Like I said in my last post, I am a bit crabby. And since I have declared spring positive blogging season, I have a couple more to get out of my system before the buds appear on the trees.
Let me tread on sacred ground for a moment.
Teachers are not supposed to “bash” teachers. We are not supposed to blame them for the problems in schools. At least that’s what I read two other teachers write last week.
Why not?
Are we that powerless?
Am I supposed to just believe that everyone else is responsible for the conditions except the teachers? If they are not responsible for the conditions then can they at least be bashed for not trying to change them?
You can’t convince me that what my kid’s do isn’t my responsibility, good or bad.
At some point shouldn’t we take ownership of something besides just the good stuff?
If my students were complaining about some problem I would tell them to get off their butts and do something about it. Right now we are in a unit in which the kids are working out their own Essential Questions. They have developed some interesting questions like “How can one person make a difference? And “It only takes one to lead.” The content of the unit lead most of them to develop questions that revolve around the theme of “One person can make a difference.”
Do we lack a leader? Do we lack someone with the right pizzazz and charisma that we can all rally behind on the way to an educational revolution?
What’s that saying about “If you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem.” Is there a middle ground that me/you/we hide in? Tell ourselves that we are not behaving like the problem people, the kids are doing fine in my class, but yet we don’t try to solve the problem outside of our four walls. So we feel good that we are solving a problem in one classroom, but still get to gripe about the problems outside of our walls.
I hide there. I hide right in the middle of that saying. I feel like I am pushing the boundaries in a middle school social studies class–we are our own sovereign state practicing a policy of isolationism. We do open our arms to those seeking educational asylum, but do not offer any foreign aid.
Every teacher operates with roadblocks to being successful. One cannot blame failure on those roadblocks. It is their responsibility to overcome them. Figure out ways to succeed despite being told they can’t. Persevere when they are facing overwhelming odds, and continuing to believe their course is just and right, even when given the label educational heretic.
I am responsible for what happens in my classroom, and is that overwhelming feeling of responsibility that will be the topic of my next post…
9 responses so far ↓
Criticism is important and can lead to productive change. The interesting thing about the teaching profession is teachers are often given a key, a grade book, and a lesson plan book, and then 36 weeks of alone time in their classrooms.
Where else does that happen? No business that I know of. There isn’t a feedback loop and there should be – beyond the annual mandatory administrator visit.
If unchecked I think Robert Fried’s words in “The Game of School” ring true. I’ve pasted them below. Sorry for the length.
“They look like adults, but they react like adolescents: touchy, easily offended, cliquish, pouting at their inability to get their way, defensive about threats real or imagined to their prerogatives, obsessed by their routines and petty comforts, tough skinned yet strangely vulnerable, isolated within their rooms. This situation is not their fault. These people truly are victims or a system where power in schools has traditionally been allocated in a manifestly undemocratic manner and where teachers are often treated more like …… “
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I am a teacher basher. Deep down inside, when I hear about teachers complaining about technology or children, when I walk the halls and see nothing but test-prep, when I find that resources are not to be shared (because they spent a lot of time on those), when I hear administration say that teaching to the test is fine, when I feel eyes burning holes in the back of my head because my class is unruly to others who could care less whether or not they ever engage them, I bash teachers.
Dear Paul,
After about…another ten minutes of attempting to add comments, then deleting them, then adding, then deleting, I am giving up. What you relate here is something that falls into the category of “easier said than done”. And while I think their are pockets of change in every school that act as leaders, I do not think, that in ten years, those pockets will be the same ones heralding change today. Leaders are one natural resource that is hopelessly scarce.
Your self-proclaimed teacher-basher,
Steven Kimmi
P.S. Don’t tell anyone at my school.
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“So we feel good that we are solving a problem in one classroom, but still get to gripe about the problems outside of our walls.”
This is almost exactly what I’ve been thinking about for the past couple of days. Your thoughts here have pushed me a little farther. I appreciate it and curse you at the same time.
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@Jenny…thanks, I don’t think I have ever been cursed at by a reader. Now if someone would just post obscene pictures.
By the way readers, Jenny is now published! http://moourl.com/cmd8i
@Steven Kimmi Seriously, what you wrote was comforting. Let’s me know I am not the only nut…I am thinking we can get leather jackets and start a club. And your “easier said than done” statement I hate, because it is so true, and I feel like I use that as an excuse to put off any kind of action.
@Charlie I hear ya about the throwing teachers into the classroom without support. I do wonder if we just hire the wrong people, the type of people who wait for help to come to them. People who are not inquisitive and curious and motivated learners. Maybe we need hire more “educational entrepreneurs.” Could we then live with the lack of standardization that would be created by hiring creative individuals?
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By the way Charlie, love the quote. Looks like a great book and here are some more for those of you that are interested:
http://moourl.com/woot/?moo=jwrmv
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I completely agree Paul.
Why should we harbor the poor habits of teachers?
Notice I didn’t say “bad teachers;” I think that every teacher has some bad habit or other that does not contribute to student learning. We need to learn to cultivate the good practices for sure, but that involves rooting out the bad ones. Does a gardner just hope away the weeds or dead limbs of plants? No, he prunes, fertilizes, and waters what he wants to grow. We need to weed out bad practices.
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I think you’ve really hit a tender note here – one that many of us don’t want to admit. But, teachers are the deciding factors in a student’s life. We have the power to individually determine if a child has a positive or negative experience with school as a whole concept. New quantitative research is backing up the notion that it’s a good teacher that makes the difference, not a good school or a good neighborhood. Kids in classes with good teachers show growth, whether they are in a poor school or a great one. Kids who have mediocre teachers, even if they are in a “top” school, are not getting a quality learning experience.
It is a lot of pressure to be a teacher. It’s a lot of work, but I, too, get tired of doing things to make their lives easier when it’s at the detriment of the learning of our kids.
Thanks for keeping focused on the kids!
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Seth Godin indirectly wrote about this recently in his post Beware of Trade Guilds Maintaining the Status Quo.
Godin writes: “Whenever a trade association raises the barricades and tries to lobby their way into maintaining the status quo, they are doing their members a disservice. Instead of spending time and insight and effort reinventing what they do and organizing for a better future, the members are lulled into a sense of security that somehow, somehow, the future will be just like today.”
Until more teachers start doing as you propose, Paul, speaking out against things that do not work, the teaching trade guild will always protect against changing the status quo.
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Hey Mr.Bogush! I started writing this post about what keeps me going throughout the day and just what gets me through tough times and anything really. I got really curious about what keeps other people strong and going so I commented on 10 other blogs (the people I was most curious about) and told them that I was trying to start a chain. So, you are one of those 10 lucky people! CONGRATS! I’m not sure how to tag it though, but check it out.
-Olivia-
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