Success

My profession is one in which there is rarely tangible evidence of success from the outside. I give out the grades, and, besides the many times I get to see lightbulbs go on for kids, hard-data success is rare. But today I got results for our school for last year's MAP. Communication Arts is such a huge deal for 3rd grade, so I spend most of the year (I've already started this year) doing test prep of some sort. Generally it's boring, repetitive, formulaic practice... a regression to "drill and kill." But it's nice to know when that has paid off, when it has had some kind of impact. My poor 3rd graders stress and worry, and spend an entire week testing, and I hate doing it to them. But today CPS released preliminary MAP scores for the district, and Midway was the 4th highest elementary school in communication arts. We had 71% of our kids at proficient or advanced (2 highest levels). I was so excited when I saw that; I know that it's all 3 grades (3-5) put together, but if our average is that high, none of the grades can be very low! So today was a day that I felt like I had really taught something, and I am so proud of the kids. Of course, in 8 years (by 2014) we have to up that percentage of kids to 100% at proficient or advanced, but I'm kind of hoping this legislation goes by the wayside (or I stop teaching) between now and then! So I'm letting tomorrow take care of itself, and patting myself on the back for doing something right!