Back from my three-week hiatus, end of the semester craziness has finally come to a close!
When you walk into a classroom you can immediately tell whether this is a place of learning for students or a holding cell for the down-trodden, waiting to age-out or drop-out. Anyone with experience in education has seen their fair share of both of these types of classrooms. However, it is important to realize the fundamental difference between the two and its probably not what you'd expect.
Recently, while doing observation hours in an urban school district, I came across a teacher who said he could only accomplish so much because the students did not have support from home, had unstable and terrible home-lives, and were unmotivated to learn. He made the honest and humble claim that he was not a miracle worker. Surely, this teacher cannot be faulted if he does not have the drive and motivation to go the extra mile to engage these disenfranchised students, they're already counted as lost causes by society. Which one of the two classrooms I mentioned earlier do you think this teacher had? Why?
Flip to another observation experience (it took four years but I've realized 20 hours a semester has begun to pay off), this time in a suburban school district, and the teacher is not only a teacher, but a coach for one of the school's athletic teams. Motivator? Oh you know it, he could motivate someone to think that derivatives in calculus was entertaining! However, this classroom of mostly middle-class students is sitting idly unfocused and unmotivated to learn while the teacher shows a video on the topic that day. What's this teacher's reason for having disengaged students?
One more anecdote from an observation experience: this time in another urban school district. It is a co-taught mathematics class and the general ed teacher and special ed teacher are working hand in hand to get this class of 30 students to understand how to graph a line using slope-intercept form (talk about BORING). About 25 % of the students are on IEPs and there is a student who has a auditory deficiency and has an interpreter. Every student in this classroom is engaged. Every student is participating. and at the end of the lesson every student leaves with the satisfaction of having learned a new skill. Oh, I forgot to mention that many of these students come from the troubled home-lives mentioned in the first scenario. Why is this classroom any different?
Educators must understand that all students have an innate desire to learn, to better themselves, to improve their situations. If the educator gives up on the student, who is left to look out for them? Teacher apathy is what stands in the way of educational success and is what marks the major difference between a person who is teaching, and a person who is a teacher. Teaching is a life-long vocation, not a 40hours a week job. No student deserves being given up on, and every student can be motivated to learn. It's just a matter of finding their trigger and taking the time to form a relationship.
As I look forward to my student teaching experience, I hope to keep the energy and drive alive because students feed off of the energy of their teacher. If the fire burns out, find a new profession because students need teachers who are motivated, driven and have a passion for learning.
-MB
When you walk into a classroom you can immediately tell whether this is a place of learning for students or a holding cell for the down-trodden, waiting to age-out or drop-out. Anyone with experience in education has seen their fair share of both of these types of classrooms. However, it is important to realize the fundamental difference between the two and its probably not what you'd expect.
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Flip to another observation experience (it took four years but I've realized 20 hours a semester has begun to pay off), this time in a suburban school district, and the teacher is not only a teacher, but a coach for one of the school's athletic teams. Motivator? Oh you know it, he could motivate someone to think that derivatives in calculus was entertaining! However, this classroom of mostly middle-class students is sitting idly unfocused and unmotivated to learn while the teacher shows a video on the topic that day. What's this teacher's reason for having disengaged students?
One more anecdote from an observation experience: this time in another urban school district. It is a co-taught mathematics class and the general ed teacher and special ed teacher are working hand in hand to get this class of 30 students to understand how to graph a line using slope-intercept form (talk about BORING). About 25 % of the students are on IEPs and there is a student who has a auditory deficiency and has an interpreter. Every student in this classroom is engaged. Every student is participating. and at the end of the lesson every student leaves with the satisfaction of having learned a new skill. Oh, I forgot to mention that many of these students come from the troubled home-lives mentioned in the first scenario. Why is this classroom any different?
Educators must understand that all students have an innate desire to learn, to better themselves, to improve their situations. If the educator gives up on the student, who is left to look out for them? Teacher apathy is what stands in the way of educational success and is what marks the major difference between a person who is teaching, and a person who is a teacher. Teaching is a life-long vocation, not a 40hours a week job. No student deserves being given up on, and every student can be motivated to learn. It's just a matter of finding their trigger and taking the time to form a relationship.
As I look forward to my student teaching experience, I hope to keep the energy and drive alive because students feed off of the energy of their teacher. If the fire burns out, find a new profession because students need teachers who are motivated, driven and have a passion for learning.
-MB
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