For several days I
have been writing a post in my head that centered on me wanting my life
back. This year has been by far my most
trying year as a teacher and I just want my normal teaching routine of being in
the classroom teaching students to go back to the way it has been in the past. It should be one of the best in the past few
years. I finished by Ed.D., graduated
over the summer, my daughter is a senior, and my personal life was getting back
on track after being centered on school for several years. I should be enjoying being in the classroom
and focusing on teaching my students, but that hasn’t exactly been the truth of
the matter. There has been much
distraction, but that is another story.
However, earlier this week something happened with my intern that made
me rethink all the selfish negativity and focus more on the positive future.
Over the years I
have hosted many interns and among the many things I have tried to teach them
has been to teach students rather
than teach the material. Of course, as
educators we do have to cover material because of the mandated objectives, but
students should come first. If you focus
on teaching students then they will take more ownership in the lessons and
everything else will come a little easier.
This is a hard lesson for the interns to reconcile with what they have
learned in their college pedagogy classes because the focus has been on how to
teach the material and reaching the objectives in such a manner that shows
student mastery of the material. This
particular week my intern was “docked” several points in an observation because
he went off track in the lesson plan and addressed the concerns of the students
rather than bringing the focus back on the lesson. That allowed my colleague and myself to
discuss the philosophy of teaching material vs. teaching the students.
We both came to
the agreement that in our teaching careers (12 for me and 8 for her) we have
seen a growing focus on teaching the test (in our case the Alabama High School
Graduation Exam). She teaches regular
and honors students and offers an after school AHSGE tutoring class, so she
admits that there is a strong focus on teaching to the test. Although she sees a strong focus she still
tries to resist but admits it is becoming harder. Whereas, I teach honors and
AP students and I have always resisted teaching to the test. My philosophy has always been that if you
prepare the students well in terms of the objectives and how to take a test
then the rest will just seem to fall into place. I went in to teaching not to teach to the
test but to teach students and prepare them for their future lives. I admit this has grown harder each year. Pressure from administration to meet AYP,
pressure from the community to teach certain skills and this year the
“suggestion” that no more than 20% of students should fail our classes. That last factor right there is enough for
another blog and possibly will become one in the future.
With the
introduction of the common core there is hope on the horizon. The CCSS brings learning back to the student
and puts a little more emphasis on student responsibility for learning. I think we have placed so much emphasis on
testing and teaching to the test for so long that our students have come to
expect everything to be spoon-fed to them and we have educated a generation of
students not as fully prepared as they could or should be. That is where the hope comes through in the
CCSS. The standards place more emphasis
than is currently on individual learning and individual responsibility. A question to be considered is how hard will
it be for the teachers to facilitate this back into their classes and help the
students make the transition. It might
not be until 10 years from now as the next generation of students rise through
the grade levels. BUT, this does provide
some hope for turning around a foundling education system and making it one of
strength again. I’m not advocating for
the CCSS fully just yet, because I have questions and concerns that have yet to
be answered, but I do see HOPE. The
HOPE that teachers can go back to teaching their students and not covering just
the material that is on the test!
For my intern he
was able to see the HOPE that comes by teaching students and running for a
little while with what interests them.
He was still able to get across the material and cover the objectives,
but he did so by filtering it in with their interests. This is what teaching should be all about!
