New Books for Adults

The Arbor Center for Teaching (ACT) Library (found on the top floor of the Juniors building) holds over 4000 volumes for teachers and parents to borrow. Topics included in the library offerings include teaching and learning mathematics; reading; digital literacies and technology; writing; diversity, equity & inclusion; family life; dealing with trauma; educational history and philosophy; among other related topics. 

Check out these latest additions to the collection! 

Comprehensible and Compelling: The Causes and Effect of Free Voluntary Reading, Stephen Krashen, a giant in the field of reading, offers his latest title on the power of pleasure reading, published in 2018.

Limitless Mind: Learn, Lead, and Live Without Barriers, Jo Boaler connects neuroplasticity, growth mindset, the importance of struggle, a multidimensional approach to teaching and learning, the development of flexibility and creativity, and the power of collaboration. Yep, all that rolled together!

Deviced: Balancing Life and Technology in a Digital World written by Portland's own Doreen Dodgen-Magee. This research-based book provides a thoughtful framework for integrating technology into our lives, with implications for how we talk with kids about their own tech use. 

Dreyer's English: An Utterly Correct Guide to Clarity and Style  Fresh, sassy and erudite, Benjamin Dreyer is considered by many to have penned the 21st-century Elements of Style.

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nahesi Coates. I'm guessing this book needs no introduction. But just in case...here is a father's long beautifully woven letter to his son about African American history, the current crisis in America's race relations, and hopeful imaginings for the future. 

So You Want to Talk About Race by Kjeoma Oluo. Maybe you've heard about this title too. Oluo explores the current racial landscape in the US and its history and provides concretes moves dismantling it.  

ACT VOICES PART 4: MIDDLE SCHOOL TEACHING RESIDENCY

In this ACT Voices video, Teacher Residency graduate Cecca Wrobel discusses her experiences teaching in Arbor’s Middle School.  A linguistics major in college, Cecca specialized in math and literacy at Arbor, teaching algebra and geometry across the 6th, 7th and 8th grades.  She also worked in reading/writing workshops and facilitated her own literacy Seminar, reading novels connecting to Humanities themes with mixed age groups.

This full immersion experience enabled Cecca to develop an in-depth action research project around “Number Talks” with her 6th and 7th graders.  These are daily math discussions in which students engage in mathematical discourse that invites them to make their own mathematical conjectures, to support their strategies with logic, and to pose questions of their classmates.  Read her action research process and conclusions: "A Sensible Practice for Sense Making:  The simplicity of introducing a Number Talks routine for deepening quantitative reasoning."

We are currently accepting applications for our 2018-2020 cohort of Teacher Residents. Schedule an inquiry visit to Arbor School this fall to learn more about our program or e-mail act@arborschool.org for more information. 
 

ACT VOICES, PART 3: TEACHING PRACTICES THAT CROSS SCHOOL CONTEXTS

In this “ACT Voices” video, teacher residency graduate Danielle Ito makes a case for building her teaching practice within an Arbor kindergarten/first grade classroom.  The multi-age setting meant that she needed to develop strong differentiation techniques to support emergent readers just beginning to link letters and sounds as well as strong transitional readers already delving into chapter books.  These practices added to others in her teaching repertoire and contributed to her success in a public school context during her second residency year.  Working in one of Portland Public School’s biggest elementary schools, Danielle taught third graders who brought 6 different first languages to the classroom community.  She says that her Arbor experience “definitely translates to teaching across any spectrum of learners.”

Also during her second year, Danielle focused her “action research” on taking her Arbor kindergarten and first grade students outside to the Arbor woods to study science, math and literacy.  She describes the benefits of this experience for her young naturalists, learning to observe carefully while exploring the flora and fauna right outside the classroom door.  Read Danielle’s action research article here for more about her discoveries and practical suggestions around place-based education.

ACT Voices, Part 2: A Teacher from Day One

Our second “ACT Voices” video features Whitman College alumna and teacher residency graduate Elizabeth Thompson.  Elizabeth explains that she was drawn to the ACT for her Master’s in Teaching and Oregon teacher license because the residency approach meant that she could be a teacher from the outset of her two years of graduate study.  Working among a close cohort of teacher residents, Elizabeth describes the rigorous academic side of the ACT approach and how she explored the idea of teachers as perpetual students and inquirers.
 

During her two years at Arbor School, Elizabeth taught within one of our K/1st grade classrooms, extending her practice to 5th grade in her second year at Stafford Elementary in the West Linn-Wilsonville School District.  She now teaches 4th/5th grade at the Cottonwood School of Civics and Science in Portland, Oregon.
 

Warm Demanders

How can a little, independent school amidst fields and woods have anything to say to developing teachers whose classrooms will one day be found in large buildings in the middle of a city?  While the externalities may appear to separate the two contexts, the essence of schooling is based not on such surface elements but on the practices that can be learned in such a setting as Arbor's.

In a recent conversation with former Arbor Center for Teaching (ACT) apprentice, Ren Johns, who was aiming for and found a mathematics teaching position at a large urban high school after earning her MAT through ACT, we discussed what it is that she believes she brings to her students that is making the difference in her teaching.  She attributes her successes with her current students, who might appear to be very different from those she taught at Arbor, to the lessons she learned through ACT, to the relentless commitment to students she saw modeled and now exhibits herself, both in the development of meaningful relationships with them and in her provisioning them with work at which they can be successful.  Ren commented further that she finds herself at the same school as another ACT graduate, Ben Malbin, whose successes in teaching American Sign Language to a wide range of students are likewise predicated on connecting with students authentically as human beings and as capable learners.  

Both of these teachers are "warm demanders," intent on working with their students students from a perspective of high expectations and empathic understanding.  Becoming committed to such understanding and developing the pedagogical imagination required to do this kind of work can be learned in any school committed to individual growth and development within a community of learners being asked to be their best selves.  Arbor is such a school.

Inside the ACT: Teaching/Life Balance

Training to be a teacher through a residency model means working in the classroom all day, combining this with graduate work after school, and during some evenings and weekends.  As a result, one of our seminar themes is the topic of life balance and how to sustain a rigorous and time-consuming professional life as an educator during and beyond the ACT program.

One healthy element in this regard is to embrace opportunities to explore the outdoors in the Pacific Northwest, and to recharge by trying a new outdoor adventure.  Recently, Assistant Director Peter ffitch built on an evolving tradition and invited ACT Apprentices to join him sailing in Puget Sound, following in the footsteps of previous ACT cohorts.  K/1 Apprentice Lauren Reynolds and 2nd/3rd grade Apprentice Kristin Bollingmo took Peter up on his offer.  After this breathtaking experience, both Kristin and Lauren headed back to Portland ready for the teaching week ahead!

ACT Voices, Part 1: Learning to Teach Through Mentored Classroom Experience

Listen to the first in our five part series “ACT Voices” in which Teacher Residency graduate Oriana Connolly discusses her reasons for working for her Master’s of Arts in Teaching and Oregon teacher license at Arbor School.  

Oriana points out that no other graduate program offers as much classroom experience, supported by a co-teacher and seminars linking theory to practice.  In addition, she explains her draw to Arbor School’s philosophy with our focus on helping children develop critical thinking and questioning via deep exploration of science and the arts.  Having the chance to build her own teaching practice with two years in a second/third grade Arbor classroom, outside on Arbor’s twenty-two acre farm and woodland campus, and in a dual language Spanish classroom in the West Linn-Wilsonville School District, Oriana went on to teach fourth grade in a dual language classroom in Oregon City. She currently works in the Canby School District teaching fifth grade within the inspiring dual language community of Trost Elementary School.

We are currently accepting applications for our 2018-2020 cohort of Teacher Residents. Schedule an inquiry visit to Arbor School this fall to learn more about our program or e-mail act@arborschool.org for more information. 

Source: Arbor Center for Teaching

Reflections of a Second Year Apprentice Teacher by Holly Bindley

If a year in the classroom has made me certain of one thing, it is that learning is messy. Beautiful— but messy. A year has also helped me to understand and appreciate the absolutely essential student-teacher relationship. It is the foundation for everything. Learners build knowledge as they explore the world around them, observe and interact with it, converse and engage with others, reflect, and make connections between new ideas and prior understandings. It is the meaning-making process. True learning involves enriching, expanding, and changing existing understanding. People make connections and draw conclusions based on their experiences and a sense of what they already know. If teaching does not begin with what students know (or think they know), students may be able to pass a test or regurgitate information– but authentic, meaningful learning will not occur.

Holly and one of her students beginning the year together in their 2nd/3rd grade classroom at Arbor School.

When children are encouraged to question and investigate their surroundings, deeper learning can occur. It is a critical step in developing lifelong learners. According to Wood (1994), second and third graders are especially intrigued by the world around them and driven by an internal desire to understand how things work. This desire is infectious. And as educators, it is exactly what we must cultivate. Curiosity is not only a crucial part of motivation, but it is also a key element of learning. I aim to always foster the curiosity of my students by creating conditions that support the process of inquiry.

In this short year, I’ve also come to realize that education should not be separate from life itself. Learning occurs when students interact with and directly experience the concept being studied. As the ancient Chinese proverb says, “I hear and I forget. I see and I remember. I do and I understand.” I have been continually reminded of the significance and truth of this statement in my first year of this program. It is such a gift to be able to live what I am studying everyday in graduate school. To be able to apply it directly in my 2nd and 3rd grade classroom—and to make mistakes and reflect on them in such a supportive environment—has been incredibly humbling and rewarding. It is the only way to learn. True experiential learning asks us to apply our knowledge to experiences in order to develop skills and new ways of thinking.

As an educator, I strive to create opportunities for active learning— where students are asked to use ideas by writing and talking about them, creating models and demonstrations, applying these ideas to more complex problems, and constructing projects that require the integration of many ideas. When combined with reflective learning experiences, active learning means deeper learning. I hope to encourage discourse to create an environment where I am not the only source of knowledge. An environment where students teach students. By creating a classroom climate of trust, my hope is that students will feel safe to take risks and make mistakes.

 I vow to honor children as the curious, insightful, dignified human beings they are. By valuing their individual voices, solutions, and thinking, I hope to develop students who are confident in the power of their ideas and in their ability to advocate for themselves and others. Open inquiry, thoughtful discussion, and considering multiple perspectives will help students develop the capacity to recognize and respect differences. I want to develop learners who find comfort in complex questions that have multiple possible solutions. Learners who understand that’s exactly where the wisdom is–– lost in the answer.

Arbor students, starting the year off right by observing and exploring at recess.

Wood, Chip. (1994). Yardsticks: Children in the Classroom Ages 4-14. Greenfield, MA: Northeast Foundation for Children.