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My mother is a elementary special ed teacher with thirty years of experience, and in addition to going back to school to get her masters a decade or so ago, reg

by douche 9y ago

My mother is a elementary special ed teacher with thirty years of experience, and in addition to going back to school to get her masters a decade or so ago, regularly takes on student teachers from the local state university. Speaking with her, it sounds like teaching theory and technique has as much churn and reinventing the wheel as software engineering. Everything old is new again, eternally. Particularly with her students, in an economically depressed, rural area, no amount of teaching skills can offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty. At least the poor buggers get breakfast and lunch provided through the federal free and reduced lunch programs; for a staggering number of her kids, those are the only hot meals they get regularly.

projektir 9y ago
It is indeed not the teacher's job to replace parents and society. But there being students from backgrounds that make it extremely difficult to teach them does not mean that the rest of us do not deserve a proper education.
clort 9y ago
> Particularly with her students, in an economically depressed, rural area, no amount of teaching skills can offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty. Surely the endgame is that an effective teacher can, despite all of this, still attempt to engage with the student and engender some kind of interest in learning the basic skills that they need to survive in the adult world? Maybe every student won't get it but the better that the teacher is at doing this, the better results they will have, with any population.. if this skill set is not natural then teaching the teachers to develop these skills will in turn increase their effectiveness? Identifying the skill set is the difficult part, I think .. and the churn in teaching theory is in part because nobody really is able to define what is successful or not and an election cycle is far shorter than the time needed to prove any particular method.
MarkMc 9y ago
> no amount of teaching skills can offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty Well, not teaching skills alone. But what about teaching skills + experience + passion + willingness to be a social worker and defacto parent? Maybe teachers who have all these qualities can 'offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty'? Imagine a teacher who discovers that a student is going hungry and visits the parent at home to explain in person why it vital for the long-term outlook of the student that the student not go hungry. In addition: (a) The teacher tries to understand the root case of the problem - is the parent on drugs, or has to work 3 jobs, or has an abusive husband? (b) The teacher investigates government or charity services that might have an impact on the problem. (c) The teacher visits the student's household regularly and tries various ways to motivate the parent to correct the problem. (d) The teacher contacts other members of the student's family like aunts, uncles, grandparents and elder siblings to explain the problem and try to get them engaged. (e) The teacher celebrates any academic success of the student with all members of the family and links this success to their efforts. (f) The teacher gives the student her phone number and tells the student to call with any questions about the homework - this gives the teacher the opportunity to find out in real-time if the student is going hungry at home, giving a deeper understanding of extent of the problem and perhaps allowing the teacher to tackle the problem in real-time. Can such a teacher overcome the effects of poverty? Here is a summary of a few studies as reported in Teaching as Leadership [1]: "The schools that are highly effective produce results that almost entirely overcome the effects of student background" [2] "Having a top-quartile teacher rather than a bottom-quartile teacher four years in a row would be enough to close the black-white test score gap" [3] "Differences in this magnitude -- 50 percentile points in just three years -- are stunning. For an individual child, it means the difference between a 'remedial' label and placement in the accelerated or even gifted track. And the difference between entry into a selective college and a lifetime of low-paying, menial work". [4] [1] http://www.amazon.com/Teaching-As-Leadership-Effective-Achie.. http://www.amazon.com/Teaching-As-Leadership-Effective-Achie.... [2] Marzano, R. J. What Works in Schools: Translating Research into Action. Alexandria, Va.: ASCD, 2003, p. 7 [3] Kane, T., Gordon, R. and Staiger, D. Identifying Effective Teachers Useing Performance on the Job Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 2004, p. 8 [4] Peske, H. and Haycock, K. Teaching Inequality: How Poor and Minority Students Are Short-Changed on Teacher Quality: A Report and Recommendations by the Education Trust. Washington, D.C.: Education Trust, 2006, p. 11
cafard 9y ago
Churn: absolutely. I am of an age to have seen the big ideas of fifty years ago come, and then mostly go. I remember the brightly colored workbooks that came with the New Math; as far as I can tell it left behind nothing but Tom Lehrer's song. My brother is enough younger that phonics had gone out of fashion between his first grade and mind, and we found him drawing outlines around words to help him recognize them. And since then, of course, phonics has fought it out with other methods of reading instruction. Your mother is clearer fighting an uphill battle, and wish her well. Yes, if you have the parents behind you everything becomes a lot easier.

by douche 9y ago

projektir 9y ago

It is indeed not the teacher's job to replace parents and society. But there being students from backgrounds that make it extremely difficult to teach them does not mean that the rest of us do not deserve a proper education.

clort 9y ago

> Particularly with her students, in an economically depressed, rural area, no amount of teaching skills can offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty. Surely the endgame is that an effective teacher can, despite all of this, still attempt to engage with the student and engender some kind of interest in learning the basic skills that they need to survive in the adult world? Maybe every student won't get it but the better that the teacher is at doing this, the better results they will have, with any population.. if this skill set is not natural then teaching the teachers to develop these skills will in turn increase their effectiveness? Identifying the skill set is the difficult part, I think .. and the churn in teaching theory is in part because nobody really is able to define what is successful or not and an election cycle is far shorter than the time needed to prove any particular method.

MarkMc 9y ago

> no amount of teaching skills can offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty Well, not teaching skills alone. But what about teaching skills + experience + passion + willingness to be a social worker and defacto parent? Maybe teachers who have all these qualities can 'offset disinterested parents, dysfunctional family life, hunger, and poverty'? Imagine a teacher who discovers that a student is going hungry and visits the parent at home to explain in person why it vital for the long-term outlook of the student that the student not go hungry. In addition: (a) The teacher tries to understand the root case of the problem - is the parent on drugs, or has to work 3 jobs, or has an abusive husband? (b) The teacher investigates government or charity services that might have an impact on the problem. (c) The teacher visits the student's household regularly and tries various ways to motivate the parent to correct the problem. (d) The teacher contacts other members of the student's family like aunts, uncles, grandparents and elder siblings to explain the problem and try to get them engaged. (e) The teacher celebrates any academic success of the student with all members of the family and links this success to their efforts. (f) The teacher gives the student her phone number and tells the student to call with any questions about the homework - this gives the teacher the opportunity to find out in real-time if the student is going hungry at home, giving a deeper understanding of extent of the problem and perhaps allowing the teacher to tackle the problem in real-time. Can such a teacher overcome the effects of poverty? Here is a summary of a few studies as reported in Teaching as Leadership [1]: "The schools that are highly effective produce results that almost entirely overcome the effects of student background" [2] "Having a top-quartile teacher rather than a bottom-quartile teacher four years in a row would be enough to close the black-white test score gap" [3] "Differences in this magnitude -- 50 percentile points in just three years -- are stunning. For an individual child, it means the difference between a 'remedial' label and placement in the accelerated or even gifted track. And the difference between entry into a selective college and a lifetime of low-paying, menial work". [4] [1] http://www.amazon.com/Teaching-As-Leadership-Effective-Achie.. http://www.amazon.com/Teaching-As-Leadership-Effective-Achie.... [2] Marzano, R. J. What Works in Schools: Translating Research into Action. Alexandria, Va.: ASCD, 2003, p. 7 [3] Kane, T., Gordon, R. and Staiger, D. Identifying Effective Teachers Useing Performance on the Job Washington, D.C.: Brookings Institution, 2004, p. 8 [4] Peske, H. and Haycock, K. Teaching Inequality: How Poor and Minority Students Are Short-Changed on Teacher Quality: A Report and Recommendations by the Education Trust. Washington, D.C.: Education Trust, 2006, p. 11

cafard 9y ago

Churn: absolutely. I am of an age to have seen the big ideas of fifty years ago come, and then mostly go. I remember the brightly colored workbooks that came with the New Math; as far as I can tell it left behind nothing but Tom Lehrer's song. My brother is enough younger that phonics had gone out of fashion between his first grade and mind, and we found him drawing outlines around words to help him recognize them. And since then, of course, phonics has fought it out with other methods of reading instruction. Your mother is clearer fighting an uphill battle, and wish her well. Yes, if you have the parents behind you everything becomes a lot easier.