People who work in schools moan and moan all the time about how “the kids don’t read” but you know what… the people who are moaning aren’t really reading either. At least they’re not, in large part, doing the professional reading necessary (IMHO) to stay up to date with what’s going on the world of literacy and language arts.

I’ve got administrators screaming about how we need to make “data-driven decisions in the English Department” but these folks aren’t reading what I consider to be some of the best, most useful, most insightful books about the world of ELA Instruction — works that are replete with not only data, but reflections upon that data so that the reader/teacher/educator can make methodological decisions based on something other than “I am doing this because it came from above — and I must always do what comes from above — where it appears they simply pulled it out of their butt” mentality.

Here’s a list of a few books NOT read by the folks who are barking at my department with orders as to how to improve, of course, our test scores:

Readicide
Holding On To Good Ideas in Times of Bad Ones
The Reading Zone
Disrupting Class
A Whole New Mind
I Read It but I Don’t Get It
Why Students Don’t Like School
Outliers

Now I could go on. And please do not ask me how I know that most of the top-ranking folks have not read these books because I’ve surreptitiously tested them in my own nefarious ways. However, the point is not to embarrass anyone. The point is to question how can anyone taking on the challenge of improving ELA in the 2009/2010 school year really be considered seriously if they haven’t done this type of reading. (And yes, I know there are more titles as well.)

Sure, it’s hard, time-consuming and dense. But not having the time is, to me, just an excuse. I mean me, I teach, I write YA fiction, I blog, I spend good time with my family and I try to exercise… but I also read! Why? Because I find it absolutely necessary to the development, implementation and application of my professional craft. And I am not drawing an administrator’s salary, either. I do this as a regular ol’ classroom teacher.

So when these folks come to me with “strategies for success” that seem to have ben taken right out of some field book from a Master’s Class in the 1990′s to deal with the problems we are facing in the here and now, I just gotta shrug and say, “Yo, before you open your mouth, open a book, huh?”

Look, I am a small, petty person prone to grudges and outbursts against the follies of people who I believe are negatively affecting the quality of life for others — especially when I believe they could be doing better (if only their intention was to do so).

Therefore, as a teacher, it’s hard to like the job Arnold Schwarzenegger is doing as the governor of California in terms of the way he is captaining our educational agenda. It just doesn’t seem to me as if he values our schools as much as I would like. To wit, click here.

However, as a man, a person, a real human being, he’s not all black and white. There are a few things I do admire about him. (Did I mention “How I Dislike Agreeing with Someone With Whom I Usually Do Not Agree”? See, I like putting people/things in a mental box… and then when they don’t fit, I am forced to change my own way of thinking. And if you know me, you know how I hate thinking… especially re-thinking. Arrggh!)

A few months ago Ah-nold gave the commencement speech at my alma mater, the University of Southern California (GO TROJANS!) and he laid out Schwarzenegger’s Six Rules for Success.

And while my initial inclination would be to mock them, after thinking about them, I have to say, it’s some good stuff.

And I would love it if my students took more of these things to heart.

Rule 1: Trust yourself.
Schwarzenegger advocates listening to your own heart to follow your own passions… passionately. On this we see eye-to eye.

Rule 2: Break the rules.
Again, this vibes with my own thinking a great deal. After all, if you want to make an omelet, ya gotta break some eggs and when I took out on the horizon, I see the status quo as something that perpetually needs to have its feet held to the fire… for if there is a better way to do something, go do it. And nothing ever really gets “invented” unless someone, as the Governator points out, “breaks some rules.”

Rule 3: Don’t be afraid to fail.
Fear of failure paralyzes people and often prevents them from giving their best effort. It wasn’t until I totally tried my hardest and BOMBED as a professional writer that I was able to re-group, re-evaluate and become a published author. Having just inked a deal for my 7th novel — after a series of rejections, mind you, from other very prestigious book publishers — I signed a new deal with Penguin. (Pretty spiffy, huh?) Getting rejected hurts, failing stings but not giving up and learning from our mistakes is critical. And often in life, one “Yes” will outweigh 20 “No’s” We have to be more willing to fail for it is the only real road I’ve personally ever known to successs.

Rule 4: Don’t listen to the naysayers
See rule 3 for more of my thoughts on this.

Rule 5: Work your butt off
There is no substitute for hard work in this world and while people may think I am a freak for saying so, I relish the feeling of giving a great effort. It feels good for my soul. And when I see students really lay it on the line and develop this muscle of “really trying when it comes to their pursuits” I feel confident in their abilities to become a success after they leave my classroom. There is no substitute for hard work. Ah-nold and I, once again, agree.

Rule 6: Give back
Teachers make a career out of giving. Matter of fact, that’s often how we measure ourselves. “Did I give enough to this student? Did I impart enough to that one?” …and so on. Seems to me that my own life functions better when I am trying to serve the needs of others — and when I get bogged down in getting what I want — especially when it comes to pursuing material goals — that’s when my life feels clogged and sputter-y. But when I am working to “give to others” I just feel good. It feeds me.

And so, there it is, Schwarzenegger and I agree… and who said pigs wouldn’t one day fly.

I think there is an interesting parallel to be drawn between this recent TIME Magazine article titled, “Why Exercise Won’t Make You Thin” and a longer school day and year.

Don’t really have a clue as to what it is, but hey, I gotta type something right now, don’t I? I mean if a blogger blogs in the forest and no one is there to comment… aw, forget it, I am WAY off track.

No, seriously, the point is, that exercise without attention to diet will not make one thinner. And so it also goes that longer school hours and more days in the classroom will not automatically make a student more student-y. Applying poor teaching strategies, using drill-n-kill worksheets, having kids read the textbook then answer the textbook questions in the back of each chapter and then have them do it over again for longer durations of time — well, simply put, these are not the answer to our educational ills.

Yes, I firmly believe we need more time in our classrooms. I do think the school year is too short. (After all, having the summer off was an agricultural need of society back in the day; these days the prime agricultural involvement of a teenager’s summer, if there is one at all, revolves around the agricultural product known as weed). The school day could use more hours as well. (I mean, as all studies show, the “witching hour” — that is, the time when kids get into the most trouble (i.e. fights, sex, drugs, shoplifting, and so on) — is between 3-7 p.m. A longer day that doesn’t start as early — so the kids aren’t as groggy — doesn’t strike me as such a bad thing. Sure, there are details to work out — and the inconvenience to all of us would be tremendous — but if we are seeking to best serve the kids, we do, in my opinion, need a longer school year and a longer school day.

But what goes on during these extended hours has got to become more productive. That’s the real issue. Doing something poorly for longer amounts of time isn’t going to make one any better at it. Doing it better will.

The jogger that eats jelly doughnuts doesn’t lose as much weight as the non-jogger who does not eat jelly doughnuts (and all akin junk food). Okay, I get it. And as much as we need to change our schedule (which we do), we moreso need to improve our intellectual nutritional offerings… that’s where we’re gonna make the real “weight” gains.

So what’s the answer? PD!!

PD — professional development — is the lynchpin. Without better preparing our nation’s teachers to do a more efficient, effective, more productive job, we are just re-arranging deck chairs. I mean let’s not mistake activity for productivity (to borrow a phrase).

And really, who does not need PD? I mean without people showing me how to bring things like nings into my classroom this year, it ain’t just gonna appear under my pillow the night before school as delivered by the Teacher Fairy.

PD: the national conversation not enough people are having.

I am immensely proud of this picture. The people you see include 1) Jacqueline Woodson, an author who has won the Caldecott Medal, the Coretta Scott King Award, the Newberry Honor Medal, and the Margaret A. Edwards Award for Lifetime Achievement as given by the American Library Association 2) Ann Martin, President of the American Association of School Librarians 3) me, and 4) Laurie Halse Anderson, the author of Speak among other books (and if I listed all her accomplishements and awards, you’d be reading for a hell of a long time — what hasn’t she won is really the question?)

And why do I post it? Because we just got together in Chicago this past Saturday to go to bat for librarians and go to bat for students.

It rocked the house!

It also packed the house. Check out this photo I took from the stage just moments before I took the microphone.

Cool, huh?

But the big point I want to make is that librarians and English teachers are joined at the hips. We are simpatico. Peeps. Homies. Personally, I adore librarians and I have a feeling if I took a poll, there are a heck of a lot of people out there in the world of the Language Arts and public schooling that would have a heck of a lot of good things to say about librarians.

But our brothers and sisters in these of-so-hallowed halls are under assault.

Don’t pretend it’s not happening. Don’t think to yourself, “Well I got my problems,” or “We, in the world of English Language Arts and school are under assault as well,” and don’t throw up your hands and think, “Get in line, Buddy… who ain’t having their screws turned right now?”

Our libraries are being massacred and it’s a freakin’ tragedy!

Let’s be simple. American libraries are a core pillar of democracy. (I truly believe that but if I go off right now to explain what I mean, well… ultimately, I think the statement is self-evident in a way so I am not gonna waste the words right now.)

And as I have said many-a-time, if you want to really judge a school, go check out their school library facilities — and the extent to which the students on campus use the library. Of course you are going to see an over-worked, underpaid, under-appreciated library staff… that’s par for the course. But a school with a run down, out of date, woeful library is almost always going to be a school that is under-performing. There is a direct link.

And it’s not the librarian’s fault. It’s the lack of recognition for the value of a school library being evidenced by the school board, the administration and the parents in the community. Those folks need to own up!

For our own part, Lynwood High School lost their librarian quite a while ago… and we are now a school expected to function without a school librarian. For some reason, the powers-that-be think that a few well-meaning aides can do the job. (NOTE: Our aides are pretty outstanding — I will say that. They have saved my butt more times than I can count. Just rock stars!) But it seems as if the school plan is to let core content teachers direct student learning and cover the gap that a person with an advanced degree in Library Sciences/Media Specialties would typically be expected to provide. And what we can’t cover (huge chasm that it is) is apparently expendable.

And the thing is, this mentality is happening across more and more locations across the nation.

Public libraries are reducing their hours. Or closing their doors. And the notion of “library as a luxury” is starting to permeate in public policy making.

It’s BULLSHIT!!!

Support our libraries. Check out the ALA website to see how you can do more. (Even being aware is a step in the right direction). And they have so much valuable “stuff” available, it’s just incredible!

Truly, the library’s contribution to America is incredible. And it’s under assault from short-term thinking bean counting ignoramuses!

Maybe Bradbury was wrong. Perhaps it will not be book burning that gets us. Perhaps it’s library closures.

Look, I am not a snoot. I believe in the value of work — real work — and I hold tremendous admiration for anyone who straps it up and puts in an honest day’s effort for an honest day’s pay. But there’s a part of me that has to laugh — so I don’t cry — when I read things like this report from career builder which highlights 20 Jobs You Can Get with a High School Diploma.

Look at how many jobs on this list pull down annual salaries that are in the 20′s. And then 30′s. And then 40′s? Now I know I live in California so things are skewed but for a family of 4 to live off of a $40,000 per year salary, well… let’s look at it.

Assume this family pays income tax. Ding!
And health care costs? (Don’t forget the dentist.) Ding!
And drives a car. With auto insurance and annual vehicle registration. Ding!
Plus, they need food, shelter and clothing. Ding!Ding!Ding!
Don’t forget 4 birthdays to celebrate, some holidays, a few special occasions and a few other moments where it’s just nice to go out to dinner or something. Ding!
Uhm, toilet paper, soap, toothpaste and so on. Ding!
Plus… well, do I need to Ding! on. I don’t think I can. We are probably out of Ding! room at this point. And this is for the person that draws a salary in the 40′s. How much more can a person who earns a salary in the 30′s be squeezed? Or the 20′s?

(Side note: Hmmm, how much is the starting teacher salary in your district? And we wonder why people are not flocking to the field of professional education.)

Now extrapolate this thinking out to those that do NOT have a high school diploma and whew, take a deep breath. According to the U.S. Census Bureau…

Look, I have no problem if one of my students wants to become a manicurist. I just want to empower them with the opportunity to own the dang nail salon if they so choose because at an average annual salary of $19,978.00 it’s gonna be tough to eat more than ramin noodles for lunch some days.

I spoke at a middle school in Oklahoma last year whereby the school was architecturally designed so that the library was the center of the building, the hub of the wheel if you will, and all the other hallway spokes were passageways to the various classrooms. Thereby for passing periods, all kids on campus had to cross by and through the library.

The library literally was the center of their campus. And these kids LOVED to read. Coincidence or self-fulfilling prophesy? (Do I even need to answer that?) They were all “library users”. It was a real sight to see.

On the other hand most campuses are designed whereby the library is an appendage, a separate place on campus, an isolated part of the grounds. I don’t think it’s by design that the libraries are being thought of in this manner… I think it’s by lack of thoughtful design that architects build schools in this way.

Simply put, they don’t view what’s most important as being most important and therefore they don’t place what’s most important in the center of the action. I mean really, did the architects ever ask the teachers, “Hey, tell us what you think should go where and why?” When I look at the design of my own school — and many of the schools I visit — I clearly see the answer as, “Obviously not.”

If we truly value our libraries (which I believe are emblematic of of the value we show for education itself), we show it to the kids long before our buildings are ever even constructed, And when the next new phase of school building occurs (I think we’re on track for new construction to begin in the year 2198 in California according to Arnold Schwarzenegger’s priorities), I only hope more schools follow the model of Oklahoma. Their library is woven into the fabric of their school and the kids absolutely loved it (and benefited from it as well).

The messages we send to our students are often crafted long before they enter our classrooms. Real teachers know this. It’s why we spend time before the year begins decorating our rooms, thinking through our seating layouts, standing one-footed on desks whereby we risk crashing to the ground and breaking our necks simply because there’s a cool bumper sticker we really want to hang above the fire alarm in the corner (Don’t just do it… do it RIGHT!).

Schools. literacy, and achievement happen by design. Think about that the next time you have to walk on over to the library.

A court just ruled that police officers are entitled to be paid for the time it takes them to get ready for work, including getting dressed and undressed.

More power to our friends in blue! And I can’t wait for the courts to hear about the time I spend prepping for my day.

First of all, as a diligent professional, I do wear clothes to work. Cha-ching! That’s cash in my pocket.

Furthermore, I comb my hair, brush my teeth and wear deodorant. Cha-ching!
(Unfortunately, however, that might not get me some extra cash-o-la because not everyone in my profession does these things so it might be viewed by the courts as “non-essential” to effective preparation. Yet, the ruthless teasing an educator takes when they don’t do these things by the kids is not worth the battle. I mean I hear the names they call one another. Ain’t no way I want that kind of wrath aimed at me. Lived through it once already, ya know what I mean? NOT WORTH IT!)

I work Saturdays… have for years and years. Cha-ching!

I buy a bunch of my own supplies. I know, I know, I won’t be reimbursed for these supplies, but when the courts here my argument about time spent shopping for the supplies… Cha-ching!

Oh yeah, there’s all that reading I do to stay up to date with the latest and greatest teaching ideas. Cha-ching!

And then there’s all that reading of papers I do in order to, what’s the term… oh yeah, grade the work of my students. Cha-ching!

(And if you saw some of the sentences they are constructing-butchering-bludgeoning and concoct-o-figurating the courts would give me time-and-a-half. Cha-ching!

Time on the phone with peers discussing how to “handle issues”? Cha-ching!

Don’t get me started on this dang ning. That’s a double whopper. Cha-ching!Cha-ching!

All in all, by the court’s logic, I figure I am due, right. So pay-me, bay-bee!!

So this is the letter I typed today in my 3rd period class to my principal:

Hi Mr. ___________ (name withheld — but easily googled I am sure),

Mr. Alan

A few things…

1) This is totally true.
2) Jose’s comment went over like an absolute lead balloon. The room went from one of comfort, learning and emotional safety to one of immediate tension and awkwardness. Everyone instantly became uncomfortable.
3) I was flummoxed. The comment was just so inappropriate, so out of left-field, so uncharacteristic of anything that goes on in my room I felt thrown. In my more than a decade of teaching, if I had to rank it, I’d say this was the most inappropriate classroom comment ever uttered in my room. And if you work with teens long enough, you know that you’ve heard some wildly inappropriate things.

The point of the activity was to examine words/phrases and to see if the denotations carry more weight than the connotations or vice versa. My examples on the board were about illuminating the difference between calling someone an “accounting manager” or a “bean counter”. (Similar denotations, wildly different connotations.) So then I had to ask myself, are students today this wildly desensitized to a sense of context, to gauging appropriateness? And in my small effort to try and cut Jose some slack by justifying his actions to myself (i.e.”Oh, Alan, maybe he just didn’t know.”) I realized, “Come on, who am I kidding? Jose was simply pushing the envelope, trying to test my limits. Don’t rationalize it. He was out of bounds.”

So I bounced him out of class with the above letter in hand and told him he wasn’t allowed to come back until the principal had answered his question for him. Such a thoughtful response, I said, required a higher authority on the matter.

Terror ran through the blood of all my other students when I sent Jose on his way. I actually had to lighten up the mood in class because kids mistakenly assumed I was furious with them as a result of something one of their peers did (I was not) — and the tension was simply too thick, a real pink elephant — so we talked about the denotation versus the connotation of the phrase “fly on the wall” and I briefly chatted about how much fun it would be to able to eavesdrop on the conversation Jose was going to have with the principal of our school about his classroom question.

Within a few minutes, things became more relaxed again.

You know, once a person graduates from high school, the days spent in our classrooms often blend into amorphous blobs of scattered recollections. For some reason though, I have a feeling Jose will always have one particular day in English class well-etched into his memory.

As we all know, you can’t be an effective teacher unless you have a line in the sand. And once it’s crossed, there must be consequences. My guess is that by lunchtime, all of my 9th graders will have heard this story, too. Gossip travels faster than a stolen teacher’s test with the answer key does around these parts.

And I expect very few behavior problems in 3rd period for quite some time. LOL!

I am hopeful. I am fearful. I am exhilarated. I am mortified. Why? Because the first in what is sure to be a long line of heavy salvos is being fired at the textbook industry with Amazon’s new Kindle, designed especially to take on the status quo in the textbook market.

I am hopeful because the entire textbook industry needs to change. Simply put, it’s outdated, outmoded, and terrifically expensive to the point of being sheer lunatic.

I am fearful because I know there is going to be years of iniquity which will befall America while some classrooms smoothly make a transition to the digital delivery of educational content while other schools operate like the modern day classrooms which still use cassette players in class. (Don’t laugh. A heck of a lot of schools still use cassette players for instruction. Forget CD’s — which are already a outdated medium of content delivery — they are using CASSETTES!)

I am exhilarated because open source can’t be too far behind meaning that the stranglehold these behemoth corporations have on our classrooms is going to crack. The vice grip such a small group of folks have had over hundreds of thousands of teachers and millions of students in terms of curriculum is sheer foolishness and if they are looking for someone to help shovel dirt on this grave so it can be buried faster, I — as well as a heck of a lot of other teachers I know — would be glad to lend a hand. Textbooks, in their current incarnation, are pretty weak and all the best teachers I know use them as supplements at best — and never (like me) at worst.

And I am mortified. MORTIFIED!!

Why? Because when I read quotes like the one below by a guy named Bruce Hildebrand, the executive director for higher education for the Association of American Publishers, which represents several big textbook companies, I am shocked by the airs he puts on.

He said, and I quote, “… publishers are “absolutely agnostic” about how their content is delivered, so if costs like printing and shipping were removed, the companies could charge less.”

Bull pies!! As my friends in Kentucky might say, that dog just don’t hunt.

Agnostic? I mean come on folks. The textbooks have been drinking at the public trough of education funding for decades. They are multi-multi-multi-million dollar businesses. And how’d they get to be that way? By holding an iron grip on the market. If a teacher wants chapter 3, 4, and 8 she has to buy chapters 1,2,5,6 and 7 and there are literally less than 10 options whereby they can turn to shop. (We all know that’s it’s pretty much down to 3 big textbook publishers right now but I’ll grant them a wee bit of latitude and avoid going down the road of hurling accusations of collusion at them — they have enough problems.)

Well, not anymore bay-bee!!! If I only want the content of chapters 3, 4 and 8 then that’s all I am going to have to buy. And the amount of people offering high quality material on how to effectively and intelligently teach Chapters 3, 4 and 8 is going to balloon immensely. I mean why should I only turn to you, Mr. Textbook Publisher?

Because you have been so good to us throughout the years? Because when times were financially tough you went easy on our purse strings? I am not so sure how much goodwill you have built up over the decades.

Don’t believe me that’ll I turn somewhere else or demand customization of my eduational items either? Maybe you ought to check out a small little phenomenon called iTunes which has taken me from having to buy every song on an entire album to now being able to buy only the specific tunes I want. (To wit, I cite the Bee Gees. I don’t want songs like Tragedy, I want tunes like Jive Talkin’ You Should be Dancing, and, of course, Staying Alive for those teacher lesson plans I create in my underwear every now and then while blow drying my hair to keep it real.)

And maybe I can finally stop having to pay for material that’s already in public domain, too. Really, how many times have the ninth grade English classes of America paid Textbook Company X for the play Romeo and Juliet? Think about the cash we have spent over the past 50 years. Well, guess what Mr. Hildebrand, that text is now free. (Always has been for you — now it is for us. Goodness, how much do I love the idea of not having to use my school funds to pay you for something which you yourself do not have to pay for when teachers at my school are being laid off due to low funds?)

But now, Mr. Agnostic, all you will be able to sell me are the accompanying study materials to R&J. This brings real competition to the game. Like have you seen the materials this little known group called the Royal Shakespeare Company offers? Or do a search on Web English Teacher for R&J? If they are offering all of this great stuff, can you go toe-to-toe with them? And even if you can, can you match their prices — which are sometimes totally free?

But you, a guy who presides over an industry that rakes in monster bucks selling 100 dollar per kid per subject area textbooks isn’t sweating the idea that schools which adopt these new Kindles might threaten your revenues?

Besides, don’t you still have to digitally develop all the content you plan to sell, make it customizable, individual, accessible and functional for e-commerce delivery? I doubt that’s an impending expenditure of a few clams against your bottom line, really I do.

But no, you are agnostic.

Well, what I think you are, if you have any common sense at all, is terrified. And rightly so. The world is changing and all the millions you have in the bank of our school money isn’t going to be able to stop this from happening.

With a little luck, maybe we’ll be able to hire a few teachers back with the cash we save, too. Oops, there go our free backpacks during textbook adoption season.

I think we can live with it.

One thing to really ensure that you nail the standards is to start with them. Don’t start with the methodology (as many educators do), start with the language arts standard, figure out the assessment and then determine how you will teach it. This is how you really lock in and make sure you hit your academic objective dead on.

For example, most teachers start with the methodology (i.e. they are going to teach a book like Dracula) and then they figure out what they are going to teach (i.e. they’ll teach symbolism) and then they figure out how to assess (i.e. I’ll give a quiz or project on symbolism.) As a Professor of Secondary Methodology in the Language Arts at Loyola Marymount University, I had to learn to teach teachers that when you teach kids in this manner, it’s not really the ideal way to make sure that you, as the educator, are drilling the core content standards the way you ought to.

Best to go…
1. Standards
2. Assessment
3. Methodology

This way you will know what you are teaching and you will know how you will measure whether or not you successfully taught it before you determine the materials you will use to do the teaching. (And this is why the standards are not text specific — more on that in a minute.)

Let’s look at it…

1. Decide to teach CA Language Arts Standards 3.7 (10th grade): Recognizing and Understanding the Significance of Symbolism in a text.
2. Have students identify, re-create (through a drawing, clip art, magazine pictures, and so on) and present a symbol from the text via the original creation of an independent poster board project.
3. Read Chapters 1 – 4 in Dracula and utilize this material as the basis for the assignment on symbolism.

Or you can use Twilight. Or you can use Monster. Or you can use Speak, The Outsiders or Freak the Mighty.

This is why the standards are, once again, not text specific. Find a book that engages your students and the standards can be a very valuable tool to make sure that you are focused like a laser on real classroom objectives while teaching high interest literature at the same time.

Oh how I wish someone had taught this to me when I first became a teacher. It’s made my life so much easier — and my classroom practice so much more effective.

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times, the standards are, for me, like a northern star, my unwavering compass as I try all kinds of crazy, far-reaching stuff to stretch my students’ minds.