Posts Tagged ‘Teacher’

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Teacher Tells Graduating Class they are Not Special

June 10, 2012

There has been an overwhelming amount of approval from the general public following teacher David McCullough Jr’s declaration to his graduating class that they are “not exceptional.”

I can understand why people have agreed with his comments and I, like many, found his speech very entertaining. However, I do not agree with the method of reducing people down to a lowly level.

Sure, the standard graduation speech, like many parenting styles, reveal an untruthful optimism that makes the student/child believe they are more than they really are and are bound to achieve more than they really do.

But don’t replace one extreme viewpoint with another.

Sure, the students at a graduating ceremony may not be exceptional, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be. Who is exceptional anyway? Who has the authority to label someone as exceptional?

I believe that everyone in the world has the capacity to live a life of integrity. Is integrity not an exceptional character trait? Not according to David McCullough Jr . I believe everyone has the potential to make others feel better about themselves. Is that an exceptional character trait? Not according to David McCullough Jr .

According to David McCullough Jr.’s standards we should just all replace our arrogance with something that doesn’t seem especially satisfactory:

A Massachusetts high school teacher who told graduating students in a speech that they were nothing special and should learn to come to terms with it has won widespread approval.

The no-nonsense David McCullough Jr told Wellesley High School’s “pampered” and “bubble-wrapped” class of 2012 that they were “not exceptional” at a graduation ceremony last weekend, the NY Daily News reports.

“Capable adults with other things to do have held you, kissed you, fed you, wiped your mouth, wiped your bottom, trained you, taught you, tutored you, coached you, listened to you, counselled you, encouraged you, consoled you and encouraged you again,” Mr McCullough said.

“But do not get the idea you’re anything special. Because you’re not.”

The English teacher illustrated his point mathematically.

“Think about this: even if you’re one in a million, on a planet of 6.8 billion that means there are nearly 7,000 people just like you,” he said.

The son of Pulitzer prize-winning historian David McCullough told the graduates and their parents that around 3.2 million other students would be graduating from over 37,000 US high schools that year.

“That’s 37,000 valedictorians. 37,000 class presidents. 92,000 harmonising altos. 340,000 swaggering jocks”.

The teacher warned that gestures have taken precedence over deeds and that today people sought to accomplish thing for the recognition rather than the pursuit of a goal.

“As a consequence, we cheapen worthy endeavors, and building a Guatemalan medical clinic becomes more about the application to Bowdoin than the well-being of the Guatemalans,” he said.

Despite his unusual approach the speech was welcomed by students and parents alike who said they appreciated being told “what we need to hear and not necessarily what we wanted to hear,” local newspaper The Swellesley Report commented.

Mr McCullough told FOX News in an interview that parents are often overly protective of their children and this doesn’t help them learn to deal with a tough and competitive world.

“So many of the adults around them — the behaviour of the adults around them — gives them this sort of inflated sense of themselves. And I thought they needed a little context, a little perspective,” he said.

“To send them off into the world with an inflated sense of themselves is doing them no favors.”

I quite liked aspects of the speech and think that it made some very good points expressed with great humour. What I didn’t buy into however, was his version of what life should be like. It seemed almost as unsatisfactory as the things he warned against.

I wish that graduating class well. I hope they grow up to be kind, caring, selfless people who try to enrich the lives of others and resist from judging or ignoring the people around them. I hope they grow up to use their skills for good, be charitable with their time and money and raise children that will do the same.

Is that exceptional? Not according to David McCullough Jr .

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Posted in Child Development | 2 Comments »

5 Tips for Frustrated Teachers

June 6, 2012


If you are finding your job quite challenging lately and you are at a loss to work out how to restore order in the classroom, I hope these tips will prove useful:

1. You Have Nothing to be Ashamed of: Even the best of teachers often struggle to keep control of a classroom. You should not feel deflated if your current crop of children are making your life difficult and testing your patience. This is nothing unusual. Make sure you keep a positive front. Children do not tend to feel empathy for a defeated teacher. On the flip side, they have respect for a teacher that can overcome difficult moments and stay positive, enthusiastic and show a willingness to intoduce new ideas to make things work.

2. What you Teach is not as Important as who you Teach: As much as it can frustrate when you have a lot to cover and so little time to cover it, it is important to note that the most important aspect of your job is to look after the wellbeing of your students. It is perfectly alright to interrupt a maths class for a discussion on bullying or respect. It is also important to realise that whilst Timmy may frustrate you and come to class with a poor attitude, the best thing you can do for him is to plant a seed of positivity. He may leave your class without the skills you have taught, but at least you have let him know that you believe in him and are there for him regardless.

3. If They are not Listening, Perhaps you Should Stop Talking: Teachers often complain about the lack of concentration among their students. This is commonplace, but not always entirely the students’ fault. Teachers often talk too much. From laboured mat sessions to interminable board work, teachers have got to realise that the more they talk, the more the students program themselves to daydream. Teachers have got to spend less time talking to the class and more time going from individual to individual. This is less threatening, more effective and better for charting individual progress. Other ideas include: Group work, games and interactive programs.

4. Stop Threatening: Detentions, suspensions and other punishments are important tools in a teachers toolbox, but boy they can get overused! A teacher’s attitude sets the tone for the classroom. If the “go-to” response is always to threaten and punish, the classroom will be a negative place. If the teacher instead put a privilege on the board (such as extra computer time) and during the class add under the privellege according to behaviour, attitude and work ethic, it sets a very different mood. Instead of feeling watched and judged, the students feel empowered to earn the teacher’s respect and motivated to win the reward.

5. Small Changes Make a Big Difference: When you are in a rut, the desperate part of you wants to change the world in a day. This is impossible. A better approach would be to isolate a goal or two such as; working on an orderly line-up, getting the students to raise hands before asking questions or getting the students to reflect on how they treat each other. These goals may seem insufficient in the grader scheme of an uncontrolled classroom but I assure you small goals can make big changes to the classroom dynamic.

I hope these tips are of use. We all struggle at times to teach effectively. You are not alone!

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Posted in Classroom Management | 2 Comments »

Students Set-Up Their Teacher and Destroy Her Career

May 31, 2012

Just because young Julie Warning was framed for having a relationship with a student doesn’t in any way excuse her behaviour. It was extremely mean-spirited and heartless for Eric Arty and his friends to collect bets on who would successfully be the first to kiss her, but regardless, a great deal more is expected of teachers than to be involved personally with a student.

Over the course of the next few days there will be a lot written about Julie Warning, yet, possibly not enough criticism levelled at Eric Arty and his friends. Their role in this saga should not go unpunished. Their bet was quite shocking and should not be tolerated by the school hierarchy. They should be expelled for their little gambling venture.

Expelled? But they were just being kids?

They were exhibiting behaviour which was quite misogynistic, terribly destructive to a young woman’s reputation and career and downright immoral.

Keeping them at the school will not only give the school a bad name, but will turn these pranksters into heroes and celebrities among the student body. This is not an acceptable outcome.

A high school teacher filmed in a passionate embrace with a pupil fell victim to a $500 bet between five friends about who could kiss her first, it emerged today.

Eric Arty, 18, beat his friends to the jackpot after the student and four friends put in $100 for a race to romance their global studies teacher Julie Warning, 26.

Andrew Cabrera, a junior at Manhattan Theater Lab HS, where Warning worked until Tuesday, told the New York Post: ‘It was a bet with a group of his friends. They gave him the $500 [pot].’

Speaking about Arty’s seduction, he said: ‘He would go after class and basically try to seduce her.

‘I don’t know if she knew [about the bet]. They were all trying to get with her.

‘One of his [Arty’s] friends flirted with her more than anyone — I thought he would be the one, but Eric came out of nowhere and got her.’

The affair was revealed yesterday by The New York Post — which ran a front-page picture of the pair kissing on Friday at Bleecker Playground in Greenwich Village and published the video online.

The case has been turned over to the Department of Education Special Commissioner of Investigations and Warning was reassigned.

However, school officials said Warning did not report to her new job yesterday and could not be reached for comment.

Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott said: ‘It’s my understanding that she did not show up to her reassignment center.

‘So we’ll do more investigating on why she hasn’t shown up.’

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Posted in Professional Conduct | 2 Comments »

Students Encouraged to Question … sometimes

May 21, 2012

I am a big advocate for encouraging children to think for themselves. I have no desire to brainwash my students or have them align their thinking to my own worldview. On the contrary, little gives me more pleasure than watching my students reach their own conclusions and engage in a robust exchange of ideas. On the flip side, it can be a bit disappointing that many children are so used to being spoonfed and mollycoddled , that it is becoming quite rare for a young child to form their own ideas.

That’s why I was deeply disturbed to read about the teacher who publicly chastised her student for daring to criticise President Obama:

A North Carolina high school teacher was captured on video shouting at a student who questioned President Obama and suggesting he could be arrested for criticizing a sitting president. 

The Salisbury Post, which first reported on the YouTube video, did not identify the teacher in question, who is reportedly on staff at North Rowan High School. The video does not show faces, but the heated argument in the classroom can clearly be heard. 

“Do you realize that people were arrested for saying things bad about Bush?” the teacher said toward the end of the argument, telling the student, “you are not supposed to slander the president.” 

The student told the teacher that one can’t be arrested “unless you threaten the president.” 

The argument started when the classroom began discussing news reports that Mitt Romney bullied a fellow student when he was in high school. 

“Didn’t Obama bully somebody though?” a student in the classroom asked, referring to an incident Obama described in his memoir “Dreams From My Father.” 

The teacher said she didn’t know — and the argument quickly escalated, as the teacher yelled at the student, telling him “there is no comparison.” 

“He’s running for president,” she said of Romney. “Obama is the president.”

 The student argued that both candidates are “just men,” but the teacher said: “Let me tell you something … you will not disrespect the president of the United States in this classroom.” 

According to the Salisbury Post, the teacher is still employed and has not been suspended. 

“The Rowan-Salisbury School System expects all students and employees to be respectful in the school environment and for all teachers to maintain their professionalism in the classroom. This incident should serve as an education for all teachers to stop and reflect on their interaction with students,” the school said in a statement, published by the Post. “Due to personnel and student confidentiality, we cannot discuss the matter publicly.”

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Posted in Teaching Methods | Leave a Comment »

Do Experienced Teachers Give Enough Back to the Profession?

May 21, 2012

Although I have not had this experience myself, I have heard many young teacher talk with exasperation about their experienced colleagues. These teachers, looking for mentorship, problem solving methods and simple direction and assurance from their older and more confident co-workers, have complained that they are often left to their own devices. They claim that experienced teachers tend to find a comfortable groove and are reluctant to do any more than absolutely necessary.

Whilst I realise that this characterisation of experienced teachers doesn’t reflect all who fall into that category, I wonder whether teacher burnout as well as the fact that experienced teachers have reached the peak both in status and salary, are contributing factors to this likely scenario. Since these teachers have devoted decades to what is a challenging and physically taxing profession, the job of mentoring a new teacher can often be too much of burden.

If this is correct, it is quite unfortunate. Our young teachers, in my opinion, are poorly trained. Our teacher training courses are high on useless theory and low on practical instruction. I have never met a teacher who considered Vygotsky’s theory of proximal development of greater use to their day-to-day teaching than the precious but fleeting weeks spent visiting schools as a pre-service teacher.

There clearly needs to be a greater incentive for experienced teachers to help new teachers settle into their role and adjust to the dramatic change from student-teacher to actual teacher.

Last year I formulated a two-tiered approach to making best use of experienced teachers:

1. Experienced teachers who are deemed to be excelling at a certain standard are offered a mentoring role for higher wages. If accepted to take on that role, these teachers would offer new teachers the chance to spend a few days in their classroom, let them observe their lessons, give them access to the their planning material and be someone out of that teacher’s school environment who can deliver advice and guidance via email and phone. This challenges the mentor teacher to strive in their new position as well as their underling.

2. For the second category of teacher, I recommend that newly retired teachers, who have left the profession with a wealth of knowledge and an eagerness to maintain links with the profession, be paid to mentor and assist teachers who have not been performing at the required benchmarks. Instead of firing teachers in the first instance, I propose that these teachers get the opportunity to improve with a greater deal of support and collaboration.

WHAT THIS SOLUTION ACHIEVES

• Provides the opportunity for excellent teachers to be better paid;

• Allows retired teachers to maintain links with their profession and share their wealth of experience;

• Gives new teachers greater confidence and a non-judgemental mentor who they can approach; and

• Allows teachers currently not working at their premium a second chance that may reinvigorate and refresh them.

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Posted in Teacher Training | 2 Comments »

Should Schools Be Allowed to Fire Pregnant Unmarried Teachers?

April 12, 2012

I believe that religious schools, within reason, should be allowed to enforce extra regulations on their staff as they see fit. This is of course provided that the staff are made fully aware of the rules before they are employed.

The question still remains. Is it reasonable to fire teachers for falling pregnant outside of marriage?

A teacher and coach at a private Christian school in Texas fired for an unwed pregnancy wants to set the record straight about who she is for those who question her fitness as a “Christian role model.”

“I’m not just some teacher that went out to a bar and go pregnant and went back to school saying it’s okay,” Cathy Samford told ABCNews.com today. “I was in a committed relationship the whole time and probably would have been married if things had gone differently and this would be a non-situation.”

Samford, 29, was in her third year as a volleyball coach at Heritage Christian Academy in Rockwall, Tex., and her first year as a middle school science teacher when she discovered she was pregnant in the fall of 2011.

She and her fiance had been planning to get married at the end of the summer, but a series of events had delayed the wedding.

Samford said she never dreamed she would be fired for her pregnancy and went into her conversations with the school thinking their biggest concern would be her missing part of the basketball season since she was supposed to coach.

When she was told she was being terminated, Samford was “totally shocked.”

“I didn’t think I would lose my job,” Samford said. “I was in shock and devastated and that’s when I said, ‘If this is the problem, I’m willing, and so is my fiancé, to go ahead and get married. That wasn’t the issue. We were going to get married regardless.”

The school denied her offer.

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Posted in School Rules | Leave a Comment »

Supreme Court Gives Permission for Teachers to Have Sex With Students

April 2, 2012

I don’t care if the student is 18 or 80, a teacher has no place engaging in sexual activity with a student. It is inappropriate and immoral, and should at the very least cost the teacher their job. A teacher can not properly conduct a classroom when they are intimate with one of their students.

I am very disappointed to read that an Arkansas Supreme Court decided it is okay for teachers and students to have sex, as long as the student is 18.

The ruling is in response to an appeal by David Paschal, an Elkins High School teacher found guilty of having consensual sex with an 18-year-old student.

State attorneys argued the law protects high school girls and boys from sexual advances by teachers. But the high court says regardless of how it feels about Paschal’s conduct, they can not abandon their duty to uphold the law.

Therefore, Paschal will have his convictions reversed and dismissed.

At a local high school baseball game on Saturday, parents reacted to the news.

“These teachers should know better because there is a difference when you are being a teacher and a friend; and somebody that is having sex with your students,” said Denise Colson.

Amy Dardenne added, “If the child wants to have sex when they are 18 with their teacher, that is fine. They are adults at 18, so they might as well do what they want to do.”

It’s unclear whether anyone in the legislature will attempt to rework the law. A spokesperson for Governor Mike Beebe says it is way to early to talk about any kind of response from the State Capitol.

Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel says his office respects the court’s decision, although they disagree with it and are evaluating all options.

It is not”fine” for an 18 year-old to bed their teacher. It is tantamount to a breach of trust on the part of the teacher. That teacher is bestowed with the responsibility of grading impartially, treating each student fairly, being a good role model and responsible citizen.

None of which can be said of a teacher who has sex with a student.

In my opinion, a high school teacher who is found to have been engaged in a sexual relationship with their student should be imprisoned for their actions.

Click on the link to read How Can a Child Sex Lobby Exist in the First Place?

Click on the link to read Should Classrooms Be Fitted With Surveillance Cameras?

Click on the link to read Teacher Orders 20 Classmates to Beat Up Bully

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Posted in Ethics in the Classroom, Professional Conduct | 6 Comments »

The Fine Line Between a “Fragile” Teacher and a Dangerous One

March 25, 2012

Sometimes it is absolutely vital to call a spade a spade. There is no good reason to protect the honour or devise a defence for a teacher that incites her class to stand for a minute silence for a known terrorist. It doesn’t matter how troubled this teacher may have been, there was no excuse for this incredibly irresponsible act:

A French teacher was suspended on Friday for allegedly urging her class to observe a minute’s silence for serial killer Mohamed Merah, the day after he was shot dead by police.

Education Minister Luc Chatel had called for the teacher to be suspended after her class reported she called Merah a “victim” and said his links to Al-Qaeda were invented by the media and “Sarko”, referring to President Nicolas Sarkozy.

“An immediate suspension has been decided along with a ban on entering the school,” the local education authority’s Florence Robine told journalists, adding that the suspension did not imply any guilt.

She “clearly said that Mohamed Merah was a victim, that the link with Al-Qaeda had been invented by the media and ‘Sarko’,” said the letter, a copy of which was published by the Paris Normandie newspaper.

“This is not the political act of an extremist but the act of a colleague who has health concerns, who is fragile and who is receiving psychological treatment,” the local head of the SGEN-CFDT union, Pascal Bossuyt, told AFP.

“She said something unfortunate in a particular context and she immediately regretted what she said,” he added.

Police shot Merah dead on Thursday at his flat in southwest France where he was holed up after going on a jihadist-inspired killing spree. His victims included three young Jewish children and three paratroopers.

It is a shame that “fragile” teachers with “health concerns” are often allowed to practice until they do something inappropriate. This was more than the act of a teacher requiring “psychological treatment.”

This was the act of a teacher who is completely unfit for teaching.

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Posted in Professional Conduct | 2 Comments »

Parents Urged to do the Job of a Teacher

March 1, 2012

It is my belief that the job of a parent is to parent and the job of the teacher is to teach. Sure it’s wonderful when parents take it upon themselves to help reinforce skills taught in class. I am always appreciative of parents that spare some time to revise concepts covered during the school day. But essentially, I am paid to ensure that the parents can spend textbook-free quality time with their children. This is in my view essential to maximising the relationship of child and parent. Children often show a reluctance to work through school material with their parents and parents often get very anxious when trying to get their children to concentrate and listen to their explanations.

It is my job to see it that parents are free to spend time with their children without having to go through the ordeal of maths and science work. That’s what they pay me for.

But unfortunately, it seems that we are not doing a good enough job. It seems as if parents have often been given little choice but to try to fill in the gaps we have left behind. You hear too many stories of parents frantically trying to complete their own childs’ homework, sometimes struggling to work out the answers themselves:

A quarter of parents in Reading admit that helping their children with homework leads to family arguments, according to a survey.

Research by tuition provider Explore Learning also showed 9.2 per cent rarely helped their children with homework with more than two thirds struggling when they did.

Maths confuses parents the most with 41.2 per cent of parents finding the subject hard to grasp compared to the 11.1 per cent of parents who find English difficult.

Nationally, nearly a third of parents admitted homework had caused friction in the family with Reading not straying far from the average when it came to struggling in maths and English.

It’s time we let parents bond with their children instead of getting them to do our dirty work. Homework, if administered at all, should be revision of concepts covered in the class. If the children are not capable of doing it independently it shouldn’t have been given to them in the first place.

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Posted in Homework, Parenting | 1 Comment »

The Teacher Bashing Era Must End

February 26, 2012

Teachers have never been more criticised and devalued than they are right now. Whilst you can’t blame all negative incidents on a political and media campaign against teaching standards, I’m sure children pick up on the discontent in the wider community.

To read that three children in the 5th Grade twice attempted to poison their teacher, makes me wonder how children as young as that can rationalise in their own minds that killing their teacher would be a worthwhile solution to their problems:

Three California fifth-graders who confessed to using rat poison in attempts to harm their teacher are being moved to other schools.

The three students at Balderas Elementary School in Fresno admitted lacing the teacher’s coffee and a cupcake with rat poison in two separate incidents, according to the Fresno Teachers Association and published reports.

Miraculously, the teacher never took a sip of the coffee or a bite of the cupcake.

One of the three accused students apparently had a change of heart and knocked the coffee cup out of the teacher’s hand before she could drink from it.

The mid-December incidents came to light two months after they happened because a parent of one of the students bragged that her boy saved a teacher’s life.

No criminal charges have been filed against the two boys and one girl, according to ABC’s Fresno affiliate KFSN. The Fresno Police Department is continuing to investigate, but says there is little or no physical evidence remaining from the December incidents. The Fresno County district attorney’s office will decide whether to press charges against the children.

All three students have been expelled and moved to other schools, according to KFSN. The two boys are being transfered to the Phoenix Academy, which does not sit well with at least one of its teachers.

This story is quite sickening. I wonder if those students involved were in any way incited by a general lack of community respect for the teaching fraternity.

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Posted in Teacher Welfare | 1 Comment »

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