A teacher’s attention

/ Julie Nariman / 4 Comments

art photography by julie narimanAs our nation discusses the idea of arming teachers, I’ve been thinking about a teacher’s ability to see and hear the many things happening in a classroom.

Years ago, I was working in a school where a teacher left in November due to illness.  A few days later, a new teacher was hired to fill the position.  The students in the class were struggling, and even though they were compassionate about the situation, they were upset.  And hungry for structure.

I met the new teacher the morning she was starting her new job.  She had a lesson plan. She’d be entering the classroom in an hour.  There were so many things she needed to do on that first day to establish structure.  Where to start?  Continue reading →

Being the “right” school

/ Julie Nariman / 5 Comments

Subway image by julie nariman

In 2005, I started working at a transfer high school for students ages 17-21 who needed to catch up academically. All of the students who attended the school came from regular New York City High Schools and had transferred to the school looking for another opportunity. I fell in love with the population and was inspired by how a new setting could create a second chance at success.

Five years later, I decided to submit a proposal for a transfer school through New York City’s Office of New Schools.

“Actually,” I was told by the office, “We don’t need any more transfer schools. We need regular schools. Why don’t you just open a regular high school that does such a good job, kids don’t need to go to transfer schools?”

Continue reading →

Taking care among glow sticks

/ Julie Nariman / 3 Comments

Glow stick photo by julie narimanA school is a place where people interact.  It’s easy to rush ahead and think these interactions don’t matter.  After reading about the staff and students in Parkland, Florida, I was reminded of how much of an impact people can make in each other’s lives.  I experienced this impact as I supervised a school dance yesterday.

The student government had planned the dance with a “Glow in the Dark” theme and bought hundreds of plastic glow sticks that students could wear like necklaces or bracelets.  However, nothing was glowing, and not many kids were dancing.  It was still daylight and sunlight was streaming through the large gym windows.  My assistant principal gave a pep talk to the demoralized student government so they could get past their disappointment.  It worked.   Continue reading →

Stiven’s precious point

/ Julie Nariman / 3 Comments

art photography by julie nariman

Our school is a school for newcomer immigrant students who are learning English for the first time. Lots of students struggle at the beginning, and passing state exams can be daunting. Despite hard work, many students fail exams the first time.

On top of all of that, they are teenagers, and sometimes they fail because they’re distracted and despite our best efforts, take longer to be fully engaged in school. This was the case for one of our students, Stiven.

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Channeling My Inner Norma

/ Julie Nariman / 6 Comments

art photography by julie nariman

In my first year of teaching, I was never observed by an administrator. I started to think that not being observed might be a good thing, as I was struggling mightily to keep my classroom under control.

I taught 8th grade English in a public middle school in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. The school itself was struggling and had been placed on a state list for low student achievement. The principal and assistant principal were both brand new in their jobs and in hindsight, I have empathy for the difficult situation they were in (although I certainly had no empathy at the time). I got used to the idea that administrators were people who helped when things went badly—for example, when a discipline problem forced me to call them and get help. Maybe it was better they weren’t visiting, I thought. What would they see in my classroom? That I was a failure?

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Silence through cell phones

/ Julie Nariman / 2 Comments

cell phone handI cannot imagine a quiet high school cafeteria. Our cafeteria is noisy and chatty. We’ve managed to (generally) keep kids in their cafeteria seats, but we do not even attempt to contain their enthusiasm, their loud conversations, laughter, exuberant calls to each other, the release of seeing each other socially for 45 minutes a day.

Yet a teacher at another NYC public high school told me that a couple of years ago, their cafeteria became quiet. Suddenly. Why? Continue reading →

The hunger to serve

/ Julie Nariman / 3 Comments

Martin Luther King Jr. QuotesKids—and people in general—have a hunger to be of service.  I’m reminded of this hunger on Martin Luther King, Jr Day.

I saw this hunger recently when I peered into a classroom at 3:30 on a Friday afternoon. It was almost an hour after school had ended when I would expect kids to be out eating pizza, or on their way home to play video games, or buried in SnapChat.

And yet, fifteen of our 12th graders were clustered around tables discussing a piece of text. Continue reading →

Permission to be excited

/ Julie Nariman / 4 Comments

Education NYC - Julie NarimanI walked into a 9th grade art class the other day simply because it looked beautiful.  Little tangles of red, teal, yellow, orange, and blue fibers covered each table and the students were gluing the fibers to paper to create a design.  I asked one group of students who looked particularly engaged, “Are you enjoying this project?”

The students looked at each other, and seemed about to express enthusiasm—and then one girl shrugged.  Following her, the others shrugged as well.  They went back to work, fully engrossed—but not able to admit it.  The girl who first shrugged seemed mesmerized by a teal fiber, pulling it out as if she had big plans for it.
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The parent at school, the teacher at home

/ Julie Nariman / 2 Comments

Rafael Nariman in Class of 1955

My dad attended a school vastly different from mine.  He grew up in Spain and learned multiplication tables by singing them in a classroom chorus led by a priest.  I learned my multiplication tables by using flashcards.

As a kid, I remember arguing with my dad about math homework.  Specifically, it was about problem-solving in algebra: my teacher had taught me one way to solve problems, and my dad wanted to show me an easier way.  I would listen to my dad (probably not for long) and then, frustrated, huff and puff that I was going to “do it the teacher’s way” because his way was confusing. Continue reading →

Please (please!) translate for me.

/ Julie Nariman / 2 Comments

document translationLuciana is a 9th grader who arrived in the U.S. in 2016 from the Dominican Republic.  She wears a sparkly pink headband, has perfect attendance, and occasionally causes mischief.

I saw Luciana in her 9th grade English class.  The students were reading an article about bullying. When the teacher encouraged Luciana to answer a question about the article, Luciana immediately turned to several Spanish-speaking classmates with a panicked look that said, “Please translate!  Don’t leave me hanging here!”    

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