Living Above the Line

Living Above the Line is an approach to discipline at Arlington Middle School.  It's not just a system, but it's a way of thinking about student behavior.  It's taking a negative, poor decisions by students, and making it into a positive.  How?  By looking at student behavior as an opportunity to teach and therefore student discipline can be seen as an extension of character education.

The key components to "Living Above the Line" approach to student discipline are:
1. 10/90-Ten percent of life is outside of your control and 90% is inside your control (Stephen Covey).  Spend your time and energy where you can actually make an impact.
2.  Consequences-All actions have a consequence, good or bad. The best consequences are natural consequences but logical consequences have their place too.  Certainty over immediacy-something will happen is more important than that it will happen right now.
3.  Respondability-How you respond is more important than the initial action.
4.  See it, own it, solve it, do it-this is the way the student takes accountability for their actions and creates a plan to fix the problem.
5. Give it time-Frustration and anger will go away with time.
6. Educators should be role models of behavior.  Respectful responses are extremely important to any and all situations.

Building a Culture without Cracks

Developing a school culture that puts student academic success at the center of all decisions is crucial to a school’s success.  In the middle grades, it is important to develop the whole student.  Great schools don’t allow any student to fall through the cracks. 

1. A strong team or teams-Teams drive much of what we do in the middle school.  The purpose of the team must have student driven decisions. 

2. Kid Centered-When students are at the center of decisions rather than curriculum, everything else falls into place.

3. Never give up attitude-I believe that schools often tell parents and student why we can’t do something.  Instead of telling people what our limitations are as a school, why not explore all options that could help an individual student.

4. Putting Programs in Place-With a never give up attitude, it would be easy to get frustrated if programs aren’t in place to support teachers that never give up.  As an example, if zeroes are not an option, then set up programs to support this belief.

5. Developing a unified approach to student behavior-It is also important that the approach to student behavior fits the kid centered, never give up attitude.

Valuing the Middle Level Student

The first characteristic of a successful school for young adolescents as described by "This We Believe" is: Educators value young adolescents and are prepared to teach them.  The Association of Middle Level Educators places this in the Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment part of the characteristics of successful schools.

What can be done to create a school where educators value young adolescents?  How can we know that teachers are prepared to teach young adolescents?

1.  School Culture-Create a school culture in which talking about students is done in a positive way. This starts at the top but doesn't end there.  Every person in the school should be an advocate for students.  When a teacher makes a joke about a kid-do you laugh?  If negative people don't have an audience, it becomes very uncomfortable for the comedian/teacher.  Take a stand for what you believe and when you do you will realize that most of the people who got into education got into it because they love kids.  You will find yourself in the majority once you take the stand that negativity about young adolescents has no place in a school.  Come with a solution to help a student, not a one liner to demean the student.

Rock, Paper, Scissors Contest

2.  Have fun with students.  Create times in the week to do something just to show that you value students.  We have an activity day during homeroom on Friday.  It probably doesn't have much academic value, but it can have a great deal of value of showing kids that you like them and want to be around them.  Last Friday our middle school completed a rock, paper, scissors contest.  I am pretty sure that this rock, paper, scissors knowledge they gained will not be on the Nebraska State Accountability tests.  However, I am also sure that the 15-20 minutes spent laughing and cheering with their classmates and teachers was not wasted time.

3.  Practices and Programs-Create programs and practices that show you appreciate students' effort.  Every student gets recognized at some point during the year with a "Soaring Eagle."  A Soaring Eagle is a note written by the principal to a student that shows appreciation for their attitude, behavior, and/or character.  The teacher submits a student's name and accomplishment using a google doc form.  The principal then gets this submission in a google spreadsheet and writes the letter to the student.  At lunch time, the student is given the Soaring Eagle along with a sucker.  Teachers also have postcards that they send home when students do something above and beyond in their classroom.

In addition to recognition, your student discipline system should show value in the individual student.  We created our own system called "Living Above the Line" that values students rather that creating a one size fits all discipline system.  Rather than having a discipline system that is punitive, natural consequences  (and logical consequences when natural consequences aren't possible) should shape student behavior.

4.  Hire Teachers with passion for the middle level-Teaching candidates with a 4-9 grade endorsement should be given some priority.  The reason I say some priority rather than "only hire teachers with MS endorsements" is that I don't want to lose great teachers because they have a 7-12 endorsement or a K-6 endorsement (or any other type of endorsement).  What is great about a 4-9 endorsement is that it shows the passion for education is with middle level students.  Passion is the key, not endorsement area.

5.  Teacher Training-If a teacher comes with little practical knowledge of what it is to teach at this level, then it is crucial to get that teacher the training necessary to work with middle level students.  Encourage teachers to join the state association for middle level educators.  Encourage teacher to participate in professional development focusing on young adolescents.

Those are my 5 ideas, what else should be added to create a school that values middle level students?

Motivating Middle School Students

Relevance
Students must see school as relevant.  Interdisciplinary projects can be one way to increase relevance.  When students see what they learn being used in all of their classrooms, they begin to see it as more relevant.  Math knowledge is not isolated just in the 45 minute period that they sit in Math class.

Relationships
Teaming can provide an outstanding way to develop relationships.  It creates a small school inside of a bigger school.  For us at Arlington, we already have a small school.  When we created the Middle School Team, it allowed our teachers the ability to discuss student issues.  Additionally, students all had the same teachers.  The schedule became simplified.  All of the students were together at the same time.  This then allows flexibility so that you can experiment with the schedule.  At one point this year, for about a month, the 8th graders were tracked by gender.  This allowed the teachers to develop a different relationship with the students.

Making School an Experience
Fridays are activity days.  Our Middle School splits into 4 different teams based on their homeroom class. Students participate in competitions and activities for a 20 minute period.  This is a break from the normal routine and has students looking forward to Friday activities

Our teachers also develop interdisciplinary projects.  When we kick off the project, the teachers make a kickoff video.  The students all come together to watch the video.  During one kick off, the students then got to eat food from the time period they were studying in Social Studies.  They also do other hands on activities on these days.

Here are some links to videos that our Middle School Team created for the unit kickoffs:

Egypt Unit: Mummy Part I:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gl7ebhBJ2XE&feature=fvsr

Egypt Unit: Mummy Part II:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoayMpzjHE8&feature=related

Ancient Rome Unit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IJKG1L403Pg&feature=related

Recognizing Effort
Additionally, our state tests are called NeSA tests.  Our tradition has been to set goals with our students.  This year, if we are 95% proficient on the writing test, we will go to the Omaha Henry Doorly Zoo.  On our other tests, it is not based on results as much as preparation.  If the students exhibit the behaviors that make you a successful test taker, we will have half a day at the local softball field where students will get to play, have lunch, and just have a fun day.  Celebrate success and effort together as a school and this increases student motivation.

Motivation
Recognizing that they should not spend their entire life going to school and then going home for a second shift of school through excessive homework is also critical.  Nothing kills motivation faster than constant homework and the lack of recognizing what students enjoy. Celebrate successes and successful effort.  Once the school establishes systems promoting relevance, relationships, making school an experience, and recognizing effort, then students become more motivated.

Homework Grading Practices

Grading practice (homework or independent practice) can be counterproductive.  When students are learning, they need feedback but that feedback should not simply be a check mark on a paper.  If students are sent home with homework and know that the next day that homework will be graded, then often the student is doing that assignment for homework completion and not for learning.  Students need to be allowed to practice without it impacting their grades.

Homework Completion vs. Learning

When homework is about completion, then you will create situations where cheating is rewarded.  It also punishes students whose parents can't help them complete the assignment.  When it's all about homework completion, a student might complete the homework but not know any of the answers on the in class assessment.  Did the student learn?

Difficulty for Teachers

It is difficult for teachers who have always graded homework to give this practice up.  Teachers ask, what will the motivation be to complete the assignment?  Are we going to lose rigor?  Are the students grades going to go down (many students are saved by the homework grade)? What if some of the students stop doing homework?  This is a scary proposition.

Relevant Homework


So why would a student do the homework?  The homework must be relevant.  Students must  see the relationship between doing homework and learning.  If the student doesn't do the homework, they will not know the correct questions to ask in class.  The homework must advance learning towards the stated objectives.  Use brain research to find best practices for homework.  Don't just send students home with what we didn't get finished in class.  Students should be practicing the skill that was taught, not teaching themselves at home.  Teachers should check for understanding and do guided practice before sending students off on their own.

Students View of Homework as Practice


In a conversation in a teacher's class that uses the approach of not grading homework, an 8th grade student said "I wish you graded homework, then my grade would be better."  Another student replied, "Don't give her that idea, then if I don't get it (understand the homework) at home, then I will panic because I have to get it done."  The student identified that learning is the most important thing in this teacher's class.  In this class, if you don't "get it", you can ask without being punished with a bad grade.

Another student told me, the nice thing about Middle School is that it's not a battle about getting homework done.  Students and teachers work together to make sure that we (students) learn.

Things to consider when not grading homework

1. Homework is most productive in Math.  Other areas show little, if any, correlation between homework and learning.
2. Homework should be limited.  Add a zero to their grade for minutes of homework.  Sixth Grade = 60 minutes.  Each subject area should be at about 10 minutes because this is a total, not per class.  The default answer should be no homework and hopefully students rarely get to 60 minutes of homework.
3. Assess students with several small quizzes. 
4. Allow students to re-take quizzes.
5. Check for understanding during class.
6. Do Guided Practice during class.
7. Create systems that require students to complete homework when they regularly don't do homework and do poorly on assessments (like a lunch time homework opportunity).
8. Leave your answer book open-let students self check.
9. Learning can and should happen in groups but the assessment should be to find out what an individual knows.
10. Have an in-class test or assessment that is based on standards.  Assessments shouldn't be fluff.  In-class assessments and tests are the way to find out how much the student learned.

Homework at the Middle Level

Homework must be meaningful and must be limited.  When students get to the Middle School level, they are now moving between classes.  Teachers must plan together to assign the appropriate amount of homework.  Rick Wormelli talks about adding a 0 to the grade the student is in to determine how much homework a student should get.  If the student is in 5th grade, the appropriate amount of homework is 50 minutes.  An important point here is that 50 minutes is the total amount for all teachers to give as homework.  If we limit homework to the 4 core classes, each class should give no more than 12 minutes of homework per day. "No homework tonight" should be the default choice, not, "There is homework tonight." (Wormelli, p 41)

What amount of work takes 50 minutes?  That answer is going to be significantly different for different students.  It is important to either differentiate homework or send the homework home with a time limit.  The teacher can assign a number of problems for practice and tell students to practice for 12 minutes and then draw a line upon the completion of those 12 minutes.  Some problems will not get done.

If teachers are able to collaborate, then they should talk to each other about the amount of homework that is being given on a particular day.  If a large assignment is being given in Math, then maybe that day there is no assignment in Science.  Even then, the Math assignment should be reasonable.  Homework should not be assigned unless students have already been exposed to a topic and they have adequate background knowledge to complete the homework without additional instruction.  Homework should not simply be what we didn't get done in class.  Students should learn the topic before being sent off to practice on their own.  Following ITIP, teachers should check for understanding, then do guided practice in the room.  After guided practice is complete, then you can assign work to be done as independent practice.

Grading of homework is also an important issue.  Students' grades should not be based on their homework, but rather on in-class assessments.  Once work leaves the classroom, no guarantees can be made about who did the homework.  If in-class assessments are the way students are graded, then a student will gain no advantage by parents helping to complete the work or copying other students work.  The focus becomes learning, not homework completion.  Students begin to see a connection between the work they do and the learning that happens.

Works Cited
Wormelli, Rick. "Teaching in the Middle: Homework How we Assign it." Middle Ground:The Magazine of Middle Level Education. 11.4 (2008): 41-42. Web. 5 Feb. 2012. <http://www.amle.org/Publications/MiddleGround/Articles/April2008/Article18/tabid/1666/Default.asp&xgt;.

Academic Labs-Failure is Not an Option

The creation of academic labs benefit our students by giving them an additional opportunity to learn in the core areas. In 2010-2011, we experimented with what we have called labs.  During periods 2-6, all 7th and 8th grade students have TA (homeroom), Math, English, Social Studies, and Science.  All 7th graders are in Math/Science and all 8th graders are in English/Social Studies at the same time.  Then we had Academic Labs followed by the other half of the core classes where 7th and 8th graders took the other 2 core classes.  These Academic labs were created for enrichment and remediation. Students would rotate through the academic labs with their homeroom classmates.

10-11 Labs (over 4 days, all students would go to each lab)

• Reading
• Writing
• Science
• Math

In 11-12, we modified our labs.  Labs are now right after TA.  Students are assigned a guided study hall or a lab depending on their academic need.  The High Ability Learners have an afternoon class that is designed to push them academically.  The labs now focus on enrichment and all students are invited to come to these labs but some students are assigned the lab.  Focus on math, reading, and writing is because our belief is that these are fundamental skills that students need to master to have a better understanding in all classes.  Students not assigned to labs are put in a guided study hall. These students do take advantage of the labs as needed based on either teachers recommendation or their own desire to get better at a  certain skill.

11-12 Labs

• Guided Study Hall 
• Reading/Writing
• Math

Our focus has been to make sure that we create an environment where all students will succeed.  These labs give students additional support.  In the last 2 years, we have had one student fail one course.  This would have been unheard of prior to the 2010-2011 school year.  This was one of many reforms we have made in our school but I believe it to be an important piece of the puzzle.

Time of Change: Transition to a Middle School

Two years ago, Arlington Jr/Sr High School embraced the "middle school" philosophy.   We are still a 7-12 building but grades 7-8 are treated in what we feel is a more developmentally responsive way.  We wanted to makes some changes that would benefit our students.  We have now completed 3 semesters in this new system.  During this time, we have only had one student fail one course.  Prior to this system, we would regularly have students fail courses. The data is beginning to prove that this system has increased academic achievement.

Challenges of a small 7-12 school
1. Shared staff-We share music, art, PE, K-12.  Of all of the teachers who teach 7th and 8th grade, one teaches only Middle School.  The rest teach at least one high school section.
2. Scheduling-Our staff was completely shared prior to the change to a middle school.  Many classes are offered only once.  This makes a schedule difficult to create.  All of the juniors and seniors that want to take sociology, as an example, have to take it 5th period during the first semester.  This really limits what classes can be taken and offered for all students in grades 7-12.  As we changed to a middle school, our concern was that by blocking off the morning for middle school core classes, this might negatively impact our high school students abilities to get into their chosen classes.
3. Difference in needs of 7th graders and 12th graders-12 year olds are nervous about using lockers for the first time.  The 18 year olds are worried about their cars, varsity sports, and graduation.
4. High School mentality-We hired most of our teachers to teach "high school."  The administration were also called High School Principal and High School Assistant Principal.  The focus can easily be on the upper grades.  Sometimes teachers can get "stuck" teaching middle schoolers and once they get seniority in their department they move "up" to teach high school classes.  For us, the problem was more structural than attitude.  In our structure,we had few opportunities to discuss 7th and 8th grade student needs.

Changes
1. Creation of an Interdisciplinary Team-Our Middle School team meets every day.  Our Middle School core teachers teach both 7th and 8th grade.  We only have 40 students per grade.  Team allows teachers to discuss middle school specific issues.  Here is our schedule of topics: M-Lesson Plans-find out what days others are giving tests/quizzes homework, T-Student issues, W-Interdisciplinary Unit discussion, Th-Professional Development, F-Homeroom Activities and Misc.
2. Creation of the Eagle Success Program-Whenever I present at a conference, this is what always gets the most interest.  I will do a separate blog about this on a different day.  ESP is a system that doesn't allow student to not do their homework.
3. Creation of Academic Labs-Students either go to a guided study hall, Math Lab, or English Lab for 30 minutes.  This is based on academic need assigned by the teachers.  However, we have several students who go to labs on their own.
4. Flexible Scheduling-we block out periods 2-6 for core academic time.  If we need to make a change an have a long period for science to meet, we can simply shorten other classes.  Math-Science meet at the same time and Eng-Soc St meet at the same time so we can make simple changes.  We also can drop homeroom or lab.  We can lengthen either homeroom for a day.
5. Interdisciplinary Units-We have amazing, creative teachers who have done some really neat things.  They create an interest in school by having fun with these units.  We begin these units with videos that the teachers make.  I will write an entire blog on these at a later date.
6. No Zero Policy-zeroes kill a students grade.  The hardest part for some teachers was how will we motivate students to complete work?  After doing this now for 5 years, I can tell you we have less missing work now than before.  Students who struggle in school are not motivated by zeroes.  They tend to be more motivated by social time.  Therefore we created the Eagle Success Program to help students complete their homework.
7. Structure of Administration/Focus on Middle School students-We created a Middle School Coordinator that acts as the administrator in charge of the Middle School.
8. Middle School Lunch-Grades K-4 eat first, then 9-12, then 5-8.  In the old system, we simply had Lower Elementary Lunch and then 2 high school lunches.  We would have 5th graders and Seniors in the same lunch and this was less than ideal.
9. Development of Living Above the Line-this is our discipline system designed for middle school students.

These are some of the changes we have made that have shifted focus to the 7th and 8th graders.  The structure of the buildings don't matter.  With some creativity, positive changes can be made and a middle school philosophy can be implemented anywhere that you have students grades 4-9.

10/90

Ten percent of life is outside of your control and 90% is in your control.  This is what Stephen Covey calls the 90/10 rule.  At some point, we flipped the numbers around and it stuck.  What this means for our students at Arlington Middle School is that you need to take accountability for yourself and spend less time worrying about what you can't control.  In the Principal's office, the terminology is used often and the meaning behind it is always used when discussing issues with students.  Although this seems like common sense, putting words to it made it so we didn't have to spend time explaining the same concept over and over.  Students know that we believe in the 10/90 rule within the first week of school and taking accountability for your own actions is an expectation.

Here's how using this simple terminology works.

A student, Johnny, comes into the office after getting into a verbal argument in the lunchroom with another student, Billy. It starts with Billy calling Johnny fat (and anyone who has worked in a school knows, it probably didn't start there-each student will have their own starting point-Billy might say it started 3 years ago when Johnny pushed Billy's sister) and then Johnny used some inappropriate language back to Billy. Johnny comes to the office and tells me "It's not my fault, he called me fat."  A simple way for me, the principal, to deal with this is to say "thanks for letting me know that, when I am talking Billy I'll be sure to ask him about that.  Now, that's your 10, tell me about your 90."  Johnny might say something like "well what was I supposed to do, just let him call me fat."  The simple response becomes to redirect him to his 90 or his part in the conflict (usually students go right to their 90 but occasionally you'll have a more stubborn student).  Johnny will know that he can come up with any and every excuse in the book but until we get to his 90 in the conflict, we won't be moving on.  The more excuses, the more time we will spend or shall I say, he will spend.  In that case, the process will become very formal and he will have to write all of his 10 in one column then after getting all of the excuses written down, he will then have to fill in the 90 column.  If it takes too much time, that's OK, we have systems in place for him to have him make up time.  In Jim Fay (Love and Logic) talk, you can say "Oh, I'm sorry, I only listen to excuses at 12:30 pm and 3:30 pm.  Which would you like to choose."  Almost every time students move on very rapidly and we move on with our day.  Johnny might get some input on the consequence when appropriate.  If this conflict happened in the lunchroom, then maybe Johnny would eat in the office for a couple of days, a natural consequence.

Excuses are taken away.  I will listen to the legitimate concern and empathize with a student.  In the above example, I might say "I can see where that would hurt your feelings, how did you respond to that (see it, own it)?"  "What might have been a better way to respond (solve it)?"  "Besides simply an apology, what do you suppose should happen to make this right?"  "I'm sorry he said that to you.  Now let's put this behind us and make this right (do it)."  "Let me know if you need any help with this issue in the future." "Let's meet again on Thursday at 8:00 am and go through how everything is going with you and Billy (do it-follow up)."

It's simple but powerful.  It simplifies what we all want students to do which is take responsibility for their actions.  We allow them to explain why they did what they did (explain, not come up with excuses). Then we refocus the student on their own behaviors and owning those behaviors (own it portion of the "see it, own it, solve it, do it" process).

See it, Own it, Solve it, Do it

Roger Connors, Tom Smith, and Craig Hickman talk about See it, Own it, Solve it, and Do it in what they call the "Oz Principle."  When they discuss these items, they are referring to business and creating a culture of accountability.  We have taken that "culture of accountability" in our middle school.  Often times, when we talk about a culture of accountability in schools, we are simply talking about taking a test and holding the adults accountable for the result of these tests.  When we discuss accountability, we discuss true accountability for your own actions.  This accountability applies to all aspects of a students life.  Often times, when I talk to a student in the office about a student discipline issue, I use the see it, own it, solve it, and do it approach for students.

1. See It-Students are asked to see what the problem is.  Students are asked to list what areas they need to improve.
2. Own it-A key component of our lessons for our students is the 10/90 principle (Stephen Covey discusses the 90/10 principle-this is the same thing-at some point, we just turned it around and it stuck).  Ten percent of life is outside of your control.  Students are asked to identify that 10%.  As an example, a student might be in my office because he called another student a name.  The first thing that student is going to want to tell me is what the other student did first.  I will tell them that yes, that did happen and that is your 10 percent.  We usually beat them to the punch and ask them to identify the "10" before they have the opportunity to blame the other student for his/her own misbehavior. Then we move to what's the student's "90?" This is where we identify what the student did and what some better options might have been.  In some cases this is a short process and in other cases, the student may take some coaching to understand this concept.
3. Solve It-Now the student is asked to come up with a solution to the problem.  How is this going to be fixed or made better?
4.  Do It-After the solution has been put into place, we get back together (maybe a day later or maybe a week or even a month later) and discuss how the solution worked, what problems may have come up, and do we need to make changes to the original solution.  This really makes student discipline a process rather than simply a punishment that is seen as unrelated to the student behavior.

Of course consequences still exist.  Natural consequences are ideal and sometimes a logical consequence occurs when a good natural consequence can't be found.  Sometimes this See It, Own It, Solve It, Do It process is formal (written) and other times it is very informal (the words may not even be used but the idea is the same).