Teachers' Lounge: Prosperity and Guilt in the Bush Recession

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Saturday March 14, 2009 · 8:02 AM PDT

2009/03/14 · 08:02

This week I achieved and important personal and professional milestone. My principal came to me with an offer of a permanent contract, a procedural step that for all practical purposes assures me of a teaching job until I retire. It's not tenure, but it is security. In Florida beginning teachers must serve three successive one year contracts before being offered a Professional Services Contract. At the end of each of those three years the principal may, without explanation, renew or decline to renew the contract so it's a big deal in Florida. Needless to say, I was grateful and ecstatic. The offer was the culmination of years of hard work and sacrifice.

Subo03

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Saturday January 24, 2009 · 6:52 AM PST

2009/01/24 · 06:52

As a middle school teacher part of my responsibility is to help my students learn how to learn. Even the best of them come to me in the early stages of acquiring academic study skills so much of my 7th grade Geography course is dedicated to introducing and practicing those skills. That sounds great, even noble, but as they say: the devil is in the details.
I'm being reflective because we just finished the first semester and report cards were just handed out to the students. Our AP for Curriculum tells us that 28% of our students have failing grades. Mine are about 10%. (This is not unusual on a yearly basis; the percentages will drop as the end of the year nears and student panic sets in.) My inner dialectic is a common one: am I scaffolding them up to higher level thinking or am I holding their hands too much? Am I pushing them hard enough? Am I denying them the learning experience that only failure can deliver? Those questions are wrapped up in a recent tactic I used with my students, one that is mildly controversial among students, parents and my peers.

Poll

50 votes Show Results

Scaffolding or Enabling?

50 votes Vote Now!

Scaffolding or Enabling?

Scaffolding, they need to see the fruits of success

24 votes

Enabling, failure is a learning process in itself

6 votes

You worry too much, have a piece of pie.

20 votes

Books that got me here

Subo03

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Friday January 02, 2009 · 1:46 PM PST

2009/01/02 · 13:46

While grading my students' papers and bemoaning their poor Language and reading abilities, their dearth of critical thinking skills, and their utter cluelessness of current events I took a few moments to look back on my own intellectual history. I had to tone down my smugness a bit. They are after all only 12-13 and still fairly low on the social consciousness curve. (I teach 7th grade geography--with a few 8th grade retainees thrown in) Still, upon reflection, my genesis as a Progressive began about that age and what I read in my teens had a profound impact on my political and social beliefs.
I began making a reading list of those influential books I read before the age of 21 and have withstood 35-40 years of memory loss. They all influenced my thouight process in some way. The list is personal and somewhat antiquated but all were read before the age of 21.

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Teachers' Lounge: Prosperity and Guilt in the Bush Recession

The Teachers Lounge: Scaffolding or Enabling?

Books that got me here