Jack M. Jose - Angels and Superheroes: Compassionate Educators in an Era of School Accountability

Angels and Superheroes

Praise for Angels and Superheroes

In these challenging times today we certainly need Angels and Heroes to keep us energized to support dynamic student learning and help young people overcome lifes challenges. Whether it is called grit or persistence, educators need to model the positive approach that principal Jack M. Jose and intervention specialist Krista L. Taylor have taken in their writing and actions. This new book is on my best reading list for teachers! Rae L. White, chair, Department of Education, Muskingum University

In these days of high-stakes testing and accountability ratings, its refreshing to read the words of Jack M. Jose and Krista L. Taylor. Their work reminds us that education is more than labeling and data trendsits also taking care of our students and nurturing their dreams. Add the ideas of this book to your list of best practices. When the student comes first, learning will follow. Mark White, superintendent, New Albany Schools, Ohio, and coauthor of Whats in Your Space: 5 Steps for Better School and Classroom Design and Leading Schools in Disruptive Times

Few professions, if any, provide more lasting value to society than teachers. A good teacher changes lives and makes the world a better place. In Angels and Superheroes , Jose and Taylor provide practical advice for how to do this important but challenging work in an even more effective and meaningful wayeven in circumstances that conspire against it. Craig Weber, author of Conversational Capacity: The Secret to Building Teams That Perform When the Pressure Is On

Angels and Superheroes

Compassionate Educators in an Era of School Accountability

Jack M. Jose and Krista L. Taylor

Rowman & Littlefield

Lanham Boulder New York London

Published by Rowman & Littlefield

A wholly owned subsidiary of The Rowman & Littlefield Publishing Group, Inc.

4501 Forbes Boulevard, Suite 200, Lanham, Maryland 20706

www.rowman.com

Unit A, Whitacre Mews, 26-34 Stannary Street, London SE11 4AB

Copyright 2018 by Jack M. Jose and Krista L. Taylor

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote passages in a review.

British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Jose, Jack M., 1969 author. | Taylor, Krista L., 1970 author.

Title: Angels and superheroes : compassionate educators in an era of school accountability / Jack M. Jose and Krista L. Taylor.

Description: Lanham, Maryland : Rowman & Littlefield, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017048864 (print) | LCCN 2017059472 (ebook) | ISBN 9781475838039 (electronic) | ISBN 9781475838015 (hardback : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781475838022 (pbk. : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Classroom managementUnited States. | Teacherstudent relationshipsUnited States. | TeachersProfessional relationshipsUnited States. | Academic achievementUnited States. | Educational accountabilityUnited States. | EducationStandardsUnited States.

Classification: LCC LB3013 (ebook) | LCC LB3013 .J67 2018 (print) | DDC 371.102/4dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017048864

The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American National Standard for Information SciencesPermanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials, ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992.

Printed in the United States of America

For Kathy

J. M. J.

For Blake

K. L. T.

Contents

Foreword

This is a wise and deeply moving book, reporting in honest and encouraging words a record of life in the highly challenging atmosphere of American high schools today. Its authorsJack Jose, principal, and Krista Taylor, intervention specialistare the veteran leaders of Gamble Montessori High School, a district public high school established in an impoverished area of Cincinnati, Ohio, in 2005. Their combined experience of over 30 years in the trenches with students, parents, and teaching colleagues gives authenticity to the hope and inspiration that shine on every page of their story.

These authors have fully grasped what is so desperately lacking in education today, with its emphasis on teach, memorize, test, then measure. Their focus instead is based on the recognition that there is a human spirit within each one of us, young and old alike. It is this human spirit that gives us our value as individual human beings and is the basis of our potential for development through the experiences of our lives. Reaching that human spirit within each child and student is the necessary foundation of a meaningful education from elementary school onward, not academic instruction alone.

Jose and Taylor developed this focus for their own approach to education through careful observation of their students in school settings, both privileged and underserved, and through a realization that, historically, when educators place an emphasis on observation of their students and subsequent revealed needs versus abstract instruction, intellectual development exceeds expectations. Observation of phenomena and subsequent study of facts are identified as the basis of all dramatic human progress in almost every field. Yet, for some reason, in the schooling of our young, we are stuck in the last century, unable to see the boredom, lack of interest, and minimal academic success so evident for far too many students in classrooms today.

The authors have found inspiration and guidance for their teaching approach in the work of the Italian physician turned global educator Dr. Maria Montessori, who developed her educational principles through a focus on observations of children from birth to young adulthood. Jose and Taylor have applied these Montessori principles to their work with Gamble students by sensitively observing how these principles support adolescents throughout their development, and thereby have established a successful model for their school.

Perhaps the most basic of Montessoris principles, developed from her lifelong observation of children and young adults throughout the world, is the recognition that human beings develop throughout their formative years from birth to age 24 years in distinct stages and in response to their surroundings. The human spirit within each child seeks to respond in positive ways to his or her immediate environment, ways that will aid formation into a complete human being of developed intellect, controlled will, and joyful response to the world and others within it. To bring forth this positive result, however, depends most strongly upon the surrounding culture of the child, including, importantly, the adults within it.

It follows then that attention of parents and teachers must be given first and foremost to preparing a suitable environment for the young, first within the home, but next, and every bit as importantly, within the school. Just as this careful preparation is particularly important in the first years of childhood, it is equally essential in the first years of adulthood, the years from 12 to 18 years. Jose and Taylor have grasped these Montessori principles and made them the hallmarks of Gamble Montessori High School.

How the authors have managed to establish a school culture that fosters positive self-formation in their students, in spite of all the obstacles in the latters daily lives in their homes and neighborhoods, is the story of Angels and Superheroes . It is told with humility and full recognition of the necessary failures and mistakes, for adults, for children, and for adolescents, inherent in the learning process. Indeed, I think it is fair to say that they regard Gamble Montessori, and their day-to-day solutions of its specific situations, as a work in progress. Yet their hard-earned wisdom to date fills every page of their book, and their generosity in sharing lessons learned is a gift to every teacher and principal of both elementary and high schools today.