to work; that with leadership from teachers and the same kind of thought-provoking materials, their own students could do as well.
Abrams asked how her class, as instructional leaders, worked with their groups to concretize their vision and implement it across the board for four years.
Answers included: by modeling techniques one wants teachers to use, reinforcing them by constant repetition; by having an end-goal for your students—whether oral defense or end-projects to master; by visiting college campuses to excite students, to make them realize that college is very close, to make them want to buy in, to own the desire to get there and work to achieve their goals; by engaging in ongoing professional development; by naming explicit teaching goals and activities we organize to get there; by have a vision of your students in four or five or six years. Will he be a learner? How can we help them to create and improve critical thinking skills, make deductions, apply learning to real life problems, articulate verbally and in writing, so that they can compete with the general population for jobs in our society? Will they be emotionally well? Whether college or work bound, they should feel secure, like themselves.
By now, the class had overrun its three and three-quarter hour time period, and some participants were called away to other group meetings. They left reluctantly as Abrams called the leadership network meeting to a close.
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