Below is an actual job description for a teaching position that was posted online, which has been translated into a realistic description of the job.
— Read on www.boredteachers.com/humor/the-realistic-classroom-teacher-job-description
So true! And why teachers retire or go into other fields.
If you are lucky the curriculum will be written to include behavioral objectives. If not, rewriting them in forms of behavioral objectives including means of measuring accomplishment is the first step. The following is only one way this can be set up. It identifies the objective, provides individualization, collaboration, measures progress towards completion and final completion.
Each student has an index card (or on a spread sheet) upon which they are checked for each behavioral objective. I prefer the index card as they may be given the card, but if your school has or allows smart phones or ipads they would work too:
(Date, John Doe, Objective, Activity, %Completed, Completed, Comments).
I prefer using index cards and then entering completion in the grade book if required.
Eighth grade and above I give the students a list of all the objectives and allow them to choose the order of addressing them. I discuss and help them decide how they will demonstrate completion or proficiency. In addition I recommend they form a group who will be working on the same objective. I paper clip the index cards together for those working in a group together. During the class period I circulate among the individual students and groups providing guidance in achieving the objective so that I can evaluate percentage of completion or those completed. I explain that it is not a competition
If the school district requires a letter grade on the report card, we as a class decide how many objectives completed will translate to an “A”, “B”, “C” or “D”. There is no “F”. Some districts have a mandatory curriculum calendar so that if a student moves from one school to another he or she will be in the same place in the curriculum no matter which school they are attending. They then use standardized tests based on that calendar. If you find yourself in one of these districts you will pretty much need to disregard individualized instruction, collaboration, and measurement based on progress. If you are a seasoned experienced teacher, you might be able to use this method and then teach to the district test.
Sometimes you need to identify a district mandate as asinine and work around it. In one district the administrators went to a conference and heard about the use of “word walls” to teach vocabulary. They then mandated their use district wide k through 12. In this system there were ten words posted on the classroom wall per week and each day prescribed lessons were to be used to teach them. These lessons were to be identified in the teacher’s lesson plans. Money was spent to purchase nylon cloth “flags” with pockets where the words for the week were displayed. Part of the teachers evaluation would be on the appearance of word walls in their lesson plans and use of the flags in their classrooms.
A good system for elementary grades, maybe. A high school economics teacher pointed out that it would hardly work with his classes where there could be twenty new terms a week and there would not be enough time to implement this system and cover the curriculum. He was told there would be no exceptions. He put up his expensive nylon flag with each of ten of his vocabulary words in their slot. He left those same words up until he was observed. He taught those words as part of the lesson as directed. After the observation he displayed ten new words in their pockets on the brightly colored nylon flag till his next observation. Sometimes it is necessary to bend the rules in order to teach. Unfortunately that’s the way it is, and you will need to choose between teaching and doing what the administration dictates.
DAY 1 NEXT TIME
You’ve taken the education courses, content courses, psychology courses, statistics courses and ESOL courses. You’ve completed the practice teaching. You have your certifications. You have your first position. You’ve gone through new teacher orientation. You have your curriculum guide. You have your curriculum calendar. You’ve made your lesson plans.
Within a month you will find yourself tempted to teach the way you have been taught by your teachers. This will be a continuing temptation throughout your career. Why?
You are facing the dichotomy of using what you know about the learning process versus the school district’s curriculum and curriculum calendar. For example, we know that effective concentration for the brightest is about twenty minutes, and your class period is sixty minutes. You will have twenty five to thirty students whose abilities and life experiences range the full spectrum, but you will be expected to individualize instruction or PLP for each. You will be expected to follow district wide dictates to be applied K through twelve when they are only appropriate for k through sixth. You will face learning objectives that are obtuse and don’t define measurement.
To survive, you will be tempted to teach the way you were taught because the system you are working under is unchanged from when you were a student. To obtain that “exceptional teacher” designation, you need to teach the way you were taught. You will find yourself the square peg in the round hole screeching silently as you are forced to fit.
SOLUTIONS beginning in part II..
apnews.com/cab6dcbdb37341f39fb50f806aca0182
I understand how you can refuse abortions by this legislation, but please list the laws that allow a child to grow. Are we talking about food stamps, Medicaid, early child hood education, school funding, teacher education?
What laws do you have to enable them to prosper? A guaranteed living wage, universal medicine, free tuition, vocational training, and certified and trained teachers?
What is your state’s ranking in these areas? If your state is in the top 10%, help us in other states learn how to help a child grow and prosper.
If your state is not doing these things then you are plainly only interested in the fetus and not so much interested in the child that is born.
I understand that they are standards. I believe standards are a good thing.
What concerns me that as of yet no one had defined the goals of our public education system. What do we think that every student in the United States should be able to do by the time they graduate?
Let’s take math. Most school require at least four years of math. So are we talking about Year One is addition, Year Two is subtraction, Year Three is multiplication, and Year Four is division. Seems like an awful long time to learn four skills.
Does everyone need algebra, trig, geometry, solid geometry, calculus, etc.? I have justified algebra to all students by showing how it teaches logic and how I have used it in remodeling my house. But a whole year? And how do you justify graphing, x and y axis, and slope and slant? I’m seventy-one years old, a college graduate and a teacher, and I have never found a practical use.
I can justify geometry for all students by showing students how to figure out how much paint they need for their room, car or bike. But a whole year? And how do you justify points, and lines, and tangents, and segments?I’m seventy-one years old, a college graduate and a teacher, and I have never found a practical use.
I took trig and calc and geometry and got my “A” but haven’t thought about them on a personal level other than when I have seen my students struggling.
So, my question to you is what should be our goal for every student when it comes to math? Please share the question with everyone and share their responses. There are a lot of frustrated students, parents and taxpayers wondering the same thing.
In most, if not all, of the states in the United States education is mandatory for all children of a certain age. Generally, students between the ages of six and eighteen must be receiving education whether public, private or in the home.
They proceed year by year through the system grouped by age and having completed the previous year’s work in English, math, science and social studies. Because of the “promotion by age” process, the academic strengths and weaknesses of individuals cannot be addressed efficiently or at all. No matter how quickly a student masters the subject matter, they must complete twelve years of schooling, Ergo, twelve years with no time off for good behavior or for that matter chance of parole. No matter how hard you work in school, no matter how many extra courses you take, the bottom line for the ninety-nine percent of students is that they have to serve their twelve year sentence.
Stop sentencing our children to twelve years without the possibility of parole or even time off for good behavior.
Make education about competency not “doing their time”.
Think about all those times when you sat through a lesson that you already knew and were bored to tears.
Think about all those times when you could have used to go a little slower to get a lesson but couldn’t.
Think about all the time wasted when the teacher had to discipline fellow students who were bored and acted out.
Think about the highly motivated and talented students for whom there was no hope of advancement because they weren’t yet old enough yet to proceed to the next competency.
Think about the economic advantages.
Think about teachers teaching highly motivated students.
Think about the students who will benefit from their hard work by being able to complete school early and begin their careers.
Think about the parents who will have children who will want to go to school.
After you have thought this through, ask your board of education to justify their current method of promoting students. If they have no good justification, push for “true” competency based education; not competency based in name only.
To introduce an experiment, I asked my students if anyone had found any money in the last month? Their ears perked up. They looked at me to see if they needed to call the principal because i had cracked up.
I asked again, an not a single student raised their hand.
Everyone wants happiness, but very few find it. The reason is that they are not actively looking for happiness. We are going to test this theory.
You assignment is to for the next week actively look for money. Obviously, you may not steal it. (I always point that out because for them it is not so obvious, and they would like to say that I told them to steal.) Again I got the crazy looks.
In every class some students always find money.
Do you look for happiness? Where do you look? Do you look in the newspaper? Do you look to your spouse? Do you look to nature? Do you look to a pet?
Where you look is not important. What is important that you start to look and keep on looking.
GOOD LUCK!
said, “A teacher that can be replaced by a computer should be.”.
At first I was offended. Then, I realized that he was talking about a teacher that was still using they paradigm that we as teachers are to fill our students with information like we were filling up a glass with water.
Teachers today must be mentors, guides, facilitators, and exploration leaders. We must also be motivators. This not the kind of motivation provided by giving out candy, or no homework passes. This is the kind of motivation that comes from asking relevant and thought provoking qustions and projects. These are the kind of questions and projects that piques children’s interes. These are the kind of projects and questions that get them discussing and arguing enough among themselves to send them to the computers and primary sources. We cannot create the interest, but we can find that which interests them through what we have most to offer personal contact, interest and concern in, with, and about them.
As Arthur C. Clark also said, “If children have interest, education happens.
Please request your local radio station to play and replay “Blowin In The Wind” written and sung by Bob Dylan. It was also sung by Peter Paul & Mary, George Harrison, ZiggyMarley and pretty much every generation of performers with the exception of this generation.
To hopefully inspire you to get the song played and another generation involved, I share with you the lyrics which I obtained from Mr. Dylan’s web site:
How many roads must a man walk down
Before you call him a man?
Yes, ’n’ how many seas must a white dove sail
Before she sleeps in the sand?
Yes, ’n’ how many times must the cannonballs fly
Before they’re forever banned?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind
How many years can a mountain exist
Before it’s washed to the sea?
Yes, ’n’ how many years can some people exist
Before they’re allowed to be free?
Yes, ’n’ how many times can a man turn his head
Pretending he just doesn’t see?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind
How many times must a man look up
Before he can see the sky?
Yes, ’n’ how many ears must one man have
Before he can hear people cry?
Yes, ’n’ how many deaths will it take till he knows
That too many people have died?
The answer, my friend, is blowin’ in the wind
The answer is blowin’ in the wind
Copyright © 1962 by Warner Bros. Inc.; renewed 1990 by Special Rider Music
Read more: http://www.bobdylan.com/us/songs/blowin-wind#ixzz3LGFAZVwD
If this is in violation of copyright, please delete. No infraction was intended.
  The Animal School: A Fable by George Reaves
Once upon a time the animals decided they must do something heroic to meet the problems of a “new world” so they organized a school.
They had adopted an activity curriculum consisting of running, climbing, swimming and flying. To make it easier to administer the curriculum, all the animals took all the subjects.
The duck was excellent in swimming. In fact, better than his instructor. But he made only passing grades in flying and was very poor in running. Since he was slow in running, he had to stay after school and also drop swimming in order to practice running. This was kept up until his webbed feet were badly worn and he was only average in swimming. But average was acceptable in school so nobody worried about that, except the duck.
The rabbit started at the top of the class in running but had a nervous breakdown because of so much makeup work in swimming.
The squirrel was excellent in climbing until he developed frustration in the flying class where his teacher made him start from the ground up instead of the treetop down. He also developed a “charlie horse” from overexertion and then got a C in climbing and D in running.
The eagle was a problem child and was disciplined severely. In the climbing class, he beat all the others to the top of the tree but insisted on using his own way to get there.
At the end of the year, an abnormal eel that could swim exceeding well and also run, climb and fly a little had the highest average and was valedictorian.
The prairie dogs stayed out of school and fought the tax levy because the administration would not add digging and burrowing to the curriculum. They apprenticed their children to a badger and later joined the groundhogs and gophers to start a successful private school.
* * * *
This little fable completely changed my views of teaching. We all, each of us as individuals, have skills at which we excel and skills at which we, to use the vernacular, suck. And yet, all students are expected to excel in all skill areas.
Suddenly I realized why two thirds of my classes were bored or potential discipline problems.
One third were bored and potential discipline problems because they were skilled in my subject, and yet they had to wait for the other two thirds to continue.
One third were bored and potential discipline problems because they were unskilled in my subject, were always lost, and couldn’t keep up with the rest of the class.
The final third cruised along while wondering why the other two thirds were unhappy and causing problems.
The traditional solution is to give additional work to both outlying groups. No matter what you call it, additional work feels like punishment to a child/teenager. We are wasting our time and money as well as doing our children, society, and taxpayers a disservice when we try to improve our educational system in the United States.
Of Model Ts and Corvettes
Over my thirty plus years in teaching, I have seen many “fixes” forced on our educational system. You have experienced them also, whether as a parent or a student. Do you remember: phonics, new math, and new science grants? I particularly remember in high school getting new science lab equipment one year, and the school district not being able to fund the program over the long term. I loved science, and it killed me to see all that lab equipment setting idle because federal funding was gone.
Each of the programs above, and I would add the integration of technology, is like putting a Corvette engine in a Model T and expecting it to go ninety miles an hour. The car will destroy itself before it ever reached the the desired goal of ninety miles an hour. Isn’t that exactly what has happened to our educational system. The harder we have tried to reach our goals the worse the system has functioned.It’s time for an educational revolution. The system can not be improved without these basic changes.
REVOLUTION NOT EVOLUTION (A NOT SO MODEST PROPOSAL)
STEP 1
Make all education competency based; not based upon age or grade level. Currently, school is like a prison sentence (twelve years without a chance of parole). Everyone does their twelve years, no less. I have seen schools where students have completed all the required courses and electives and still not be allowed to graduate until they have put in the whole twelve years.
Every student should take every course at his own pace until he completes the competencies required by the state or national government or employers. They may at the same time be in beginning reading, advanced math and biology. They may be taking one course at a time or they may be taking several courses at once.
There should be no age limit for people to begin or continue taking courses in public schools. If an eighty year old woman wants to study literature, she should be able to take the course. After all, she is a taxpayer. If a thirty year old man wants to take book keeping or accounting for his small business, he should be able to. If a six year old is interested in rocketry, he should be able to study it.
STEP 2
The U.S. educational system is based on an agrarian society. Guess what? We haven’t been an agrarian society for decades, if not centuries. Being based upon an agrarian society, we only have school nine months out of the year. Name me a business large, small, service, manufacturing or agricultural that lays off its workers and shuts down down its facilities for three months out of the year. We need to make the school calendar be three hundred and sixty-five days a year, and we need to make the facility available twenty four hours a day. When rooms are not being used for classes, they may be used by community organizations for a small fee to cover utilities, janitorial service and security. People who don’t have children will be more likely to support schools they can use.
Students may attend as many days a year as they want. They could schedule their classes around outside jobs.
Teachers may teach as many days a year as they want. They would be compensated for the extra months they teach and wouldn’t need to find job(s) at minimum wage during breaks and the summer.
Parents would be able to better plan their work schedules and child care.
Step 3
Now that we are competency based and school and teachers are available all year around, lets use technology. Technology will allow students to proceed at their own pace. Teaches will be able to serve as mentors to the learning process instead of lock stepping students of varied abilities and interest through a one size fits all curriculum.
Let’s stop wasting money on textbooks which are out of date before they are published. Go digital. With the money saved provide every student with a laptop or tablet. If you are worried about getting them back, charge a fee. For those students or parents that cannot afford to either buy or rent, have a business partner step up. Don’t buy technology. Lease it. It changes too rapidly; and will be too expensive to update. Use free technology from the internet like Kahn Academy and Next Vista for Learning.
STEP 4
Get parents, grandparents, the business community and the general public involved. Get everyone involved. Get civic organizations to use the school facilities. Get adults using the gym for basketball, volleyball, community dances. Everyone should know where the schools in their community are. Encourage everyone to come to school to get involved in courses whether their eight or eighty. Find out what people want to learn and provide them with the opportunity.
Step 5
We must have two education systems.
The states can keep their state schools, but there will be federal “charter” schools which adhere to common core principals. I have long heard about how the federal government should stay out of state issues. I agree wholeheartedly.
The federal government would have the right to run federal charter schools any way it wanted. The federal government would fund their charter schools with federal tax dollars.
The states would have the right to run their state schools however they wanted. The states could fund their schools however they wanted but without federal tax dollars. No state monies would be used to fund federal charter schools and no federal funds would be used to finance individual state public, private or state chartered schools.
Parents would be able to choose whether to send their children to federal charter schools which were funded by federal tax dollars or state schools funded by state tax dollars. At last the hue and cry against big government involvement in education would be addressed.
States could have all the charter schools they wanted. States could write whatever curriculum they wanted with or without creationism. The states could teach that climate change is not backed by science. States could teach that the earth is six thousand years old by counting the begats. States could once again manipulate who goes to what state schools because the parents would have a choice.
I am looking forward to your comments, particularly questions, suggestions, criticisms to help improve our educational system.
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