It’s Been Tough Breaking Down Walls My Students Have Built
The mood has changed in Cynthia Castillo’s class since I first visited in October. The kids are quieter, more settled; the energy is calm. When I first arrive, a guest speaker is talking to the kids about a summer internship, and they listen attentively. There are no side conversations. When Cynthia transitions to their vocabulary assignment, they do it quickly and smoothly.
The class is significantly down from its initial enrollment of 45. Today, I count 29 students, though Cynthia tells me there are about 35 enrolled. Several kids were pulled out at the semester because they’d failed so many classes that they needed to be put on a track where they did much of their classwork in APEX, an online credit recovery program. Other students, having failed even more classes, were transitioned to continuation school. A few “checked out,” leaving school without transferring anywhere. Though none of these moves are positive, the students who remain in the class seem on the whole more focused. Unlike other days earlier in the year, no one wanders around the room during a lesson.
After a vocabulary lesson, they move into a project on geneology. All of them are creating a family tree called a genogram that traces not only lineage but medical history, education and even relationships; antagonistic relationships are marked with one kind of line,