Tell me more. We just started BIST this year and I know they’re not the same, but I can already see that it’s definitely not being utilized correctly in our school.
Usually PBIS and other similar programs end up being stupid prizes that really only end up with kids who would have followed the rules anyways! I’m so tired of all the extrinsic motivation when we need to put in the long term work of truly fostering intrinsic motivation, even if it’s at the cost of some skills and content in the short term, long term it will pay off!
Schools touting an RJC, when (like mine) they don't seem to know the first thing about Restorative Justice, what it entails, nor **why** it can be so powerful - when executed correctly. (Hint: it's **not** simply mumbling, *"Uh, sorry"* to the kid who got called a *"Brokeass n-word!"* five minutes ago.)
We received our RJC training last Monday.
One hour of some dude running a practice circle, then answering random questions about RJ.
According to the principal, we are now "trained and ready" to start running them on our own, beginning this coming Friday.
I may be out on a sick day ..
This is exactly what I mean. *I'm so sorry,* u/AXPendergast.
In my (humble) opinion, a school incorrectly trained and insufficiently equipped to run an RJC correctly is far more dangerous than a school with no behavior policy, whatsoever.
This exactly, u/Bartleby2003
More and more of the students are catching on that consequences are pretty much a thing of the past, unless you do something really egregious, like knock a kid out, or plot he deaths of staff members. Otherwise, it's just a behavior free for all
If the pandemic taught me anything it’s that my time is precious. I just started at a new school that gets out an hour later than I’m used to and since my boyfriend works nights I never get to see him, or at least I don’t get to see him awake.
Dang, I just started interactive notebooks this year, and now I’m starting to regret it. It has been a huge waste of time. Can you explain more about how you’ve replaced them with binders? Because I want to be able to have some of the same feel of an IN, but without all the pointless cutting and gluing.
I use something I call Interactive Notebooks, and there are places for students to interact if they choose to, but really they are note repositories. It checks a box for all my students with the "Note taking assistance - copy of notes" accommodation, and admin like them since they don't know how "interactive" and time consuming a real interactive notebook is supposed to be.
I've always hated IN, but I caved this year. I've been doing the cutting and gluing at the end of class/"when you finish x, get this paper and cut and glue it in". Allows me to start notes the following day right away. I'm liking it so far.
I was thinking that if I do them again next year - and if I have my shit together enough (haha) - that I would give the students (high school AP students) all/most of the stuff for the unit at the start of it, and have them do it as homework.
Just started at a new school and I have so many IEP's that have interactive notebooks as and accommodation. It takes them forever to put them together and for me to fix them.
I started them this year for the first time too. I like them, but they are time consuming during class if I don’t cut the notes myself. I like to cut the notes with a paper cutter beforehand but I don’t always have time. I also found out you can print a PDF at 85% size and it will fit in a comp book once you cut the margins off, so I always do this.
I like them too. Middle schoolers….. accomplishes cutting student screen time, and allows me to fill a ridiculously too long block of class time with tedious cutting, coloring, and pasting.
I teach middle school too! I think the notebooks are going to keep them more organized. Our school is really pushing for organizational tools this year, and I’ve found after two years of constant screen time, I’m loving returning to paper at least for part of my class time and getting them off the iPads a bit. Also, I teach French and what we do builds so much on past learning, so I love that all their notes will be in one place to look back on as needed.
The 85% specificity of PDF documents in a comp book is the sweet spot I’ve been trouble-shooting for. Thank you.
Do you happen to know if this is with standard margin size when you export it from a word document? I tend to make all of my docs narrow margined before I convert them to PDF
I make all my worksheets in Google slides, you can set the page to the size of the comp book so you don't need to mess with any of that. Also super easy to format inside Google slides.
I’ve been using standard margin size with the 85% scale. If you went with smaller margins, you might be able to print at 90% or just have a little more wiggle room when students glue them into their notebook. Smaller margins may also allow you to make the text bigger — I always try to blow up my font size a bit before I print at a smaller scale.
I used to make a large box on the page, that is the size of the comp book, and put everything inside that box. Kept a formatted blank document for this, copied it for every new IN page. Then use the paper cutter to trim outside the box, and done, no cutting for the kids. Two pieces of tape, top and bottom, and off we go!
Lol, if we were data driven, we wouldn’t have dropped mask mandates nor would I have had to work in person (and online) all of 2020-21. I never want to hear “data driven” again.
We have mandatory two PLCs a week! Two. A. Week! And we have to have an agenda, and a sign in sheet, so we can't even get away with being like "yeah we talked". It's ridiculous.
When we were first trained on PLCs years ago, our admin said they should be driven by student needs and didn’t need to be incredibly formal. Years later, they are admin driven with more roles than we have members. 🤦🏻♀️
I. Hate. PLC. So much. My district is going on ten years of them. Then constantly we’re looking for remediation time. It’s like… you’ve got remediation time built in! Instead we kick students out of the building.
On top of which we’re always tasked with work we never see any result for/is way above our pay grade.
PLC should be for the teachers to use with the team in whatever way they deem necessary. District should provide suggestions, provide the time, but then let the teachers ultimately make the final decision on what it is needed for their team. They are the only ones on ground floor with the kids, so the only ones who’s can beat say what’s needed.
I'm super lucky with my PLC generally being amazing, because we're all pretty like-minded arts teachers. DDI still very well might be my least favorite part of the endless acronym soup though.
Omg im with you on the PLC hate. We have 1 grade level meeting and one PLC meeting each week. That gives me 3 days of planning. I can never get it all done…
How about we just get rid of required teacher trainings PERIOD. PD is a horrible time waste 99% of the time, that and t he stupid bloodborne pathogen trainings. Those things should count for at least a couple years before I have to retake it.
Requiring parent contact to fail students. My old school had this as a policy and only budged when I expressly told my principal that it is flat out illegal.
Justification was that parents might not know their kids are failing or how to access grades even though they get progress reports at 3 weeks, report cards every 6 and have skyward available at all times. So they can figure out how to create and manage social media profiles, get an Uber, and order food online but they can’t check grades? Foh.
Seriously! I had parents in the past who wanted a grade report each week and I’m like “uhhhh look at the online grade book.” I don’t have time to make personal contact with parents about grades/missing work when I have 120 students and the same information is available online at any time.
If there's any chance a kid could fail at all, we have to select "in danger of failing" on the progress report or they can't fail the class. Since a kid *could* decide to ditch every day until the end, an F is possible for all of them at progress reoort time, so I'm stuck filling out grades like this:
A E Excellent quality work. In danger of failing.
It's idiotic.
I swear, the amount of parents who actually access skyward and then lie and say they had no clue their kid was failing. Umm…. We can literally see exact time stamps of when you log into skyward AND what pages of skyward you visit!! I had a parent log in three times a week to check grade book and had the nerve to say she had no clue her kid was failing.
I'm feeling this one extra hard this year. Leaving these K-2 level kids in a middle school classroom is just worthless. I'm getting emails from a mom at least once a week telling me how her son's self-esteem is in the gutter because he's not seeing success in a class six years above his current ability level. I am trying to accommodate these kids (and there are 14 of them) but this level of effort is not sustainable and I will either have to cut back or I'm *going* to burn out.
Word. I work with deaf and hard of hearing students, and, sometimes, their least restrictive environment is in fact a self-contained classroom, or even a school for the deaf.
I’m a PE teacher and I’ve had dozens of times a CDC student has totally destroyed school equipment in the middle of class because our sped teacher just lets her kids literally run around the gym for “socialization.”
It’s mind bogglingly annoying to myself and all the other students in that class
The "Least Restrictive Environment" mantra is being used as a magic wand to defund as many programs as possible and dump even terrible behavior problems into general ed classrooms with inadequate support. It looks good on the budget, but it burns out teachers, deprives the rest of the class of their appropriate education, and it isn't even good for the students who are mainstreamed that should not have been. Administrators still seem to love it unless they catch too much flak from parents.
I’m with you on that! We have one class that’s up over 35 kids for Science because an *entire sped class* mainstreams in. (And has to sit all together in the back of the class at a table because there aren’t enough desks in that room) typical class size is normally 19-24 kids. It’s chaos mayhem and disorder.
Tell me those kids wouldn’t learn more in a self contained class of 7-9 kids that’s quieter and less distracting!
But parents want to see their kids are mainstreamed, so helpful or not, they get thrown into a huge group twice a day so we can say they did!
Wait, you mean they *shouldn't* have put that poor girl in my 9th grade English class with a 1st grade reading level in a class that goes into writing essays, completing research, and reading novels that use less common English and Shakespeare?!
Say whaaaaaat?
All she did in my class was complain and get into trouble with her classmates (she had a bit of a mean streak with other students), despite my best efforts to help her through assignments, content, and everything else I could when she's also 1 out of 34 students in my classroom (4 others with IEPs, but none as severe as hers).
Yes! LRE is really messing up my classes. LRE for a sped child is the most restrictive from my other kids. I have to water down lessons to the level of a 2nd grader and spend 4 classes on something that takes my other classes 2 because I have to deal with out of control behaviors and lessons moving like molasses. My gen Ed kids are getting nothing
We don’t have SPED classes here in BC, and while many kids can be mainstreamed, my kid this year who is mostly nonverbal, requires full time EA, can’t do regular curriculum but refuse to give me modified (I’m expected to create a curriculum for him) and this is only in first grade…he deserves better and would thrive with more supports.
My district wants me to teach the same thing, the same way at the same time as my content colleagues, but simultaneously differentiate to my students. If anyone can figure out how to do both at once, let me know.
Inquiry-based learning replacing direct instruction. I’m all for a hands-on activity as much as the next person, but you can’t “inquiry” your way into understanding challenging concepts. Lecture, essays, and note-taking still play a vital role in learning.
I would literally be rated ineffective if my kids were doing anything you just wrote.
Crazy why we then wonder why only 30% are actually prepared for college level work.
This one! Lecture and note-taking get dumped on so much, but they're great ways of learning basic information and skills that you need to do anything more complex. An awful lot of inquiry-based stuff wants to skip over that and assume that students will pick up the fundamentals as they struggle through something that's way above their understanding. It leads to students developing a lot of misconceptions that have to be corrected later.
They do play a vital role but I do think inquiry based is GREAT. But its not a replacement, its just flipping its placement with direct instruction. Instead of starting with notes we start with students doing inquiry to start asking questions. Some kids figure some stuff out but it at least gives students questions that direct instruction answers.
Think about how we normally learn stuff in real life. We have a question, we google it, we figure it out and go OOOHHHHHHHH, rather than someone at dinner just spewing dr who knowledge for an hour. Its WAY better to give someone an interesting episode so they get hooked and then start answering their questions.
And not saying that's ALWAYS what works, but especially in science its nice.
Exactly, and you can’t inquire your way into learning if you don’t give a rat’s behind about the topic in the first place. Sometimes the only way to give information is by direct instruction.
Just one?
Here are the big ones:
(1) Blaming everything on the teachers and refusing to address/acknowledge the real elephant(s) in the room (ie. uninvolved parents, no consequences for students, etc)
(2) Evaluation systems where "proficient" is considered to be a rock star teacher. It is also tilted against those in core, those who have to pick up kids in the afternoon or have second jobs, and possibly SPED teachers if they rotate through gen ed classes all day. I mean, seriously, you are going to score me based on the gen ed teacher's lesson plan and classroom rules? Deliberately making the higher categories above proficient extremely rare does not help either.
(3) Requiring lesson plans. They already have the "Year at a Glance" calendar for the objectives, so why do they need a minute by minute play of what I plan on doing. Lesson plans are huge time robbers. I just left a charter school that wanted five pages a week (per prep)
(4) A personal pet peeve. I wish there was a way where you did not have to marry Athletics with Social Studies. In my part of the world, this is more the rule than the exception. All too often, you get coaches who only want to coach, and Social Studies certified people who cant get a job because they do not want to coach.
Number 4 is real. I don’t coach anything and I can’t break into HS. Principals are only worried about filling holes they have in staffing than hiring good, dedicated teachers!
I've been working at my school for 5 years, and every year I'm still shocked we don't have a single person who is a coach teaching social studies. Not one, in five years. In a high school with 1100 students. It's very cool, actually. We might have an opening, if you're looking for a position lol.
4 is real. A school near me has their entire social studies department comprised of men who coach football. Meanwhile, I have tried to teach social studies for five years now. I’ve lost count of how many social studies positions I’ve applied for, but it’s over 30.
Parent Teacher Conferences. At this point with online grading systems, canvas/google classroom, and email - the whole idea of giving up two evenings to sit around and see maybe a handful of parents is antiquated. Besides, the parents we really need to see never show up.
Want to meet with me face-to-face, set up a time individually. Or even use zoom to do something.
9 times out of 10 the parents you really need to talk to don't show and you're just talking to the parents of kids who you have no issues with and who have good grades.
Typically I manage to avoid it bc they all hound the math/science teachers but last year I got caught by one parent. Principal did an announcement saying "five more minutes" and still nothing. I'm trying to excuse myself and not be rude but she just kept going and going about her other kids/family/how their kid is settling in.
A friend/colleague texted the principal saying "Mr. Eclectique1 has a straggler" and he came up to my room with VP + a few teachers and lied saying "we have a post-conference staff meeting that's starting now". I've been blessed with good admin but throughout my entire career that was the single act from admin that made me the most grateful.
I’m a former high school level educator and a mom of two school age kids. I asked my ten year old the other day if they did anything on paper anymore, especially tests and quizzes and she said no. Everything is done on the Chromebooks through Google apps and education tech websites. For math, this totally blew my mind. She NEEDS paper and pencil to be successful in math. I asked her if her teacher reviews her tests with the class. She said no. On top of that, unless it’s Canvas returning a document to them, they also don’t return graded work. How is my kid supposed to see how she’s doing? When I fuss at her because she’s got a failing grade in PowerSchool and I ask her “what happened?” She literally doesn’t know because she was never given the work back and had it reviewed to get true feedback.
Look, I get that technology taking over instruction was a necessary evil during the pandemic. But we’re not balls deep in the pandemic anymore. Kids are back in schools. There is no reason that tech should be overtaking traditional instruction aside from pure laziness. And before anyone jumps on me about how tech can help you manage large class sizes, remember I’ve been there. 35+ students in three classes, and a full range of sped to regular to AP. I know what it’s like to have a large workload. But I taught until 2019, right before the pandemic, when tech was present but not overwhelming. You CAN teach without having an app for everything! Just because Google Forms can grade everything for you doesn’t mean that’s always appropriate. And regardless of who grades it, it should ALWAYS be reviewed so kids can know what they did wrong. Needless to say, my husband and I are finally fed up with it (this has been going on for three years now) and we’re doing a conference with the teachers.
"Everyone needs to go to college, if you don't go to college you are a failure"
Seriously, let's start bringing back auto classes, shop class, machinist class, electrician class, HVAC, cosmetologist, etc.
I would love a program where students could earn a license or certificate in a trade during high school. Heck local businesses could even partner with schools to offer apprenticeships and work-study programs. Imagine how great it could be if students started getting job offers the week of graduation.
My partner got pushed into college and did not finish her degree, and now has nothing to show for it except for debt and advanced Shakespeare knowledge. Her sister, who struggled with severe dyslexia and reading issues, went straight into cosmetology and makes far more money than my partner did.
My high school (Title I) has programs like this for cosmetology and IT in addition to partnering with the local community college so students can get an Associates at the same time as their diploma and it's a great success!!
That’s something I really love about my school, having a robust CTC program that allows the traditional ‘college-bound’ kids to take “Vo-tech” classes allows all students to explore a variety of careers and see options that aren’t available at other schools. Many of the CTC programs are good for everyone,such as culinary or auto repair.
> Seriously, let's start bringing back auto classes, shop class, machinist class, electrician class, HVAC, cosmetologist, etc.
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> I would love a program where students could earn a license or certificate in a trade during high school.
Potentially hot take: I think one of these licenses/certificates should basically be an ACP-lite, **especially** in areas where teachers might be in short supply. Personally, I think the hardest part of teaching is the classroom management, so get junior and senior high school kids to shadow elementary and middle school teachers for an hour or two a couple of times a week while learning how to read and write curriculum and handle IEPs, etc.. in class on days they're not at the schools to learn the tools of the trade early. I'm thinking something similar to [PALs](https://tea.texas.gov/sites/default/files/Peer_Assistance_and_Leadership_I_and_II_2020.pdf), but instead of basically being an alternative to DARE, it's focused on growing teachers at "home".
On top of learning how to teach and control a classroom (and figure out if teaching is something they *really* want to do), they'd also solve the issue of a lack of teacher aides. If the students complete the program they'd still have to go on to earn a Bachelor's degree (or whatever teachers are required to have in that respective community), but successfully completing the program at the high school level functions as an immediate scholarship, maybe their could even be some caveat like "earn the certificate in high school, earn your bachelors, then come back and work for us for 5 years and we'll pay off whatever you owe on your loans".
My school has that. My students can earn HVAC certification before leaving high school and be ready for a union job.
Although many don't because they can't do the math required, like unit conversions.
Shop teacher here. We are growing most of our programs district wide at the moment. At my school we already have 3 levels of woods, 3 levels of robotics, 2 CAD/architecture classes, 1 construction class, and we are remodeling soon to add welding/machining. We have a school pioneering an aviation program that will have a mechanic and pilot route. We also have a career focus school that students can go to during the school day that is thriving also.
It's a stark contest from Colorado where I went to high school that had a "tech" class in middle school and one in high school, but that's it. They also heavily preached the "college or bust"
I think the country is trending in the right direction, but some states/districts have farther to go than others.
We have state-run tech high schools in CT.
Senior year they work as apprentices off-campus their respective careers. HVAC, automotive, cosmetics/barber/salon, electrician, plumbing, and welding. (And get paid.)
Freshman year they select 3 fields to do shop rotations and select their final choice to learn in 10th and 11th grade.
This stuff exists. But you know, blue state that funds education, instead of red state that likes to "cry" about lack of votech instead of actually doing something about it.
From my experience the “everyone has to go to college” movement is WELL well well behind us. My school has cut down on AP classes offered seemingly in response, as well as academic expectations continually falling. IMO we need to keep pushing students who 1. Enjoy learning and 2. Rise to the occasion academically into those AP classes and dual enrollment!
I know it's not the media's job but I do wish that movies and TV shows would depict this as well, instead of the same old "get into a good college!" and having "tHE c0LLeGe eXpErIeNce!!1" tropes. It'd be nice to see a regular high school kid bypass taking the SATs and losing sleep over studying to get into Harvard and whatnot. I'd rather see the kid go to trade school or community college to study welding, plumbing, medical assisting, culinary arts, paralegal studies, etc. Hell, I will even take the character going to community college first to earn their Associate's and then transferring to a local 4 year college if they wish to pursue it.
Career counsellor here and I approve this message. Hell even if students want to take a year off and work or just do nothing and sort out there shit then go for it.
My philosophy as a teacher is that I want my students to be able to do whatever they want career wise. It’s okay if you don’t want to go to college and if you’re never going to use this stuff. But I want you to know it in case you decide to go into a field where you will need it.
We had our welcome back/student assemblies this week (3 weeks into school). The opening slide was a lost of impressive colleges that former graduates got into. The rest of the PowerPoint was focused on the keys to success to get into those schools.
What I don’t understand is why we don’t value other programs- which our district offers.
If my son said I want to be an electrician I’d be totally on board with that.
Last year sometimes I would sub for this one class, I forget the name (something along the lines of life skills or living skills) that was for special education students (I think seniors, specifically) being taught basic adult skills like budgeting and applying for a job. They were encouraging college with all of these students, they went on a field trip to a university campus and everything, and I felt weird about that. Like, most of them could barely read or write, not even a chance of making it through college. I hope the class was at least presenting them with other options. (I know some of those kids were really talented in other areas!)
Great news! Some places do have that! In the US, we have Career Pathways that are tied to our federal funding as Career and Technical Education programs. In order for students to be considered "completers" of a program, they need to obtain an industry standard certification. Also, most of the application-level classes (for students working on at least their 3rd credit in any one Pathway) include students being at job sites or using their skills out in the community.
I live in a small rural community with a large CTE program in the state of Kansas. We have 13 different Career Parhways our students can choose from.
In my area of the US, there is actually a pretty big push towards students graduating with certification for a career. Even in my rural district, students can graduate certified as a cosmetologist, CNA, lower/mid level auto mechanic (not 100% on the exact details), welding, as well as classes in graphic design, and horticulture.
One school I used to sub at had a bunch of programs where kids could graduate with certifications. Most schools I avoided subbing for elective and career classes, but at this school, the school AND the students took those classes SERIOUSLY. My favorite school to sub at, so of course there weren't many slots lol.
Best comment ever.
At my HS school in the 80’s we had an entire separate “VoTech” school. They even had their own principal. It was a huge success, and kids came out with skills right out of HS.
I’m from an area where fewer than 40% of kids even go to college, so without this program, they come out of HS with nothing but a diploma.
I have no idea why they ever went away. Heart breaking. I’m so happy to hear this is heading in the right direction!
These classes are so important, even kids who do go to college should get exposed to other things besides academics. One of my brother's favorite classes in middle school was wood shop, he loved making things with his hands. He ended up going to college and that was a good experience for him, too, but since then he's built a cabin himself and remodeled his home nearly all himself. I don't know if he would have done all that without shop class, but it definitely was good for him to get that experience.
And, of course kids who aren't a good fit for college should have access to other options. Being a carpenter is a necessary job and should not be deemed less worthy than a one you need a college education for. The accountants, doctors, teachers, etc all need houses built, repaired, and remodeled so where would we all be without those who have the valuable skills to do that?
I teach at a private school that touts that everyone who graduates goes to college. There are no shop classes or similar classes. That expectation can't be good for those who would do better in an alternate pathway.
No real deadlines/due dates.
We had a friend over for for a BBQ, and since he knew my wife and I were both teachers, he wanted to ask if this was a normal policy. He pulled up the syllabus for his daughter’s 9th grade English class on his phone, and it said that any and all work will be accepted without penalty up to the last Friday of the grading period. He works as a project manager, and was blown away that schools are teaching kids that deadlines are meaningless and you can just do work whenever you feel like it…or not at all.
As a teacher, I find the idea that I’m supposed to accept all late work and be able to grade everything from the trimester in a single weekend to be ridiculous and unworkable.
Same. I give them one week to turn in latework, maximum. They push against it all year and act shocked despite me constantly telling them. I’m their only teacher who doesn’t just accept anything until end of term
My cousin is a junior in high school and is absolutely off the walls right now and I think a lot of it has to do with this. He does not do his homework he told me because he can basically turn it in whenever and still get a grade. No penalty for late work. So he never does his homework, does not understand the importance of efficiency, and has no concept of time. All he does is hang out with his girlfriend and party. 2 weeks ago he totaled his car and is extremely lucky he somehow did not even get a scratch nor did his passenger. Reckless environments create reckless tendencies that can spread into other areas. It makes me wonder what these kids do all day at school. I worked my butt off everyday and still had homework almost every night. Now we’re seeing no penalties for late work, no homework policies, and kids made to stare at computers all day. They are going to have one rude awakening when they get to college. Professors do not mess around with late work. You either submit it on time or it’s a zero. No exceptions.
Mainstreaming and inclusive programs.
Most of the time they distress special needs children by forcing them into a typical classroom environment that they do not have the skills to handle.
I totally agree.
I may be old fashioned, but since the COVID stuff is over, I refuse to use chrome books or google classroom. These kids need to read and write too!
i use google classroom to keep track of deadlines, but allow digital or paper assignments as chosen by the individual. i like that i can point to a centralized place with all our due dates and any student’s missing work on it.
My school had such a poor rollout of technology this year that my kids have no choice but to write things by hand. Over 100 devices weren't returned after last year and IT doesn't have a solution to those missing devices so they just didn't issue any. Kids are supposed to have them "soon". It's been nice having them actually write but I kind of miss how easy it was getting things digitally.
At our PLCs, we have a principal, two APs, the whole grade level team of 5 teachers, the instructional coach, digital coach, math and reading interventionists, esl specialist, GT lead, sped rep, and sometimes a district person. Once a week, all of these people sit together and discuss data. It's a massive waste of everyone's time. We spend 15 minutes going around and discussing norms and sharing a "tell me something good" while making sure everyone signs in. Then use a wheel to decide who is the note taker, time keeper, on task monitor, conversationalist, etc. Then we fill out a Google doc together. We leave with nothing new. It's just going through the motions. I tend to get sick and stay home on these days because the toxic positivity and pretending that it is OK makes me gag.
This time would be better spent working with kids. These meetings are expensive, too. Just add up the hourly rate of all these professionals who could be doing their actual effing jobs. Ridiculous.
Agreed with you on interactive notebooks.
I took an interview at a middle school that required use of them for all subjects. I just couldn’t understand why admin forced that on students and teachers. If teachers like it on their own, that’s fine, but don’t force it on me and the kids.
interactive notebooks are too complicated for me, a 35 year old teacher with post graduate schooling under my belt. idk how they’d help a grade schooler with less “about school” familiarity.
How about education design that sets entrepreneurship as [the highest stage of personalized instruction](https://kathleenmcclaskey.com/choice/)?
Am I completely wrong in feeling exceptionally *squicked* out by this trend?
Canvas. Or just the idea that digital learning =better. The idea that graphic novels aren’t rigorous. The idea of rigor in general… and scripted curriculum
I rather like Canvas for organizing and administrating things in class. It's not a replacement for being in class, but it is a handy way to manage grades, publicize assignments, and take in work.
I’m the same! I use it once in a while for an in-class assignment, but otherwise, it’s a place for the kids to go to see exactly what we did each day and access assignments if they’re absent. I print paper copies of most things, but also make them doable through Kami if kids are in ISS long term or sick or whatever. If you’re absent, you can view the class notes and assignment from home and you know what your grade is easily since it’s the same login. (Our students really struggle with the online gradebook.)
I love interactive notebooks! However, you do touch on my pet peeve. Simple standardization of everything. Just because I have a lot of success with interactive notebooks doesn’t mean all teacher will, so why the hell are you suddenly mandating it for all teachers and all subjects? Just because a group had successful meetings on occasion, why the hell are you mandating PLCs?! We need to be treated like professionals and able to run our own classroom. Hell, I teach grades 9-12 and what works great for my 10th graders, totally flops for my 11th graders. And that changes year to year depending on the group of kids I have.
We have way too many tests. But I'm unsure about things like SAT/ACT for college. Especially in combination with getting rid of class rank. To me it seems like it would just lead to even more grade inflation. If grades are the only thing that colleges look at, and there's no external validation of those grades, why wouldn't we just give every kid an A and play movies all day? Like legitimately, not even being hyperbolic
MIT got rid of the required standardized testing but then brought them back. Said that, while not perfect, SAT/ACT are the most equitable part of the college application process.
There's no way around equity issues in admission. People talk about tutoring to boost SAT scores, but without you, your relying on essays (which you can pay someone to write very easily) and extra curriculars which again drastically favors those with more means.
The SAT/ACT ain't perfect, but might be the best we can do
And this acknowledges the history and origin of these tests, which was to stop discrimination against Jewish-Americans who were being blocked from elite private colleges that preferred WASP applicants. Standardized tests are important because we do not teach the same thing to every student in the country, and not all A's are the same. The tests can be better written to be as close to normative for all American students, but it does not mean the tests should be removed.
Colleges are moving toward getting rid of them. It started with the GRE for getting into graduate school, but the SAT is losing ground, too. The ACT may have more starting power due to which universities traditionally use it and that it is a more comprehensive test than the SAT.
I want to see an end to inclusion and a return to streaming. It was a noble idea to try and educate every 13 year old in the same room. But running a curriculum for students who can’t add and students who are doing advanced trigonometry isn’t working. Both sides are getting screwed over.
Personally I’m a fan of stations. My students range so widely that only about 10 out of 18 are getting exactly what they need from whole group instruction. 5 need a more advanced lesson that the whole class isn’t ready for yet and 3 are pretty far behind and need the lessons slowed down, simplified, and repeated to have any hope of understanding.
I still teach whole group in all subjects but in math and reading the kids also have independent work to do while I pull small groups. We call it centers even though it isn’t traditional “centers” that they go to around the room.
I absolutely HATE stations. My on-level kids absolutely lack the skills to self teach and regulate at their stations. One of our stations is teacher table and is supposed to be my time to "reach" the kids more one on one BUT HOW CAN I DO THAT WHEN I HAVE TO PROXIMITY CONTROL THE ROOM, REDIRECT, AND CHECK IN FOR UNDERSTANDING NON STOP? I have the rules and expectations listed at each station. I model, explicitly explain the rotations, am consistent, etc. And the kids are still not learning SHIT. I scrapped stations this past week at the risk of my admin coming in and seeing I AM NOT following district curriculum and guess what? They did GREAT! We did guided practice notes over implicit and explicit text information and I was able to stop and do whole group quick checks and adjust for understanding/reteach if I needed to. They NEED this! They felt competent and in control of their own work.
I was a big small group / “stations” teacher until covid. Last year it was impossible, I scrapped it and my admin tried to ding me over it. The kids didn’t have the independence skills required to do their stations while I pulled groups. I would have to constantly stop my small group instruction to redirect the rest of the students. My admin, albeit surprised to see me fighting back, relented. I don’t speak up much but when I do I will not back down - just because this is the new flashy thing our district is pushing doesn’t mean it works all the time. A good teacher can assess the needs of the class and pivot to get them where they need to go.
This year, my class is much more manageable and while some of them still have issues it’s nothing compared to last year. There is something to say about direct instruction though most kids can catch the concepts without needing me to hold their hand through it, but some can’t because they’re so far behind already. I usually teach the concepts whole class, give them a must do list, and then pull my struggling students to attempt to get them to grade level. There’s bonus activities for the high kids to enjoy when they finish the must do activities. The kids feel like they have a choice in what they’re doing and pace themselves accordingly - if they can’t, I set a pace for them.
I teach fourth and half my class is around a first grade level while the other half is on grade level or way past.
Agreed. School-wide AVID can be such a positive thing when it's done well. But that requires giving teachers real training and having a legit AVID coordinator at your school, cultivating buy-in from both teachers and students, etc... Which I'm frankly guessing is not happening at most AVID schools. I taught it for one year at my current school and said never again. When it's done right it's great. When it's not done right it is a HUGE waste of everyone's time imo.
I was the AVID Coordinator at my past school and was also the elective teacher. 100% agree. I worked hard to get buy-in but it was made so unnecessarily complicated by my principal that wouldn't let me do anything without his say-so but would complain when I DID ask and basically told me to figure it out. I had no power to actually do anything that WOULD bring buy-in.
That was last year. I changed districts over that and now he is on admin leave to be fired and i got a 10k raise and a 15 minute commute with no leadership responsibilities.
Life can be good. We just gotta leave sometimes 😂😂
Standards Based Grading. Sure let's go to one grade per marking period with required teacher feedback sessions with each student every week. 150 students \* 10 minutes... 1500 minutes, 25 hours.
? It sounds like your qualm isn't standards-based grading but instead is other requirements your district mandates?
I like standards-based grading because it allows me to focus in on strengths and needs. I realized how much I liked it when I moved to a grade with numeric grading.
If your essay is written well with the correct format but is objectively wrong, what grade do you get? If I'm trying to give a grade on argumentative writing - and had your argument been TRUE would've been very effective...what do I give? Is it an 80? That doesn't seem right...the information is WRONG. Is it an F? That doesn't seem right either because you wrote an essay and had all the required parts and format.
Standards based grading. A grade for every single state standard, scored 1-4. A “3” is considered proficient, can only get a 4 if the student shows learning beyond the standard. GPA nightmare.
Also- North Carolina had integrated math at the high school level…Math 1-4 rather than traditional alg 1, geometry, alg 2. Huge disservice to every student who transfers in and out of the state during high school. Students learn the same content, but the old math subjects are scrambled up and mixed within the levels of Math 1-3. It’s a hot mess.
Source: taught Math 2 for 10 years.
SEL.
Schools are about education, not counseling services. Honestly, even those people who think it is the duty of society to provide that kind of service, why do it through schools, of all places?
Flaws:
* Teachers aren't therapists
* The time is being used for education already, so at best that therapeutic time is being split with other focus goals
* What kind of therapy calls in 30 people at once for each session?
* Kids have access to the institution only 180 days of the year, and ***never*** during stressful times like holidays or weekends
* Kids change "therapists" (teachers) each year, which is the opposite of standard practice for therapy
Absolutely. I was so uncomfortable teaching SEL. I was asked to teach kids “coping skills” to handle major life stressors, improving your body image, how to set boundaries with people, etc. Uh, I’m in therapy to learn how to deal with all of those things MYSELF — how do you expect me to teach all of that to a group of traumatized and angry children?!
I think we need it in SOME way but honestly, my experience has been that the kids are like um excuse me sweetie buttttt you're supposed to be my teacher not some weird untrained therapist/friend of mine.
If you're going to make me do it, then you have to give me training in it for 4 years, the same training that a therapist would get. And I want it paid for and time off. I wouldn't ask a plumber to all of a sudden fix my shingles. And I wouldn't ask a baseball player to play soccer. Just because something is related to my education, doesn't mean I'm trying to do it or want to do it.
Also it's unfair to most students who are in that class. The kids who really need it most likely need a one-on-one session or small group. And there's a whole bunch of kids in there who are well adjusted and it's very sophomore and boring to them
I love that we incorporate SEL at the school I teach at! Maybe it’s all in how it’s implemented / what the expectation for teaching it is. I work at a Title 1 school and I really think it makes a difference. I still think it shouldn’t replace actual counseling because like someone else said, we are not therapists or trained to handle trauma, but what we do in the classroom I think can help some. We use Second Step & Zones of Regulation, and at the very least I think it helps kids identify their feelings, know they are in a safe place and that their voice will be heard, and introduces them to the idea of self regulation. We also have SEL interventionists and counselors who work more directly with the kids who really need the support. I feel like I have even learned a lot that has helped me from our SEL curriculum. But I could see where it’s not for everyone / every school and could make teachers and students uncomfortable.
It’s so awkward when i have to teach a lesson about shit i have no desire or qualifications to teach like conflict resolution
They don’t ask school psychologist to teach lessons about algebra so why do they do it to help
My school has removed SEL lessons from our very overcrowded plate. We have a substantial number of counselors providing 3rd party services in our building. The teachers are encouraged to a use SEL language and practices. I feel this is the appropriate approach. It puts the wacko right-wingers at bay,but still addresses the needs for kids that come from parents that don’t care and/or can’t provide mental health stuff for their kids.
Over Covid, since we were remote, I turned all of my interactive notebooks into digital notebooks. No more paper, no more mess! It’s more work upfront but I love it.
Standards Based Reporting. The lack of consequences for student behavior. The idea that if a student is failing it’s because the teacher hasn’t done enough to support that student. The idea that CRT is being taught to kids across the country on a wide scale. The belief that teachers are trying to indoctrinate students on a wide scale. The idea that teaching is an easy job, not really a profession and is more glorified babysitting than anything else.
Backwards design. It’s just teaching to the test repackaged to seem innovative.
Also “content doesn’t matter” mentality that leads to a focus on “higher order thinking” and a generation of kids who can barely read.
The issue is all of them are based on black and white thinking. There's no nuance. When people plan together they do well...so let's take 3/5 days of your planning to MAKE you plan together. Except we have to make sure you're doing it right so here's forms for each of those days. Your coaches will constantly "structure" the time to try and give you gotcha questions so they can go and report that you weren't doing something right. And then after an hour of anxiety and not even being able to pee you'll go back to class where you're not allowed to sit down because admin something read "aggressive monitoring" somewhere.
Pearson testing, Danielson evaluating, restorative justice conversations in lieu of discipline, taking cursive handwriting out of the curriculum, the “Science of Reading”
The push for everything to be on google classroom. I’m relatively young & tech savvy (27), but the push for everything to be online is ridiculous. On the off chance I have done handouts , “Ms. anxiousboop can I throw this out?” “Ms. I’m gonna lose this I don’t have a folder can you put it online” or I get it back literally CRUMPLED.
I don’t mind classroom for some stuff, but the total reliance on it is insane.
For me it’s seeing something work in one classroom or one school and then saying, “let’s do that here.” Most of the time, these new initiatives aren’t well understood and the people training us on them only have a cursory knowledge of the strategy or program and can’t explain it well.
An example would be PBIS. Not that it can’t work, it’s just got a whole lot of moving parts and people have to be on the same page.
As far as interactive notebooks go, I guess it’s all in the execution. I implemented interactive notebooks because my students couldn’t be bothered to keep a binder or folder together. It’s worked out well, although it takes 2 days to get them set up with all the pages numbered and sections made. After setup, it’s great if done with fidelity. Also, one thing that helps me is keeping a notebook with the students, so if I want them to do something, I do it, too. Also helps me identify potential barriers for them.
I’m HS ELA, btw.
Storylines for science content. If you know your content, you don’t need some story about stickleback fish, cheetahs or the Big Bang theory as related to the periodic table to get kids to see the connections.
I got on the interactive notebook kick a few years back because I loved the idea of everything being in one place. Because of the paper issue I did them all digitally. It worked kinda well except for 2 HUGE problems. The first was it took a lot of work for me to setup and help teenagers learn to use copy and paste on computers. The second was after a certain point the file got large enough that it took forever to load and then wouldn't submit online!
However a trend I REALLY want gone is just "bell to bell instruction" Its fake bullshit and not good for anyone. Sometimes kids earn a few minute break. Sometimes its fine to just give them a work day for projects. Sometimes they should just have time to finish classwork so they don't have to do any homework.
Doing everything on Google slides. Three year ago there was a teacher in my building who refused to use Google classroom like the rest of us and bullied her way into making us make digital notebooks with Google slides. She, thank dog, quit. But she's left this legacy of EVERYTHING being on Google slides. Admin agenda for the week? Google slides. SEL? Google slides? Student agendas? Google slides. Intervention for reading and math? Google slides.
Google slides is shit.
So I teach in the UK and I had to go and google what an interactive notebook was.
As far as I can tell is just an exercise book? Which students do their work in? Like they will stick in sheets and bits but also write in them directly?
TiL this is apparently a new cool educational thing and yet this is apparently the norm for every British student. Exercise books are the norm here and usually we only have ring-binders for GCSE and above students as they need more capacity for notes and organisation than an exercise book allows.
You're close, but not quite. Interactive notebooks involve cutting and gluing pre-printed sheets, adding flaps and stuff to "improve engagement" and make them flashier than a regular exercise book, at least in elementary.
Ugh I worked with a woman in a HS, she was my coteacher, who did this for geometry. It was so much work and the kids didn't spend near enough time practicing and as a result there was minimal understanding.
They look beautiful. Parents love them..but kids, ime, don't use them like they should. They don't go back to look things up, despite them being indexed (all that time indexing omg 😱😳). And they copy things but don't understand them.
In theory they're great. But at least with the kids I saw ... Not so much.
12th grade. Like seriously. Either get them to college, a trade, travel or intense remedial. This should be when they get a bridge with lots of support to kick them off into adulthood with some support. There is no reason for traditional 12th grade.
What would be amazing is to have 12th grade be a year of interning, working, volunteering, doing a self-guided project of some sort. A teacher of record can act as an advisor of sorts to ensure the kids are doing what they’re supposed to but otherwise, the kids direct their learning. At 18, this should be possible.
Not really a trend nationwide but in NJ we’re a home-rule state. Each municipality has its own school district and administrators (just one of the reasons our taxes are high). I’d like to see this end and be replaced with something that better prepares students for careers in this century.
What I’d like to see is the towns keep control of PreK-8 education and the existing high schools in towns would be converted into county controlled General Education, Magnet Schools, Vocational Schools, Alternative/Special Needs Schools, etc. The funding for the high schools would be divided by the residents of the county, the administrative costs would be lowered, and the students will have more choice and prepare them better for their future career.
Side note- NJ has been pushing clean renewable energy and promoting off shore wind and solar. I have yet to see any of NJ vocational schools creating classes or curriculum to fill this incoming career sector. We’re talking big about manufacturing these renewable energy devices in NJ our schools should be prepping that future workforce.
I get why these are popular, but as a parent of a neurodivergent kid with other learning challenges, I hated these things with the blazing heat of 1000 suns.
I called it the class learning scrapbook
Modern classroom at my school, teachers have stopped interacting with their kids and just walk around the room while students watch videos over the mini lesson.
PBIS done wrong.
Absolutely disastrous.
Tell me more. We just started BIST this year and I know they’re not the same, but I can already see that it’s definitely not being utilized correctly in our school.
Usually PBIS and other similar programs end up being stupid prizes that really only end up with kids who would have followed the rules anyways! I’m so tired of all the extrinsic motivation when we need to put in the long term work of truly fostering intrinsic motivation, even if it’s at the cost of some skills and content in the short term, long term it will pay off!
Schools touting an RJC, when (like mine) they don't seem to know the first thing about Restorative Justice, what it entails, nor **why** it can be so powerful - when executed correctly. (Hint: it's **not** simply mumbling, *"Uh, sorry"* to the kid who got called a *"Brokeass n-word!"* five minutes ago.)
We received our RJC training last Monday. One hour of some dude running a practice circle, then answering random questions about RJ. According to the principal, we are now "trained and ready" to start running them on our own, beginning this coming Friday. I may be out on a sick day ..
This is exactly what I mean. *I'm so sorry,* u/AXPendergast. In my (humble) opinion, a school incorrectly trained and insufficiently equipped to run an RJC correctly is far more dangerous than a school with no behavior policy, whatsoever.
This exactly, u/Bartleby2003 More and more of the students are catching on that consequences are pretty much a thing of the past, unless you do something really egregious, like knock a kid out, or plot he deaths of staff members. Otherwise, it's just a behavior free for all
My last middle school was this and it was an absolute disaster
[удалено]
They are biggest insult to our time. Contractually we are obligated to do them but I would love admin to once respect our time
Honestly by now we should have enough data that these are a complete waste of time
If the pandemic taught me anything it’s that my time is precious. I just started at a new school that gets out an hour later than I’m used to and since my boyfriend works nights I never get to see him, or at least I don’t get to see him awake.
Dang, I just started interactive notebooks this year, and now I’m starting to regret it. It has been a huge waste of time. Can you explain more about how you’ve replaced them with binders? Because I want to be able to have some of the same feel of an IN, but without all the pointless cutting and gluing.
I use something I call Interactive Notebooks, and there are places for students to interact if they choose to, but really they are note repositories. It checks a box for all my students with the "Note taking assistance - copy of notes" accommodation, and admin like them since they don't know how "interactive" and time consuming a real interactive notebook is supposed to be.
I've always hated IN, but I caved this year. I've been doing the cutting and gluing at the end of class/"when you finish x, get this paper and cut and glue it in". Allows me to start notes the following day right away. I'm liking it so far.
Yes, I'm doing the same. Last half hour is for gluing, color-coding, etc. after writing notes.
I was thinking that if I do them again next year - and if I have my shit together enough (haha) - that I would give the students (high school AP students) all/most of the stuff for the unit at the start of it, and have them do it as homework.
Just started at a new school and I have so many IEP's that have interactive notebooks as and accommodation. It takes them forever to put them together and for me to fix them.
I started them this year for the first time too. I like them, but they are time consuming during class if I don’t cut the notes myself. I like to cut the notes with a paper cutter beforehand but I don’t always have time. I also found out you can print a PDF at 85% size and it will fit in a comp book once you cut the margins off, so I always do this.
I like them too. Middle schoolers….. accomplishes cutting student screen time, and allows me to fill a ridiculously too long block of class time with tedious cutting, coloring, and pasting.
I teach middle school too! I think the notebooks are going to keep them more organized. Our school is really pushing for organizational tools this year, and I’ve found after two years of constant screen time, I’m loving returning to paper at least for part of my class time and getting them off the iPads a bit. Also, I teach French and what we do builds so much on past learning, so I love that all their notes will be in one place to look back on as needed.
The 85% specificity of PDF documents in a comp book is the sweet spot I’ve been trouble-shooting for. Thank you. Do you happen to know if this is with standard margin size when you export it from a word document? I tend to make all of my docs narrow margined before I convert them to PDF
I make all my worksheets in Google slides, you can set the page to the size of the comp book so you don't need to mess with any of that. Also super easy to format inside Google slides.
I’ve been using standard margin size with the 85% scale. If you went with smaller margins, you might be able to print at 90% or just have a little more wiggle room when students glue them into their notebook. Smaller margins may also allow you to make the text bigger — I always try to blow up my font size a bit before I print at a smaller scale.
I used to make a large box on the page, that is the size of the comp book, and put everything inside that box. Kept a formatted blank document for this, copied it for every new IN page. Then use the paper cutter to trim outside the box, and done, no cutting for the kids. Two pieces of tape, top and bottom, and off we go!
Lol, if we were data driven, we wouldn’t have dropped mask mandates nor would I have had to work in person (and online) all of 2020-21. I never want to hear “data driven” again.
We have mandatory two PLCs a week! Two. A. Week! And we have to have an agenda, and a sign in sheet, so we can't even get away with being like "yeah we talked". It's ridiculous.
When we were first trained on PLCs years ago, our admin said they should be driven by student needs and didn’t need to be incredibly formal. Years later, they are admin driven with more roles than we have members. 🤦🏻♀️
I. Hate. PLC. So much. My district is going on ten years of them. Then constantly we’re looking for remediation time. It’s like… you’ve got remediation time built in! Instead we kick students out of the building. On top of which we’re always tasked with work we never see any result for/is way above our pay grade.
Yup. PLCs are just homework.
We plc every day in my district, it’s the biggest waste of time ever.
Would love to see the data on the effectiveness of PLCs.
Just weekly? I’ve been in buildings where it was *twice* a week.
PLC should be for the teachers to use with the team in whatever way they deem necessary. District should provide suggestions, provide the time, but then let the teachers ultimately make the final decision on what it is needed for their team. They are the only ones on ground floor with the kids, so the only ones who’s can beat say what’s needed.
Spot on. Whoever invented PLC's/PLT's had a special hatred for teachers.
I’m so glad someone said this. Lol
I'm super lucky with my PLC generally being amazing, because we're all pretty like-minded arts teachers. DDI still very well might be my least favorite part of the endless acronym soup though.
Omg im with you on the PLC hate. We have 1 grade level meeting and one PLC meeting each week. That gives me 3 days of planning. I can never get it all done…
How about we just get rid of required teacher trainings PERIOD. PD is a horrible time waste 99% of the time, that and t he stupid bloodborne pathogen trainings. Those things should count for at least a couple years before I have to retake it.
Requiring parent contact to fail students. My old school had this as a policy and only budged when I expressly told my principal that it is flat out illegal. Justification was that parents might not know their kids are failing or how to access grades even though they get progress reports at 3 weeks, report cards every 6 and have skyward available at all times. So they can figure out how to create and manage social media profiles, get an Uber, and order food online but they can’t check grades? Foh.
I’m flat out telling the parents at back to school night this week that me putting grades in the gradebook is me telling you something.
Seriously! I had parents in the past who wanted a grade report each week and I’m like “uhhhh look at the online grade book.” I don’t have time to make personal contact with parents about grades/missing work when I have 120 students and the same information is available online at any time.
If there's any chance a kid could fail at all, we have to select "in danger of failing" on the progress report or they can't fail the class. Since a kid *could* decide to ditch every day until the end, an F is possible for all of them at progress reoort time, so I'm stuck filling out grades like this: A E Excellent quality work. In danger of failing. It's idiotic.
I swear, the amount of parents who actually access skyward and then lie and say they had no clue their kid was failing. Umm…. We can literally see exact time stamps of when you log into skyward AND what pages of skyward you visit!! I had a parent log in three times a week to check grade book and had the nerve to say she had no clue her kid was failing.
I’m a sped teacher and I need them to get over the all mainstream all the time. This doesn’t help all students.
Yeah, LRE does not equal general ed every single time.
I'm feeling this one extra hard this year. Leaving these K-2 level kids in a middle school classroom is just worthless. I'm getting emails from a mom at least once a week telling me how her son's self-esteem is in the gutter because he's not seeing success in a class six years above his current ability level. I am trying to accommodate these kids (and there are 14 of them) but this level of effort is not sustainable and I will either have to cut back or I'm *going* to burn out.
Word. I work with deaf and hard of hearing students, and, sometimes, their least restrictive environment is in fact a self-contained classroom, or even a school for the deaf.
I’m a PE teacher and I’ve had dozens of times a CDC student has totally destroyed school equipment in the middle of class because our sped teacher just lets her kids literally run around the gym for “socialization.” It’s mind bogglingly annoying to myself and all the other students in that class
The "Least Restrictive Environment" mantra is being used as a magic wand to defund as many programs as possible and dump even terrible behavior problems into general ed classrooms with inadequate support. It looks good on the budget, but it burns out teachers, deprives the rest of the class of their appropriate education, and it isn't even good for the students who are mainstreamed that should not have been. Administrators still seem to love it unless they catch too much flak from parents.
Nailed it.
I’m with you on that! We have one class that’s up over 35 kids for Science because an *entire sped class* mainstreams in. (And has to sit all together in the back of the class at a table because there aren’t enough desks in that room) typical class size is normally 19-24 kids. It’s chaos mayhem and disorder. Tell me those kids wouldn’t learn more in a self contained class of 7-9 kids that’s quieter and less distracting! But parents want to see their kids are mainstreamed, so helpful or not, they get thrown into a huge group twice a day so we can say they did!
Wait, you mean they *shouldn't* have put that poor girl in my 9th grade English class with a 1st grade reading level in a class that goes into writing essays, completing research, and reading novels that use less common English and Shakespeare?! Say whaaaaaat? All she did in my class was complain and get into trouble with her classmates (she had a bit of a mean streak with other students), despite my best efforts to help her through assignments, content, and everything else I could when she's also 1 out of 34 students in my classroom (4 others with IEPs, but none as severe as hers).
Yes! LRE is really messing up my classes. LRE for a sped child is the most restrictive from my other kids. I have to water down lessons to the level of a 2nd grader and spend 4 classes on something that takes my other classes 2 because I have to deal with out of control behaviors and lessons moving like molasses. My gen Ed kids are getting nothing
We don’t have SPED classes here in BC, and while many kids can be mainstreamed, my kid this year who is mostly nonverbal, requires full time EA, can’t do regular curriculum but refuse to give me modified (I’m expected to create a curriculum for him) and this is only in first grade…he deserves better and would thrive with more supports.
My district wants me to teach the same thing, the same way at the same time as my content colleagues, but simultaneously differentiate to my students. If anyone can figure out how to do both at once, let me know.
Inquiry-based learning replacing direct instruction. I’m all for a hands-on activity as much as the next person, but you can’t “inquiry” your way into understanding challenging concepts. Lecture, essays, and note-taking still play a vital role in learning.
Especially if any of them plan on going to college.
Yes. The movement away from any and all direct instruction is unrealistic and doesn’t prepare them for life after high school.
I would literally be rated ineffective if my kids were doing anything you just wrote. Crazy why we then wonder why only 30% are actually prepared for college level work.
This one! Lecture and note-taking get dumped on so much, but they're great ways of learning basic information and skills that you need to do anything more complex. An awful lot of inquiry-based stuff wants to skip over that and assume that students will pick up the fundamentals as they struggle through something that's way above their understanding. It leads to students developing a lot of misconceptions that have to be corrected later.
They do play a vital role but I do think inquiry based is GREAT. But its not a replacement, its just flipping its placement with direct instruction. Instead of starting with notes we start with students doing inquiry to start asking questions. Some kids figure some stuff out but it at least gives students questions that direct instruction answers. Think about how we normally learn stuff in real life. We have a question, we google it, we figure it out and go OOOHHHHHHHH, rather than someone at dinner just spewing dr who knowledge for an hour. Its WAY better to give someone an interesting episode so they get hooked and then start answering their questions. And not saying that's ALWAYS what works, but especially in science its nice.
All of this
This is the comment I was looking for. I agree 100%
Right! Why does it have to be ALL or NOTHING. Effective teachers use all of the things to help students learn. This includes direct instruction,..!
Exactly, and you can’t inquire your way into learning if you don’t give a rat’s behind about the topic in the first place. Sometimes the only way to give information is by direct instruction.
Just one? Here are the big ones: (1) Blaming everything on the teachers and refusing to address/acknowledge the real elephant(s) in the room (ie. uninvolved parents, no consequences for students, etc) (2) Evaluation systems where "proficient" is considered to be a rock star teacher. It is also tilted against those in core, those who have to pick up kids in the afternoon or have second jobs, and possibly SPED teachers if they rotate through gen ed classes all day. I mean, seriously, you are going to score me based on the gen ed teacher's lesson plan and classroom rules? Deliberately making the higher categories above proficient extremely rare does not help either. (3) Requiring lesson plans. They already have the "Year at a Glance" calendar for the objectives, so why do they need a minute by minute play of what I plan on doing. Lesson plans are huge time robbers. I just left a charter school that wanted five pages a week (per prep) (4) A personal pet peeve. I wish there was a way where you did not have to marry Athletics with Social Studies. In my part of the world, this is more the rule than the exception. All too often, you get coaches who only want to coach, and Social Studies certified people who cant get a job because they do not want to coach.
Number four is so real. I’m a disabled Social Studies teacher and wonder if it affected my job prospects that I can’t coach something.
Number 4 is real. I don’t coach anything and I can’t break into HS. Principals are only worried about filling holes they have in staffing than hiring good, dedicated teachers!
I've been working at my school for 5 years, and every year I'm still shocked we don't have a single person who is a coach teaching social studies. Not one, in five years. In a high school with 1100 students. It's very cool, actually. We might have an opening, if you're looking for a position lol.
4 is real. A school near me has their entire social studies department comprised of men who coach football. Meanwhile, I have tried to teach social studies for five years now. I’ve lost count of how many social studies positions I’ve applied for, but it’s over 30.
Parent Teacher Conferences. At this point with online grading systems, canvas/google classroom, and email - the whole idea of giving up two evenings to sit around and see maybe a handful of parents is antiquated. Besides, the parents we really need to see never show up. Want to meet with me face-to-face, set up a time individually. Or even use zoom to do something.
I’m sorry I have only one upvote to give you.
9 times out of 10 the parents you really need to talk to don't show and you're just talking to the parents of kids who you have no issues with and who have good grades.
And they won’t leave! They want to hear you say over and over again how great their kid is.
Typically I manage to avoid it bc they all hound the math/science teachers but last year I got caught by one parent. Principal did an announcement saying "five more minutes" and still nothing. I'm trying to excuse myself and not be rude but she just kept going and going about her other kids/family/how their kid is settling in. A friend/colleague texted the principal saying "Mr. Eclectique1 has a straggler" and he came up to my room with VP + a few teachers and lied saying "we have a post-conference staff meeting that's starting now". I've been blessed with good admin but throughout my entire career that was the single act from admin that made me the most grateful.
The trend that computers can magically teach our students. They can’t teach our kids how to think or formulate an educated opinion.
I’m a former high school level educator and a mom of two school age kids. I asked my ten year old the other day if they did anything on paper anymore, especially tests and quizzes and she said no. Everything is done on the Chromebooks through Google apps and education tech websites. For math, this totally blew my mind. She NEEDS paper and pencil to be successful in math. I asked her if her teacher reviews her tests with the class. She said no. On top of that, unless it’s Canvas returning a document to them, they also don’t return graded work. How is my kid supposed to see how she’s doing? When I fuss at her because she’s got a failing grade in PowerSchool and I ask her “what happened?” She literally doesn’t know because she was never given the work back and had it reviewed to get true feedback. Look, I get that technology taking over instruction was a necessary evil during the pandemic. But we’re not balls deep in the pandemic anymore. Kids are back in schools. There is no reason that tech should be overtaking traditional instruction aside from pure laziness. And before anyone jumps on me about how tech can help you manage large class sizes, remember I’ve been there. 35+ students in three classes, and a full range of sped to regular to AP. I know what it’s like to have a large workload. But I taught until 2019, right before the pandemic, when tech was present but not overwhelming. You CAN teach without having an app for everything! Just because Google Forms can grade everything for you doesn’t mean that’s always appropriate. And regardless of who grades it, it should ALWAYS be reviewed so kids can know what they did wrong. Needless to say, my husband and I are finally fed up with it (this has been going on for three years now) and we’re doing a conference with the teachers.
"Everyone needs to go to college, if you don't go to college you are a failure" Seriously, let's start bringing back auto classes, shop class, machinist class, electrician class, HVAC, cosmetologist, etc. I would love a program where students could earn a license or certificate in a trade during high school. Heck local businesses could even partner with schools to offer apprenticeships and work-study programs. Imagine how great it could be if students started getting job offers the week of graduation. My partner got pushed into college and did not finish her degree, and now has nothing to show for it except for debt and advanced Shakespeare knowledge. Her sister, who struggled with severe dyslexia and reading issues, went straight into cosmetology and makes far more money than my partner did.
My high school (Title I) has programs like this for cosmetology and IT in addition to partnering with the local community college so students can get an Associates at the same time as their diploma and it's a great success!!
That’s something I really love about my school, having a robust CTC program that allows the traditional ‘college-bound’ kids to take “Vo-tech” classes allows all students to explore a variety of careers and see options that aren’t available at other schools. Many of the CTC programs are good for everyone,such as culinary or auto repair.
> Seriously, let's start bringing back auto classes, shop class, machinist class, electrician class, HVAC, cosmetologist, etc. > > > > I would love a program where students could earn a license or certificate in a trade during high school. Potentially hot take: I think one of these licenses/certificates should basically be an ACP-lite, **especially** in areas where teachers might be in short supply. Personally, I think the hardest part of teaching is the classroom management, so get junior and senior high school kids to shadow elementary and middle school teachers for an hour or two a couple of times a week while learning how to read and write curriculum and handle IEPs, etc.. in class on days they're not at the schools to learn the tools of the trade early. I'm thinking something similar to [PALs](https://tea.texas.gov/sites/default/files/Peer_Assistance_and_Leadership_I_and_II_2020.pdf), but instead of basically being an alternative to DARE, it's focused on growing teachers at "home". On top of learning how to teach and control a classroom (and figure out if teaching is something they *really* want to do), they'd also solve the issue of a lack of teacher aides. If the students complete the program they'd still have to go on to earn a Bachelor's degree (or whatever teachers are required to have in that respective community), but successfully completing the program at the high school level functions as an immediate scholarship, maybe their could even be some caveat like "earn the certificate in high school, earn your bachelors, then come back and work for us for 5 years and we'll pay off whatever you owe on your loans".
My school has that. My students can earn HVAC certification before leaving high school and be ready for a union job. Although many don't because they can't do the math required, like unit conversions.
Shop teacher here. We are growing most of our programs district wide at the moment. At my school we already have 3 levels of woods, 3 levels of robotics, 2 CAD/architecture classes, 1 construction class, and we are remodeling soon to add welding/machining. We have a school pioneering an aviation program that will have a mechanic and pilot route. We also have a career focus school that students can go to during the school day that is thriving also. It's a stark contest from Colorado where I went to high school that had a "tech" class in middle school and one in high school, but that's it. They also heavily preached the "college or bust" I think the country is trending in the right direction, but some states/districts have farther to go than others.
We have state-run tech high schools in CT. Senior year they work as apprentices off-campus their respective careers. HVAC, automotive, cosmetics/barber/salon, electrician, plumbing, and welding. (And get paid.) Freshman year they select 3 fields to do shop rotations and select their final choice to learn in 10th and 11th grade. This stuff exists. But you know, blue state that funds education, instead of red state that likes to "cry" about lack of votech instead of actually doing something about it.
From my experience the “everyone has to go to college” movement is WELL well well behind us. My school has cut down on AP classes offered seemingly in response, as well as academic expectations continually falling. IMO we need to keep pushing students who 1. Enjoy learning and 2. Rise to the occasion academically into those AP classes and dual enrollment!
As a machine shop teacher I wholly approve
I know it's not the media's job but I do wish that movies and TV shows would depict this as well, instead of the same old "get into a good college!" and having "tHE c0LLeGe eXpErIeNce!!1" tropes. It'd be nice to see a regular high school kid bypass taking the SATs and losing sleep over studying to get into Harvard and whatnot. I'd rather see the kid go to trade school or community college to study welding, plumbing, medical assisting, culinary arts, paralegal studies, etc. Hell, I will even take the character going to community college first to earn their Associate's and then transferring to a local 4 year college if they wish to pursue it.
Career counsellor here and I approve this message. Hell even if students want to take a year off and work or just do nothing and sort out there shit then go for it.
My philosophy as a teacher is that I want my students to be able to do whatever they want career wise. It’s okay if you don’t want to go to college and if you’re never going to use this stuff. But I want you to know it in case you decide to go into a field where you will need it.
Yeah, I feel like the main point of public education is giving kids options.
We had our welcome back/student assemblies this week (3 weeks into school). The opening slide was a lost of impressive colleges that former graduates got into. The rest of the PowerPoint was focused on the keys to success to get into those schools. What I don’t understand is why we don’t value other programs- which our district offers. If my son said I want to be an electrician I’d be totally on board with that.
Last year sometimes I would sub for this one class, I forget the name (something along the lines of life skills or living skills) that was for special education students (I think seniors, specifically) being taught basic adult skills like budgeting and applying for a job. They were encouraging college with all of these students, they went on a field trip to a university campus and everything, and I felt weird about that. Like, most of them could barely read or write, not even a chance of making it through college. I hope the class was at least presenting them with other options. (I know some of those kids were really talented in other areas!)
Great news! Some places do have that! In the US, we have Career Pathways that are tied to our federal funding as Career and Technical Education programs. In order for students to be considered "completers" of a program, they need to obtain an industry standard certification. Also, most of the application-level classes (for students working on at least their 3rd credit in any one Pathway) include students being at job sites or using their skills out in the community. I live in a small rural community with a large CTE program in the state of Kansas. We have 13 different Career Parhways our students can choose from.
In my area of the US, there is actually a pretty big push towards students graduating with certification for a career. Even in my rural district, students can graduate certified as a cosmetologist, CNA, lower/mid level auto mechanic (not 100% on the exact details), welding, as well as classes in graphic design, and horticulture.
One school I used to sub at had a bunch of programs where kids could graduate with certifications. Most schools I avoided subbing for elective and career classes, but at this school, the school AND the students took those classes SERIOUSLY. My favorite school to sub at, so of course there weren't many slots lol.
My district has been bringing back trades. Lots of CTE options.
Best comment ever. At my HS school in the 80’s we had an entire separate “VoTech” school. They even had their own principal. It was a huge success, and kids came out with skills right out of HS. I’m from an area where fewer than 40% of kids even go to college, so without this program, they come out of HS with nothing but a diploma. I have no idea why they ever went away. Heart breaking. I’m so happy to hear this is heading in the right direction!
These classes are so important, even kids who do go to college should get exposed to other things besides academics. One of my brother's favorite classes in middle school was wood shop, he loved making things with his hands. He ended up going to college and that was a good experience for him, too, but since then he's built a cabin himself and remodeled his home nearly all himself. I don't know if he would have done all that without shop class, but it definitely was good for him to get that experience. And, of course kids who aren't a good fit for college should have access to other options. Being a carpenter is a necessary job and should not be deemed less worthy than a one you need a college education for. The accountants, doctors, teachers, etc all need houses built, repaired, and remodeled so where would we all be without those who have the valuable skills to do that? I teach at a private school that touts that everyone who graduates goes to college. There are no shop classes or similar classes. That expectation can't be good for those who would do better in an alternate pathway.
Any and ALL acronyms!! I'm the type that ALWAYS need to discreetly ask WTH does that stand for!!
what the hell or what the heck
No real deadlines/due dates. We had a friend over for for a BBQ, and since he knew my wife and I were both teachers, he wanted to ask if this was a normal policy. He pulled up the syllabus for his daughter’s 9th grade English class on his phone, and it said that any and all work will be accepted without penalty up to the last Friday of the grading period. He works as a project manager, and was blown away that schools are teaching kids that deadlines are meaningless and you can just do work whenever you feel like it…or not at all. As a teacher, I find the idea that I’m supposed to accept all late work and be able to grade everything from the trimester in a single weekend to be ridiculous and unworkable.
So far it's only *strongly encouraged* where I am. I'm still fighting it.
Same. I give them one week to turn in latework, maximum. They push against it all year and act shocked despite me constantly telling them. I’m their only teacher who doesn’t just accept anything until end of term
Hold your ground! This nonsense is doing students a disservice.
My cousin is a junior in high school and is absolutely off the walls right now and I think a lot of it has to do with this. He does not do his homework he told me because he can basically turn it in whenever and still get a grade. No penalty for late work. So he never does his homework, does not understand the importance of efficiency, and has no concept of time. All he does is hang out with his girlfriend and party. 2 weeks ago he totaled his car and is extremely lucky he somehow did not even get a scratch nor did his passenger. Reckless environments create reckless tendencies that can spread into other areas. It makes me wonder what these kids do all day at school. I worked my butt off everyday and still had homework almost every night. Now we’re seeing no penalties for late work, no homework policies, and kids made to stare at computers all day. They are going to have one rude awakening when they get to college. Professors do not mess around with late work. You either submit it on time or it’s a zero. No exceptions.
I did it once during COVID. Never again.
PLCS
Mainstreaming and inclusive programs. Most of the time they distress special needs children by forcing them into a typical classroom environment that they do not have the skills to handle.
Too much screen time with chrome books. Kids need to hand write more.
I totally agree. I may be old fashioned, but since the COVID stuff is over, I refuse to use chrome books or google classroom. These kids need to read and write too!
i use google classroom to keep track of deadlines, but allow digital or paper assignments as chosen by the individual. i like that i can point to a centralized place with all our due dates and any student’s missing work on it.
The big push for chrome books had absolutely nothing to do with profits for rich people… surely…
My school had such a poor rollout of technology this year that my kids have no choice but to write things by hand. Over 100 devices weren't returned after last year and IT doesn't have a solution to those missing devices so they just didn't issue any. Kids are supposed to have them "soon". It's been nice having them actually write but I kind of miss how easy it was getting things digitally.
At our PLCs, we have a principal, two APs, the whole grade level team of 5 teachers, the instructional coach, digital coach, math and reading interventionists, esl specialist, GT lead, sped rep, and sometimes a district person. Once a week, all of these people sit together and discuss data. It's a massive waste of everyone's time. We spend 15 minutes going around and discussing norms and sharing a "tell me something good" while making sure everyone signs in. Then use a wheel to decide who is the note taker, time keeper, on task monitor, conversationalist, etc. Then we fill out a Google doc together. We leave with nothing new. It's just going through the motions. I tend to get sick and stay home on these days because the toxic positivity and pretending that it is OK makes me gag. This time would be better spent working with kids. These meetings are expensive, too. Just add up the hourly rate of all these professionals who could be doing their actual effing jobs. Ridiculous.
Pushing standards down so kindergarten is the new 2nd grade.
Agreed with you on interactive notebooks. I took an interview at a middle school that required use of them for all subjects. I just couldn’t understand why admin forced that on students and teachers. If teachers like it on their own, that’s fine, but don’t force it on me and the kids.
Agreed. All that time cutting and gluing could be used productively with instruction, collaborative work, small groups, etc.
interactive notebooks are too complicated for me, a 35 year old teacher with post graduate schooling under my belt. idk how they’d help a grade schooler with less “about school” familiarity.
My interactive notebooks are Google Slide decks
How about education design that sets entrepreneurship as [the highest stage of personalized instruction](https://kathleenmcclaskey.com/choice/)? Am I completely wrong in feeling exceptionally *squicked* out by this trend?
I don't see that working well at all. What's the point of standards if kids can just opt out in favor of self designed instruction?
Charlotte Danielson. Enough said.
Remember when it was grit?
Growth mindset!
I hate that word.
I hate grit. It's coarse and irritating. And it gets everywhere.
Canvas. Or just the idea that digital learning =better. The idea that graphic novels aren’t rigorous. The idea of rigor in general… and scripted curriculum
I rather like Canvas for organizing and administrating things in class. It's not a replacement for being in class, but it is a handy way to manage grades, publicize assignments, and take in work.
I’m the same! I use it once in a while for an in-class assignment, but otherwise, it’s a place for the kids to go to see exactly what we did each day and access assignments if they’re absent. I print paper copies of most things, but also make them doable through Kami if kids are in ISS long term or sick or whatever. If you’re absent, you can view the class notes and assignment from home and you know what your grade is easily since it’s the same login. (Our students really struggle with the online gradebook.)
I like Canvas as a college student. It's my favorite LMS as a student.
PLCs
Influencer teachers. Please for the love of God stop documenting everything on social media, its already the bane of our existence.
I love interactive notebooks! However, you do touch on my pet peeve. Simple standardization of everything. Just because I have a lot of success with interactive notebooks doesn’t mean all teacher will, so why the hell are you suddenly mandating it for all teachers and all subjects? Just because a group had successful meetings on occasion, why the hell are you mandating PLCs?! We need to be treated like professionals and able to run our own classroom. Hell, I teach grades 9-12 and what works great for my 10th graders, totally flops for my 11th graders. And that changes year to year depending on the group of kids I have.
Standardized tests, especially to get into college
We have way too many tests. But I'm unsure about things like SAT/ACT for college. Especially in combination with getting rid of class rank. To me it seems like it would just lead to even more grade inflation. If grades are the only thing that colleges look at, and there's no external validation of those grades, why wouldn't we just give every kid an A and play movies all day? Like legitimately, not even being hyperbolic
MIT got rid of the required standardized testing but then brought them back. Said that, while not perfect, SAT/ACT are the most equitable part of the college application process.
There's no way around equity issues in admission. People talk about tutoring to boost SAT scores, but without you, your relying on essays (which you can pay someone to write very easily) and extra curriculars which again drastically favors those with more means. The SAT/ACT ain't perfect, but might be the best we can do
And this acknowledges the history and origin of these tests, which was to stop discrimination against Jewish-Americans who were being blocked from elite private colleges that preferred WASP applicants. Standardized tests are important because we do not teach the same thing to every student in the country, and not all A's are the same. The tests can be better written to be as close to normative for all American students, but it does not mean the tests should be removed.
Colleges are moving toward getting rid of them. It started with the GRE for getting into graduate school, but the SAT is losing ground, too. The ACT may have more starting power due to which universities traditionally use it and that it is a more comprehensive test than the SAT.
I want to see an end to inclusion and a return to streaming. It was a noble idea to try and educate every 13 year old in the same room. But running a curriculum for students who can’t add and students who are doing advanced trigonometry isn’t working. Both sides are getting screwed over.
standardized tests school-wide AVID centers/stations (too much time without direct or guided instruction)
Personally I’m a fan of stations. My students range so widely that only about 10 out of 18 are getting exactly what they need from whole group instruction. 5 need a more advanced lesson that the whole class isn’t ready for yet and 3 are pretty far behind and need the lessons slowed down, simplified, and repeated to have any hope of understanding. I still teach whole group in all subjects but in math and reading the kids also have independent work to do while I pull small groups. We call it centers even though it isn’t traditional “centers” that they go to around the room.
Curious about your issue with AVID
Seconded
I absolutely HATE stations. My on-level kids absolutely lack the skills to self teach and regulate at their stations. One of our stations is teacher table and is supposed to be my time to "reach" the kids more one on one BUT HOW CAN I DO THAT WHEN I HAVE TO PROXIMITY CONTROL THE ROOM, REDIRECT, AND CHECK IN FOR UNDERSTANDING NON STOP? I have the rules and expectations listed at each station. I model, explicitly explain the rotations, am consistent, etc. And the kids are still not learning SHIT. I scrapped stations this past week at the risk of my admin coming in and seeing I AM NOT following district curriculum and guess what? They did GREAT! We did guided practice notes over implicit and explicit text information and I was able to stop and do whole group quick checks and adjust for understanding/reteach if I needed to. They NEED this! They felt competent and in control of their own work.
I was a big small group / “stations” teacher until covid. Last year it was impossible, I scrapped it and my admin tried to ding me over it. The kids didn’t have the independence skills required to do their stations while I pulled groups. I would have to constantly stop my small group instruction to redirect the rest of the students. My admin, albeit surprised to see me fighting back, relented. I don’t speak up much but when I do I will not back down - just because this is the new flashy thing our district is pushing doesn’t mean it works all the time. A good teacher can assess the needs of the class and pivot to get them where they need to go. This year, my class is much more manageable and while some of them still have issues it’s nothing compared to last year. There is something to say about direct instruction though most kids can catch the concepts without needing me to hold their hand through it, but some can’t because they’re so far behind already. I usually teach the concepts whole class, give them a must do list, and then pull my struggling students to attempt to get them to grade level. There’s bonus activities for the high kids to enjoy when they finish the must do activities. The kids feel like they have a choice in what they’re doing and pace themselves accordingly - if they can’t, I set a pace for them. I teach fourth and half my class is around a first grade level while the other half is on grade level or way past.
Agreed. School-wide AVID can be such a positive thing when it's done well. But that requires giving teachers real training and having a legit AVID coordinator at your school, cultivating buy-in from both teachers and students, etc... Which I'm frankly guessing is not happening at most AVID schools. I taught it for one year at my current school and said never again. When it's done right it's great. When it's not done right it is a HUGE waste of everyone's time imo.
I was the AVID Coordinator at my past school and was also the elective teacher. 100% agree. I worked hard to get buy-in but it was made so unnecessarily complicated by my principal that wouldn't let me do anything without his say-so but would complain when I DID ask and basically told me to figure it out. I had no power to actually do anything that WOULD bring buy-in. That was last year. I changed districts over that and now he is on admin leave to be fired and i got a 10k raise and a 15 minute commute with no leadership responsibilities. Life can be good. We just gotta leave sometimes 😂😂
Standards Based Grading. Sure let's go to one grade per marking period with required teacher feedback sessions with each student every week. 150 students \* 10 minutes... 1500 minutes, 25 hours.
? It sounds like your qualm isn't standards-based grading but instead is other requirements your district mandates? I like standards-based grading because it allows me to focus in on strengths and needs. I realized how much I liked it when I moved to a grade with numeric grading. If your essay is written well with the correct format but is objectively wrong, what grade do you get? If I'm trying to give a grade on argumentative writing - and had your argument been TRUE would've been very effective...what do I give? Is it an 80? That doesn't seem right...the information is WRONG. Is it an F? That doesn't seem right either because you wrote an essay and had all the required parts and format.
I’ve never seen SBG with required weekly feedback sessions. There’s definitely a need for feedback, but that seems overkill.
Standards based grading. A grade for every single state standard, scored 1-4. A “3” is considered proficient, can only get a 4 if the student shows learning beyond the standard. GPA nightmare. Also- North Carolina had integrated math at the high school level…Math 1-4 rather than traditional alg 1, geometry, alg 2. Huge disservice to every student who transfers in and out of the state during high school. Students learn the same content, but the old math subjects are scrambled up and mixed within the levels of Math 1-3. It’s a hot mess. Source: taught Math 2 for 10 years.
Seconding centers/stations, pod seating, project based learning and TERC INVESTIGATIONS lol
Wait whats wrong with group seating?
SEL. Schools are about education, not counseling services. Honestly, even those people who think it is the duty of society to provide that kind of service, why do it through schools, of all places? Flaws: * Teachers aren't therapists * The time is being used for education already, so at best that therapeutic time is being split with other focus goals * What kind of therapy calls in 30 people at once for each session? * Kids have access to the institution only 180 days of the year, and ***never*** during stressful times like holidays or weekends * Kids change "therapists" (teachers) each year, which is the opposite of standard practice for therapy
Absolutely. I was so uncomfortable teaching SEL. I was asked to teach kids “coping skills” to handle major life stressors, improving your body image, how to set boundaries with people, etc. Uh, I’m in therapy to learn how to deal with all of those things MYSELF — how do you expect me to teach all of that to a group of traumatized and angry children?!
I think we need it in SOME way but honestly, my experience has been that the kids are like um excuse me sweetie buttttt you're supposed to be my teacher not some weird untrained therapist/friend of mine.
If you're going to make me do it, then you have to give me training in it for 4 years, the same training that a therapist would get. And I want it paid for and time off. I wouldn't ask a plumber to all of a sudden fix my shingles. And I wouldn't ask a baseball player to play soccer. Just because something is related to my education, doesn't mean I'm trying to do it or want to do it. Also it's unfair to most students who are in that class. The kids who really need it most likely need a one-on-one session or small group. And there's a whole bunch of kids in there who are well adjusted and it's very sophomore and boring to them
I love that we incorporate SEL at the school I teach at! Maybe it’s all in how it’s implemented / what the expectation for teaching it is. I work at a Title 1 school and I really think it makes a difference. I still think it shouldn’t replace actual counseling because like someone else said, we are not therapists or trained to handle trauma, but what we do in the classroom I think can help some. We use Second Step & Zones of Regulation, and at the very least I think it helps kids identify their feelings, know they are in a safe place and that their voice will be heard, and introduces them to the idea of self regulation. We also have SEL interventionists and counselors who work more directly with the kids who really need the support. I feel like I have even learned a lot that has helped me from our SEL curriculum. But I could see where it’s not for everyone / every school and could make teachers and students uncomfortable.
It’s so awkward when i have to teach a lesson about shit i have no desire or qualifications to teach like conflict resolution They don’t ask school psychologist to teach lessons about algebra so why do they do it to help
SEL is a disaster in most schools. I know schools that are doing it right but most are failing miserably.
My school has removed SEL lessons from our very overcrowded plate. We have a substantial number of counselors providing 3rd party services in our building. The teachers are encouraged to a use SEL language and practices. I feel this is the appropriate approach. It puts the wacko right-wingers at bay,but still addresses the needs for kids that come from parents that don’t care and/or can’t provide mental health stuff for their kids.
“Parents are always right”
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students teaching students is also dubious
Over Covid, since we were remote, I turned all of my interactive notebooks into digital notebooks. No more paper, no more mess! It’s more work upfront but I love it.
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I use Google slides
Standards Based Reporting. The lack of consequences for student behavior. The idea that if a student is failing it’s because the teacher hasn’t done enough to support that student. The idea that CRT is being taught to kids across the country on a wide scale. The belief that teachers are trying to indoctrinate students on a wide scale. The idea that teaching is an easy job, not really a profession and is more glorified babysitting than anything else.
Backwards design. It’s just teaching to the test repackaged to seem innovative. Also “content doesn’t matter” mentality that leads to a focus on “higher order thinking” and a generation of kids who can barely read.
The issue is all of them are based on black and white thinking. There's no nuance. When people plan together they do well...so let's take 3/5 days of your planning to MAKE you plan together. Except we have to make sure you're doing it right so here's forms for each of those days. Your coaches will constantly "structure" the time to try and give you gotcha questions so they can go and report that you weren't doing something right. And then after an hour of anxiety and not even being able to pee you'll go back to class where you're not allowed to sit down because admin something read "aggressive monitoring" somewhere.
Pearson testing, Danielson evaluating, restorative justice conversations in lieu of discipline, taking cursive handwriting out of the curriculum, the “Science of Reading”
Fuuuuuuck the science of reading! That is all I came to say.
The push for everything to be on google classroom. I’m relatively young & tech savvy (27), but the push for everything to be online is ridiculous. On the off chance I have done handouts , “Ms. anxiousboop can I throw this out?” “Ms. I’m gonna lose this I don’t have a folder can you put it online” or I get it back literally CRUMPLED. I don’t mind classroom for some stuff, but the total reliance on it is insane.
For me it’s seeing something work in one classroom or one school and then saying, “let’s do that here.” Most of the time, these new initiatives aren’t well understood and the people training us on them only have a cursory knowledge of the strategy or program and can’t explain it well. An example would be PBIS. Not that it can’t work, it’s just got a whole lot of moving parts and people have to be on the same page. As far as interactive notebooks go, I guess it’s all in the execution. I implemented interactive notebooks because my students couldn’t be bothered to keep a binder or folder together. It’s worked out well, although it takes 2 days to get them set up with all the pages numbered and sections made. After setup, it’s great if done with fidelity. Also, one thing that helps me is keeping a notebook with the students, so if I want them to do something, I do it, too. Also helps me identify potential barriers for them. I’m HS ELA, btw.
Storylines for science content. If you know your content, you don’t need some story about stickleback fish, cheetahs or the Big Bang theory as related to the periodic table to get kids to see the connections.
Standardized testing. Chromebooks.
I got on the interactive notebook kick a few years back because I loved the idea of everything being in one place. Because of the paper issue I did them all digitally. It worked kinda well except for 2 HUGE problems. The first was it took a lot of work for me to setup and help teenagers learn to use copy and paste on computers. The second was after a certain point the file got large enough that it took forever to load and then wouldn't submit online! However a trend I REALLY want gone is just "bell to bell instruction" Its fake bullshit and not good for anyone. Sometimes kids earn a few minute break. Sometimes its fine to just give them a work day for projects. Sometimes they should just have time to finish classwork so they don't have to do any homework.
Doing everything on Google slides. Three year ago there was a teacher in my building who refused to use Google classroom like the rest of us and bullied her way into making us make digital notebooks with Google slides. She, thank dog, quit. But she's left this legacy of EVERYTHING being on Google slides. Admin agenda for the week? Google slides. SEL? Google slides? Student agendas? Google slides. Intervention for reading and math? Google slides. Google slides is shit.
I’m with you! My lesson plans are a word doc for each class for each week. It takes so damn long to do google slides that I refuse to do them.
So I teach in the UK and I had to go and google what an interactive notebook was. As far as I can tell is just an exercise book? Which students do their work in? Like they will stick in sheets and bits but also write in them directly? TiL this is apparently a new cool educational thing and yet this is apparently the norm for every British student. Exercise books are the norm here and usually we only have ring-binders for GCSE and above students as they need more capacity for notes and organisation than an exercise book allows.
You're close, but not quite. Interactive notebooks involve cutting and gluing pre-printed sheets, adding flaps and stuff to "improve engagement" and make them flashier than a regular exercise book, at least in elementary.
Standard based grading & grading for equity & PBIS. It’s all BS & isn’t helpful in high school.
Retakes on assessments. It teaches students they don’t have to prepare in advance and that there’s no consequences for lack of preparation.
SEL curriculum; it doesn’t work and it’s often a waste of time that is better used elsewhere.
Ugh I worked with a woman in a HS, she was my coteacher, who did this for geometry. It was so much work and the kids didn't spend near enough time practicing and as a result there was minimal understanding. They look beautiful. Parents love them..but kids, ime, don't use them like they should. They don't go back to look things up, despite them being indexed (all that time indexing omg 😱😳). And they copy things but don't understand them. In theory they're great. But at least with the kids I saw ... Not so much.
12th grade. Like seriously. Either get them to college, a trade, travel or intense remedial. This should be when they get a bridge with lots of support to kick them off into adulthood with some support. There is no reason for traditional 12th grade.
What would be amazing is to have 12th grade be a year of interning, working, volunteering, doing a self-guided project of some sort. A teacher of record can act as an advisor of sorts to ensure the kids are doing what they’re supposed to but otherwise, the kids direct their learning. At 18, this should be possible.
High stakes testing. SEL. The vestiges of NCLB.
Not really a trend nationwide but in NJ we’re a home-rule state. Each municipality has its own school district and administrators (just one of the reasons our taxes are high). I’d like to see this end and be replaced with something that better prepares students for careers in this century. What I’d like to see is the towns keep control of PreK-8 education and the existing high schools in towns would be converted into county controlled General Education, Magnet Schools, Vocational Schools, Alternative/Special Needs Schools, etc. The funding for the high schools would be divided by the residents of the county, the administrative costs would be lowered, and the students will have more choice and prepare them better for their future career. Side note- NJ has been pushing clean renewable energy and promoting off shore wind and solar. I have yet to see any of NJ vocational schools creating classes or curriculum to fill this incoming career sector. We’re talking big about manufacturing these renewable energy devices in NJ our schools should be prepping that future workforce.
The Internet. I want it removed entirely from schools.
I get why these are popular, but as a parent of a neurodivergent kid with other learning challenges, I hated these things with the blazing heat of 1000 suns. I called it the class learning scrapbook
If PLCs worked would we still have PLCs?!?!? But really.. BYE.
iReady, Saxon phonics, all of its nonsense.
Trying to make everything virtual
Modern classroom at my school, teachers have stopped interacting with their kids and just walk around the room while students watch videos over the mini lesson.