Thursday, November 17, 2005
The Changing Face of Education
23 years ago, so long time ago, I made a decision in college to became an Elementary Education Major. I loved student teaching, planning my lessons, and watching the kids grow. My first job was in Houston, Texas. I grew up on the Iron Range of MN, not diverse at all, and went to the fourth largest city in the country. The school was 100% African American and I was amazed how much pressure the put on their kids to pass the standardized tests. Teachers closed their doors and cheated so they would look good. I would tell these stories to my dad, also an educator, and we would shake our heads. The teachers would spend the entire year teaching toward the test. The kids wouldn't learn any skills but damn they could pass the damn tests. I taught second grade so my kids didn't have to take the tests so I was still able to enjoy planning my lessons, being creative (which my creativity is very limited), and not feeling the pressure.
I am back in MN where life is normal again. The kids take the standardized tests and we look at the scores and decide what skills we need to work harder on. THENNNNN, the Bush administration passing NCLB. Their answer to struggling kids is take the teachers and shoving staff development down their our throats. Give us a prescribed, research based curriculum that is suppose to work. HAHAHA!!! Start testing kids in Kindergarten and label them as failing to meet the graduation requirements in the state. These kids are 5 or 6. Also, test the kids so much in grades 1-3 so that the classroom teacher is only testing and not teaching. That doesn't include taking away from planning time to grade the damn test scores. Now, most teachers can tell you in the first week, those kids that are struggling, those kids who are gifted and those that are on grade level. We don't really need five different tests to us that. Kids all learn at a different rate. Some kids aren't ready to read until 2 or 3rd grade. Not any more, if you are not reading coming out of Kindergarten you have a problem.
What was wrong with the way we learned? Was is so bad???? Everyone in education is feeling the pressure from the Bush administration. Today, I had two young college students come in and observe the "URBAN SETTING". I told them to run as fast as they can. Life in my building is extremely stressful, teachers are unhappy, and I swear the principal is coming to work drunk daily.
The big talk is to start paying us for how our kids perform on tests... Please, until someone can guarantee me that my kids will get a healthy evening meal, have someone help them with their homework, read to them at night, make sure that they get to sleep at a decent hour, and just talk to them the playing field is not equal. In my classroom, I had a little boy tell me that his mom won't buy a year book for him because if she has extra money she goes to the casino. On Monday I had a conference with a parent who had just arrived from the casino at 4 am and she told me that they cannot afford their daughters ADHD medicine. One child told me his homework is never finished because his mom is gone and his dad is always sleeping or watching TV. Several of my kids, I had the same kids last year, were pulled out of class for over a month because they either went to Mexico or Africa. Everyone says that their kids will read, keep a journal and attend school there. Not happening.....
Enough venting for the evening.....
Mary
I am back in MN where life is normal again. The kids take the standardized tests and we look at the scores and decide what skills we need to work harder on. THENNNNN, the Bush administration passing NCLB. Their answer to struggling kids is take the teachers and shoving staff development down their our throats. Give us a prescribed, research based curriculum that is suppose to work. HAHAHA!!! Start testing kids in Kindergarten and label them as failing to meet the graduation requirements in the state. These kids are 5 or 6. Also, test the kids so much in grades 1-3 so that the classroom teacher is only testing and not teaching. That doesn't include taking away from planning time to grade the damn test scores. Now, most teachers can tell you in the first week, those kids that are struggling, those kids who are gifted and those that are on grade level. We don't really need five different tests to us that. Kids all learn at a different rate. Some kids aren't ready to read until 2 or 3rd grade. Not any more, if you are not reading coming out of Kindergarten you have a problem.
What was wrong with the way we learned? Was is so bad???? Everyone in education is feeling the pressure from the Bush administration. Today, I had two young college students come in and observe the "URBAN SETTING". I told them to run as fast as they can. Life in my building is extremely stressful, teachers are unhappy, and I swear the principal is coming to work drunk daily.
The big talk is to start paying us for how our kids perform on tests... Please, until someone can guarantee me that my kids will get a healthy evening meal, have someone help them with their homework, read to them at night, make sure that they get to sleep at a decent hour, and just talk to them the playing field is not equal. In my classroom, I had a little boy tell me that his mom won't buy a year book for him because if she has extra money she goes to the casino. On Monday I had a conference with a parent who had just arrived from the casino at 4 am and she told me that they cannot afford their daughters ADHD medicine. One child told me his homework is never finished because his mom is gone and his dad is always sleeping or watching TV. Several of my kids, I had the same kids last year, were pulled out of class for over a month because they either went to Mexico or Africa. Everyone says that their kids will read, keep a journal and attend school there. Not happening.....
Enough venting for the evening.....
Mary
# posted by sjobs @ 6:20 PM 
Comments:
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Well, you know I'm a sympathizer on this issue I don't know what the solution is--you might--but No Child Left Behind ain't it.
I remember reading about how these policy wonks conduct polls to name their initiatives. And Americans, with their all-time short attention spans--their headline-reading-only brand of catching up on the news... It's not encouraging.
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I remember reading about how these policy wonks conduct polls to name their initiatives. And Americans, with their all-time short attention spans--their headline-reading-only brand of catching up on the news... It's not encouraging.
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