Taylor Currie

Ms. Chawkat

Independent Research GT

3 February 2017

Advisor Interview
(47 minutes 16 seconds)

Taylor Currie: Hello Ms. Meitl this is Taylor Currie from Independent Research.

Claire Meitl: Hi. I was expecting your call and, yes, it is two. I currently have two two year olds

running around my house ,so if I am not too coherent, that is why. How are you? Did you have a

good vacation?

Taylor Currie: It was pretty good. Not long enough, but other than that it was great.

Claire Meitl: No, it never ever is. Ok, shoot. How can I help you?

Taylor Currie: I have few questions to ask you and if I am taking too much of your time, just let

me know and I can adjust my questions.

Claire Meitl: Not a problem. I welcome the opportunity to rest for a while. I was just playing

hide and seek.

Taylor Currie: Oh, thats always fun. Ok. First, in your Differentiation powerpoint, under the

category Principles of Differentiation, you used the phrase respectful tasks. I was wondering

what you meant by that.

Claire Meitl: I feel, as do most educators, that giving students busy work or giving students

work that is too high or too low is not respectful to them. I believe that is the context in which I

used that phrase. It was all about differentiation, so you respect the age of the students without

demeaning them or in giving them such a task that reaching it is almost an impossibility, and

then they become frustrated.

Taylor Currie: Ok. Wonderful, thank you. As a student in Howard County I haven't really

experienced a problem with not being able to obtain the resources I need. The first question is,

have you ever been in a situation where adequate materials were not provided for your student?

Claire Meitl: Yes, but not in Howard County. They were not provided in the school or in the

home. I have taught in other school systems in which finding materials or getting materials at the

middle and high school level was an impossibility. Thats part of that respectful tasks, to

understand what it is thats available to them.

Taylor Currie: I understand. When you have this problem, how do you overcome it?

Claire Meitl: I brought in materials of research and they were to use them, or I adapted to what

they could use to change what I was asking of them. I personally believe very strongly,

especially at the middle school level, but at the high school level also, it is very important that

students show me what they understand through project. Whether it's a group or an individual, I

want what Im teaching reflected in the success of the task they give me. So, when I taught high

school, I taught 1984. One of the assignments was to find instances in our society of 1984, to

describe the incident, and to tie it into the book. How is it used in the book? How is it used in

real life? I used this assignment to know that they had really looked into the book. They could

chose whatever they wanted it to be: television, and most of them had television; grocery

shopping, many found that sale prices were actually lower the week before the item went on sale.

Just different things that they could look at. At the middle school level, I asked them to look for

examples of comparative and superlative advertising -- my product is better than. I did this in

Howard County. In Howard County, the students could provide their own testing. When I was in

Minnesota, Lincoln Junior High School, I was in a very poor area and many of the students had a

single mother. I found out later that two kids were actually living in a car. I had to find materials
and provide them to the students. We compared advertising. When something says, the best

product that means other products like it must not be as good. So, we looked at comparative,

superlative, and also the different kinds or advertising. We looked at what kind of language was

used; then, they tested the products. I asked them to find products from a certain list. They had

the option of doing individual work or teams of three and four. They had to design the test to

figure out which is better. Lets say the products are Coke and Pepsi. I used school funds for that.

Now, I could have also asked and applied for a grant. Some school systems have them, some

merchants have them, or I could have just gone and asked for the products. So, it required more

effort on my part. The kids had to find what was the comparative and they had to design the test.

Then, we wrote letter of compliment or complaint based on that. They wrote a group letter and

shared their findings. Many of them received products back; all of them received letters back and

they all learned a little bit about the power of the consumer. Many of them compared with their

classmates to find their questions. As a rule, people could only take part in the testing if they

knew all of the ingredients, for allergy reasons. If they were allergic to any of the products they

would not take the test; I never had a problem with any allergic reactions. So, those are some

examples. We were able to complete a task without computers. We were writing the letters. Since

we were sending them out, the kids all wanted their letters to be very professional. They were

really looking at spelling, capitalization, and punctuation. Again, this was a middle school task

but it was respectful of what they could do with an understand of how things would work in the

real world, which I really like. Does that make sense?

Taylor Currie: Yes. That sounds like an awesome project.

Claire Meitl: Oh yeah, it really was. I have one group of students here, because it's on the

internet, and they wrote to this company and signed their name, Jennifer Jones. They got back,
Dear Jennifer, .... It bothered a lot of the kids that they were referred to as Jennifer instead of

Ms. Jones. So they wrote as a group to complain. This was Procter and Gamble. Even though

Procter and Gamble thanks them for their response and even sent samples, they were upset. After

they wrote again and signed it the same, Procter and Gamble apologized and changed their

policy because it was condescending. In the project they learned the word condescending. They

also learned the word serendipity. I had all my students do this whether they were in above or

regular. I had two students in Howard County that wrote to taco sauce companies. They both had

similar letters and similar responses. One person got five free sauces and the other got one. They

didn't understand why one would get more than the other. So, we had a group call, a conference

call, to ask if the reason was that a women signed her name. They said that they have so many

give-aways in a day that by the time they got to the last one, they just threw in all the extras. It

was a serendipitous arrangement. The kids posted their comments. By the way, I was only in

Minnesota for three years, at this school. We didn't have that much going on there, but I kept

track and a lot of the students have written to me that they are consumers and they have written

to companies, especially when the companies have been positive in what theyve done. That was

it, that people need both positive and constructive criticism. We looked at the differences in

criticisms and how we go about it.

Taylor Currie: Wow. That amazing that you incorporated real life skills there.

Claire Meilt: Absolutely, and many of them are parents no wand that continue writing to

companies. They have an understanding of consumerism and the responsibility of consumers.

Taylor Currie: Well, that was a great answer. Thank you. I have examples and everything.
Claire Meitl: Real world applications are really important. Especially when they can apply

grammar or anything in English class that continues to be important in the real world. Oh, and

now I have another grandchild who is holding her sister here. Taylor, my life is fun.

Taylor Currie: I understand, I have a lot of little cousins that always want to play when they

come to my house.

Claire Meitl: I know, two year old twins and then their sister is thirteen. She knows everything, I

don't even have to use a computer. Do you remember when you were thirteen? You knew

everything.

Taylor Currie: Oh yeah absolutely. I still know everything, what are you talking about?

Claire Meitl: Yeah. Its when you have children that you realize you know nothing. Ok, Ive now

locked myself in the bathroom so I think were good.

Taylor Currie: Ok. If you want to finish this up a different time that is totally fine. You could a

little busy busy.

Claire Meitl: No, there is no better time. My daughter is redoing her house and when we got

back from the cruise her new floors were going in. Thats why I didn't know what my schedule

was going to be. She asked me to take the children and I said, Sure. Now Im good. I'm in the

bathroom, the door is locked, and the children are accounted for.

Taylor Currie: Ok. Im going to transition into a slightly different topic here with the net

question. Have you ever worked with students who transitioned from homeschooling to public

school?

Claire Meitl: Oh yeah.

Taylor Currie: Are they typically more prepared, or less prepared to handle the curriculum?
Claire Meitl: It honestly depends on the child. We have, especially in English, cyclical

understanding of information. If any one says, I learned (blank) in this classroom, that is a

miracle because you have to relearn things. For example, you could probably remember learning

the subject of a sentence. You probably remember how, when you have a predicate noun that

follows, the predicate pronoun should be in the nominative case. You may do this correctly, but

some people use it incorrectly so you don't get the reaffirmation. It's in the reviewing that you

realize rules of things. Education is really giving you information in a way that you won't forget

what you learned, in order to recall it. If you can't, you need to review it again. This is what I

mean when I say it's cyclical. For a lot of topics, you know how to use it at one point in time but

they you lose it. I'm trying to look at bizarre cases. So, you know what an onomatopoeia is,

right?

Taylor Currie: Yes.

Claire Meitl: And you learned it at some point in time. However, if you went to an adult the

word onomatopoeia is something they know they have heard but they don't remember what it is.

I see it all the time in Jeopardy. They know they understand it. If they were given examples, they

might be able to get that the term is onomatopoeia, but not right away. So, you larn and you

review what you've learned to make it more concrete. That's a very basic example; I am trying to

think of more. So, that's why we have trivia. It's a way to remember the things that you may not

have to recall all the time. Learning is also, to go back to a reference. I had a poster up in my

room for many years that was READ kind if thing. Number one is to learn how to read. Number

two is to question everything that you have read and go back to the fats to substantiate it. I think

that's extremely important in life. Going back to the example, if you know that an onomatopoeia
is something, you can just go look it up and review it yourself. I would have to review terms in

mathematics but I have an understanding of where I would look. Does that make sense?

Taylor Currie: Yes, it does make sense.

Claire Meitl: Its also giving you the desire to look. Some people have no desire to do it after a

certain time. I think that's the difference in many cases between the ability to learn and the desire

to learn. That's what teachers need to do, tap into what gives you the desire to learn whatever it is

you're teaching.

Taylor Currie: So, as it relates to the desire to learn, have you found ways that schools try to get

the opinions of students to help with that?

Clare Meitl: Rephrase that. I'm not understanding what you want, Im sorry.

Taylor Currie: Ok. No problem. Are there ways in which school stry to gauge the opinions of

their students in a way that can help teachers sculpt lessons around student interest.

Claire Meitl: I would hope so. I think i sent you some of the questions that we looked at when

we put together units years ago and there were introductory questions to the unit and then exit

questions. I did that as a matter or course and many other teachers do as well. There are many

teachers who craft, it is called crafting, the details of your profession. So, what works with a

certain group of students may not work with another. If you're not looking at reviewing or

changing your approach, at the end at least ask the kids for their honest opinion. Many times they

could just do it on the computer and I couldn't tell which students were saying what. It provided

an honest appraisal. What did you like, what challenged you the most, what did you find that you

still didn't understand. Years ago I was the resource teacher in the central office. We were

looking at a review class to examine why kids were not successful. If they weren't successful,

they were in this class trying to learn what they did not understand. The whole course was based
on, why don't you want to learn this? or whats preventing you from learning this? Or what is

your opinion about what you're leaning? That was taught all the way through. If you don't see

the value in what you're learning, why would you study it? So, I see the value of English, but

that's my job. My real job is to get students to see the value in it. In what way can I explain it so

that you can see the value of it? Sometimes it doesn't work at all. You can't see the value of it.

The value is not seen by that particular person for that particular objective.

Taylor Currie: Ok, great. The new common core came into effect a few years ago. Did you have

any interactions with that? Did you work with that at all?

Claire Meitl: Did I?! You're actually talking to the right person. Zelena gave me common core

over the summer. When I got my job at the board of ed, I thought I would be leaving the building

and working with teachers; doing what I really love doing. I wound up writing assessments. You

were probably not even there but we had assessments by quarter. When I started teaching, in

Maryland, we had something called dimensions of learning. That was the total of our curriculum.

It covered three pages. I worked worked at the state, working on state assessments. I was one of

the many teachers who responded to a call. At the end there were two of u that remained in the

group that was writing state goals and objectives. So, I came to my job in Howard County and

Zelena said, Since you were at the state level and practically memorized the state requirements,

let's rewrite the assessments. There was no way we could measure if students achieved what

they needed to achieve based on the state. It was unbelievable to try to. Even though we had very

clear cut what was english, what was grammer, what was reading in the goals of the state; it was

all state standards. To write assessments was crazy. We wrote and rewrote assessment. I led the

group as well as being a participant for many years, as well as your GT teacher. I don't know

about writing, but she certainly was reading and looking at assessments and making sr they were
grammatically sound. Then the summer that we were asked to look at new common core. This

was before the standards of the new common core were to be looked at, but we were given

copies of them. Zelena said, Let's look at them, not only in English, and compare them to the

Maryland state standard. We looked at the standards are they compared to Social Studies, PE,

wherever they could be applicable. I love the standards. I love common core. I will say it at the

Bibles. I don't necessarily like PARCC, but I love common core. Its easy to understand. It builds

on itself. Another project I had when I was working with the board was to explain to parents

what students were learning at each level in a way that they could understand. We used the

Maryland State standards, and I worked with an elementary school general. We were looking at

what they would learn at different levels: from 3-5 they are learning this, for kindergarten-2

they're leaning this. We focused on the six areas of writing because we had to find some kind of

way to organize all of the information. We were trying to get the standards in an understandable

forms so the parents could see progression. Thats all we had. Now, we don't have to do that. I

can send u a copy, as well as a middle school assessment. I have high school assessments as well.

You never took a high school assessment, right? You took the states test?

Taylor Currie: Im not sure. I think I took one is math in middle school.

Claire Meitl: When people say, Oh my gosh, we are testing more than ever before. I cannot

believe it, that's just not correct. Twenty years ago we had just as much. The difference is that

the emphasis is not the same. I started working at the Board in 2003. Years ago, getting your

certificate or diploma was dependent on passing a test. This was even before the bridge projects

were made to help the kids. Weve always had standards. The standards have to be met; however,

there was no way to measure them. Even at the high school level you were not asked all the

standards. There were hundreds of them that we had but they didn't build on each other so
teachers were picking which ones they want you to know. We even had analogies at one time, in

the state, but they dropped those. A lot of it was the minimum for the kids to know when they

graduated. Now, the standards build on each other. I'll give you an example of how easy it is to

find them. I have an app on my phone and on my computer and on my ipad that has the common

core standards. It's not the state, its common core. Each state with common core gotta dig down a

little further in that particular standard and pull areas of objective leading to the standards, at the

specific level. Teachers may have chosen different objectives but they had the same standards.

Make sense?

Taylor Currie: Yes, that makes sense.

Claire Meitl: Ok. So, I pulled up the standard in a teachers classroom and I am not a qualified

observer in a classroom; I wouldn't write the person up for whatever they were doing. I'm just

there to literally observe. This new teacher did a lovely job of asking students to find examples

of pronouns in this piece of writing. Excuse me for one second. Sorry about that. It is always this

hectic at my house.

Taylor Currie: I can relate. It is absolutely fine.

Claire Meitl: And I love it that way. So, this man was very effective. This kids were in volved

and energetic. They had success after success. I said to him, Explain why you did it.

He said, Its explanatory and i'm a really good teacher.

My job was to be a cheerleader for new teachers so I said to him, Its a fantastic thing to find

out what kids know. Where are you going with this?. To give him an example of what i was

talking about, I said, Lets look at finding pronouns with this common core, for first grade.

This was a sixth grade class. Did all the kids have 100%? Of course not. Did they have 100% at

the end of first grade? No, but that is what they were directed to find. In sixth grade, we want
them to go beyond that. If they don't have the grasp on the early levels, you need to review and

remediate those students so that you can build them up until they can understand. The objective

was to use nominative and objective pronouns, reflective and objective pronouns. The

complexity is built, but if they didn't have that basic understanding, they wouldn't be successful.

His lesson was great for answering the question, What do you know? If you stop there, you are

really assessing the kids on a first grade understanding. So, i pointed that out to him how easy it

was to find the standards without even having the book. I mean, I didn't know it was first grade, I

found it in minutes. So, the skills are outlined and they are built on. That makes assessing it a lot

easier. Again, that cyclical nature of understanding becomes so important for every english

teacher in the world; I think it's true for other subjects as well. What did you understand at the

earliest? If the student did not understand the basics, you cannot build upon them. We need to

help them understand the basics before we can continue to teach.

Taylor Currie: Do you think constant testing is the only way to gain knowledge of where

students are in their understanding.

Claire Meitl: Oh, no! Not at all. Neither do the people at the board, writing the standards. You

can assess that in conversation. You can asses that in work that you have the kids do. You can

assess it in Jeopardy games the kids play. Fun and games kind of thing can give you just as well

of an understanding. For example, in a composition, I know right away that the kid doesn't know

the topic because they make many errors. You pin point where the errors are and go from there.

Writing is the one area that helps english teachers understand where their students needs are. For

example, there's spoken english where you can make grammatical error, sort of, and then there's

written english, Most of the people in the world do not know the difference between fewer and

less.
Taylor Currie: Wow, we just had a lesson on that.

Claire Meitl: Uh huh. Most of the people in the world do not understand that people are single

individuals and are not composed of multiple parts. So the man, did not do their work, he did his

work. It all comes back to pronouns. They're used incorrectly all the time. When people use a

plural pronoun for a single person, you have to wonder, Are you schizophrenic? But people do

that all the time. His, her, and their, are constantly misused and most people don't care. I wrote to

Guy Fieri and the Food Network because it bothers me. I said, Can you please say fewer

ingredients, not less ingredients. I never heard from them. I don't think it's important to them, I

don't think it's important to most americans. It just bothers me because it's my job and i'm picky

but is it going to keep bill gates from keeping his billions? No. Anyway, I'm going on a tangent

and i don't need to. You can assess very easily without making it a test. I love jeopardy, I used to

make kids write the questions that went onto the board.

Taylor Currie: I always looked forward to Friday Jeopardy in fifth grade.

Claire Meitl: Yeah, I did that before we even has computers i had a big barn where the kids

wrote it out. Personally, thats what I did. I can't say that for all teachers ad many people do a

much better job than I have doen. I have been constantly amazed at what teachers have gone to

provide and do because I really and truly believe that people get into his occupation because they

want to improve the understand of children in the area in which they got their degree. I never

liked meetings at the middle school level where we talked about a student. I hated it. We all

know the student in the Kid Talk, as it was called. It's done in a lot of different way, and maybe

it's more effective somewhere else. I would prefer just asking the teacher, What to do you see

you children having problems with in English, Grammar, Reading, or whatever else. We would

discuss that at a team level and people could include the other subjects. We tried to include that
all subjects are seen in everything that you do i your understanding of math or economics. In the

project I described to you, the kids had to know what percentage of people prefered the project

which looks so much better than just a fraction. If you have a small test group, you don't have to

tell them that, just share a percent.I had to see if they did the math correctly even though it was

an english class. It all works together. When teachers plan together and look at the different

components to make sure students are understanding, That makes a lot more sense to em than

looking at individual students aier and over again.

Taylor Currie: Alright, well, you have answered all of my questions. Is there anything you

would like to add?

Claire Meitl: No, I mean it's important to look at individual student, but not over and over again.

If Bob doesn't get in in September, and you're still talking about Bob not getting it in January,

something is drastically wrong and its not necessarily with Bob. I think there is a general

frustration with that. Its at the high school level as well. We tend to look at individual students

instead of general factor that hinder progress.

Taylor Currie: Ok. I really enjoyed having this conversation with you. I have wonderful

insights.

Claire Meitl: Ok. And again, I like to use choice boards. I used choice board before they were

called choice board. I do like tiering assignments as well and that part of that resect. I've had

students come to me when choosing a project and they are just too easy. That's why the students

pick them. Kids know what they're doing. I do also want to say that working in groups is

important because you work in groups in life. In a classroom, you ask the kids, Did you do a

good job?, without anyone knowing you've asked them, and What about the other people in your

group? Did they do a good job? Did those people do a good job? You have to be honest, So, I've
gotten more honest when I ask kids about their groups. They have to turn other forms in a sealed

envelope. I had to open all of these envelopes in order to find what they said, but I found true

honesty about what they needed to have done or what they did not understand. I learned the

factors that kept groups from working together. You not only learn the students, you can assess

schools. English teacher, by their first nature, become editors when they're marking papers. That

doesn't make sense to me because I'm not an editor for twelve year olds in middle school. I'm not

even an editor for sixteen year olds. I should be able to use curse and look at things and ask them

what they did right and wrong. To me, that's better then here is your grade, tell me why you go it.

That's Not even for. Did I give you the sheet for how I grade writing assignment?

Taylor Currie: I don't think so.

Clair Meitl: The first thing I did at the very top of the grading sheet is ask, What are you proud

of accomplish in this piece of writing? If it was left blank, I wouldnt grade the paper. If it said

grammar or conventions, I would ask them to be more specific. If it said spelling I would ask

them to find where spelling was important in the writing. At the end, when they got their papers

back with my notes I said, What were you most successful with i this piece of writing? What

area are you going to work on in your ext piece of writing? What questions did you have that

weren't answered that may affect what you were able to write about? Those three questions are

used by most successful people in the world today and they don't think about it. They have

internalized it: What did I do that was good? What do I need to improve/ What questions do I

need to ask that may affect this? You use this all the time too. Think about it. Don't you?

Taylor Currie: Yes, absolutely.

Claire Meitl: That's a way of building on skills in every area, whether it's pitching in softball or

riding a bike.
Taylor Currie: alright, well, I'm gonna let you get back to your grandchildren. They sound like

they miss you.

Claire Meitl: Their sister, I believe, is tearing up the house, but thank you. Anytime I can help

you, feel free to call me. Again I apologize. I didn't know what I was facing in terms of what I

was doing today.

Taylor Currie: That is totally fine. Thank you so much, I'll talk to you soon.

Claire Meitl: Have a good one.

Taylor Currie: You too. Bye.

Reflection Paragraph

Overall, I felt that my interview was very successful. My advisor, Claire Meitl, is

extremely useful because she gives me multiple examples for everything she said. I feel that

most of my questions got answered and some of the answers were thing unfamiliar to me. I did

not get to ask all of the questions I had planned to ask for time reasons; I did not want to keep

Ms. Meitl away from her family for too long. As I analyze the rest of my research and begin to

organize my thoughts, I plan to formulate a few more questions that I would like to have

answered and have a secondary interview with Ms. Meitl. Regardless of the unasked questions, I

think the insights will be very important for my research and I appreciate having experience with

the process of interviewing.