3 ms·

Speaking as an ex-teacher, more money is also direly needed.

by brianm 16y ago

sethg 16y ago
I suspect that the two are related. If the people setting your salary see you as a cog who is expected to do precisely what you’re told, they will see your labor as cheap.
- yummyfajitas 16y ago
  It's been shown that the most effective teaching method is to treat teachers as cogs and provide them with scripts for teaching their classes. http://www.jefflindsay.com/EducData.shtml http://www.jefflindsay.com/EducData.shtml The unions oppose it in spite of the proven educational benefits. They don't seem to have an objection to "whole language", though.
  - sethg 16y ago
    From my observations, I would surmise that in a school of mediocre teachers, the direct approach is probably better; a more flexible approach to lesson planning would just gives those teachers an excuse to throw up their hands and say “follow your bliss, kids”. But the constraints that provide necessary support to mediocre teachers are a straitjacket to the good teachers... thus encouraging good teachers to abandon the field. When I was an ed student, the guy who taught the reading-methods class said that direct instruction was absolutely an important part of a whole-language classroom; if you see that kids in your class are having trouble reading words with “th”, then you are doing nothing wrong in the sight of God and Dewey by taking them aside and presenting them with a lesson on “th”. But a teacher in a whole-language class who isn’t paying attention will not realize what kids are getting stuck on and therefore will just assume that everything is going to work out, somehow, eventually. A good teacher in a class that is all phonics phonics phonics, on the other hand, will be aware that a lot of the phonics lessons are wasting everyone’s time on unnecessary drills.
  - Alex3917 16y ago
    "An educational technique that [...] shows that even the most disadvantaged children can excel" I would argue that any program that lets disadvantaged children excel should automatically be viewed with suspicion. Is there a good book about these studies though?
- pasbesoin 16y ago
  Money ~= autonomy in the rest of your life.

Speaking as an ex-teacher, more money is also direly needed.

by brianm 16y ago

Speaking as an ex-teacher, more money is also direly needed.

sethg 16y ago

I suspect that the two are related. If the people setting your salary see you as a cog who is expected to do precisely what you’re told, they will see your labor as cheap.

yummyfajitas 16y ago
It's been shown that the most effective teaching method is to treat teachers as cogs and provide them with scripts for teaching their classes. http://www.jefflindsay.com/EducData.shtml http://www.jefflindsay.com/EducData.shtml The unions oppose it in spite of the proven educational benefits. They don't seem to have an objection to "whole language", though.
- sethg 16y ago
  From my observations, I would surmise that in a school of mediocre teachers, the direct approach is probably better; a more flexible approach to lesson planning would just gives those teachers an excuse to throw up their hands and say “follow your bliss, kids”. But the constraints that provide necessary support to mediocre teachers are a straitjacket to the good teachers... thus encouraging good teachers to abandon the field. When I was an ed student, the guy who taught the reading-methods class said that direct instruction was absolutely an important part of a whole-language classroom; if you see that kids in your class are having trouble reading words with “th”, then you are doing nothing wrong in the sight of God and Dewey by taking them aside and presenting them with a lesson on “th”. But a teacher in a whole-language class who isn’t paying attention will not realize what kids are getting stuck on and therefore will just assume that everything is going to work out, somehow, eventually. A good teacher in a class that is all phonics phonics phonics, on the other hand, will be aware that a lot of the phonics lessons are wasting everyone’s time on unnecessary drills.
- Alex3917 16y ago
  "An educational technique that [...] shows that even the most disadvantaged children can excel" I would argue that any program that lets disadvantaged children excel should automatically be viewed with suspicion. Is there a good book about these studies though?
pasbesoin 16y ago
Money ~= autonomy in the rest of your life.