WHERE have you BEEN?

I just want to say, SORRY!

I started substitute teaching and ended up with a position as the Technology Lab Assistant. This took up a great deal of time and I was not able to post. Now school is out and after a wonderful vacation in Nantucket, MA, I am back to reading blogs and hopefully writing more blogs.

The cartoon and the "story" If you Give a Teacher a Mouse.. just posted are results of slowly becoming caught up with reading all my blogs.

I think they are both fun and true!

I subscribe to over 125 blogs in my Google Reader. When you go absent for a while, it takes quite some time to get caught up. There is always something new waiting to be told, learned, read, or digested.

Soon I will be back to substituting in the Year Round Schools in our district.

Hopefully, a full time regular teaching position will be "just around the corner."

If You Give a Teacher a Mouse...

Another cute video...

Teachers Are People

Long time no see, here at the BLOG.
I must show you this great Cartoon.

Happy New Year!

I have been gone on vacation and busy with Christmas/New Year Holidays! I will get "back to business" soon.

Priorities for the new Secretary of Education

At Leader Talk Kevin Reilly had a post about what he thinks the new Secretary of Education needs to do.

His ideas are very interesting to me. Most of them do not ostensibly sound like education goals. They are more related to what you might think belong in departments other than the Department of Education.

For example...

"1. Provide health care for all of my students so we can finally address the scourge of childhood obesity, diabetes, and poor nutrition;

2. Ensure that every child has access to comprehensive eye exams and appropriate interventions when they are struggling just to see let alone to read;

3. Ensure that every child has regular dental checkups and access to highly qualified dentists so that my students’ baby teeth aren’t rotting in their heads;

4. Provide the funding support and infrastructure so that all of my students can attend preschool like the affluent kids do;

5. Create a way for every child in America to have a laptop and access to the Internet so that poor children aren’t pushed further behind by the technology divide that favors their more affluent counterparts;

6. Divert the 10 billion dollars we are currently spending every month in Iraq and re-invest in the modernization and construction of state-of-the-art school buildings in every community in America;

7. Guarantee a college education of the highest quality for all children so they are motivated to apply themselves academically;

8. Eliminate unemployment so that the parents of my students can properly provide the basic necessities for their children-food, clothing shelter;

9. Significantly raise the minimum wage so that our parents are not forever struggling against the tide…fighting the unwinnable battle to stay ahead of a runaway economy and its stunning indifference to the working poor; and finally…

10. Eliminate politically motivated accountability systems like NCLB that primarily test our students’ ability to take tests while ignoring all of their other assets: like their creativity and their critical thinking and problem solving and communication skills; or their proficiency with technology or their ability to speak in multiple languages or lead others or serve their community…"

Items 5, 6, 7, and 10 do apply more directly to what is commonly considered the Department of EDUCATION.

For more information, you should check out the blog for his charter school as well. It will explain why he has these items listed on his top 10 things for the new Secretary of Education to accomplish.

It is important that everyone think about all aspects of education. There is more to education and teaching than just the 3R's, NCLB or mandated state testing results.

What do you think is the answer to these problems?

Life Long Learning and Information Overload

Wow, I seem to be posting a lot these few days. I am obviously reading a lot too.

I was behind in reading all my blogs in my Google Reader.

I am one of those people who when I check out a book, buy a magazine, or open a newspaper, I want to devour everything in it. I am reluctant to put it down, return it, or put it in the recycle bin until I have "finished" it.

In these days of information overload, this is a problem. There is always going to be more information than I can consume myself. I have to be wise in what I read. I have to learn to pick and choose what I want to read "thoroughly" and rely on others sometimes to synthesize what information is out there for me.

This is a problem that will be out there for all of our students. (That includes each of us as well. WE ARE ALL STUDENTS!)

We must learn how to pick and choose what we become passionate about. We must learn to pick and choose what we spend our time reading, learning, and doing. One of the most critical things we all need to learn is how to prioritize what is most important to us.

Learning is not over when the school day is over. We must all continue to be LIFELONG LEARNERS!

How can you hire "the right" teacher?

I was reading Larry Ferlazzo's blog and happened upon his reference to an article from the New Yorker about how to find the best teacher from a group of "recruits." It is hard to find the answer to this question before prospective teachers have been in the classroom.

Tenure, I believe, creates average or below average teachers.

Teachers, in their first years, can either do really well, or sometimes, really poorly. Some teachers take longer to get "grounded" in what works for them. So the first 2 or 4 years, whatever is required for tenure in a district, isn't always a "true value" of a teacher's worth. Also, the number of years a teacher has taught does not necessarily make a good or bad teacher. A teacher who has taught for 20 or more years who is still teaching exactly the same way s/he started out is not always a good teacher.

Teacher's unions and tenure help make teachers feel too complacent in their position. If a teacher is a good teacher, s/he doesn't need tenure.

I have been told that the original reason tenure was developed was to allow for college professors to test the waters in what was happening/what they were teaching without fear of reprisal from the authorities/the "powers that be" in the college hierarchy.

Even in the elementary and secondary schools there can also be power struggles. You can have a poor administrator/principal who is resentful/afraid of a teacher who is exceptional and well-liked by the students/parents/school board.

Nevertheless, I still believe, as I have often said, teachers really should be paid according to what they are worth, yet is hard to determine "what they are worth."

We need to concentrate on finding the way to determine what teachers are worth. The answer is not based solely upon the test scores of their students. Teachers teach and students learn much more than any test scores will ever show.

Only then we will improve our schools and the education of our youth.

That's where the money needs to be spent. On the teachers - the good teachers.

Good teachers succeed no matter what the challenges are, but they shouldn't have the additional challenge of not enough money for basic educational supplies.

(Editorial comment: Sorry I couldn't resist...When banks, Wall Street firms, and car manufacturers get bailed out, but schools receive little or no financial help our priorities are out of whack!)

What do you think?