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Having been both a teacher and a student who chafed under the rules, I'd suggest that it's not quite that stark. The rule makers are people trying to maintain a
by acjohnson55 8y ago
Having been both a teacher and a student who chafed under the rules, I'd suggest that it's not quite that stark. The rule makers are people trying to maintain a learning environment that works for everybody under their care to make progress. You have to make split-second decisions to keep the dynamic productive, and there's not a lot of margin for error. In a perfect world, you'd have time to negotiate solutions with individual students. But in the real world, you have to negotiate collectively, and there are things you don't have the discretion to negotiate. So, this often takes the form of rules.
It's very much an art to do this effectively, without alienating your students. You have to be consistent, yet flexible. Thorough, yet empathetic. Fair, yet differentiated. It's a web of contradictions.
- jacobolus 8y agoThere are many amazing teachers and school administrators, and many who are just muddling through doing their best every day. There are also some sadistic jerks, and some who are incredibly bad at communication and problem solving and controlling their own emotions, especially among the lower levels of the administrative staff. I can understand that dealing with scores of angsty teenagers every day, and especially getting stuck with resolving all of the most intractable disputes, can be trying for even the most patient person. But there are some administrators who escalate every situation brought their direction into an aggressive pissing match. As if the reason some of them stuck with the job is that exercising control over other humans (in however petty or counterproductive a manner) makes them feel powerful.
- acjohnson55 8y agoFor sure. There's no defending the sadists out there. I just think that even if we got rid of them, we'd still have a lot of issues.