Those seven little words have been at the heart of my professional soul searching for most of my teaching career. As a secondary school math teacher, that question has come up with such regularity over the years that it prompts not just conversations in the classroom, but with colleagues and parents. It can be found as the topic of teacher workshops and key note addresses at conferences. So, why is it that we expect our children to learn something as abstract and seemingly irrelevant to the ‘real world’ as algebra?

One of the most common responses we give as teachers is that it’s not about the algebra itself, it’s about learning how to think. Now, take a moment and put that statement into context. You are standing in front of a room full of adolescents who have an entire world of other things on their minds. How do you think that statement goes over? They already know how to think, have been doing it ever since they could remember, and besides, there are fries for lunch! Well, we invariably move on and continue the lesson, and don’t really worry about it until the next time it is asked, which is usually not too far down the road.

In actuality, however, this is a pretty good answer. If we were not capable of thinking abstractly when facing a problem or new idea, how far would we have progressed? The ability to think abstractly is something that depends upon brain development, but at the same time, is something that can be learned and practiced. And since we are working with children who are at a stage in their lives where this ability is beginning to flourish for the first time, it can be a truly exciting endeavor. So why aren’t they excited about algebra? And even geometry, which seems to have countless applications, gets a bad rap in high school. I believe it’s all about framing and context. Open any high school algebra textbook and it becomes immediately obvious. x’s and y’s and countless exercises that are about as exciting as watching grass grow. And hidden away, at the end of each problem section, are a couple of word problems. Problems numbered in the high 20’s or 30’s. The section that students pray we overlook when assigning the night’s homework. “Just let me grind through the practice exercises, which are just like the examples we did in class, and I can go to sleep.” This begs the question, how much abstract thinking does this entail? What happened to the excitement of discovery? What happened to the answer to ‘Why do we have to learn this?’

If our goal is to help our students learn how to think, then those challenging ‘word problems’ need to come first. It is obvious that there is no way we can teach them to solve every problem they will face in life, so teaching them how to think creatively and abstractly when faced with a new problem is the key to their future success. They need to be able to try out different approaches, discover the ones that don’t work, as well as the ones that do. They must learn to recognize when they don’t have the tool they need to solve a problem and thus must find a new one. Learning then has a context, and there is a reason for developing a new skill. This is at the heart of what we often refer to as becoming a life-long learner, then the door is open for them to experience the joy that ultimately comes from learning for learning’s sake. This is what is at the heart of The Webb Schools Mathematics Department’s phased introduction of Problem Based Learning (PBL) in our mathematics classrooms.

We are in the process of transforming the environment in our classrooms into one which is more student-centered, more focused on discovery, and promotes discussion and presentation of each student’s ideas. The content of our math courses is not changing, however, the pedagogy behind delivering that content is. By using very carefully constructed and sequenced problems that allow the students to discover the skills and concepts found in a traditional algebra/geometry curriculum, we give them a context for their learning. At the heart of the process is nurturing their ability to independently solve challenging problems that they may not have been faced with before. We pose written problems that will ultimately require them to apply a skill they have previously developed, or will guide them in the discovery of a new skill. We then ask them to present their ideas to their classmates. They must present an argument they believe leads to a solution, and to justify it. On the other hand, they may have struggled with a particularly challenging problem and not been able to find the solution. In that case, we expect them to explain their difficulty, and see if any of their peers may have an insight that would help them. In this way we are fostering habits of mind that we all use in our day to day lives as adults, while delivering the content that we know they will need for future studies. As they become aware of their own growth as independent learners and problem solvers, the answer to the question “Why are we learning this?” becomes obvious.

As educators, this approach to teaching mathematics puts us in the position of being a mentor and coach. We pose the questions, and then step back and guide rather than direct. We allow the students to take the center stage. It is their voices you will predominantly hear in our classrooms. At the same time, somewhat behind the scenes, we are in a position to nudge the discussion if necessary. We are there to ensure that the content is recognized and that the different strands that flow though our curriculum are pulled together at the appropriate times. It is critical that the teacher recognize when to step in, and when to let the students take the lead. In this way, we encourage an environment where our students are engaged, collaborating, discovering, and developing habits of mind that will foster success, not just across Webb’s curriculum, but throughout their lives.

Twenty-two of my thirty-two years in independent schools were spent in day schools, some very good and some fairly mediocre, but all of them had good students with dedicated teachers. Their debate teams did well; the football teams reigned supreme. Most went on to colleges and parents were fairly pleased with their investment. However, it wasn’t until I went to my first boarding school as an assistant headmaster that I realized that these are schools that take education to another level. And by that, I don’t mean that boarding schools are repositories for more advanced placement or honors classes, nor am I suggesting that the college placement was any better. All of those are features of schools that can be found anywhere. Where a school defines itself is where its soul is, and the soul of a boarding school lies in its development of a unique community of adults and students all living together; sharing a common purpose as defined by the mission of that school. Such schools are places that are not defined by the culture of the immediate surrounding community but by the multitude of experiences of their students, many of whom come from regions of the country and the world unknown to the average independent day or public school student. Boarding schools are places where students develop an appropriate sense of independence that all parents inherently wish for our children. Boarding schools, by their very nature, encourage and guide their students to learn to develop those emotional intelligence skills we often find so elusive in a seventeen year-old. 

How these schools do this is something that can only be discerned by walking the campus and spending time listening and observing. Doing so, one will find, for the most part, motivated students with a common purpose happily engaged in the lives of each other. Artificial barriers to understanding and acceptance tend to disappear; social cliques can be rare; and intellectual risks can be taken without fear. The possibilities for expanding the education of a child beyond the classroom are enormous. As an example, I often think of a boy who came to us some years back as a sophomore from a local public school. We soon found that he had an extraordinary voice, but his talent had been unrecognized by his school. Freshmen rarely get recognition for their talents in large schools, often because they are too fearful to even attempt to share their talent. Yet, he was auditioning for our school musical and, yes, he had an extraordinary voice. He went on to become the highlight of our entire theater program and is now on a full scholarship studying opera at a conservatory back East. I do not believe this would have happened had he not transferred to a boarding school like ours.

Imagine a place where your son or daughter rooms with a student from Malawi or Kiev. Imagine students with a range of religious backgrounds living in the same hall together. If we have learned anything of the events of this new century, it is that the days of cultural isolation are over - we are all so interconnected.  It is inevitable that our children, when they become adults, will be faced with a completely different kind of world - a world that requires a different sort of individual. I am not certain children can learn that worldview without venturing beyond the block they live on. Boarding school students experience the world through classmates and teachers who come from cultures and places different from their own. They are poised for success in the new, global environment. Experience a boarding school and you will understand.

If you’re going to change the world, it will probably happen by the time you turn 17.

In a recent chapel talk to the students, I shared with them the reasons that I got into this profession of education in the first place.  I conveyed to them many of the factors that led me down this road.  But the core reason, when it comes right down to it, is that I believe passionately that if you’re going to change the world, it will probably happen by the time you turn 17.  

By changing the world, I do not mean necessarily becoming a famous general, business tycoon, or politician.  By changing the world, I mean choosing a life of purpose where day-in and day-out you contribute something to making the world a better place – be it large or small.  The first question you have to ask, therefore, is how can you make everything you have learned at Webb, educationally and socially, work for you?

When I was a young child growing up in San Diego in the late 60’s/early 70’s, my mother taught a class in junior high school in a little town south of San Diego – less than a quarter mile north of the U.S. Mexico boarder.  Basically, it was a large class of Spanish-speaking students who were attempting to cross the bridge from Spanish-speaking classes to a traditional English-speaking high school curriculum.  This eighth grade program was a sort of do-or-die scenario for many of the students.  If they survived it and thrived, chances are they would be successful in high school, and continue on to junior college, or maybe even traditional four-year college.  If they didn’t, chances are they would go downhill from there, most probably never graduating from high school.  

Many of the students in the program were actually illegal aliens – students who would literally get up at 3:00 a.m., and sneak across the border so that they could attend classes in the U.S. that day.  They would then sneak back across the border that night, or stay at a friend’s home in the U.S.   

Bear in mind, this was well before the hot-button political issues surrounding immigration.  The U.S. had a pretty casual position on the topic, so much so that, periodically, the principal of the school would assemble the teachers, and inform them that he had been tipped off that the Federal Marshals would be paying the school a visit to do what they termed an illegal alien sweep.  The teachers, including my mom, would then prepare packets for these students to take back home to Mexico for up to 3 weeks, until the coast was clear.  

As a child, I remember being mesmerized by her stories of these kids.  I was dumbfounded – why would students go so far out of their way to go to school?  I only did it because I had to, because my parents made me; or so I thought.  

Fast forward now 35 years.  Several years ago, my mom and dad were on a bus going to a San Diego Charger football game.  A man approached my mom and asked “are you Mrs. Stockdale?” Yes my mom said, thinking that he had recognized my dad and just wanted to say hello.  You probably don’t recognize me, I was in your Southwest 8th grade class.  This person was one of those who had to sneak across the border every morning to go to school.  As it turns out, he is now an American citizen and after graduating from college, went on to receive an advanced degree.  He is now a professor of English Literature at a university in San Diego.  He went on to inform my mom that his best friend from this now acclaimed 8th grade class, who was also once a Tijuana citizen, is also now an American and, after graduating from college, now works in the San Diego Sheriff’s department.  
This story is important to me for two reasons.  First, I am incredibly proud of my mother and her spirit of helping everyone around her become a better person.  

Second, it reinforces beautifully why I am so passionate about working with teenagers – if you want to make a real difference in the world someday, the life-changing experiences when you are young will set the stage forever.  Those kids from Tijuana had an insatiable appetite to learn and to be educated.  They were young and daring in one way, but very wise in another and their actions allowed them to make better lives for themselves and eventually to make a real difference in the world.  All they needed was a teacher who believed in them, and who inspired them to pursue their dreams.   

When hiring teachers at Webb, I certainly look at their skill sets, their educational backgrounds, and their experiences as educational leaders.  But more importantly, I look for people who truly know and understand the importance of this work – that we are in the business of changing students’ lives by inspiring them to make our world a better place.  How privileged I feel to be at a school with such a clear and uncompromising focus on educating honorable leaders who are destined to make the world a better place.

As an independent school educator of some thirty-plus years and a director of admission at a number of highly-selective independent schools for twenty-two of those years, I must admit that I am becoming increasing concerned about the overuse of the term “gifted child.” Now, as a disclaimer, I believe profoundly that every child has a gift for something and that those gifts are often overlooked in large or small schools. And no, I am not talking about that hard-working A’s-all-the-time, terrific test taker. We all have them; we all identify them easily; and, of course, we love them as much as we love all our students. But, I am seeing so many applicants whose resumes list Gifted and Talent Education (GATE) programs or participation in the one of the many programs designed for the “high-performing student” that I am beginning to wonder who is not “gifted.” Many of these students are happily spending their summers studying forensics, psychology, writing, economics and I applaud those interests.  It sure has to be better than spending the summer locked in front of the newest version of World of Warcraft. But there are so many of these programs and the vast majority use your typical battery of standardized tests to identify such students; the result of which is that now we have seventh graders taking some version of the SAT and that is implicitly encouraging parents to prepare sixth grade students for the SAT. Oh, to be in the SAT prep business today! And how very sad this is all becoming. Just the other day, I had a young parent ask me if I would accept her child’s SAT results in place of our typical standardized assessment test for admission. “And what grade is she in, may I ask?” “Well, she’s gifted, you know, and she took the SAT in grade 7.” “How do you know she’s ‘gifted’?” “Well, look at her test scores.”

Some years back, I had the privilege of working as the director of admission for a school whose entire focus was the truly exceptional (we call them “highly capable”) learner. I was simply captivated by these remarkable students, for how one captures their attention and imagination goes well beyond what I am seeing in many a school’s classrooms. These are the children that learn in a completely different way from most children. Their minds are working in overdrive and everything seems a world of wonder.  Placed in your standard “I teach you; you learn” environment, they either explicitly rebel or check out. They might see solutions to math problems completely outside the norm. Some have extraordinary individual talents (I am thinking of the boy I took to the National Geographic Geography Bee finals in 2001. He won.); some have extraordinary verbal skills. What they have in common is that they are such uncommon learners and I believe they are among the most misunderstood and poorly served in educational institutions where standardized tests, SAT results, and registration in AP courses are used to determine what many believe defines a “gifted” student.   It is not so.

During my interviews I can pick out the child of which I am writing. I am thinking of a boy - let’s call him Joseph - who sat in my office and could talk about whatever esoteric subject came to mind. During those thirty minutes we explored black holes and the possibility that if the Big Bang means the universe started from nothing, then nothing must be something. We analyzed the meaning of the word “should” and engaged in solving a physics problem of motion. He was a talented animator and designer of computer games but he never played them. His head was full of ideas; his room full of books. On paper?  A “B” student. He didn’t turn in his work as, for many of these children, the homework we demand is pretty much mindless and I would agree. This is not the kind of student who can sit quietly solving the odd-number problems in the back of the algebra text. Most likely, he knows the material without expending much intellectual energy. Answer the questions in the back of chapter four of A Survey of World Literature? I don’t think so. The result? Well, instead of attempting to discern what this student really knows or can demonstrate mastery of, he gets a “C” since 40% of his grade is mindless homework. So, he disappears to the middle of the classroom, unnoticed and certainly forgotten in big schools. He doesn’t bother anyone and is never encouraged except for the rare instance that a special teacher opens her eyes and reaches out. She notes the student who confounds her with his questions that seem to come out of nowhere and whose verbal dexterity can only be matched by his remarkable insights no matter how seemingly inane. I know because I worked with such students like Bert, all of 10 years old, who assisted me on a tour of the school with a father, an engineer. Upon viewing a class where algebraic solutions were scattered across the board (this was fifth grade), the engineer suggested an alternative solution to the problem. “No”, remarked Bert. “That would be wrong. Let me show you why.” He was right. I can still see that father’s eyes. Bert and all his classmates used to call all teachers and administrators by their first name. “Hi, Leo.” It would only work there. I just loved the place because everything was so very different from what I was used to. And we had waiting lists. 

I always worried for these children because after they graduated from grade 8, there really were no schools for them. Yes, of course, there were the schools hyping IB programs or their lists of AP courses and, horror of horrors, universities that purported to “accelerate” these children bypassing any notion that developmentally they were still only fourteen years old. What’s the rush? I wonder. But IB/AP does not necessarily address the needs of the truly exceptional, highly capable learner. There are few schools that are addressing their needs and certainly not in the public sector. The task is left typically to that special teacher of whom I remark; and given the size of their classes and the independence from state mandated standards, I believe many independent schools, particularly boarding schools, are well-suited to address the needs of such students.

Teenagers want to be known, and once known they do remarkable things. Imagine then if that highly capable child who possibly does not understand his talents or gifts – they seem too natural – is identified in a caring community such as we have in boarding schools. The possibilities for that child are enormous. I love seeing these students on my campus and I can tell stories about every one of them. And I can do so because they seem to thrive in the intellectual freedom provided by schools like ours. When you sit around a table with fifteen students and engage in a Socratic dialogue about Robert Frost’s take on the American Dream, or take your students on a field trip to the Utah wilderness to search for a newly identified miniature T. Rex, you open the possibility for such students to reveal themselves.  It is when you let them stretch their minds without the burden of meeting arbitrary rubrics for success that the highly capable child begins to see that the world has meaning for him or her. And when we teachers hear them think, it is something to behold.

I’ve been in a LOT of very good meetings lately, all of which have had some focus on the work we do with Webb students, in and out of the classroom. Through all of these conversations I have been reminded of one of my guiding principles in working at schools, that being, as simple as it might seem, to leave every place that I work in better shape than I found it. As our world changes, and at an alarming pace, one’s grounding in the foundation of his or her personal belief structure becomes increasingly important. It has always been my strongest belief that we have a responsibility to our students to assist them in developing more than an intellectual base from which to build their lives. As, if not more, important is to help them develop a conscience that will allow them to move forward in life confident that they have it within themselves to make a difference in the quality of their lives and the lives of those around them.

When working with faculty and students, I often find myself reflecting back on the teachings of Dr. Nel Noddings who so eloquently reminds us of the importance of having students learn to care about the things and beings around them – think of the applications and interpretations that can grow from such a simple idea. If students learn not to “do,” but to “care” about a subject, it will likely follow that their dedication to that subject will become a part of their learning process. This allows for a subtle shift of focus (and energy) away from teachers having to motivate (or entertain) students, to finding ways to have them channel their newfound energies.

Noddings also argues the importance of having students learn to know that they are cared for – in essence that they matter and that their contributions matter, however great or small. While we continue to encourage our students to learn and cultivate their own senses of identity and individuality, they must also learn that it will likely be through acts of communal collaboration that they are ultimately successful in school and in life, whether that collaboration be with a teacher, another student, a colleague or a life partner. It is essential that students learn to be aware that they play a role in a bigger picture – caring requires that they turn their attention outward, rather than inward – and they must be taught to constantly consider their impact on the greater good.

Daily, we struggle as a faculty to achieve that fine balance where we have confidence that we are teaching content and process in ways proportionate as to allow our students to be most successful in this new world. Constantly, we remind ourselves of the responsibility and opportunity we have as an independent school to equip our students with the essential tools that will allow them to distinguish themselves among the masses of capable and driven young adults who will shape the legacy of their generation. As an example, take the use of technology - our challenge is to guide our students in developing a conscience that will allow them to be discerning with their research, the choosing of applications, the sharing of resources, or the generation of original (and often very public) material, all while staying grounded in a true, not virtual, reality where they are capable of original thought. Learning this sense of responsibility is a transferable skill that they will need to sharpen to succeed at such seemingly simple tasks as interpreting the news or forming a political opinion. They must learn to wade, intellectually, through the white noise that our media-driven society produces. We are challenged constantly to find ways to provide students with skills of discrimination that will afford them a sense of balance from which to make constructive choices.

Simple, yes?  No, not really… but this work is so worthy of our full attention as we are challenged to secure the foundations of our students for “when the winds of changes shift.” In one of my meetings I was struck by the phrase “boundary dissolution” – its many implications and potential applications in the work we do with your children. Such a simple concept, yet consistent with a teaching premise that lends a different, critical importance to every, single thing that we choose to share with and inspire in your children, and the connections we guide them to make. This is noble, demanding, rewarding, ever-evolving work, and why I’ve spent my life in good places like this.