I'll repost the main idea of my comment in the original post:
I love the idea, but I think that it would be difficult to find widespread interest among the staff. Maybe it would be best to test it with extracurricular activities.
Actually, I think there might be a fair amount of support for the idea. As long as we had willing people to be Heads of Houses, other teachers could participate to lesser degrees.
But that's why we should come up with a reasonable proposal.
I think it needs to be universal for it to have the desired effect; but teachers with less interest could be less involved with the House issues. In the Potter books, even though all the teachers were in certain Houses as students, it's primarily the Heads of Houses who are involved in House events, competitions, etc.; and everyone else just awards or detracts points from Houses based on student performance.
I think one of the things that might benefit from this system is our school discipline issues. Detention, for example, seems to be fairly ineffective. At least, some kids don't seem to be fazed by it. (Every time I have detention duty, I seem to have the same kids...even though they're months apart!)
I think having detention coupled with the peer response to causing your House to lose 50 points, though, might possibly get kids to exert positive influences on each other's behavior. Maybe they won't care about losing points; but they might care about everybody being mad at them for losing points.
There will still be Ron Weasleys and Draco Malfoys, Crabbes and Goyles with the new house system. One caution: punishing the group for the behavior of one may not produce the results we want. We may find some unfortunate Full Metal Jacket-like peer enforcement (on a much smaller scale--since bars of soap are rare on campus).
If asked, I would be happy to serve as a head of house. Here is how I envision the role. I am working on making my lectures more painful than any detention could be. The heads of houses--let's say JP, Jonathan, Noah, and me--would serve as a layer of enforcement--not replacing Greg, but enhancing his role. He sends the student to us and require us to sign off on a detention. We would also have the option of assigning additional penalties.
I have found the two page essay to be pointless. My daughter's teacher over in San Marcos has her write a letter to him if she breaks a rule. If one were late to Mrs. Soule's class, one could write a note to Mrs. Soule. If one were snotty to Miss Swabacker, one could write a note there. (This may not work--I'm just throwing it out there.) I, personally, would then double any point penalty.
This would, of course, be a great boon to the discipline--at least potentially. But the positive points are where it's at! I have seen the "slave" system work on the other side of campus.
Problems:
1. How do we sort students? 2. How do we identify student with house?
Opportunities: 1. If I see a freshman or sophomore--two ages I instinctively avoid--with an ipod dangling from an ear, and I want to assess some sort of penalty, I need to a. accost him or her, b. ascertain his or her name, c. ascertain the name of the house. I then know the student. And the student knows me.
2. When I arrived six years ago and I had a total of fifty students a day instead of over a hundred (which still is not all that many, really) and the school had about a third as many students, we all knew all the students. The house system would make for a renewal of that atmosphere--the Cheers atmosphere, "Where everyone knows your name."
3. After the first year, we'd have houses firmly established, and the mentor system we all wish to adopt would evolve rather naturally. We'd just get out the sorting hat, and the freshmen would go to the correct table--applauded by the older Sabertooths, Sumatras, Siberians, and Siegfried and Roys. The mentoring would start. "No. We don't do that here." "Pull up your pants." "That's Waterhouse. Don't cross him. He doesn't suffer fools gladly." My imagination is running away with me, of course.
My point is: this can be done. It isn't all that much more different than the old home room system. We can take baby steps, as Jonathan suggests, and install it as a sort of Charter Olympics thing.
I am recalling one of Kurt Vonnegut's later novels in which a candidate ran for president on a platform of giving everyone a new middle name and artificially creating clans throughout America. The more connections we can create the better.
"Oh, another Abelovski. I know just what to do with you. Better be GRYFFINDOR!!!!"
I call Sabertooth House! (Since posting on a blog does not portray my exaggeratedly excited demeanor on writing that, allow me to state that I'm kidding. I'm sure we probably all want Sabertooth House--but I don't think we should allow callsies.)
I see your point about the possibility of students inappropriately taking the "punishment" of others into their own hands, but I don't think, at Charter, that it would be a very serious problem. The students who are likeliest to get upset about losing House points are probably not the kind of students who would take things into their own hands. However, obviously, we don't want it to happen. But it's only the littler, everyday things we'd likely be dealing with points for. If someone is really causing a serious problem, it needs to be seriously dealt with. But for things like tardies, or dress code, or cell phones, etc., I don't think it would be that big a deal.
Of course, you could also potentially avoid the problem by offering opportunities for the offending student to avoid losing the points. For a tardy, which has an automatic detention anyway, you could say that the quality of the letter they write (I like that idea) may earn the points back, or something along those lines.
Also, if you give a lot of points, too (I agree that positive points are the key), then the occasional loss of points won't be as significant.
And of course, I would take points away from my own House--yes, from my own House!--if a student in my House crossed a line in responding to another student's loss of points.
Sorting is definitely an issue. Obviously, there are two general approaches. Random; and non-random.
Random would obviously be easy.
If it's non-random, we'd obviously have to establish some sort of criteria, and some sort of system, that would still give a roughly even distribution.
Although the idea of Houses by general subject area has come up in conversations I've had, I don't think it should be subject area. I don't want to have attitudes like "Science is better than English" floated around the student body. Too many students think in those nonsensical ways as it is.
Another idea that has come up in conversations I've had is to use some sort of a survey process. You could have questions with multiple answers, each representative of a different House, and whichever you have the most of, you go there. Less obvious, though, than some of the "Sorting Quizzes" one finds online (okay...I've just admitted that I have taken a Sorting quiz online) with questions where every answer is totally obvious as to its House affiliation, like:
If you have a difficult task that you're afraid to do, you
a) be brave and just go for it b) research better ways of doing it c) work hard and just do the best you can d) find a way to cheat, or get someone else to do it for you
Personally, I think that both random and non-random ways would have their own merits, quirks, and flaws.
Identifying students with Houses would be a little trickier. At first, we'd probably just do like you suggest--getting the student's name and House. Maybe at some point we could get color-coded wristbands, or pins, or something. It would be really easy if we had uniforms, but we probably never will....
I was actually thinking about Charter Olympics too, and how it would be a lot of fun to have it be by Houses instead of classes. It wouldn't be rigged, that way...it would be a real competition!
I also like the idea of Heads of Houses being involved in discipline. I think it could potentially be much more effective for students to have to 1) get a lecture from their Head of House; 2) have to write a letter to the offended party, apologizing for the incident; 3)receive the point penalty (modified by Head of House as desired); and 4) serve out the rest of the detention hour, and then return the signed form to Greg. I'd even be willing, were I a Head of House, to take care of my House's detentions on a recurring basis...because I think that most of them, after having one detention from me, would want to avoid another. Really, within certain bounds, of course, "detention" becomes a looser term that simply means you see your HoH and he or she deals with your infraction.
Anyway, I agree with Mel...it could actually be done; and we could start small, and let it evolve.
In response to Jonathan's post on the Creativity thread about not being able to implement the system without full support:
If there are teachers who don't want to participate in a House system, then they just don't have to be Heads of House, or affiliated with one at all. They can teach their classes and do things as they always have. If they don't want to give/take points in class for whatever, fine. No harm, no foul.
And if we were to alter the discipline system as alluded to by Mel and me in the above comments, then those teachers who don't want to participate can still just assign detentions as always by writing a referral and giving it to Greg, and he can send the students to their HoH.
I am still a bit confused on the purpose, goals, and funtions of the house system...even after reading part of the Collegiate Way website. If you want to get more teachers and the administration on board with this idea, the structure, goals, and funtion of the sytem at ECHS needs to be formulated. What does it add to our school? Might it distract from other initiatives that should be pursued? Does linking it/the idea to the Harry Potter series cause a problem with some students and parents...especially with parents? Dick
To allow for a little more freedom, and to not take over the general blog, I created a blog at http://echshouses.blogspot.com where we can flesh out some of these ideas over the summer.
11 comments:
I thought this was interesting...apparently, we're not the only ones thinking about this sort of thing.
http://collegiateway.org/news/2007-harry-potter
I'll repost the main idea of my comment in the original post:
I love the idea, but I think that it would be difficult to find widespread interest among the staff. Maybe it would be best to test it with extracurricular activities.
Actually, I think there might be a fair amount of support for the idea. As long as we had willing people to be Heads of Houses, other teachers could participate to lesser degrees.
But that's why we should come up with a reasonable proposal.
So I guess the question is - would this be purely voluntary, or universal?
I think it needs to be universal for it to have the desired effect; but teachers with less interest could be less involved with the House issues. In the Potter books, even though all the teachers were in certain Houses as students, it's primarily the Heads of Houses who are involved in House events, competitions, etc.; and everyone else just awards or detracts points from Houses based on student performance.
I think one of the things that might benefit from this system is our school discipline issues. Detention, for example, seems to be fairly ineffective. At least, some kids don't seem to be fazed by it. (Every time I have detention duty, I seem to have the same kids...even though they're months apart!)
I think having detention coupled with the peer response to causing your House to lose 50 points, though, might possibly get kids to exert positive influences on each other's behavior. Maybe they won't care about losing points; but they might care about everybody being mad at them for losing points.
There will still be Ron Weasleys and Draco Malfoys, Crabbes and Goyles with the new house system. One caution: punishing the group for the behavior of one may not produce the results we want. We may find some unfortunate Full Metal Jacket-like peer enforcement (on a much smaller scale--since bars of soap are rare on campus).
If asked, I would be happy to serve as a head of house. Here is how I envision the role. I am working on making my lectures more painful than any detention could be. The heads of houses--let's say JP, Jonathan, Noah, and me--would serve as a layer of enforcement--not replacing Greg, but enhancing his role. He sends the student to us and require us to sign off on a detention. We would also have the option of assigning additional penalties.
I have found the two page essay to be pointless. My daughter's teacher over in San Marcos has her write a letter to him if she breaks a rule. If one were late to Mrs. Soule's class, one could write a note to Mrs. Soule. If one were snotty to Miss Swabacker, one could write a note there. (This may not work--I'm just throwing it out there.) I, personally, would then double any point penalty.
This would, of course, be a great boon to the discipline--at least potentially. But the positive points are where it's at! I have seen the "slave" system work on the other side of campus.
Problems:
1. How do we sort students?
2. How do we identify student with house?
Opportunities:
1. If I see a freshman or sophomore--two ages I instinctively avoid--with an ipod dangling from an ear, and I want to assess some sort of penalty, I need to a. accost him or her, b. ascertain his or her name, c. ascertain the name of the house. I then know the student. And the student knows me.
2. When I arrived six years ago and I had a total of fifty students a day instead of over a hundred (which still is not all that many, really) and the school had about a third as many students, we all knew all the students. The house system would make for a renewal of that atmosphere--the Cheers atmosphere, "Where everyone knows your name."
3. After the first year, we'd have houses firmly established, and the mentor system we all wish to adopt would evolve rather naturally. We'd just get out the sorting hat, and the freshmen would go to the correct table--applauded by the older Sabertooths, Sumatras, Siberians, and Siegfried and Roys. The mentoring would start. "No. We don't do that here." "Pull up your pants." "That's Waterhouse. Don't cross him. He doesn't suffer fools gladly." My imagination is running away with me, of course.
My point is: this can be done. It isn't all that much more different than the old home room system. We can take baby steps, as Jonathan suggests, and install it as a sort of Charter Olympics thing.
I am recalling one of Kurt Vonnegut's later novels in which a candidate ran for president on a platform of giving everyone a new middle name and artificially creating clans throughout America. The more connections we can create the better.
"Oh, another Abelovski. I know just what to do with you. Better be GRYFFINDOR!!!!"
Great points, Mel.
I call Sabertooth House! (Since posting on a blog does not portray my exaggeratedly excited demeanor on writing that, allow me to state that I'm kidding. I'm sure we probably all want Sabertooth House--but I don't think we should allow callsies.)
I see your point about the possibility of students inappropriately taking the "punishment" of others into their own hands, but I don't think, at Charter, that it would be a very serious problem. The students who are likeliest to get upset about losing House points are probably not the kind of students who would take things into their own hands. However, obviously, we don't want it to happen. But it's only the littler, everyday things we'd likely be dealing with points for. If someone is really causing a serious problem, it needs to be seriously dealt with. But for things like tardies, or dress code, or cell phones, etc., I don't think it would be that big a deal.
Of course, you could also potentially avoid the problem by offering opportunities for the offending student to avoid losing the points. For a tardy, which has an automatic detention anyway, you could say that the quality of the letter they write (I like that idea) may earn the points back, or something along those lines.
Also, if you give a lot of points, too (I agree that positive points are the key), then the occasional loss of points won't be as significant.
And of course, I would take points away from my own House--yes, from my own House!--if a student in my House crossed a line in responding to another student's loss of points.
Sorting is definitely an issue. Obviously, there are two general approaches. Random; and non-random.
Random would obviously be easy.
If it's non-random, we'd obviously have to establish some sort of criteria, and some sort of system, that would still give a roughly even distribution.
Although the idea of Houses by general subject area has come up in conversations I've had, I don't think it should be subject area. I don't want to have attitudes like "Science is better than English" floated around the student body. Too many students think in those nonsensical ways as it is.
Another idea that has come up in conversations I've had is to use some sort of a survey process. You could have questions with multiple answers, each representative of a different House, and whichever you have the most of, you go there. Less obvious, though, than some of the "Sorting Quizzes" one finds online (okay...I've just admitted that I have taken a Sorting quiz online) with questions where every answer is totally obvious as to its House affiliation, like:
If you have a difficult task that you're afraid to do, you
a) be brave and just go for it
b) research better ways of doing it
c) work hard and just do the best you can
d) find a way to cheat, or get someone else to do it for you
Personally, I think that both random and non-random ways would have their own merits, quirks, and flaws.
Identifying students with Houses would be a little trickier. At first, we'd probably just do like you suggest--getting the student's name and House. Maybe at some point we could get color-coded wristbands, or pins, or something. It would be really easy if we had uniforms, but we probably never will....
I was actually thinking about Charter Olympics too, and how it would be a lot of fun to have it be by Houses instead of classes. It wouldn't be rigged, that way...it would be a real competition!
I also like the idea of Heads of Houses being involved in discipline. I think it could potentially be much more effective for students to have to 1) get a lecture from their Head of House; 2) have to write a letter to the offended party, apologizing for the incident; 3)receive the point penalty (modified by Head of House as desired); and 4) serve out the rest of the detention hour, and then return the signed form to Greg. I'd even be willing, were I a Head of House, to take care of my House's detentions on a recurring basis...because I think that most of them, after having one detention from me, would want to avoid another. Really, within certain bounds, of course, "detention" becomes a looser term that simply means you see your HoH and he or she deals with your infraction.
Anyway, I agree with Mel...it could actually be done; and we could start small, and let it evolve.
In response to Jonathan's post on the Creativity thread about not being able to implement the system without full support:
If there are teachers who don't want to participate in a House system, then they just don't have to be Heads of House, or affiliated with one at all. They can teach their classes and do things as they always have. If they don't want to give/take points in class for whatever, fine. No harm, no foul.
And if we were to alter the discipline system as alluded to by Mel and me in the above comments, then those teachers who don't want to participate can still just assign detentions as always by writing a referral and giving it to Greg, and he can send the students to their HoH.
I wouldn't disagree, though, about testing it with ASB events, etc., first.
I am still a bit confused on the purpose, goals, and funtions of the house system...even after reading part of the Collegiate Way website. If you want to get more teachers and the administration on board with this idea, the structure, goals, and funtion of the sytem at ECHS needs to be formulated. What does it add to our school? Might it distract from other initiatives that should be pursued? Does linking it/the idea to the Harry Potter series cause a problem with some students and parents...especially with parents?
Dick
To allow for a little more freedom, and to not take over the general blog, I created a blog at http://echshouses.blogspot.com where we can flesh out some of these ideas over the summer.
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