Kids Today

I'd dreamed of being a teacher when I was younger. I even had a blackboard that I used to teach my stuffed animals. I received a copy of the Young People's Science Encyclopedia which I read several times. The book was volume 1-Aa with information on how educators can order the entire set for their classroom. I'm not sure how I got this one, but back in the day, I mailed off for almost everything offered in magazines. 

I also received a book about cats from Little Friskies Cat Food. I had to mail away with the coupon cut from the food back to prove my purchase of their food. I had a huge appetite for information about things I cared about (cats).

Both of these books are available from booksellers for a minimal price. These books do not possess any antiquity qualities that I know of, so their only value is that of nostalgia. As an aside, it would be interesting to see how much has changed in the subject of science since the late '60s. I looked at the Cat Book on one of the seller's websites and they showed pictures of the book's interior. When I saw them I knew I would still love the contents.

Remember there was no internet and I was dependent on reading (books) for knowledge. Our family even had our own World Book Encyclopedia set. I used those extensively for the little research papers we were assigned in elementary school. 

Now that I'm a substitute teacher, I get the opportunity to sample the job as it is today. I am not saying I'm experiencing the teacher's actual job. There is so much more that goes into teaching than just showing up. When the teacher leaves lesson plans, I happily follow them. I've gotten to see several different teaching styles based on the plans they leave behind. For the most part, the students understand their directives and appear proficient in doing their work. That's not to say that they don't have questions. Which I happily answer. Sometimes my answers don't work for the student. When this happens I recruit another student to be a tutor. 

Except for 1st grade, I've subbed for classes in each K-6 level, including one special education class.  Elementary grades were fun to work with. The students were excited to show what they knew. 

I've also subbed for 8th, 10th, and 12th grades. I subbed for high school grades in two different schools and the experiences were very different from each other. At one school the students wanted to get their work done and they were cooperative and positive. At another school, the students were defiant and disrespectful. It was filled with disruptive boys that alternated between making cat sounds and shouting "F... You". The boys were impossible to appease or control. This was a shame because there was a small group of girls who dutifully did their work. 

Eighth grade at one school was also an absolute nightmare! This included three blocks of different 8th graders. For these classes, I made the executive decision that they would not be doing work on the laptops. Instead, I assigned them reading in an actual textbook and assigned worksheets to complete. I made this decision early in my first class. The kids were shocked that I told them to put the laptops away. "We always do our work on laptops", they whined. To which I said, "Not today." The students were further shocked when I told them they had to hand the worksheets in and those that didn't work didn't work on them would get a "zero" for the day. "You can't do that," they said,"you aren't the teacher". To which I said, "I am today." 

Who knows what the regular teacher did with the stacks of "zeros". I hope he follows through. I was shocked to find that roughly a quarter of the students did the work. 

Lessons:

#1: Teaching and learning looks completely different in this post-COVID world than it looked when I was a student. (I wrote about that in my last post.)

#2: Many students are NOT motivated to do well for the sake of doing well. 

#3: Some student populations have a culture that rewards being disrespectful. 

Long story short: Nothing in Middle School or High School will reflect your own school experience.

Herculean Heroes

A long while back, I took two years off as a sort of "sabbatical" from banking. One of those years I spent teaching Middle School Math. Fast forward to today. I have one year of actual teaching in the school system under my belt and I can tell you that teaching today does not look like teaching in the early 2000s. It definitely doesn't look like the 1970s. The county I've been substitute teaching for has fully embraced technology and each student is provided with a laptop. In some classes, the students are using technology for their school work almost exclusively.    

I've observed a lot of interactive learning applications being assigned with knowledge checks at the end. This is true across grade levels. I can only hope that the technology helps reduce the time that the teacher works outside of the classroom. Working in the classroom requires a significant amount of stamina and patience. At the end of the day, teachers deserve to truly clock out. But, of course, that is not the case for them. 

Most of the teachers I have subbed for provide clear plans for their classes. I cannot express how grateful I am for this. Some of the plans include directing students to complete certain assignments on their laptops. In those cases, my job is to make sure students are actually on task, which is not hard to do. I do it by walking around. Some teachers use the "share the student screen" technique. It allows teachers to check any student's screen while they are in their classroom. There are incentives for the students to complete their work, which can include game time on the computer. 

One nice thing about computer learning is that students can complete their work at their own pace, without being intimidated when others have finished. The apps also provide bright, kinetic animation which presents information in several ways. It can help a visual learner grasp the concepts as well as an auditory learner. It also has practice features that help the hands-on learner. 

Electronic presentations are simply "how it's done" now. This is true even in the field of adult learning as well. For corporate training, I can't help but think of the time that can be saved when there are good training packages that can reduce the individual trainer's prep time. When I was in the corporate world, I appreciated online training because it allowed me to schedule for myself. The information could be reviewed quickly, which I really appreciated.  

Some people express worry that using colorful and interactive apps to teach our students will diminish their ability to learn the "old-fashioned" way. For as long as I can remember parents or concerned adults worried something important would be lost with each teaching innovation. 

As a product of the '70s education system, I can tell you we were not hurt by such things as Sesame Street or "The New Math" or other such things that were new. When calculators were introduced in the classroom the concern was students would become dependent on them. --Heck, I'm dependent on them. The difference is that today a calculator is readily available on our phones. 

For an accurate analysis of what educational tools work for today's students, I defer 100% to the teachers using them. I don't know which applications help our teachers and which add extra layers of work. My guess is there are some of each. 

I hope that it is the teachers that are consulted for any new school curriculums. I hope that it's the teachers who decide which books (or applications) are best for each group of students. The reality is that their voice is probably rarely consulted. My guess is that teachers' needs (which is another way of saying student needs) are not the biggest consideration. 

When we speak about "what's wrong with education today", it is certainly not the teachers. Teachers are herculean heroes. If we really want to know "what's wrong..." then we need to ask the teachers. They are the only ones truly qualified to answer the question!

View from Parking Lot of School

Freshly Sharpened Pencils in Fall

"Colourful" - By Ole Houen from Denmark

Each year when fall arrives or school starts I remember the line from the movie, "You've Got Mail". Tom Hanks writes to the anonymous Meg Ryan, "Don't you love New York in the fall? It makes me want to buy school supplies. I would send you a bouquet of newly sharpened pencils if I knew your name and address." It's one of the best lines ever! 

I love any place where the crisp, fall air overtakes the summer heat. Buying school supplies is another love of mine.  There is something about new spiral notebooks and file folders that makes me want to organize all of my papers! It helps if they are pretty.

"You've Got Mail" will turn 25 in December, so a whole generation of people must not have seen it. I recommend renting this one and enjoying a feel-good movie. It's not a spoiler to say that two people fall in love...so there, I've said it. But the movie is also a love story about New York. And of books and bookstores. The internet mail communication was cutting edge when the movie came out, which is funny. The movie offers me a love story to nostalgia as well. 

This is my and my daughter's favorite movie. When we lived in the same town we watched it together at least once a year. 

Nora Ephron is the film's director and the writer most credited with writing the script. What needs to get more acknowledgment (in my opinion) is the fact that the movie is co-written with Delia Ephron (Nora's sister).

Delia Ephron is a talented writer in her own right. Last year, Delia released her memoir, which I highly recommend. Since it has been a while since I read it, I looked back at what I wrote on Goodreads, which I'm sharing with you below.

I absolutely loved this book; it is Memoir at its best. I'm afraid my review will not do it justice. Ms. Ephron tells her stories with the intimacy of a close friend. One of the best stories is "Love and Hate on Hold with Verizon". Ms. Ephron captures the insanity of trying to get something simple corrected when you are dealing with a company that is so big it really doesn't care if you are satisfied. Her story is about Verizon, but could just as easily be about AT&T or Cable TV. The frustration, laced with humor, is universal.

Delia's Webpage

Enjoy the beautiful weather!