Creating Engaging Classrooms

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"Everyone please stop what you're doing, close your computers, and give me your fullest attention. This work we're doing is very important and we all want to do our best. I'm noticing that several of you are off-task now and that's not good. Let's stay mindful of our work and try to remain on task. Thank you."

If you've ever taught, I'm sure you've said this or something similar to students. I know I have.

Let's stop.

The truth is that statements like the one above aren't effective. They distract the students who are on-task without actually addressing the reasons that some are off-task in the first place.

We continue to say things like this because the immediate response is short-term compliance. Students appear to be more engaged after we say something so we feel better about ourselves. This makes us more likely to say things like this in the future.

I'm not suggesting that we stop addressing off-task behavior; I'm actually suggesting that we start.

The next time you're planning produces less engagement than desired, take time to reflect upon why before taking action. Then, take action.

Here are a few ideas, as examples:

1. Involve your students in the planning process.

Form a student academic advisory board in your school or class. Before launching a new project or unit, ask them to convene to tune your ideas. Take their feedback seriously and use it to improve your practice.

Include a broad range of learners. You'll want input from multiple perspectives; asking only the top ten for feedback won't solve your engagement issues.

2. Observe disengaged students and ask them why they're struggling to stay on task.

If your question is sincere, they'll be quite honest. Write their responses down as if you were a researcher collecting data on student behavior. Taking this step will pay off immensely during future planning.

Over time, analyzing this data will reveal patterns of student disengagement. Are the same students always disengaged? Is there a particular activity that disengages more students than others? Are students in some classes or at different times of day more likely to disengage than others?

By analyzing data, you'll be better able plan for and prevent disengagement in the future. To do this, however, you have to first collect the data!

3. Ask an outsider to do the observing for you.

A trusted administrator might be a good place to start. Lacking that (or additionally), ask a colleague to sit in during one of your classes to collect data. Be specific about what data you want them to collect. Help them help you by providing the data collection format and tool.

Do you want to know when or how often a particular group of students disengages? Do you want to know what your proximity in the classroom does to engagement? An outside observer can see things that you never will in your own class.

4. Make peer accountability a celebrated part of your school or classroom culture.

It should not be the teacher's sole responsibility to keep everyone on task. In too many schools, though, we teach our students to be passive bystanders to their peer's disengagement and misbehavior. Make this unacceptable by addressing it explicitly and regularly when it occurs.

When one member of a group does significantly better or worse on an assessment than the the rest, there's a teachable moment that shouldn't be skipped. When one member of the group is distracting the others, what steps can that group take to address that distraction in a non-threatening way?

By taking class time to teach students to hold one another accountable to their work, you'll not only decrease disengagement, but you'll be teaching them an essential 21st-century skill.

5. End every project or unit with a day of student reflection.

Divide the day into three parts.

  1. Start with a review of the work they did and ask them to provide feedback on how you could improve upon it the next time around.
  2. Ask them to reflect upon how the class functioned as a group. What went well? What didn't? What might they be able to do next time to make the class better.
  3. Ask them each to reflect upon how they functioned, individually. What study habits or activities worked particularly well for them? What worked the least? What should they work to improve personally in the future?

Take notes throughout the day and store them with your lesson plans or project resources.

6. End every class with five minutes of honest reflection.

Choose a reflection format, as appropriate, to get student feedback on what they learned, what questions they have, or what needs to be covered more thoroughly the next day.

Whether it be through a journal, an exit slip, a discussion, or a any other format, the point is to increase communication from your students about what they need to learn to be successful.

7. Identify school and district resources for the most disengaged students.

Let's face it, we can't solve every problem ourselves. When we can't, it's important to acknowledge that we can't and to ask for help from someone who can. Regardless whether these students need academic, social, psychological, or behavioral support, remember that no classroom is an island. Use every resource available for this small segment of every school population.

8. Leverage parent relationships to help increase student productivity.

This is especially helpful when students are not engaging in homework. Calls and emails to parents for feedback and support are typically greeted more positively when delivered sincerely and without emotion.

Ask parents what their kids say about your class at home. What work do they see their kids doing at home? How much homework are their kids getting? Is it too much? Are other commitments getting in the way? What do they think could help you engage their kid in learning?

By taking time to collect and analyze data before deciding to act, and then acting intentionally to address the actual challenges of student engagement, we will start to realize a world with increased student engagement and achievement.

Moreover, you can stop giving the whole-class lectures on the importance of staying on-task.

Parent Communication 3.0

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Imagine it's Sunday night. You're sitting on the couch with your spouse watching a reality show. During a commercial break, you pick up your smartphone to check Facebook and notice you have 3 new emails from your son's school. Each one is an automated messages about his grades.

He's failing.

Without much understanding of the school's online gradebook or new grading policies, you call him into the room and ask for an explanation about what's going on. You're concerned.

He's dumbfounded. There is no way he could be failing. This must be a mistake.

In fact, he asserts, it may not even be his fault. His teachers don't even teach any more; they call themselves facilitators now and expect the students to do all the learning on their own. It's very stressful and everyone is failing.

This hits a nerve. You know that the school is going through a change process; you attended a meeting about the changes at the beginning of the year. Could they be expecting too much too soon? Is your child, who has always received high marks in school, being harmed by these new changes at school?

You call a few other parents to hear how their kids are doing. The perception is mixed: some are doing better, some the same, and some worse. During each of these conversations, you share your concern for what's going on at school. Could it be the school's fault that your kid is failing?

In desperation, you send a terse email to the teachers and carbon copy the school principal.

While the actual conversations that play out may vary, the theme of the messages I receive is almost always the same:

  1. My child is not doing as well at school as he has in the past.
  2. The school has changed a lot since I was in school.
  3. My child can't articulate what he is doing wrong.
  4. The problem must be the school, program, or teachers.

This is understandable. When the only information parents have comes from their prior experience, an automated email, and a struggling child, it's tough to argue with their logic.

There's no solution to this problem; in fact, it's not even a "problem" to be solved. Rather, it's a complex circumstance of communication that needs to be addressed in multiple simple ways.

1. Reduce the default number of notifications sent out to parents by online gradebooks.

I've heard from parents that our online gradebook sends out as many as ten emails per day, by default, depending on teacher activity. Simply from a signal vs. noise point-of-view, that's far too many. While some parents tune out all emails they receive, others anxiously look into each one in fear that they are going to miss something important if they don't.

I feel sorry for the students with parents in either case.

The truth is that in a challenging school environment, grades fluctuate, especially at the start of each grading term. To notify parents of each fluctuation as they occur is unreasonable: it causes anxiety and leads to an inaccurate assessments of reality.

Schools need the capability to change these default settings to meet their school's particular needs. Or, the default ought to be set to zero; motivated parents who want notifications are more likely to turn them on than they are to turn them off.

2. Involve parents well before problems ever arise.

It's a common misconception that parents should become less involved in their children's education as they grow older. This is harmful. Teenagers need their parents support and understanding as much as they did when they were in elementary school. The only change should be what parental involvement looks like over the years.

A group of parent leaders recently told me that I need to hold a mandatory "parent bootcamp" every summer. While the logistics of this alone scare me to death, the need behind the sentiment is quite real: the high school their kids are going to is a lot different from the high school they attended. The building might be the same, but the culture, instruction, and resources are not.

Parents of 21st-century educated kids need more than a handbook and an hour-long orientation. They need consistent, quality, flexible, and varied opportunities to become involved in their children's educational development.

3.) Educate students on training their parents to use and understand the school's online gradebook.

There's a very practical reason why students should want to do this: to get their parents off their backs when grades do fluctuate. As long as the training comes well before problems arise, parents will know what to expect and when.

Parents may still send teachers emails (and we want them to), but with a more thorough understanding of the school's online gradebook, and after a practical conversation with their child, the tone of that email should change from terse to inquisitive.

4.) Urge teachers to email parents before posting grades that may have a negative impact on overall scores.

There are times when a teacher's lessons do not go as planned. Student writing, for example, does not always live up to expectations. Sometimes, students do not test as well as we'd like them to.

Without getting into an entirely different challenge, let's just acknowledge that when teachers raise performance expectations beyond that which students are accustomed to reaching, the scaffolding can sometimes fall apart.

When it does, it is essential that teachers email parents before grades are posted. And, it's equally important that this email is positive.

Here's an example email that was sent by one of my American Studies facilitators to learners (CC'ing parents) regarding a recent draft:

Learners,

We have published the Background Information grades. As we stated in class, the paper was graded on each person's individual section of this portion of the White Paper. We were looking for citations, in-text citations, proper use of mechanics, and organization. We also looked to make sure you were contributing equally to your group.

We acknowledge that many of you will be disappointed by your grade, but ask that you understand this is just one phase of the project. As you take our feedback and apply it to your paper, the paper will improve and so will your overall grade for it. Remember, we are all learning and a big part of learning is struggling with the concepts until we can grasp them. I have already seen how much many of you have learned as a result of your struggles and everyday we learn more and more. Please keep that in mind as we push toward completing our rough draft in the week to come.

Have a wonderful week!

This email informs learners and parents that:

  • expectations on the project are high and will not be lowered.
  • that many struggled to meet the expectation.
  • there is no reason for alarm.
  • lessons learned through feedback can be applied to future phases of the project.
  • With effort, everything will be okay.

Imagine the same Sunday night again. This time, something is different.

Getting emails from the school's gradebook is rare, so when one comes in, you investigate it. Recalling the parent workshops you attend, you check for grade comments, look at the posted agendas, and find the rubric used to assess your son's writing.

The conversation you have with your son is more productive because you have talked about the online gradebook before and you have a common understanding about what's going on at school. Moreover, you already had a similar conversation with your son about his grades when the teacher emailed his concern earlier in the week.

Feeling a sense of relationship with the school and the teachers there, you still send an email. This time, though, it's more to learn about after-school study hours and to ask if there is anything you can do to help at home.

Your son is still failing, but you understand why and know what steps he needs to take to improve.

What more could you ask for?

Until - Video Edition

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The New Tech Network has uploaded the video of my Ignite Talk at the closing session of their annual conference last year. For the record, if I seem nervous and rushed, it's because I am. Ignite presenters are given only 5 minutes to present 20 slides that auto-advance every 15 seconds. I'm trying to pack a lot of (too much) information into each slide.​

Overall, the product is watchable and the message is something I think about a lot as a school administrator. Enjoy.​

Presentation by Patrick Malley

Until

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Here are the slides and notes from my Ignite talk from yesterday. Please keep in mind that my notes were just that: notes. I did not say these exact words on stage. When the video goes up, I'll update this post.

I'd like to share a simple idea that changed the way I view my role as a school administrator. In doing so, I'd also like to challenge you to reflect upon your school's current discipline policy and how you personally deliver consequences to the young people you serve.

​Before I make my point, though, I need to start with some definitions. Behavioral Psychologists define learning "as the process leading to long-term or potential behavioral change." Typically this takes one of two forms.

Punishment can be defined technically as "any consequence to our behavior that reduces the likelihood that we'll repeat the behavior again." For example, if I ridicule a student for talking in class, and she does not like ridicule, then she is less likely to ​talk in class in the future. This is punishment.

The flip side of punishment is reinforcement, which can be defined as "any consequence to our behavior that increases the likelihood that we'll repeat the behavior again. For example, if I tell a student that she is a good writer and she respects my opinion then she is more likely to write in the future. This is reinforcement.​

Of course, years of living this way in public education have left us all understanding these concepts all too well. Do your work or you will fail. Put your cell phone away or I'll take it away. Raise your hand and then I'll call on you. In public education, we get behavioral modification.

All to often when we talk about disciplining children what we really mean is punishment. I'd like to make the point today that discipline and punishment are not the same thing. Discipline is something we want our students to embrace from within. Punishment is a tool frequently used in schools that comes from without.

The message to the punished is this: "You're not able to discipline yourself. You have done something wrong. Therefore, we're going to do bad things to you to teach you a lesson." The very nature of this is the opposite of empowering. It removes power.

It was the realization that if I'm to create a culture that is truly empowering then I must punish less. In fact, I probably shouldn't punish at all. Instead what I needed to do was find a way to reinforce much, much more.

Because I like and respect you, I need you to know that I'm not crazy. Remember that reinforcement and reward are not the same thing. I'm not recommending that you ignore anti-social behavior and I'm certainly not suggesting that you start giving our lollipops for all types of good behavior.

What I am saying is that we need to find a way to reframe the way we communicate consequences to turn them into reinforcers. Here's a little trick to help you do this: take any traditional punishment, add the preposition "until" followed by a pro-social consequence, and you should have a reinforcing statement.​ Let's look at an example.

Consider the statement "You have detention." Assuming that the student being assigned detention doesn't like it, the purpose of this consequence is to reduce behavior. By our definition earlier, then, this is punishment. Now, let's take that exact same statement and apply until to turn it into reinforcement.

In this revised statement, notice that the student still has detention, but I've respected the student enough to add a condition to get out. I've turned the traditional punishment of detention into a reinforcer because instead of focusing on reducing bad behavior, I'm focusing instead on increasing good behavior. The student is now more likely to come to me with a plan. Let's look at one more example.

Consider the punishment "Shut down your computer," said to a student for overusing social media during group work time. Never happens, right. This statement, taken at face value, is punishing because its purpose is to reduce social media overuse by this student in the future.

If we apply my rule and add the until to this statement, we change the focus of the consequence form, "You are bad and cannot handle using your computer" to "Let's talk about this later on when I have more time." This student is now more likely to talk to you later, thus it is a reinforcer.

The cynics and psych minors in the room will tell you that things are never this black and white. While issuing these consequences our goal is still to reduce bad behavior. But the focus of the statement has changed from what you are doing to the learner for being bad to what the learner has to do to be good.

The next time and every time that you issue consequences to  students, ask yourself where you're attention is focused? What message are you sending to students about who they are? Have you given ample opportunity to correct what's been done? Is your consequence respectful?

If the answer to these last two questions is no then step back and ask yourself if you're truly empowering students at all. Be tough on yourself to rethink traditional punishments in a way that will shift the focus from what's been done to what can be done.

Take advantage of consequences by treating them as opportunities to connect with students about their decisions and the effects that they have on others. After all, aren't most behavioral issues in schools related in one way or another to relationships.

As a point of caution, don't be creepy by overusing this idea or becoming overly manipulative. For example, don't give students unrealistic expectations to fulfill like raising their grade from a D to an A to regain your trust for using a cell phone during class.

The last point I want to make is to love what you do. If ever you're considering a consequence for a child that doesn't make you feel good about the work that you do, ask yourself if there's another way to frame it so it better aligns with your personal and school philosophy. Thank you.

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Roll Your Own Digital Signage

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Last fall, I was lucky to have an interesting problem: our newly renovated learning space included eight 42" monitors, each located above a "laptop touchdown station" where students could plug in to collaborate, practice presentations, etc. The challenge was deciding what to show on these screens when students were not plugged in.

​Corridor at Niles New Tech in Niles, Michigan

After researching commercial digital signage solutions, we decided that there has to be a better (less expensive) way to do this on our own. This post will outline what we did to create a social and dynamic digital signage solution using HTML, CSS, and a bit of javascript. While I image that "what we did" will be pretty specific to our needs at the time, my hope is that some of the ideas shared in this post will be helpful to others down the road.

To start, let's talk about the hardware:​

  • The monitor we went with was the NEC V422 because it had sound, accepted a variety of input types, and had scheduling capabilities to turn on and off automatically at specified times of day.
  • Behind each monitor was an electrical outlet, an ethernet port, and an HDMI port. The HDMI port worked simply as a local connection for students to plug into that station. It only ran one foot down the wall to a second input plate above the counter.
  • Connected to the back of each monitor via VGA was a simple NComputing L-Series virtual PC.  These boxes were connected to our network via the ethernet jack and were the necessary link to make our digital signage work.
  • On the other end of the network connection was obviously a server running the virtual PC installations.​

That was about all the hardware we needed to make this thing work. The rest of the work was in the software. Here's what happened on each:

  • ​My network admin setup the NComputing devices to automatically restart, login to the network, and open Chrome in full-screen mode every night. Since I didn't do any of this work I can't provide much detail beyond telling you that it worked. Of course, there were times when a particular device lagged or didn't work properly but the fix was usually as easy as restarting the individual box manually.
  • We set http://sign.nilesnewtech.org as the homepage in Chrome for each of these setups so that it would always open to our signage webpage.
  • We then set the timer on each monitor to turn on at 7am and turn off at 4pm.​ Every morning, when the students came in, the signage would be on every screen. If students wanted to "take over" a monitor locally to use it as an external monitor, they simply changed inputs and plugged in their laptop via HDMI.

​Screenshot of the Niles New Tech digital signage webpage.

Once we had monitors connected to virtual PCs that automatically opened a webpage every night, our next step was to design and code a webpage ​with some interesting content.

When designing the site, I knew that I didn't want to create anything that would require much future updating through the backend. In other words, if I had to go back through the HTML every time I wanted to make a change, I knew this solution would fail. I don't have time to spend my day in code.

With this in mind, I started looking for javascript solutions that would take advantage of APIs to pull content from other sources like GoogleDocs, Twitter, or Flickr. By taking advantage of these services, I was able to create a single webpage that dynamically pulls content from these services throughout the day. My teachers, students, their parents, and visitors can all easily post content right alongside our school calendar and announcements. 

Here are the resources I used:

  • The calendar is a simple Google Calendar embedded into the page. You can setup your parameters for this right within the Google Calendar embed interface.​
  • ​Everything that follows requires the jQuery library.
  • The HTC Hero inspired digital clock / weather widget ​is called jDigiClock.
  • Both the News & Announcements and Shout-outs sections of the site pull content from Twitter and are powered by electronaut's LiveTwitter plugin.
  • ​The image slideshow that pulls recent images from the school's Flickr is powered by Flickrfeed.

​Screenshot of index.html

​Once I found all of the resources needed to make the signage work, I started coding. Attached is a zipped up copy of everything I have at http://sign.nilesnewtech.org. Your free to steal the design and everything I've done. I've simply pulled together resources from other places. 

Download the files here.​

Other things you'll need to do and know:​

  • The News & Announcements section pulls content from a specific Twitter account. I gave access to this Twitter account to my teachers and secretary so that they could post whenever they had something to share. A notable benefit of doing this is that you can share the Twitter account with parents and students through other places (like your website, on Twitter, etc.). It's not only useful for the sign. (Edited on line 50 of index.php)
  • The "Shout-outs section pulls content from tweets that include a specified phrase (like a hashtag). This allows anyone to get their words on the screen just by using that tag in their tweet. This is an important and powerful part of the sign - it keeps people looking.​ (Edited on line 51 of index.php)
  • You'll need a Flickr account to link up to the pictures. (Edited on line 7 of setup.js) We all installed Flickr uploader apps on our phones so that we could easily take a picture of student learning in the classroom and upload it right to our shared account. Then, the next time the sign refreshed, it would show the new pictures you just took.
  • There are refresh rate caps with Twitter. You may need to change the refresh rates on lines 50 and 51 of index.php if you have a lot of signs pulling from Twitter simultaneously.​

That's about all I have to share. I realize that this is not a very good technical post for those of you without a coding background. I simply can't think of any way to explain much more without turning this into a coding tutorial. If you have questions or hang-ups, feel free to post questions as comments or you can find me on Twitter @ptrkmkl​.

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Math Dream Sequence A

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​Here is my first shot at a dream sequence for high school math. It's truly a "dream" sequence: flaws, incomplete stories, and all. My point here is not to hit the nail on the head. I just hope to share an idea that math can be sequenced differently with a better result.

Here it goes:

​9th grade

All incoming high school students take the same math course integrating Algebra 1 and Geometry. If they were successful in Algebra 1 in middle school, great. They can take an "Honors Geometry" track embedded within regular Geometry and be leaders in the classroom by completing all problem extensions, helping others, etc.

Students in this integrated math course would receive two math credits and would have two math teachers, but there would be no difference between them. Both teachers would be responsible for both subjects and students would see them as equals.

The course would be 90–120 minutes long and would meet every day. Instruction would be 100% project- or problem-based. Students would be divided into periods by the previous year's academic performance to achieve a diverse group in every class. ​With two teachers and support from special education and counselors, learning would be differentiated for all learning styles and paces.

10th grade​

Learners who are successful in math during the 9th grade would ​move on to take an integrated Physics / Algebra 2 class. This course too would have an Honors track embedded within it. Extensions to problems would be required by these Honors students who would be expected to take a leadership role in the classroom.

This course would have two teachers: both certified in math and science. Again, students would not know who was who - both teachers would take responsibility for teaching both subjects. The class would be 90–120 minutes long and meet every day. Instruction would be 100% project- and problem-based. Learners at all levels would be in the same classroom for this course.

11th grade​

By the third year of high school, some students would be prepared (and will need) to take Pre-Calculus. ​Others may have struggled through their first two years of math and/or have educational plans that do not require them to learn much more advanced mathematics. Having already satisfied 3/4 of the MIchigan's requirements in mathematics, it's at this point that it makes sense for a few divergent paths to emerge in math sequencing.

  1. Students in need of advanced mathematics understanding could take a stand-alone, hour-long, problem-based Pre-Calculus course or a more traditional semester-long Pre-Calculus and Calculus 1 course sequence at the community college.
  2. Students not needing advanced mathematics who are interested in a service career could take an integrated Statistics & Social Science (Sociology/Psychology) course.
  3. Students interested  in more hands-on technical career ​could earn their math credit through a program at the nearby Career and Technical Education Center.

12th grade

By creating divergent paths during the 11th grade, students' math options would become even more specific to their desired outcomes and ability during their fourth year of high school.

  1. Students following a path of advanced mathematics could continue to take advanced courses at the community college.
  2. ​Students following a service or health career path could earn credit through industry-specific math courses offered at the community college.
  3. Students attending the Career Center would continue to earn their math credit through the programs offered there.​
  4. Students choosing to change paths would be supported to do so according to their ability.​

Conclusions

To reiterate the point made in the first paragraph: this plan is not perfect. The cost of doubling up math in the freshmen year is substantial and would have to be offset in some way elsewhere in the school. The cost and quality of off-campus courses would also need to be considered.  

With that said, it gets students where they need to go without compromising classroom culture by splitting the most skilled math students from those who struggle.​ It creates math teaching teams who can support each other to truly differentiate. It provides ample time for students to complete challenging projects and problems. And, by providing two Michigan math requirements in the first year, it provides students the opportunity to re-take a course if they struggle and fall behind. It starts to get at some of the questions I was writing about last night.

I realize that there are a lot of points and assumptions that I'm making without specifically spelling them out. As a rule, that's probably going to be a theme in my writing. I simply don't have time to pull out every detail. The point is that I hope others will join in the conversation. Things will get spelled out in time. If you have questions, I encourage you to ask. 

Math Switch-a-roo

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Lately, I've had trouble getting the sequence of high school math out of my head. For example, in Michigan, where I work and live, most students learn math as follows:

  1. Algebra 1​
  2. Geometry​
  3. Algebra 2​
  4. Pre-Calculus​
  5. Calculus​

Following this sequence, the only ​way for a student to get to calculus while in high school is to take Algebra 1 in the 8th grade. Since not every student needs or will be successful in calculus, most students wait to take Algebra 1 until they get to high school.

In my district, a quarter to a third of students take Algebra 1 in the 8th grade. It's safe to say that most of these students are "good at school." What I mean is that they tend to watch their grades and have supportive families. Completing schoolwork comes somewhat naturally to them. Their being good at school is one of the reasons they get scheduled at a pace to complete calculus their senior year.

As a school administrator charged with the task of re-thinking teaching and learning, I have to question whether this practice is wise or necessary. Here are some of my questions:

  1. What effect does being in a math class full of peers who are good at school have ​on your overall learning experience?
  2. What effect does being in a math class absent any peers who are good at school have on your overall learning experience?​
  3. ​What effect does putting all students who are good at school into one math class have on the rest of your courses or your school culture (especially in small schools)?​
  4. What implicit messages are you sending students by separating them by ability in this way?​
  5. What data and research exists to ​support separating students into ability groups in math?
  6. What track record of success can schools who practice this method of scheduling math show to back up their practices?​
  7. ​Who says that algebra should be split up like this? Is this best for learning?
  8. Who says that any math should be separated at all? Should we integrate everything and teach logical chunks of math each year?​
  9. Can 8th graders comprehend Algebra 1 deeply enough to change gears to Geometry for a full year before going back to Algebra 2?​
  10. Might there be other ways to sequence and structure math to ​better serve our students' needs.​

I don't yet have answers to all of these questions, but I'm seeking them out. ​​​What I'm fairly certain of though is that math is sequenced the way it is ​because of tradition and status quo. We can change things if we have the will.

Last week we decided that all of our incoming 9th graders are going to take geometry. We're breaking the sequence to buy some time to think about algebra​, to integrate all learners in all classrooms (from special education to honors students), and to allow my 9th grade teacher to focus on one subject instead of two or three.

Next year, I'm not sure what we'll do. What I'd like to do is teach all algebra in one class with two teachers and twice the time. I doubt I'll have the numbers on my side to make that happen the way I want, but I have a year to think about it, to share my ideas with others, and to come up with a better solution.