A Pedagogy of Hope & Belonging

Here is Edward Bear, coming downstairs, now, bump, bump, bump, on the back of his head behind Christopher Robin. It is as far as he knows the only way of coming downstairs, but somewhere he feels there is another way, if only he could stop for a moment and think of it.'-- A A Milne

  School reform reminds me of the above quote concerning Christopher Robin and Pooh.  

Note: Our Children are in need of much more support that far exceeds new standards, new curriculum, new teaching techniques and new tests.  Take a look at some of the national statistics and data:

Moments in America for Children Children’s Defense Fund-January 2014

• Every 2 seconds during the school year a public school student receives an out-of-school suspension.*
• Every 9 seconds during the school year a public high school student drops out.*
• Every 20 seconds a baby is born to an unmarried mother.
• Every 21 seconds a child is arrested.
• Every 30 seconds during the school year a public school student is corporally punished.*
• Every 32 seconds a baby is born into poverty.
• Every 47 seconds a child is abused or neglected.
• Every 62 seconds a baby is born into extreme poverty.

• Every 70 seconds a baby is born without health insurance.
• Every 1-and-a-half minutes a baby is born to a teen mother.
• Every 1-and-a-half minutes a baby is born at low birthweight.
• Every 3-and-a-half minutes a child is arrested for a drug offense.
• Every 8 minutes a child is arrested for a violent offense.
• Every 22 minutes a baby dies before his or her first birthday.
• Every hour a child or teen dies from an accident.
• Every 3 hours and 15 minutes a child or teen is killed by guns.
• Every 4-and-a-half hours a child commits suicide.
• Every 5-and-a-half hours a child is killed by abuse or neglect.
• Every 11 hours a baby’s mother dies due to complications from pregnancy or childbirth.
• *Based on 180 school days a year. See Endnotes in The State of America's Children 2014 for citations. –

I have been studying what researchers call "turnaround teachers" now for more than a little bit of time. Turnaround teachers all teach differently yet they have some common core traits or what I like to think of as ways of seeing the world.

Turnaround teachers and adults create HOPE!!!

At their core they know that kids simply do not learn very well from people they do not like!!  

Creating A Healthy School Culture for All Kids

Take a look at the work of Nick Hobbs. 33 years ago Hobbs working with the hardest of the hard kids.... developed his 12 Re-Ed Principles ( not rules )

His work starts here....... with TRUST

12 Principles of Re-Ed- 

 Trust is the glue that holds teaching and learning together.

1. Competence makes a difference, and children and adolescents should be helped to be good at something, and especially at schoolwork. School is near the center of a child's life and kids spend large amounts of time in this place. We must make sure they experience being good at something in school.
2.  Time is an ally, working on the side of growth in a period of development when life has a tremendous forward thrust.
3.  Self-control can be taught and children and adolescents helped to manage their behavior without the development of psycho-dynamic insight.
4.  Intelligence can be taught. Intelligence is a dynamic, evolving, and malleable capacity for making good choices in living.
5.  Feelings should be nurtured, shared spontaneously, controlled when necessary, expressed when too long repressed, and explored with trusted others ....
6.  The group is very important to young people, and it can become a major source of instruction in growing up.
7.  Ceremony and ritual give order, stability, and confidence to troubled children and adolescents, whose lives are often in considerable disarray.
8. The body is the armature of the self, the physical self around which the psychological self is constructed.
9.  Communities are important for children and youth, but the uses and benefits of community must be experienced to be learned.
10.  A child should know some joy in each day and look forward to some joyous event for the morrow.

-Excerpted from Hobbs, 1982, Habel, 1988. (Hobbs credits the idea of the importance of joy in the life of children to the Russian Educator and youth worker, Anton Makarenko.)