If you’re looking for a line of work where it’s relatively easy to become well-liked, teaching probably isn’t for you. That’s not to say that it’s impossible to have students and/or colleagues like you — I’ve certainly had my fair share of both — but the heart of your work is convincing a lot of people, more and more of whom have grown up with the instant gratification of modern technology burnt into their synapses at an early age, to set aside those enjoyments and…
Indiana teachers ‘shot execution style’ with fake bullets during active shooter training (New York Daily News) One of the biggest challenges we teachers face is making sure that every moment in our classes has some kind of meaning to it. As interminable as college classes can seem when you’re a student, most of us who teach those classes only have about forty hours over a semester not only to impart knowledge to our students, but also make sure that our students understand that knowledge well enough to be…
On Fox News, Dinesh D’Souza calls on Trump to use “force” and send the National Guard to college campuses to crack down on liberal protesters (mediamatters.org) Of all the social calamities caused by the last thirty years of right-wing education “reforms,” historical detachment may be one of the worst. As an increasing number of schools have been forced to cut their curricular offerings in order to handle an ever-growing host of problems, from budget cuts to mandatory standardized tests on math and reading, fewer students…
An 11-Year-Old Student Was Arrested in Florida After Refusing to Stand for the Pledge of Allegiance (Time) For the last few years of her life, Mom and I had DVR service through our (asshole) cable company, but she didn’t care for it all that much. Even if her eyesight hadn’t deteriorated so much that she had to squint with her face three inches away from the television just to see the cable box menus, Mom didn’t tend to adjust well to new technology, unless it…
[Content warning: This blog contains discussions of bullying.] Nathan Phillips says Covington Catholic teens were disrespectful after investigation clears them (USA Today) One of my primary motivators as a teacher, and something I repeat to myself every day I teach, is that I need to be the kind of teacher for my students that I needed when I was younger. This would be a difficult enough task on its own, but as I’ve often pointed out, anyone who gets into teaching because they think it will…