How hard is teaching.

When no one knows the goal of public education...so how can a teacher be judged?

And the way we test and grade, and assume grading using A-B-C-D-F, can a student pass with D's? With C's? With a mixture of C's and F's? It's kind of like a teacher is supposed to present a certain amount of information, over a certain period of time, and kids with D's will be rewarded the same as kids with A's...both pass to the next class or grade. Kids with C's and D's and a mixture of F's, how much have they actually learned? Of the information presented by the teacher/lesson plans, how much of it should kids be expected to KNOW at the end of the class study? 90%...70%...50%...30%?

When we take our driver's test we are required to meet a precise score...like 40 correct out of 45 questions. There are no A's or B's or C's or D's? Either people pass or they do not. I guess today it is too harsh to treat school students in this fashion since huge numbers of kids might fail? Meanwhile we're talking about 'how hard is teaching'...

 

I would be happy if they would just manage to teach kids some of the basic logical fallacies (Ad Hom, Non sequitur, Appeal to Authority and so on) some basic critical thinking skills and what constitutes a valid argument. It just blows me away the amount of fallacious and bad argument coming out of the mouths of politicians and (even more bizarre because unlike many politicians these folks know better) the media.

The reason there is so much of this is because they can get away with it.

Then in terms of the basic principles on which this nation was founded. Teaching kids one concept would change the entire political landscape.

Individual rights and freedoms are "ABOVE" the legitimate authority of Gov't. Gov't power is to be extremely limited (limited to what ?)

"We the people" give Gov't its authority. As opposed to "divine right/God" as was the case in the past. We give them the power to punish (make law) but, only for acts which are injurious to others - murder, rape, theft. Direct harm in general. Individual liberty ends where the nose of another begins. This is the same line where Gov't power starts.

This agreement between the Gov't and the people is termed the "Social Contract". Any proposed law that goes outside this contract (outside direct harm or a grey area) must have approval of an "overwhelming majority". 2/3rds at least. NOT - simple majority 50+1. This was termed "tyranny of the majority".

No man wants to be ruled over by another. We give Gov't power but this power is to be very limited. We only give them this power for extreme things .. things that we as a people have overwhelming agreement.

Who thinks murder should be legal .. or rape, or theft. Very few. An overwhelming majority these to be illegal and so the law is legitimate.

This is the same bar for any other law and especially in the case of a law that meddles with individual liberty. This goes for any Gov't be it Federal, State or Municipal.

Take Pot vs Heroin. Good luck getting an overwhelming majority to agree that pot should be illegal. Heroin ? no problem.

How about beastiality ? I highly doubt that 33% of the population thinks bestiality should be legal.

As you can see this is great system - if only we would follow it.

 

I'm afraid you're correct. Standing up in front of a class and intellectually slugging it out with them mano e mano is a thing of the past. The teachers they have now are garbage. They aren't teachers. Just... scum.

Don't just watch this video, but read the comments. Tons of students saying this guy was right. Nobody is saying "dayum, that's a messed up teacher", and the reason for that is because the vast majority of teachers are just like that teacher of his. They can't teach, not interested in teaching, and don't really want to even if they were given the chance.

 

Hey, don't get me wrong I actually agree with you. I am merely pointing out the flaws. We can't really hold teachers responsible unless they are in there telling the children there is no such thing as God, and if you hear anybody say that name let me know. Or if the teacher is teaching them to kill the president. I think you took me the wrong way there man. I am actually against public schools. In my opinion there is no teacher that is going to teach a child better than the parents, given the fact the parents are good people and responsible. Especially with today's technology. I mean just about any book within the library is at the fingertips of a keyboard now. And with books that explain how to teach whatever topic is at hand. The problem is, the powers that be have built a society in which both the father and mother have to work just to make ends meat. This allows the government to step in and indoctrinate the kids to their desire. And it's much easier and much more powerful at a young age.

 

It's the Peter Principle...aggregate Americans no longer have the competence to effectively and fairly manage our government...our nation. Don't know if people are dumber, or lazier, or simply not interested, but we can see our incompetence on display just about every day. We're supposed to elect representatives who can rise above the muck and govern but we're now proven we're also incapable of doing this...

 

I started public school long ago and except for some comments I have made in other posts here, it served me well. My father worked all the time and my mother was a stay at home mom. But, never did either of them help me with my studies! My mother made sure I was ready for school and that I had lunch but never did either of them study with me. And even when I failed a few times at school my parents did not intervene. School might have been easier if I had parents to mentor me but they didn't and things worked out. So based on my experience, although I can see a benefit in an involved parent, I can never blame parents for the failure of their kids. As such, and I have written this many times before, a public education system should be designed full knowing the parent does not need to be involved...

 

Former high school teacher, here.

It is extremely easy to do a bad job as a teacher and I'd guess that half of them are just riding along within the system and doing a lousy job. As an example, where I taught we had a senior history teacher whose only assignment was for the students to outline the text book. At the end of the semester they'd turn their loose leaved binders in and she'd flip through them. Their text books were all marked up, a sure sign of a bored student who were learning how to hate history. What a shame. Being a good teacher means that you make a new lesson plan for each class daily taking into consideration the personalities and interests of the students in that particular class at that time. This takes work, thought and some collaboration with your fellow teachers. It is imperative that you show up in class energized and full of pep. The students will follow your energy trail. If you have it, they will too, if you don't you will have bored students. Teaching is therefore, work. Prior to teaching I spent a few years as a drill sergeant, which was by far the best teacher training that I ever received. Why? Because every student/soldier had to get an "A". Bring that same standard with you into the public school classroom and you will be a winner. Standard education classes, that I also had to take, were a massive waste of time. Good teachers inspire their students and love their subject. Poor teachers do the opposite, most do the opposite.

 

Most parents even middle class don't do that. Now what?

 

What would you suggest is needed?

 

Just say to hell with it. Give up! You're not good enough. You can't compete.

That's what is up.

 

So what's the solution?

 

What exactly is the problem ?
For teachers, I would think that most/if not all of them have adequate knowledge of the subject they are teaching, while they are provided a number of students who can vary quite greatly in their ability/desire to learn.
The closest thing to a 'solution' in education of our young, in my opinion, would be to try and group students into classes with others who are most similar in capabilities, advancing them to the next grade only after they have acquired the ability to make progress in the next grade level.
The first 6 years of school should concentrate heavily on reading writing and arithmetic, formerly known as the 3 R's, building communication and comprehension skills.
The final 6 years of public, taxpayer provided, schooling should concentrate on preparing students to become responsible and self sufficient adults, to recognize their abilities and how to put them to best use. Perhaps they should pursue a trade or maybe a degree in some subject which a need exists? Do schools no longer have guidance councilors? In my senior year of High School several classmates and I actually had job offers provided to us by our guidance councilor. I passed on mine as it was in a Northern European country and I don't like the cold.

 

How Trump would talk about the issue if he cared:

"The issue is we have teachers that are weak, we have parents that are weak, we have people that manage the schools that are stupidly weak. We have people that are doing crack in our inter city high schools, we have gang wars breaking out near our schools, we have terrorist shooting up our schools, we have people running our schools that are morally corrupt and there is no order in the morally corrupt school system. We need to crack down on the slackers, bully's and cheaters. Because if we don't it's going to lead to the destruction of our work force and to our kids future. I know all about schools because I remember when I went, I know it better than the teachers and professor's do. I happen to be very smart and know all of the best words to use because I went to school when it worked. Now it is broken, now our teaching is broken, now our kids are broken and I will fix it because only I know how. And it's so easy folks, yet they don't want to do it.

Everyone knows that the school system worked a lot better back in 1950-60 than it does now. We need to go back to that, we need order, we need teachers empowered to punish kids again, we need more guns on school grounds, we need our parents to be active again, we need to deport the rapist, we need to deport the gangs and we need to ban Muslims to end the terrorism in our schools."

 

If we're going to bring government/politicians into the conversation, perhaps it would make more sense to involve State/local governments who should be capable of acquiring first hand the relevant facts from parents/students/teachers of the problems that exist and how to best solve them.

 

Ok. My next question is...how are they inadequate in their knowledge? Aren't they trained properly in school? What are the teaching programs for?

 

What do you mean by weak teachers?

 

Weak teachers are those that have no authority in the classroom and shouldn't be in charge of a bag of potato chips, let alone a bunch of kids.

Government employees who know they can't be fired don't have any incentive to do their job. It's really easy to be weak, and much harder to be strong. But you don't want that. You want weak teachers who have no reason to even try to do their job.

So you get what you got.

 

It's even worse than that, any teacher that tries to restore order in a class room is worse than Hitler and then "those parent's" will come to complain there bullying disruptive child shouldn't be punished. So teachers give up because of our sue happy culture. Teachers coming from private schools quit when they learn how screwed up our public schools are in spite of better pay. Yes you heard that right teachers working for private schools sometimes make less than the ones working for our public schools do.

The democrat sue happy culture and weak light handed BS is why our schools are quickly going down the drain. In Asia they don't put up with our western SWJ sue happy crap and they get the skills they need.

The GOP is also at fault in some other areas like the ones trying to make the schools run on a shoe string but really the Democrat's own the failure of the public school system though and though in the US.

 

What? in my post are you referring to?

 

Hello. Teachers speak up for yourself.

 

The school system is a massively funded epic fail. It should be scrapped.

“According to the New York Post, which reported the same story earlier on Thursday, “79.3 percent of city public-school grads who went to CUNY’s six two-year colleges arrived without having mastered the basics” of reading, writing, and math, and had to take non-credit remedial classes to catch up.” New York Magazine,No, 80 Percent of NYC High School Graduates Are Not Illiterate,By Adam Martin, 3/8/16.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/03/80-of-nyc-high-school-grads-not-illiterate.html

 

So let's take the discussion to where it needs to go. I have a few questions:

1. What is the future of teaching?
2. Regardless of the reasons are the majority of teacher's doing what they need to do?
3. Is teaching a real profession anymore?
4. Would we be better without the school system as it is today and replaced with something else?


Thank you for your responses in advance.

 

We all agree the school system doesn't work. So let's not pretend it's a well oiled machine that needs to be tweeked. It's not. So let's get some real answers folks.

 

How utterly vague. How, exactly are you defining what you are referring to as 'the school system'? Education is a perpetual process which begins with birth and ends only with death. The primary objective of public paid for and provided schooling should be to teach our young 'how' to think (learn) NOT 'what' to think. From what I see, it would appear that schools have become politicized far too much and our young are NOT being prepared adequately to become productive and self sufficient members of the societies available upon emancipation from their parents. The word 'Freedom' today appears to have been redefined to mean 'without want'.

 

For several years in my career I was a professional instructor that fulfills the same role as a "teacher" but with specific courses and classes dedicated to specific needs of the industry. We didn't have the problem of "bad instructors" because we didn't follow the typical public school format.

We divided the responsibilities between "teacher/instructor" that provides for the delivery of the "class content" and the development of the "class content" by "course/class developers" that prepared all of the materials and what was to be delivered to the "student" each hour/day of the class. Some people are better at delivery and others better at development but the "same class" was taught the "same way" by all of the delivery instructors/teachers. That made it relatively easy to determine if a problem existed because the problem could be fixed by the course developer and that fixed it across the board.

We didn't use "traditional" teaching methods because they're not good enough for industry that requires proficiency by all employees. We used Competency Based Learning systems where all of the students became competent in knowing and understanding the information that they needed to know by the end of the class. We achieved 100% proficiency 100% of the time. Above this is mentioned by the drill sergeant example because every soldier had to be proficient so they all ended upon with an "A" at the end of training.

Good teachers "engage" their students and this effectively limits the class size to. In industry the class sizes were always limited to between 8-12 students. Less than 8 wasn't cost effective and over 12 made it impossible for one person, the teacher/instructor, to keep all of the students engaged at the same time. I've often stated that once the class size exceeds 12 then the teacher/instructor is spending their time on crowd control as opposed to teaching and while not literally accurate what it implies is that the size of the class has exceeded the capability of one person to keep all of the students engaged at the same time. Because of the class size the teacher/instructor can't even keep 12 students engaged and the larger the class gets the fewer students the teacher can actually keep engaged.

It was interesting because my mother went to a "one-room school house" growing up in the 1920's. As she recalls in averaged about 18 students and she received an excellent education and that appears to contradict my statement above but it doesn't. The teacher was addressing grades 1-12 and this broke the students up into very small groups based upon subject/grade level.. The teacher might be teaching American history to 9th and 10th "age" children but this was a small group of perhaps four students. The rest of the class was engaged in self-learning by working example for other classes or reading or whatever. The teacher only "taught" small groups of the 18 students throughout the day.

We also have technology today that can be used to accommodate different learning styles. If we wanted to teach the history of the Battle of Gettysburg then some students are just fine reading about it, some may do better with limited reading and more involvement with a discussion group lead by the teacher or an assistant, while others would learn more by watching the History Channel's documentary on it. Both means of learning should be and can be available for use by the student.

The point I'd make is that we have some fundamental flaws that can be fixed but it requires a national initiative to accomplish that change. The greatest barrier we have today when it comes to fixing our problems with public education is that the US Sect of Education has zero academic knowledge or experience related to how education needs to change today in our public schools. She's an opponent of public education and has no interests in fixing public education. . .