8th Grade Playlist: #3. West Coast by Coconut Records

When you think of great sing along songs, you think about songs of joy and hope. These are upbeat songs like “Sweet Caroline,” and “More Than A Feeling.” So when I heard Jason Schwartzman (yes, the actor) of Coconut Records urge us to sing-along to “West Coast” I wasn’t quite sure it made sense.



This is a song about a man missing someone in his life. We’re not sure whether it’s a girlfriend, friend or family member. The circumstances of the distance between them isn’t made clear. It could be a break-up or someone making a career move.  It’s not clear who is to blame for the situation.

Does this sound like the kind of a song that works as a sing along? I wasn’t quite sure until I saw this video of Coconut Records performing live:



“West Coast” is a beautiful and intriguing song. It reminds me of “Wake Up” by Arcade Fire. Coconut Records has an indie rock flair mixed with a sense of story telling. “West Coast” is a song that takes us on a journey and brings us to a place we don't quite expect.

The song begins simple enough with a keyboard line, and then immediately draws us in with hints of a larger story told through fragments of thoughts. The verse is in 7/4, with the beat organized in a group of three and then a group of four. This metric pattern creates a subtle feeling of being unsettled as the melody doesn’t quite play out like you expect. The meter doesn’t bring attention to itself, rather it enforces the emotions of loss and longing in the lyrics.

After the second chorus, Jason calls to everybody to sing a soaring line that is sung over the verse music. There is a feeling of unity and freedom, almost a sense of flying as the words of the verse enter layering underneath. This section continues to build and then suddenly pulls back with the words “I miss you."

Music is about feeling comforted by knowing that there are other people in the world who share our emotions. When we sing along with a song we connect our own emotions with that song in an immediate and very real way. Sometimes those emotions are happy but other times they are not. “West Coast,” is a sad song but it reminds us that the feeling of missing someone is bittersweet. The only reason you miss someone is because of how great that person makes you feel and that is exactly what that soaring melody line is all about.

If you feel like singing along, than just sing along. It’s not about whether the song is happy or sad, it’s about the connection you feel with the artist.  In that moment you are sharing an emotional world that transcends time and space that only music can create.

Election 2012: The Land Of Hopes And Dreams

When George W. Bush was reelected as President in 2004 some of my friends who were Democrats were quite upset. By that time President Bush’s leadership he demonstrated after 9/11 had faded in people’s minds and many liberals expressed significant issues with his leadership. It wasn’t just my friends were angry with Bush being re-elected. A lot of people were spreading doomsday scenarios resulting from four more years of President Bush.

But we survived and none of my friends who said they would, actually moved to Canada.

Now the tables are turned. The same liberal negativity towards President Bush is coming from extreme conservative voices towards President Obama. The doomsdays scenarios and the criticisms are just as crazy as the far left liberal complaints about President Bush.

Is there a lot at stake in this election? Yes, but it reaches far beyond just the president. While the Electoral College renders some people’s voices moot, local elections and referendums count on every single vote, every single voice. So please do your research and vote.

I vote because even with Politics, I’m an optimist. Are their corrupt self-serving politicians out there? Of course. There’s corrupt self-serving people in every part of our society, from schools to churches, from books clubs to waiters. But we still go to these places. We don’t’ just give up on institutions because they have problems.

We are the American government. It’s not some alien entity, the government is a reflection of who we are, with all of our great traits and some features we’d rather not think about sometimes. It is the collective expression of all our greed and selfishness, but it is also an expression of our greatest hopes and dreams.

A couple months after President Obama was elected someone I knew who was conservative asked me how that “hope and dream stuff” was working out for me.

After four years it’s still working out great. I still believe in President Obama.

I don’t believe Mr. Romney is a horrible person or that he’d lead our country into an apocalyptic zombie wasteland of capitalism run wild. In many ways he would be a very similar president to President Obama. To accomplish his goals he would have to move towards the center with many of his views like President Obama had to. Any major changes he would try to make would take time to implement.

Am I worried about the economy? Yes, am I sure either Mr. Romney or President Obama have significantly better plans to fix it? Not really. It’s not like the President can literally make jobs. I don’t think President Clinton doesn't deserve the credit for the surplus, and President Bush doesn't the blame for the recession. The consequences of economic policies are passed down to latter presidents. It’s difficult to place blame or credit for something as immensely complex as the economy on one person. I trust that there are smarter people then me trying to figure this stuff out on both sides of the aisle.  Regardless of who will be elected, our economy will continue to improve, not because of one man but because of our collective will.  

The main reason I voted for President Obama is that I believe he along with the Democratic party is on the right side of history when it comes to LGBT rights and women’s rights.

Democrat Stephen A. Douglas was on the wrong side of history when it came the issue of slavery when he lost to President Lincoln.  Southern Democrats as well as some Republicans were wrong fighting against the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act.

While slavery and Civil Rights were extremely contentious issues of their time, no reasonable person in our society now would argue that our country did not move into the proper direction of protecting more people’s rights.

We are now at a similar impasse. The Supreme Court is deciding which case to hear this year about the issue of Gay Marriage. Women’s rights have once again come to the fore as a political issue. At this critical time, more than ever, we need a President who can lead on these issues, fighting to expand rights to all citizens.

Can President Obama make these changes all by himself? No, but his voice, on these issues brings comfort to those who feel disenfranchised and reminds us of the compassion within us that we sometimes forget. This is the part of us that puts aside stereotypes, and insecurities and acknowledges the basic human rights that we all deserve. Right now, every single voice that fights against hate and bigotry is literally saving lives.

I am 100% confident that future Republican candidates and Republican platforms will have very different things to say about LGBT Rights and Women’s Rights. It will take some time and there will be people like the ones whose insecurities resulted in the need for National Guard Members to escort students to school in Little Rock. But we will get through this, and America will continue to expand rights to all of its citizens.

So vote. Vote with the best inside of you. Don’t vote for a “lesser evil.” Put aside the gaffs, the jokes, and the headlines.  Think about who represents the best inside of you, the best inside of all of us. Believe in our system as we believe in ourselves. Place hope in politicians through your vote. If you don’t believe in anything or anybody, you will never be disappointed, but then again you will never know what its like to feel the glory of a dream fulfilled.

Year 3: Week 8 - The Buffers

They are called “buffers.”

These are the students, most of whom are girls, that teachers sit between the most disruptive students, most of whom are boys. A lot of the science of making an effective seating chart for a classroom is the careful placement of buffers.

You probably know someone who was used as a “buffer” by a teacher. I married one. Growing up, Diana was an attentive and cooperative student and because of this, she was sat next to the more disruptive students in her class. Logically, Diana’s teacher should have rewarded her good behavior by letting her sit next to one of her friends. Instead she was used like so many students as a “buffer.”

Seating charts have positive motivations too. Sometimes you sit students next to other students who they work well with but more often than not, seating charts are created to discourage inappropriate behavior.

“Buffers” may help the class and the more disruptive students but it’s not really fair to students who are putting in the best work. It’s a necessary evil, that I don’t really like, which is one reason I felt compelled earlier this week to have a talk with my “buffers.”

This class was a little rough. I’m not sure why. It could have been my lesson plan, or the specter of Halloween. Either way, it was a class where enough of the students were disruptive enough that I had to give a couple stern warnings and some harsh lectures.

Usually when students are being disruptive in class I hold them back after the other students have left and have a private conversation with them about their behavior. I was mentally preparing myself for this when I looked into the eyes of one of my students, one of my “buffers,” looking tired and a little sad.

Instead of holding back the half of the class that was causing issues, I asked the teacher to take those students and leave me to talk with the students in the class who consistently did amazing work and demosntrated great behavior in class.

I told them that I was sorry that the class had to get so harsh and that I wanted to make sure that they knew that the lectures I gave were not about them. I told them that I understood that it was frustrating to be in a class and have a teacher get mad at a class when they had done nothing wrong. I told them that it was important to me that they understood these things and that this angry song they heard wasn’t about them.

One of the reasons I did this was because I was so frustrated with some of the students in the class that I wasn’t able to talk to them in a reasonable way (a teacher should never talk to a student when he or she is truly angry). Also, I just felt bad for the other students.

Of course you have to put out the biggest fire in the room and yes that is the disruptive students, but you can’t take the quiet, attentive ones for granted. They need to know that they are appreciated, that you care about them and that they matter. These students are more than “buffers” that allow the class to keep going, they are what is working in your class.  For every time you need to redirect a students behavior, you need to complement and build up the students who are doing great things.

If you do this enough, you may just find that you don't need kids to be buffers any more.  

God, I Love Legos

8th Grade Playlist: #2. 50 Ways To Say Goodbye by Train

I asked my 8th graders to share me songs by their music heroes.  Here are my reactions to these songs.

Sometimes we forget that pop music can be funny. Growing up in the maelstrom of gangster rap and grundge music, I remember music getting really dark and serious. Even now, sometime it seems like pop musicians feel that the only way to be taken seriously is well to have music that is not all really all that much fun.

This is one of the reasons I love PSY's “Gangnum Style.”



People laugh at the ridiculousness of this music video and revel in it. It’s a breath of fresh air, but the thing is, most music videos of the 1980s were just as silly as this one and just as fun. Also “Gangnum Style,” is a great song.

When one of my 8th graders sent me “50 Ways To Say Goodbye” by Train, I was dreading having to listen to this song. Look, I acknowledge the catchiness of Train’s music but the nonsensical lyrics of “Hey, Soul Sister” drive me crazy (here is my post about that song). Well, my student made the effort to e-mail me about this song and it deserves my attention so here we go.



Wait a second, David Hasselhoff!! I LOVED this guy on Knight Rider. There’s a mariachi band and there’s lead singer Pat Monahan dropping any level of pretention and hamming it up for the camera! This is awesome AND the lyrics totally make sense.

Okay, the story is that a guy gets dumped and because of the shame and hurt, he can’t bear to tell his friends the truth so he makes up ridiculous explanations for his ex-girlfriend’s absence including being eaten by a lion and getting hit by a purple Scion.

Genius.

Look, this is exactly what great pop music is all about. Train is incorporating some cool sounds like a Mariachi band ala Johnny Cash’s “Ring Of Fire.” Then they took a very sad and difficult feeling of being rejected and turned in it into a hilarious anthem.

Sometimes the only way to deal with difficult emotions is to make a joke out of it and Train effectively does this helping us work through these emotions by reflecting the ridiculousness of this reaction. At the same time Train makes us feel better about the impulse of hiding the truth by letting us know that we are not crazy for feeling a need to hide being dumped from our friends.

Train, you totally redeemed the nonsense of “Hey soul sister, ain’t that mister mister” with “She'll think I'm Superman, Not super minivan.”

Nicely Done.

. . . but we still got some work to do to get passed "Meet Virginia."

Year 3: Week 7 – To Be Liked

“It’s nice to meet you Mr. Tang. My son really likes you.”

“Thanks, that’s fantastic, but its not my job to be liked.”

Back when I was student teaching I had this conversation with one of my student’s parents. Coming out of graduate school, I had this view that if a teacher’s priority was to be liked, they were misguided. Our job as teachers is simply to “teach” and if we focused on being liked, then we wouldn’t be doing our job.

While I still agree that a teacher’s priority shouldn’t be to be liked, it’s difficult to be an effective teacher if students don’t like you. I’ve had teachers that I didn’t like, but I dealt with it if they were good enough teachers, but that was more of a college thing, especially with middle school and my elementary school students this, “being liked” thing is becoming more and more important in my mind.

It’s not so much the goal of being “liked” that misguides teachers it’s what teachers do to become liked that gets in the way of learning. If you ask students what they like about teachers you hear a variety of answers. Sometimes it’s the fact that the teacher is funny, or because the teachers like sports, but more often the answers are focused on the teacher’s professionalism.

Kids like teachers who are fair, prepared, professional, and who genuinely like their students. While a group of students may request to goof off during a class, letting them do that is not going to make them like you as a teacher. Challenging them to work hard, tuning back homework on time, having interesting and engaging activities and materials and creating a safe classroom environment will buy you more points in the “like” category then any amount of free time.

You don’t want to create a personality cult where students simply do things because they want to please you and also there are lines in relationships between students and teachers that should never be crossed. A students liking you as a teacher is a very different thing than a student liking you as a friend or seeing you as a peer. This is a difficult thing to distinguish which is probably why when I was a rookie teachers I was told to completely ignore the whole “being liked” thing.

It is essential for teachers to like their students as people. Also, it is important that students like something about their teachers mixed in with a high level of respect for their teachers as well. The way we go about creating this relationship is very hard and is different depending on what grade you teach and what groups of personalities make up your class.

Being liked isn’t something to be put out of your mind as a teacher. Sometimes we need to make choices and do activities to create connections with students.

Earlier this week a parent came up and told me that her son liked me.  I replied, “Thanks, I really like teaching your son.”

Buffy's Special Lady!!

I HAS DIANA!!! SHEZ TEH BEST LADY EVR!! IS WAIT 4 HER 2 COME HOME!!!!

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SHE TEACHEZ ME HOW 2 DO ALL DIS GREAT STUFF LIEK PULAY TENNIS!!! IM VRY GUD AT TENNIS!!!

IM ALWAYS HAPPEH WHEN WE R TOGETHR!!!

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