Focus on the Joys of Teaching with Jill Speering
In this wide ranging conversation with author and former teacher and literacy coach Jill Speering shares insights from her memoir Rubies in the Rubble: An Educator's Transformation from Pain to Prominence, from Abuse to Absolution. The discussion includes Jill's work as an elementary teacher, district-wide literacy training specialist and school board member. This insightful discussion touches on literacy, teaching for joy (instead of a test) and school board politics.
People mentioned in episode
Reading Recovery North America
Information about Marie Clay who was mentioned in the podcast
We discussed the legal issues around a “gag rule” implemented on teachers while Jill was a school board member. For more information about K-12 educators free speech rights about issues of public concern, see these resources:
ACLU of Washington Teachers Free Speech Rights
Information about the case Pickering v. Board of Education 391 US 563 (1968) by David L. Hudson, Jr. at the Middle Tennessee State University Free Speech Center
Information about the Pickering Connick Test by David L Hudson, Jr. at the Middle Tennessee State University Free Speech Center
Transcript
Scott Lee 0:01
Greetings friends and colleagues. Welcome to the Thoughtful Teacher Podcast, the professional educators thought partner, a service of Oncourse Education Solutions. I am Scott Lee. Today I share a conversation with former teacher, school board member and now author, Jill spearing. Jill is a 35 year career educator who taught kindergarten and first grade children to read through writing using invented spellings and then publishing students stories into books within the classroom. During her career, Jill received many accolades, including Distinguished Educator for Middle Tennessee, and master teacher under then Governor Lamar Alexander's career ladder program. During her last 15 years in Metro schools, Jill trained Reading Recovery teachers and presented her own reading research at national conferences. Her articles have been published in the Tennessean in educational journals, and in Reading Horizons, a national reading publication. After retiring from teaching, Jill continued her advocacy for young children and for inclusive public schools. She was twice elected to serve on the Metro Nashville school board. After serving for eight years on the school board. She published her first book, Rubies in the Rubble an Educators Transformation from Pain to Prominence from Abuse to Absolution. We start our conversation, talking about the book. Thank you so much, Jill, for joining us today on the Thoughtful Teacher Podcast.
Jill Speering 1:53
It's great to be here. Thank you so much, Scott.
Scott Lee 1:56
So first, let's start with your book. Most of the memoirs I've read, that are written by educators, particular teachers start usually when the teacher starts teaching. They're the first day of school sometimes maybe, while they're doing student teaching, something like that. But you started with your childhood and you share every part of your life in the book. Why did you choose to write your book that way?
Jill Speering 2:25
Yes. You know, when I first started sharing my book with other people, they said things like, you've got three books here. And I did not want three books. I wanted to tell the story in the first section of the book that demonstrated why I was so passionate to work with at risk kids, and then carry that through. I think that was important because the students that I was passionate about, were actually me as a young person that was teaching myself.
Scott Lee 3:03
Yeah, because because that was the first thing I was thinking about, too, was I'm like, Why is she telling me about herself? And then you know, of course it may it started to make a lot more sense as I got into it. Is there anything in particular about your childhood that made you decide, oh, I want to I want to be a teacher. Were you thinking about that all along? Or was there an event or anything in particular?
Jill Speering 3:30
Well, as I look back over my life, I realized that there had been a couple of teachers who had dramatically impacted me in a positive way. And because I had a difficult childhood with a father who had been in World War Two and suffered through his own trauma that was passed down to myself and my siblings. And I felt like that it was important for me to, I wanted, I wanted no child to feel the way I felt growing up. And that became the be all and end all. I've sought ways to better my teaching. And you know, that took me through opportunities for a master's degree and studying in the University of New Hampshire and the Ohio State University, so that I could ensure that I could teach the child because any child that was in my classroom, I felt like it was my responsibility to ensure that that child learned, it wasn't the parents fault that that child was having a problem. It wasn't the previous teacher. It was my responsibility. So that was the impetus for me to continue my education and see seek out ways to ensure that every child learned,
Scott Lee 5:02
we're going to talk a little bit about Reading Recovery in a few minutes. But a lot of the study that you mentioned, centered around Reading Recovery, so could you just briefly share a little bit about what that is, and why you're such a proponent, even though it may be a few minutes before we get into all of the ins and outs of it.
Jill Speering 5:24
Sure. Reading Recovery started in New Zealand, they did the research in the 70s, and implemented it in the 80s. And Reading Recovery is a first grade intervention, it's very individualized, there are no two lessons that are the same because no child is the same. And they have a repertoire, what they know and what they don't know. And that's, that's individual. So, Reading Recovery works with the students one on one, in the 30 minute period, five days a week for about 20 weeks. And the children. To me, it changed my life. I felt like family, I have learned how to teach our children. And not only you know, so often we teach and things that that their child is hearing just goes right over their head, because they don't understand the concepts that we're using. And the words that we're using, like the letter and a word, you know, the concept of a letter and the concept of a word. In reading recovery, there's an observation survey, where you can really get a good look into the child's thinking, and, and then I can build my lessons around what the child knows and your interest in order to make learning easy to beautiful program.
Scott Lee 6:53
I know you dealt with a lot of this, like I did for a while there were a lot of those scripted types of reading interventions that just never really worked. And, you know, because they're not individualized.
Jill Speering 7:07
Yes. Yes. You know, that's so interesting, because so often, we're presented, we educators are presented with a curriculum. And often it's verbatim, you know, it's, this is what their teacher says, and this is what the student is probably going to say. But but rather than teaching a curriculum, I think it's important that we teach the children and using the curriculum as a guide, but the it's the child that is important. And following the child, as Yetta Goodman would say from the University of Arizona, is imperative for success in the classroom.
Scott Lee 7:47
One other thing, the title, the word Reading Recovery, and I've never actually used it, but I've read a lot of good things about it. Can you tell what, why they use the word Reading Recovery? Particularly recovery?
Jill Speering 8:02
Yes, absolutely. I used to say Reading Recovery is not a 12 step program for kids who have been Hooked on Phonics. But in New Zealand, you know, it's an island and ships get off course. And when a ship gets off course, the navigator plots the coordinates to get the ship back on course, and therefore they have recovered. The ship, Dr. Marie Clay's thinking about reading recovery was that if we can determine which children are getting a little off course early, then we can recover that trajectory in a short amount of time.
Scott Lee 8:47
And I've actually done navigation, sailing navigation, I've even learned how to use a sextant and things like that. But one of the things whenever you're plotting a course, because the water and the wind is always moving you you're always in a constant state of recovery. Navigators actually use the word recovery. When they realize that they've lost course they always are assuming that they're recovering the course because it you're not traveling over ground and it never, you never can hold a perfect course. So it's always in recovering. So I just thought that was so interesting to read about. You've kind of talked about it. What do you see as the key to motivating or reaching a difficult student?
Jill Speering 9:36
For me, when I had pretty much given up on myself and I had a father who called me stupid, and I lived up to that expectation. I hated school. I didn't like my teachers. But yet, when I was in the classroom with a teacher who believed in me, at first I felt I don't know what's wrong with her, you know, she must not be too smart. And then I thought, Well, I'm gonna milk this as much as I can, just always expecting that the other shoe was going to drop. But what happened was that I began to adopt the teachers belief in me. And as I did that, I mean, it didn't happen, all of a sudden, it happened slowly over the course of the year. But as I began to adopt her belief in me, I started excelling. And I wanted to make straight A's, and I asked my mother to wake me up an hour early, so I could, you know, study one more time for the test. And, and it became such a dichotomy between failure and success. And success was so sweet. But it took me a while to get there, but that that whole idea about believing in myself and having a teacher who not only liked me, but I mean, I thought she loved me and respected me and I wanted to be around her. So I think that's important for teachers to, it's difficult to, like every student, but we never want them to know if we don't like them. Or if we find them difficult. That's something that we have to work toward.
Scott Lee 11:31
There have been times as a principal, where I've had a student complaining about a teacher, they don't like me or whatever. And I'm like, "Well, you do they respect you?" "Well, yeah. Do they do this? And this and this," I'm like, "you don't always have to be liked, even. But what are you getting out of this teacher's class?" Oh, well, doesn't even always have to be liked. And, and I have worked with teachers even that were sometimes not really well liked. But they were still effective with kids. Yes. It's interesting that you that you're talking about motivation, and teachers expectations, and curriculum. I mean, there's a lot of things out there right now, that are creating a lot of angst for a lot of teachers. I was just reading today. So far, although a lot of teachers and surveys in the last couple, three years have been saying, thinking about leaving, we're not seeing an enormous exit. Like there was some worries might happen, thankfully, but there's still a lot of angst and a lot of concern. What advice would you offer an early career teacher to kind of help keep them keep them motivated in the field? And I guess what other types of supports do you think teachers need?
Jill Speering 12:49
I think that if we, as educators are not enjoying our teaching, the students are not enjoying their learning. And to find a way, knowing your students, knowing their interest, and being able to add live to some degree, but make it make learning fun, whatever that means, for that particular teacher. I'd like to do cheers in my classroom. And every time somebody did something good, hip, hip, hooray. And then we were, we just always have high energy kindergarten in first grade. I think that's nature. If the if the teacher is not enjoying her work, the students are not enjoying being there. And, and that's vital. There also, for teachers to know, their subject matter. If we know our subject matter. And, you know, when we get out of college, I thought that when I got to college, I was going to know everything I needed to know, that certainly was not true. That was only the beginning, I had a lot more to learn. As we continue that zest for knowledge and that zest for how to reach our children, then it makes learning fun, it makes our learning fun. And I loved learning as much from my students, as they learned from me. There's one student that in the first day of kindergarten, I said, "well tell me how do you like school?" And he said, "I'm disappointed." And I said, "Wow, what happened?" And he said, "I thought I'd learned rain today." Student taught me so much, that when kids come to school, they have something in mind that they want, especially when they first begin school. So after that, I never let a first day of school go by that every child did not take something home that they could read to their parents and It might say, My name is" you know, but, but every child could read something. And so every child went home the first day feeling like a reader, and they had learned read.
Scott Lee 15:13
That is interesting, you know, kind of as a side note, we're always still learning to read anyway, I want to talk about something else and kind of change gears a little bit. And talk about some of the less positive things because you talk about some a lot of disappointment, a lot of professional disappointment in your book. On several occasions, you were involved in implementing effective research based educational programming only to have a leadership change, or an administrative change somewhere in the organization that just came in and dismantled the program, even though it was working, and you could demonstrate that it was working, I guess, what are the negative effects of that? What are your thoughts on that? And why does it always seem to happen so much in education?
Jill Speering 16:03
I know, I know, it's so sad. It seems like pendulum swings back and forth, doesn't it. And sometimes when a new director comes in, they want to make a mark, and they want to establish their programs. And as opposed to a director of schools who comes in and takes time to see what's going well with the district, what's working, what isn't working, I had an experience where the director of schools was very supportive, according to his own comments about reading recovery. But then as it turned out, when he got mad, he was get back at people. So when when things didn't work in his favor, he retaliated. And at one point, we had 84 Reading Recovery teachers, and four teacher leaders, who are the trainers and the teachers. It was the day before we were going to present our budget to the mayor, I was on the school board at the time, when that happened. The teachers, me they weren't, they were devastated. Sure. And 50 of them were at 50, out of the 84. Were at the meeting. And there were tears and upset, the director wanted them to do something different. And I asked them while they were there, are you willing to do this, not one teacher raised her hand. So as a result of that those teachers were snapped up by surrounding districts, they had lost their respect for our school system, surrounding districts, they'll put out the word that they would like to interview, and we lost over 50%. Like within a few months, it is a devastating thing to when you feel like you have a program that's working. It's a matter of fact, after the second year of reading recovery in Nashville, the research and development office did a study that said concluded that we had actually saved $330,000 in retention savings alone. And that didn't include the amount of money that we had saved in special education dollars.
Scott Lee 18:21
I don't think people really understand how much because you've been on a school board and dealt with the budget. I know you understand this. People don't really understand how much it costs to retain a student for another year in school. I mean, it's it's it's huge. The average cost of a student varies from state to state, but we're both in Tennessee, it's about $10,000 a year. Well, every time you retain a student, you add that back in as a as a cost again, unless you find a better way to do it.
Jill Speering 18:55
Yes, yes. And that was the beautiful thing about New Zealand Reading Recovery when it started in New Zealand, because they they did not want to see students fall they did not want to see the students fail and the way they impacted that was by offering interventions throughout the years.
Scott Lee 19:17
Just kind of an aside note that pops into my head that added cost of retention doesn't count economic loss, or you double the chances of the of the child eventually dropping out of school, got dozens of studies of this and the economic loss of a student that drops out of school is huge. And that affects all of us.
Jill Speering 19:41
That's right. That's right. You know, when I was teaching in the inner city, I was the new teacher on the block in an inner city school that was close to the projects. And a student came he had already repeated kindergarten. So it was his third year in school and the first grade Teachers were upstairs and the kindergarten teachers were downstairs. But because I was a new teacher, I was downstairs. Now Jerome came a week late. And they started bringing him downstairs. And he was kicking and screaming. And I thought what in the world was going on? That poor child thought he was going to be placed back in kindergarten for another year? And even as a little fella, he just didn't want that. And it was clear from his behavior. Yes, yes, it negatively affects our students.
Scott Lee 20:38
And the thing is, there's so many things you can do without actually having to retain a student. Yes. Let's talk a little bit more about what it was like being on the school board. It wasn't all bad all the time. I don't think you're ready to retire. Why run for the school board. I mean, to me, that sounds like just the worst thing ever.
Jill Speering 21:00
People thought I was crazy. I had, I had retired and the person who was in the district seat, district three where I live, had decided that he was not going to run for re election. And because I had worked so much with the community and different people inviting them to come and see a Reading Recovery lesson behind the glass, I had made some contacts out in the in the field. And so a group of elected officials got together and tried to come up with some names to replace the district three seat that was retiring. And my name came up. And they called me and asked me if I would consider it and I thought, Oh, I don't know anything about being a politician. I don't like asking for money. I just I can't imagine me doing this. But then I thought, what would it be like to sit on the other side of the table? What would it be like to have more decision making possibilities. So I decided to do that. And I raised $8,000, which was a lot for me, but not ponent raised $35,000. My opponent was a charter school person. And so he had getting the big money. He was not an educator, he had no children in school, but I beat him because I think being an educator resonated with the voters. And, and also, I just worked my tail off for me, I was out knocking on doors and took every speaking engagement I could and was was elected to the school board. And I really loved being on the school board for a big part of that time, the director of schools at that time, asked me what I wanted. And I said, I want a comprehensive literacy program. So he helped make that happen. And I got to be a part of that. And we came up with this beautiful, comprehensive literacy program. Well, as before, we had a hodgepodge of reading programs that actually contradicted with one another in philosophy. So I was so proud of the work that we did on that literacy committee. So it was your right it was it was really a good experience, I hope until it was.
Scott Lee 23:33
You talked a little bit about it. But toward the end of the time that you were you're on the school board, you were dealing with a difficult superintendent, and everything was becoming public. What is that? Like? You know, people can read the book and get the blow by blow. But just what is that, like having to do that? Because that, to me, that is so foreign about what that experience could be like, and the public discourse just must have just been poisonous, and it must have been not very good for for the for the public for the school district any of it?
Jill Speering 24:11
Yes, it was a very painful time, the director of schools already, and he came in with such a strong interview, and we were just all of the board and we he it was a unanimous decision to bring him in. And and I just loved him for about the first nine months. But he had a gag rule. So he was saying that board members could not talk to teachers and teachers could not talk to board members. Well, he you know, board members didn't like that. So he raised, you know, he got over that one. But he still had this teacher scared. So the teachers didn't want to talk to us, but go ahead. Oh, no,
Scott Lee 24:53
I'm just thinking sorry. I'm thinking about my school law class. Yeah, I think that against the law.
Jill Speering 25:01
Yes, yes. Okay. I think it is. But you know, nobody helps you to. As a
Scott Lee 25:06
matter of fact, I'm sure it's against the law. And there have been test cases about that very thing. So, I mean, after school, part of the reason why tenure exists was to prevent this kind of intimidation. Yes. Yeah. Influence anyway. So sorry. Yeah. Just kind of an aside there. Yes, you tried to keep this out of the press and keep it within the district after the gag rule was implemented. And of course, people continue to talk to you on the downlow as much as they could, why did it have to become public? What motivated you to force this out into the open? Because I think it's important that people see that sometimes it's, it's just usually important to even if you're afraid of a superintendent, to find an ally on the school board. So So tell us a little bit about that.
Jill Speering 26:04
As I was talking to teachers, and realizing that our superintendent was giving the board members one message, and the educators a different message, I went to the superintendent and talked to him about it, we had like a weekly conversation around this topic for about three months, and nothing was changing. And, and I said to him, If this does not change, I'm going to bring it to the board floor. And still nothing changed. So I began to bring things to the board floor. And when that happened, of course, the press was very interested. And we were on the news almost every night. My life played out in bright lights on to television. But the sad thing about it was that it I had, I had so much respect for our school district. And at one point, the director played a song by the name will "Blow the Whistle," and which has some difficult language to hear. And he only played a little segment of the song, but he prefaced it at a principals meeting by saying, "when we have a hard board meeting, this is what the song that plays in my head." My principal started calling me immediately. I mean, my phone was ringing off the hook. Now I let him know that that was not okay. And he, he didn't agree with me. He said it was only just a few minutes. But even though it was only a few segments, the principal's who didn't know the song, were on their phones, looking up the lyrics. And so it became even though they were not spoken words, it was what was on everyone's mind. And to me, that was such a travesty to see that happening in my district that I had worked for 35 years and, and I'd never seen anything like that before. So I was the only board member who stood up, I signed a civil service complaint about that, and nobody else wanted to touch it. That was a difficult experience. And I ended up in the hospital with open heart surgery, I had to have a triple bypass because of those. It's about a year that that we tussled, and that I felt like it was my responsibility. You know, when I was teaching, it was my responsibility. And I was a board member, I voted for him. And it was my responsibility. When I learned that he wasn't who he said it was my responsibility to stand up.
Scott Lee 28:56
Yeah, you still have to be accountable and to take accountability. So fast forward a little bit, and you had two terms on the board and decided not to run for a third term. And instead, you go to New Zealand to learn about schooling there. Was that what was that like? As you point out New Zealand has a much higher literacy adult literacy rate than the United States looked it up according to OCED they list the United States around 86% and New Zealand 99% for the adult literacy rate. So and that was part of your motivation. I know. So tell us a little bit about about that and what you learned in New Zealand and then also what you think we could be doing better in the US based on your experiences in New Zealand?
Jill Speering 29:48
Yes. Going to New Zealand was like going to heaven. I got to visit 19 schools, while I would say are on the north and the south. I'll And people were very welcoming to me. And one of the things that stands out to me about the way New Zealand does their instruction is that there's not competition in school. There's collaboration and cooperation, very different from our school here. They don't give grades, they give progress report functioning at grade level, a little below grade level above grade level. And they do give the STAR test in math and reading the beginning of the year, the middle of the year, the end of the year, those those tests are not graded, those tests are used to help the teachers understand where the kids are, and to impact their instruction. And I just feel like we could do so much more than we do here in the United States. In New Zealand, they have time set aside every day, where the kids get to go out on the playground and talk to each other 45 minute periods, about twice a day. And you know, in the United States, or in Tennessee, we have a 20 minute recess period, and of five minutes is getting out the door. So you know, kids are just impacted in terms of not having an opportunity to talk to one another. And that impacts learning when their mind is someplace else that impacts their learning. But when they had this opportunity to go outside and talk to their peers, and sort their business out, then they can come back. And they're tuned in tapped in turned on to learning. And that's what they had discovered in New Zealand. And I think we could do that, here in the United States, it would just take a change in philosophy. But we have a belief system, that time on task is what's important. And even as a kid, there will be times when I would be trying to work a math problem. And my brother would say, Get up and walk around it, get your mind on something else, and then come back. And it works like a jewel, if I just got up, walked around, talked about something else talked on the phone for a minute, and then came back it I saw it with fresh eyes. And and we don't we don't honor that the way our brains work like that in the in Tennessee. And I think across the US,
Scott Lee 32:40
as a matter of fact, you know, we even grade schools, one of the schools that came off of the local school that came off the priority list, there was an article in the paper about it today. And one of the comments was, it may not be that that particular school had better test scores than they had in the past, but some others are lower. And that push them up that entire system is wrong. And that's the way that so much the way we run classrooms to your right, it has nothing to do with the brain and how we learn nothing to do with what's important and what what parents say they really want for schools to do what employers say they want for schools to do. So.
Jill Speering 33:28
Yes, learning how to think. And, and in the workplace, you know, we have projects that students have to do. And in New Zealand, they had a kind of a place for a greenhouse each year, they take the cover off. And the next group of students that come into the fifth grade, are responsible for working together to figure out how what the dimensions need to be how large it needs to be. And they figure that out working together cooperatively. And it's just such a beautiful thing. It's so simple, and it helps the school to to have this new cover. But also, the biggest thing is that helps the children to respect their thinking process and there's a teacher there that supports them and leads them along the that continuum of thinking but it's just such a beautiful way to to have education where instead of learning facts and figures, to learn how to work together and solve real problems.
Scott Lee 34:38
One last question, what action would you like to see a teacher who has just read your book Rubies in the Rubble? What action would you like to see teachers who've read the book take?
Jill Speering 34:50
I would like for them to look at their children differently. I would like for them to think about how do I get to know To the students intimately, what are their interest? What's their desire? What do they like to do, and then build their instruction around that building on what the students know, rather than what they don't know. That that would be the most important thing for me. And if teachers did that, it would really impact their their students, and of course, standing up for having a voice. And in my early life, I didn't have a voice. I got slapped around a lot. My mother kept saying, your father is going to kill you if you keep sassing him. So I was afraid to use my voice. But as life unfolded, I realized how important my voice is. And the voice of educators is so important. And I would love to see more educators serving on the board. Yes, we need their input.
Scott Lee 35:59
Well, thank you very much, Jill. It's been wonderful talking with you today.
Jill Speering 36:05
Thank you, Scott. It's been a delight.
Scott Lee 36:10
The Thoughtful Teacher Podcast is brought to you as a service of Oncourse Education Solutions. If you would like to learn more how we help schools and youth organizations, embed social emotional learning within their cultures, and implement strength based restorative interventions, please visit our website, www.oncoursesolutions.net. This has been episode 10 of the fall 2022 season. If you have enjoyed this podcast, please tell your friends and colleagues about it either in person or using social media. We also greatly appreciate positive reviews on the podcast app you use. The Thoughtful Teacher Podcast is hosted and produced by R. Scott Lee who retains copyright. We encourage diverse opinions however, opinions expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of producer, partners or underwriters. Guests are never compensated for appearance, nor do guests pay to appear. Transcripts are available following podcasts publication at our website, thoughtfulteacherpodcast.com. Sponsorship opportunities or other inquiries may be made on the "Contact Us" page at our website thoughtfulteacherpodcast.com. Please follow the Thoughtful Teacher Podcast on Twitter @drrscottlee and on facebook@facebook.com Thoughtful Teacher Podcast
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