Jacqueline’s Blog

What inspires me as a teacher?  Well, I have been thinking about this a lot.  One thing for sure is the students.  When a students learns to grasp a concept or skill, it is like a child opening up a present and the surprise that you see in their eyes.  The joy that the children feel when they realize that they can do it is priceless.  It is almost like a drug.  Once you see that look in their face and the confidence that they show, you are willing to do almost anything to get the next child to that same place.  I know for first grade teachers, it is when you see children shift from a struggling reader towards having a self-extending system.  You feel so useful!  I think that when people see that joy, they want to share in it for a lifetime as a teacher.

I think the other thing that inspires me is being involved in a community of learners.  Listening to everyone’s burning issues and watching the different ways people tackle it is definitely inspiring.  Yesterday, at the conference, I got to see the work that everyone had struggled with through the year.  The projects turned out so great and I think everybody in our group has changed the body of research out there.  When you are surrounded by great people like the folks that I have worked with in the program this year, you can’t help but be inspired.  For people who don’t go back to school, they miss out on the wonderful things that other learners can share.  I think after the program is over, I could spend five years or so, just taking some of the ideas that I have heard from the other participants in this program, and trying to begin to implement them.  That’s inspiring!

      This chapter begins by talking about something that we have been debating throughout our degree program.  It talks about how many teachers graduating from today’s teacher education programs feel the need to change the world.  As we have discussed many of the issues that are also described in this chapter, I think many of my fellow students in this program feel the same way I do.  We, too, must teach to change the world.  With so many areas of education moving in the wrong direction, we have an obligation to speak out and do what we can.  As I read about things that can help us change the world, I questioned the direction that the state of Georgia seems to be moving in educational decisions.  The first topic that was discussed was teacher shortages.  I was surprised to learn that some colleges still graduate students that haven’t had the opportunity to student teach.  Why is this still happening? I don’t understand how colleges and universities who don’t require student teaching maintain accreditation.  Hasn’t the federal government regulated this too?  If not, this is one area where they should.  And to go even further, we definitely shouldn’t employ people who don’t have certification in the area in which they teach.  I think back to when teachers in Georgia all had to get certified in technology by taking a class called InTech.  Why can’t the state raise the requirements in small increments like that?  I know that in many northern states, to keep your teaching job after a certain number of years, you must attain your Master’s degree.  Why can’t subject area classes be offered during that time so that teachers who don’t have certification in their subject area can attain it at the Masters level.  I also liked the idea of apprenticeship programs.  I think it makes sense.  This would allow teachers who are reaching the ends of their careers to stay in a little longer and help new teachers master all the many things that they must keep juggling in the time of a school day.  However, I keep coming back to the main problem that seems to plague many attempts to improve the system.  Funding!  Until our society stands up and demands that things change, I think that funding will prohibit many of the suggestions that could improve the educational system.  Judy Smith talks in this chapter about raising the consciousness of our society to what our schools need.  I hope that many of us after this program is complete will feel empowered to begin those discussions.  I will begin some of these talks by agreeing with Judy Smith’s comment about poor leadership at the administrative level.  Until we require our administration to actually be instructional leaders, I believe we may find ourselves making some of the same mistakes over and over.  That is why now, I will not give many of my close colleagues at school or at GSU a hard time if they go into administration.  I see now more than ever that if we don’t have diligent leadership who can explain the importance of a quality educational program that is developmentally appropriate, our elected officials will continue to pass legislation like No Child Left Behind that will lack educational integrity.  I also agree that we must counter deficit thinking within our schools and by our teachers with community strengths.  I think we will need to encourage teachers to seek out the strengths of the community similar to the teacher in the chapter.  Until we ask our teachers to actively seek out strengths within our school communities, we may find those strengths will remain hidden.  I know we can do it, but we can’t expect to see great results in one day.  It will take hard work over time and a stubbornness not to give up.  I know this Ed.S. group is up to the task!

     Assessment is suppose to drive our instruction.  However, after reading this chapter, I’m not sure that educators in American History ever realized the correct way that assessments should be used.  It sounds like we as educators in the US have misunderstood how these assessments should be used.  I look back to when I was in the classroom and I think there were times when I misused those assessments as well. Now, after being trained in Reading Recovery, I understand that seeing a student in the process of thinking and the decisions they make can give educators a lot of information about what to teach next.  I think the way that Juliana Jones expresses her assessments provide a clear understanding of what all educators should be looking for.  She talks about using writing as an assessment tool.  She gains a lot of information about strategies, false starts, steps they took, and why.  I think that we have to teach our students how to accurately express their understanding.  This would give us so much information.  However, I think the idea of efficiency seems to take a front seat to correct implementation of assessment.  I think many teachers feel that they don’t have time to analyze or use the assessment information in this way.  In this chapter, they provide a table created by the National Forum on Assessment, which I think we should all revisit periodically to reflect and revise our own performance and understanding of assessments. The two areas that I need improvement are number 4: Professional collaboration and development support of assessment and number 6: Communication about assessment is regular and clear.  As I reflect about my time in school, we took classes that helped preservice teachers clarify the limits of assessments.  We learned about what good questions looked like as well as questions that contained biases and subjectivity.  I think if we were engaging in conversation about test questions and its limitations, we could gain some crucial information that could help students, teachers, and community leaders keep the results in perspective.  I also think that communication should improve in relation to test results.  I know when I was little, I don’t remember when we actually took the test.  However, I do remember having the classroom teacher have a conference with my mother and myself about those results.  She provided strategies and activities that I could do over the summer break that could help improve the test results in the future.  This helped me understand that I did well in certain areas and needed to work on a couple of areas.  This helped me keep the test results in perspective.  I know when I started teaching, we didn’t have time at the end of the year to do that.  I wish that there could be a couple of days in the summer that we could meet with parents and students who wanted more information about the test.  This might help us provide vital information to improve performance on next year’s tests.  I don’t know what I would have done if I had grown up during No Child Left Behind.  I get nervous about testing, by the stakes do seem to be higher today than 20 years ago.  Will the emphasis grow or will we be able to lower the emphasis to a normal level?  I look forward to a day without NCLB to find that out. 

There were so many thoughts that I had as I read this chapter.  I think this is where deficit thinking can be the greatest. I remember when I first started teaching, understanding that I needed to be flexible to involve parents in the school environment.  I remember hearing that I may need to conduct phone conferences over a parent’s lunch break and such.  However, lately, I believe that some teachers are beginning to expect that the parents work within a teacher’s schedule.  There are times when I think that even some of my colleagues have difficulty with involvement due to the school schedule.  So, why shouldn’t we be more flexible?

      One of the ideas that I wanted to respond about was providing transportation for parental involvement.  Could we send out a bus before meetings or activities to increase participation.  I think this is a good idea.  However, I am wondering what the administration at the county level would say with gas prices so high? I am afraid that deficit thinking would take over and they would find a way to cost those transportation costs.  I wonder how some of the schools pay for this expense?

      The other idea found in this chapter is parents who are too involved.  They talk about how parents in middle- and upper-socio economic areas throw their economic power behind the decisions that the schools make.  They even talked about administrations being fired due to parental involvement.  I can’t wait to talk to the Tritt family about this.  I can’t identify with this idea and haven’t seen a parent that enraged.  I wonder if anyone from Tritt has.  Their perspective on this would be interesting.

     The last idea that I wanted to talk about is full-service schools. At our school, we have a dentist come a couple of times a year.  I would love for that program to be expanded.  We seem to fuss with parents at the beginning of the year over vaccinations and then later due to eye- and hearing exams.  If we had a health clinic at school, these students could receive thes services at school.  I know we have a school nurse, but she is busy with the increasing number of diabetic children.  She spends about 1/3 of each school  day working with these children.  This prevents students that may need to see the nurse from getting assistance.  I do think that if children were able to see a health professional about headaches, fever, or vomiting, we could prevent some of the viruses that can run rampant in our school.  But, again, I go back to cost.  How would we pay for it?

 One last thing that the chapter talked about on page 391 was a parent’s right to challenge the system.  The book talks about how we as a school community don’t teach our parents how to effectively challenge the system.  I know every school is required to give a copy of the parents rights for special education.  But, I wondered how schools could encourage this challenging idea.  Could we have paper work available at the local library?  And then I thought, you have got to be kidding me!  I know if you researched it a little, probably with the help of a librarian, there are already books and articles that talk about this very thing.  I don’t believe the book’s assertion that parents don’t know how to challenge the system.  I think if a parent is motivated enough, they should be able to find information that would help them…That’s enough for my rambling thoughts.  See you in class!