I work at school and I end up thinking about working and school a lot. I have some VERY not nice thoughts a lot. The funny thing about knowing too much is that is makes you less happy. Being the teacher is the easy part. The role is straight forward: I have things to teach, concrete things. I teach people how to speak another language. They try or not and are successful or not. It is very utilitarian for me.
Most of the kids do learn and they do become speakers of the language. Their language is built by me, my direction, and my resources. I have stopped waxing philosophical about the whole thing. They should learn it because it is an important skill. Hurrah or not.
The funny (not ha, ha, funny) bit is that the school and many of the other teachers want us to be philosophical. I can't imagine why and it gets on my nerves. I always want to point out that if you do your job well, we wouldn't need all of these pep talks.
I know that it is all of the European sinking into me. It is my husbands bullheaded approach. "Do the work, all of it, and do it well." Sometimes Americans annoy me. Sometimes I want to stop being American altogether.
At this point I feel like I should talk about all of the differences that we all end up talking about. 'You know some kids learn differently.' and "You have to find the kids interests.' Really? How on earth can we do that? And what about the subject? You know, the subject that I teach.
I am just feeling the drag right now. I feel that we are being dragged down. All of the work seems to go into the bottom of the class, all of the resources. That's where the money seems to go.
I was never at the bottom. My children are never at the bottom. I keep getting told how lucky I am. I am not lucky. I work hard and I help my kids to work hard too. It just feels like nobody cares about the A students anymore.
What happened to awarding excellence?
1 comments:
I agree that often it seems like my children's teachers are spending too much time trying to help the kids struggling on the bottom so they can pass or helping the English language learners. This year our elementary school got rid of the Gifted and Talented program because of lack of resources. I know the kids on the bottom need the help, and I know that educational intervention can help them avoid lifelong poverty and help close the gap between the haves and the have nots. And still it means that my husband and I have to basically be teachers for an additional 1-3 hours a night for a 3,6 and 10 year old. I am envious of my uncle who could afford to send his kids to private school where they had 12max kids to a class, his son is at MIT now and one of the nicest kids I know.
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