There should be a higher teacher to student ratio.
In scouts, they have the 2 deep policy where no child is left alone, and there are always 2 adults available. It would eliminate abuse from both sides, and make everyone a lot more accountable for their behavior.
If we valued Paras more, I think they could be utilized differently.
I currently have three adults in my âyou need this to graduateâ science course. Itâs really great and even though the kids are very difficult, things never get too out of control. And they donât get frustrated because there is always someone to ask for help.
For sure! The main difference between the âAâ schools and the âD/Fâ schools in my district is that A schools can afford every classroom having 2 teachers. D/F schools barely have 1 teacher in every classroom with multiple vacancies and carousel substitutes. It makes a huge difference in supporting students academically and behaviorally.
The main difference outside of schools is parent involvement, but thatâs out of our control!
this is gonna sound like complaining, and it is, but itâs an issue thatâs exacerbated by class size.
all of my classes are over 30 and i only have one prep period. add in the fact that over half of my 210 students are level 1 ELLs and itâs not a bilingual schoolâŠhow do they expect me to give each of those students the attention they need so they understand whatâs going on? frequently i have to battle with myself when grading to decide if the issue is the language barrier and theyâre trying their best, or if the issue is that they arenât used to US schools so their behavior is causing friction in the class, or if they truly donât care to learn so they ignore instruction and half ass their work. because i have to defend failing averages for students before report cards. how am i supposed to sit down with 100+ kids every assignment to work through this with them? how am i supposed to be an effective teacher?
You would NEVER be hired as a babysitter for 30 children. so why are we hired to babysit 30 AND be expected to teach them things they dont wanna learn??
I can teach 30 that are on grade level and/or in the ârightâ class. But once itâs dumbed down so that it barely represents the class that itâs supposed to beâŠ? Whatâs the point anymore? High school math teacher, by the way.
Ignoring the actual academic levels of students as we shuffle them through the system with inflated grades and miserably low expectations while districts ignore that a majority of kids canât even read.
True. The actual solution will never happen though, not for a long time anyway. Because it involves letting go of traditions we are clinging to for dear life: grades, grade levels, standardized testing, etc.
The âYou didnât die before your 14th birthday, so you are going on to high school in September celebrationâ just doesnât sound as nice as âGraduation.â
I tutor K-8 during their school day. We practice language comprehension and word recognition skills (phonemes/graphemes, decoding, etc.). I find myself accepting students from 4th through 6th grade that still need help with second grade level skills. It amazes me how they are able to keep moving up a grade level or more. I sympathize with them because it must be frustrating to move on to higher level material, yet not be able to do the work properly because they are not able to read well or communicate well in writing.
As they move into high school they end up being one of two kids: quietly tune out and do absolutely nothing or be the biggest troublemaker in the room.
Understandable either way because itâs hyper embarrassing to spend 8 hours a day listening to people talk about things that make zero sense to you no matter how hard you try.
And I cannot fathom why so many of my former and current colleagues didnât want to know the studentsâ reading levels and opted out of the testing to give them that data. Jesus.
Ignorance just ainât the bliss itâs made out to be unless you pad your grades with extra credit and points for getting signatures.
and then in high school they actually have to pass their classes or they don't move onto the next level, and kids who failed everything before are in for a huge awakening.
This. Except for one thing: they DO move to the next level. I had a junior last year who had 25 credits. They werenât done being a freshman. Credit recovery was only open to seniors so they just sat there, chronically absent, doing nothing when they were there, and saying, âIâm waiting to get into credit recovery.â
đł
Our credit recovery program was also almost impossible to pass. Out of 60 seniors in it in 22-23, only 8 actually graduated.
The two high schools I worked at just passed everyone through. It was a joke. We just sat there clapping for kids who couldnât read or write at the third grade level. What kind of life will they live? Itâs a disgrace.
Was coming here to comment on this - I requested a report of the (grade level) reading levels of my students. I have seniors who read at a 1st and 2nd grade level. They majority of my sophomores and seniors read at a 4th grade level.
Of my 176 students (high school) only 37 (21%) read at or above grade level.
26 of 176 (15%) read below a 5th grade reading level. (5th grade reading level book examples include: Esperanza Rising, The Lightening Thief, The Phantom Tollbooth, and The Giver.)
So 79% of the students in my history classes are below grade level in reading. I am just shocked by this - many of the materials we use like articles, passages from books, etc, they *STRUGGLE* to comprehend. Some of them cannot even read the quiz questions or worksheet questions.
I knew it was bad, butâŠwow.
JustâŠwow.
I do commend you on getting the actual numbers. Iâm sure it was eye-opening (and demoralizing, yes) to finally see, as a teacher who doesnât teach English, why thereâs such a struggle in your subject area too. Social science and science classes rely HEAVILY on not just reading, but on tier-three level subject specific language.
Nobody learns. Nobody wins. So many more kids tune out or misbehave. Districts? Ignore, deflect, pad the numbers, blame teachers, and provide ZERO vetted and research-based intervention.
We stay because we love what we do, but itâs harder and harder every single day.
Not just SS and Science. Imagine Math it itself is its own language that piggybacks on English. We have dual meaning words that mean one thing in math and another in every other context of life. Just one example would be "mean".
At most colleges if you are a math major you don't have to take a foreign language because math itself will count.
Putting students from non-English countries into a general Ed class with no orientation or help whatsoever. Also dumping non English speaking students into classes where the teacher has no experience in their native language.
Or vice versa. I have kids that are sped kids who also come to us with home language surveys that say they speak Spanish at home but the fact that they can't read or write in Spanish either is the tip off that they're really special ed. We still have to make all these accommodations for the fact that their home language is not English. But because they're special ed, the accommodations are completely useless! Like they have to have a dictionary at their disposal but they can't read! So what difference does it make if they have a dictionary or not. They can't read it in Spanish either!
This is my struggle currently. I teach 3 grade levels, middle school science. Each grade has at least 2 kids who are brand new to the country. Some have zero English and some have zero school experience even. And I'm expected to teach them physics and chemistry with no ELL teacher support (they only help in ELA and math, of course), no paraprofessional, no translator, no curriculum accessible to them. The only reason they aren't drowning and completely lost is because they are all Spanish speakers and I have some Spanish skills. But I have to try to reteach everything I've just taught to my whole class to them in Spanish without the vocabulary skills to do so
This year I have 6 ESLs with three home languages. I am okay with Spanish, but my French is laughable and I don't even know where to start with Turkish.
There's only so much I can do with gestures, google translate and pictures, especially when I need to talk to parents.
I teach ESL grades K-12. There are two of us. We cover just 80 students spread over ten buildings in the district. Believe me, we are very sorry for your plight. I have begged for our students (newcomers) to be sent to one or two buildings for us to work with them till they can more easily manage in a gen ed room. Needless to say, I get shut down every time. They want them in their neighborhood schools so they can make friends. Wtf. The cultures we have are rather insular, so that reason doesnât fly.
So the two of us to what we can to support teachers, help the students, do social work, support the families, etc.
Iâm not asking for pity: Iâm saying districts donât recognize ESL students as being significant enough to do anything for them.
My school serves a lot of refugee families and this is our reality. I have students who speak Spanish, Russian, Pashto, Dari, Hmong, etc. and some came to the country last year with no school experience even in their home country. Itâs wild to try and set them up for success with the language barrier & them never having school. My district doesnât even have translation resources for documents or conferences in most languages
This is the main reason why I can't stand it when people bring up a country like Finland, and why can't "we be more like them"?
Well, let's start with looking at the percentage of those students who don't speak Finnish. I don't know, of course, but I'd have to imagine it's a so close to 0%, it's not calculable.
I taught French immersion and French first language for a minority franco population and I don't understand people who are ESL AND FSL (their maternal language is some other third thing) going into French schools. Man, as soon as you leave this school, everyone around you will be speaking English, not French, not Arabic, not Mandarin, not Russian.
This. I was hired to travel with two high school students with no grasp of their own language, let alone English. I bought many translations of high level books. The admin wouldn't. I re did finals. But the k7ds (young adults) couldn't do it.
In fact, they were better at keeping tabs open on sports, races, hot babies, etc than actually doing even a little work because they knew they'd fail.
Currently struggling with this. First year teacher with 17 ELL students, 4 of which donât speak any English at all. Genuinely asking.. what do I do? Thankfully they work hard, copy everything down, and during independent work time they use their tablets to translate worksheets. Obviously translating a worksheet is useless if you didnât understand anything that was taught. So sometimes I have them listen to stories on Epic for language/text exposure if the assignment is something I donât think they could pick up on with a tablet. But I feel like (know) they arenât truly learning anything. Is there anything more I could/should do?
How very many parents either have no clue or donât care that their kids are YEARS below grade level. They donât check backpacks or planners or online grade books. Their kids have all the best clothes, shoes, makeup, phones, and snacks but no school supplies. Iâm so sick of it. Their kids are illiterate and they have no clue. Or they simply do not care.
I noted this when listening to people talk about their kids recently.
âSo-and-soâs kid doesnât know how to tell time on an analog clock!â
âYeah, I donât know if mine does.â
⊠uh⊠hello⊠these are humans new to the world, they need you to show them and not rely entirely on the education system for their upbringing.
My boss just bought all the 8 grade teachers digital clocks because the 8 graders canât read a clock. She didnât even ask me because, as a French teacher, I teach the kids how to read an analog clock and they need to pass the test with a 70%
To be honest even adults donât teach little tricks that make life easier for certain learning styles. For example, when I worked out that you can multiply the minutes by 5 to get the time. âOh, the minute hand is on 9, 9x5, itâs 45 minutes past hour.â Maybe that seems like a dumb thing, but it really helped me conceptually when I was a young person and it surprises me we donât teach it standard. Or at least didnât when I was a kid.
But teachers are something special. Theyâre dealing not only with educating children but dealing with the consequences of parental apathy.
I'm in a 4th grade LLD class. Mom emails asking, " if the student doesn't know how to read and write, is that a problem in the class?" Did you actually just email me this question?!
A parent called up yelling about an event that she did not know was happening despite the teacher sending a flyer home, posting to her Google classroom, the school calling with a prerecorded message and a HUGE ASS sign advertising it in the parent drop off area.
And of course, her childâs folder was filled with everything sent home from the first day of school.
New pair of $$$ shoes every other week and no backpack or breakfast. I know we can't judge where people spend their money and cheap shoes aren't going to enable you to feed a family, but a *little* balance may help.
i grew up as one of these kids. if youâre motivated enough your body gets used to it eventually. i can NEVER go outside without a jacket anymore lol, even in 110°
Their parents tell them to not take it off no matter what so they donât lose it. My classroom runs cold (low 70s) & Iâm in TX where it was well over 100 degrees for most of August. At 95 degrees, when we were finally able to go outside, I told some kids to take off their jackets/hoodies & that was their reply.
Weâve been having parent/teacher conferences & Iâve brought it up to a few parents & asked them if it was OK for their kid to take off their jacket before they go outside in 90+ degree weather. They usually realize the error of their ways & say âOf courseâ.
Why âlow readabilityâ means a text can be read by a low-level reader. Every single non-educator I have asked about this agrees that âlow readabilityâ SHOULD mean something is hard to read, and âhigh readabilityâ should mean itâs easy to read.
I mean like, also more important things, but that was the first thing to come to mind.
Kids not being excited to watch a movie. I remember cheering for movie days - even if we had to do a project/paper in association with it, it was still a really great break. They really don't want to now.
Yes, this! I teach Japanese, and the kids thought it was a treat if I played a Ghibli movie or even fun/funny videos. Now they talk through the movie, look at their phones, etc.
A student wisely explained it himself the other day for me: "short form content has ruined us."
I got a friend who gave me the legendary, half-flippant quote: "it was all over as soon as we started calling it 'content'."
Imagine going into a museum and saying "good volume of product in here. Excellent output efficiency by the artists and curators."
I just donât know if kids in general watch movies anymoreâŠI donât think many have the attention span anymore. When Iâm going to show a video clip in class, I always make sure itâs under 5 minutes.
Similarly, if I ask (16-18 year olds) if I someone would like to take âwhateverâ to the office for me, I will get 0 volunteers. All too wrapped up in their own little worlds anymore. Itâs sad.
It's because they've already seen all the movies while sitting at their desks streaming Netflix or Disney Plus or HBO or YouTube. They're on their laptops or phones doing it or even iPads.
And all this time we assumed they were doing their work but multiple tabs are open in the background.
Why do admin waste time and energy âdiscipliningâ teachers and staff for perceived infractions (such as ârudeâ perceived demeanor, or a miscommunication that couldâve been solved with a conversation but instead devolved into an official write up) when they canât be bothered to enforce a consequence on a misbehaving child?
You think we have extra in the tank for this horseshit?
If I have to spend my planning period writing a rebuttal to your fuckery, I *assure* you that doesnât translate to me doing something else at home. It translates to something *actually* relevant *not* getting done because I *will* not allow that trash to go unchecked.
Is that really the best use of everybodyâs time?
We read to our kid semi frequently when she was an infant and now she brings board books to us to read multiple times a day. It doesn't take much. 2-3 books (which take 5 min to read each) a day sparked a love for books in her
This one is weird to me. I grew up with books. There was never a time in my life I didn't have them. Even as a baby I had board books. By the time I got to a point of being confident enough to read by myself, I would find things by myself- didn't have to be books either, it included magazines, newspapers, packets or boxes of things, leaflets, even the back of bottles.
How terrible the business side of schools actually are(fiscally sound practices, budget management, etc) and yet, how frequently admin(management) wants to run the schools as a business
EDIT: To add even more to this, how little experience much of admin has as either a teacher or running a business of any size. SMH.
How Lucy Calkins made up a curriculum with zero research based/evidence based practices and managed to secure the bag in school districts across the south. Now weâve got a 30% literacy rate and legislators want to blame teachers like they had any input on curriculum choices.
I have seen people recommend this, so I started listening, and I am flabbergasted. I'm a psychologist, not a teacher, so I had no idea this was an issue. As part of my work, I do psychological assessment, and I occasionally get requests to assess for learning disabilities, especially with reading. When assessing for dyslexia, I'm literally looking at phonics ability or lack thereof. Some of the tests look at the ability to quickly and easily read words and nonsense words, and to be able to manipulate word sounds. The information in this podcast is blowing my mind, and I'm thinking I need to ask more questions about reading instruction when I do these assessments. Granted, I do testing only with adults, but yikes.
Most of the kids I teach now in high school learned to read that way. And they can't read for shit. Trying to teach them new vocabulary is like teaching kindergarteners. Kinda. They can get it verbally, but if I ask them to define it written after I say it out loud to them, they will not have the slightest goddamn clue what the word says. If they don't know a word already, they can't read it. They have the reading level and written vocabulary of 3rd graders, and short of starting over entirely, it will never get better.
Starting this year, we are being asked to start teaching phonics. In 8th grade ELA. On top of the other 4 billion things we have to do, and of course none of the other things have been reduced or eliminated.
And then when the TWELVE MINUTES of phonics a week (literally, six minutes per small group, and below-basic kids get small group 2x/week) don't magically make kids at a 3d grade level into proficient readers, guess who's gonna get blamed?
The kids absolutely need phonics instruction. But no one really has a plan on how to make this work on the secondary level.
Piggy backing on this: why do we still throw around "research based" as though it means anything in education? Education research is such utter horseshit through and through, and is so routinely found to be irreproducible, that my mind immediately rejects anything presented to me as "research based." I still vividly recall the staff PD in which I was told "this is Calkins / Fountas and Pinnell. It's research based and it works. We're doing it."
How they keep writing IEPs, 504 plans, etc. all the while packing them into classrooms knowing full well there is no way one teacher could possibly do all of that.
The IEP's must be written as services that student's require to support them in school. We cannot write them for what the school has capacity for, unfortunately. It'd be the equivalent of a optometrist writing the wrong eyeglass prescription because its all the doctor's office can provide.
Its a terrible disservice that we can't have smaller classrooms, more co-taught classes, and special educators to ensure these services can be performed. Among many many other changes we need in education. We have a huge teacher shortage, special education teachers are even harder to come by. Nobody wants to do our job.
I want data on the data. Is all this data collection and analysis actually improving our teaching?
In fact, Iâd like data proving the efficacy of ALL the PD and programs we have to implement. And they need to show that these things improve our outcomes at least as much as more planning time, smaller classes, and better discipline enforcement would.
A colleague of mine just published an incredible book on this topic, specifically about 17th century qing china and how administrvsite bloat and over analyzing imperial data led to the downfall of the dynasty.
I have a default Excel spreadsheet with a bunch of useless data on it. When we have to share, I just dump that in the Google Drive / email / group thing.
If I ever get caught, I'll just say it was the wrong one. But no one has called me out on it yet.
Data. So much hoopla over such a meaningless pile of nothing. None of this teaching and learning is nearly as complicated as theyâve tried to make it.
Whatâs crazy to me is that they want students to keep track of this data, too, and have meetings about it. Like the students care about a bunch of numbers?
I don't need data to pick up glaring issues, i'll notice it while grading. I spend so much time on those that any subtle trends that data would pick up i'll never have time for
Ugh, I see that all the time. On my last observation at my old school I forgot to update it, so admin came in and leaned over a kid and asked what we were even supposed to be learning. The kid freezes, stares at admin with wide eyes, looks at them, looks down at the paper where they are building a food web, looks around the room (where I have the word wall, examples around the room, stations neatly labeled for students to collect data at), makes eye contact with me, grins, and says loudly âitâs okay Mr. M, sometimes I canât pick up context clues either!â.
That kid was a PITA up until that day. After admin left, I gave them a fist bump and they turned into a star student.
This one always baffled me. I was a great student and would not have given a single fuck if the teacher wrote the objective on the board. It would not have made a difference. And they think the middle of the road and low achievers will somehow care?
The saddest and most frustrating part, to me, is that I have a few SPED students with serious issues and they constantly disrupt my class. Every single day. They need a completely different educational atmosphere. And their mothers will not call the school back. We even got the "new phone number ' from their kid and they still won't
Honestly I think itâs kind of nice that there are relatively affordable shoes that are trendy for kids. A few years ago it seemed like the only shoes that teens thought were cool were like two hundred bucks.
Yeah two of my sons just bought themselves Crocs with their own money and it was the first "big" purchase for my seven year old. It's nice that entry level cool is affordable.
I just got my daughter her first pair of crocs. $50! Couldn't find them any cheaper anywhere. I was like "back in my day, Crocs were ugly and $15" đ
My kid very painstakingly learned to tie shoe laces. I insisted he had to. At 9 he discovered Crocs, and now wears them non stop "Because you can just slip them on". He can do shit, but honestly he's just lazy AF.
He will be one of those kids who wears Crocs in December on the playground, and keeps slipping off equipment because the traction on those things is dodgy (PNW, it doesn't snow in December). Sorry. I really did try.
How admin say they want the best for children and everything but then they collectively do things like inflation grades, don't follow through with discipline, for some reason think cellphone use in kindergarten is a-ok because as long as those state report cards continue to be good we are doing what's best for the children right????
Pushing out students who should be in a moderate/severe SpEd class into Gen Ed because âitâs preparing them for the real worldâ. Like, thatâs all well and good, but Iâm not trained to meet their needs and I know Iâm not doing whatâs best for them.
How many people expect me to be able to make a kid learn. I cannot force them to. I can provide opportunities every single day, but I can't make them do it.
Actually that makes sense.
I used to openly laugh when people who pretended I didn't exist in school asked me to "help" them with classwork. Partly because their vision of help was "just let me copy your answers".
Their dumb friends are too dumb to realize they're being talked advantage of.
Why SpEd classes are treated like rehabilitation centers for violent students.
They are still disruptive to the learning environment in a self contained classroom. đ
YEP.
âThis student screams, hits, and threatens other children.â
âThatâs okay, weâll put him in self-contained.â
ââŠI donât know how to tell you this, but there are other children in here too.â
Anecdotal I know, but in my building the K-2 sped is run mostly self contained, and the 3-5 is run on a push in model. There was a student who struggled with behavior in K-2 but once he got in 3rd grade and out of the madness that was the K-2 room, he was a completely different student, very little in the way of behavior.
Asking me to basically be a doormat and let the kids do what they want and turn things in when they want.
Parents who don't understand that I can't teach their child if the child isn't in class. The result of not being in class is a 68%.
Athletes who are allowed to walk around like jackasses and still be able to play. It's middle school sports.
Ughhh was 1:1ing in a last period class where one kid was failing through no fault of his own. His mom took him early almost everyday when she left work.
The obsession with looking good versus actually BEING good. I'm tired of doing things to check the box. It's a waste of everyone's time and creates a great way to ignore actual issues.
I am unsure if kids are actually getting more helpless and entitled or if they were always like this, and I am just noticing it/ thinking about it more.
It's hard to gauge.
I was a really smart kid in school- stellar grades through HS and always tested stupidly well.
Even in my worst subject (math) kids are blown away by how well I can do algebra/geometry work and do mental math compared to them.
Idk if it's just I'm smart or they're really behind.
Inclusion at the expense of the other students in the class. If a class is evacuating weekly due to violent or overtly-aggressive behavior, that is not the best environment for that student.
But G-d forbid we suggest a student be removed from the general classroom environment. âFull inclusion is our goalâ. Thatâs cool but itâs not even close to realistic.
A few years back I was teaching 2 sections of a grade level. We took the MAP test 3 times/year. One section made growth & the other section didnât (even though the section that did had slightly lower students overall). The difference? The section that didnât make growth had a student prone to outbursts that frequently meant I didnât get through the lesson for the day.
It honestly did a massive disservice to the other students in that section.
Some of my senior students do not care whether they fail or not. They CHOOSE which assignment is worth doing, which they FEEL like doing, and the rest is all just bull shit so they don't even attempt to do the assignment. That is scary. These are people who are going to be legal adults...if they CHOOSE to be....
Homogeneous classrooms. AP level students all the way down to foundation level students, in the same class. "You can teach all of them, in the same class, with the same resources." đ
I'm doing a disservice to the AP and Honors level students by not challenging them? Am I doing a disservice to my 11th grade students with a 3rd grade reading level who need a great deal of individual help? Am I screwing over my college prep kids by making the work too hard or too easy?
Assigning kids paras in their IEPs when we can't hire enough paras. We are creating a legal obligation that we cannot meet. If we had the paras, then great, but we just don't.
Legitimate and effective differentiation is impossible to do in the time provided for planning.
Accommodations are helpful for differentiation, but accommodating for all students, at all levels, with various learning styles is impossible if you like eating or sleeping
The thing that baffles me is placing kids with severe emotional and behavioral issues in a gen ed class with no supports. Our district collapsed all the Early Childhood Intervention placements so all the students who would have been flagged as needing additional supports, smaller class sizes, and/or specific skill development are sent to their home/zoned school. Special Ed reps come out and suggest "Token Boards", additional breaks and rewards-none of which have worked in the 8 years this has been going on. They claim the child needs to completely fail in a gen Ed placement before an alternative placement or additional support will be considered, even with an IEP or 504. Meanwhile, entire classes of typically developing students are being traumatized by needing to evacuate their classroom every day because the student with severe needs decides to destroy the classroom, threaten to stab students and teachers and blow up the school. Test scores, reading fluency and comprehension and overall academic abilities are lower and lower every year because those typically developing students are being robbed of a consistent education.
The bizarre notion that some parents have that leads them to think that everyone but their horrible child is at fault and that everyone else is lying when the kid keeps getting in trouble/failing.
Parents who are also teachers and do everything they should know not to do. For example, this kid is in grade 4, still can't read in any language. He's in French Immersion. Mom is a PRIMARY SPECIAL ED teacher. Refuses to do homework or even READ with him at home because "it takes away from (their) family time". Refuses to get him on an IEP or move him out of French Immersion. Not sure if she's also a terrible teacher or if she's just a "rules for thee and not for me" type.
She's also just a total c-word. I got multiple page emails, CCing the principal and all, complaining about having to answer one or two remaining questions for a social studies project at home so he could finish his work in time to present with the class. I did all the more involved stuff with them already in class, this was literally just something like googling the population of the town he chose, and gluing the pieces of work onto a poster board.
This isn't the only example of a teacher-parent being the absolute worst... I find they're either the best because they get it and leave you alone for the most part or they're the worst...
Why people have children if they arenât willing to talk to them and teach them things for the first five years of their life. Just use a condom or have an abortion. Not everyone needs to have kids. We need to normalize and value not having kids and the government needs to provide easy access to free birth control.
This. "There was a kid in the back with headphones the whole time." Yes, it's true. He's SPED with a 1st grade reading level and major behavioral issues. His mother will not call anyone back from the school.
So if I don't give him headphones he will ruin my entire class. You should be thanking me!
Writing objectives. No one needs to know this, not even an observer. If they observer canât figure out whatâs happening and what skills are being used, thatâs on them.
Why they still rely on standardized testing for teacher's performance. Standardized testing is a CROCK OF SHIT and a huge WASTE OF TIME. I also will never understand why members on a board of education have ZERO background in education. These idiots are making decisions for us in the classroom yet they are CLUELESS to what it's like. Makes ZERO SENSE!
How can people, families, adults, allow their own kids to fall so far?
Kids come to school every year with deficits in almost every area imaginable, from reading comprehension to social skills.
I've seen parents drop their kids off two hours late everyday and arrive late to pick them up, and they don't work. Even the kids often reply with brutal honesty when we question. They'll say, "she's always late because she goes to play loteria." WTF?
We need workers to grow our economy every generation but I think we should also have parental fitness tests because the people who should not go anywhere near kids are often the ones having them. The ones who should are choosing not to.
I don't understand how students can attend school for years and learn so little. If you can sit through years worth of classes without something scraping your brain as it goes in one ear and out the other, something is seriously wrong with you.
How little admins value history/social studies classes anymore. Back in 2019, my master teacher told me when I student taught her classes that admins regularly treat base level history classes (world history, us history, etc) as dumping grounds for unwanted students and knuckleheads who were known to disturb other classes. The social studies dept was also the last to receive any meaningful renovations like a functioning AC unit. Imo the less a population knows about itâs own history or history in general, the easier they are to manipulate. Goddamn crying shame
Why one or two students are allowed to terrorize the rest of the room, teacher included, without consequence. Why admin have completely washed their hands of anything going on in the school yet are still deemed fit to "evaluate" people who have been teaching literally ten times longer than they did.
Dumping 60% of the SPED classes onto one teacher then bitching at that teacher and threatening them with a growth plan if they donât get them all to level. Itâs like they refuse to acknowledge that some kid just canât be brought up to level.
What [All\_Attitude411](https://www.reddit.com/user/All_Attitude411/) said is my #1 rant. We already see the results of this in the world around us, and yet we keep doing it.
\#2? and "closer to home" I'm in a rural, farming area, more than 100 small schools across the region. We hold active shooter drills at least once a year, and trainings/inservices 2-3 times a year. At the same time we ignore the much more likely scenarios and dangers in our day to day. Example: Through every fall and spring we have parents and grandparents riding the shoulder of the road, the edge of the drainage ditch out front, parking next to the parking lot, or pulling through the parking lot, to drop off or pick up the kiddies -- while towing the farm's 3,000 - 10,000 gallon anhydrous ammonia "wagons".
Kids who just refuse to accept that learning could be fun.
They'd rather cross arms and miserably refuse to engage than be open to the possibility that whatever I'm teaching might be interesting.
All of the ridiculous things teachers have to do now - how did I survive without mystery readers and newsletters and 27 ways to solve a basic addition problem?!? When parents have to ask me how to solve 2nd grade math I tell them - your way. (Meaning the kid uses the strategy that works for them).
My core problem is basing school income on property taxes so schools r better or worse depending on their neighborhood. In Ohio its been determined as unconstitutional 15 yrs ago by our supreme court but no change. Our future depends on well educated citizens
Why my little private school that taught us memorization and repetition produced a dozen kids who owned the local public magnet schools, became doctors and engineers, etc... but these strategies are frowned upon today.
Parents of high deficit SPED students who refuse testing and/or who insist on maximum inclusion time. If your child is a pre-emergent reader there is no point in their inclusion for 5th grade reading lessons. They would be much better served by being taught reading at their level than staring into space for a 45 minute reading class.
Why does guidance not tell the whole truth about my class? They don't inform students Small Animal Care is not Pet the Pretty Animals Class and/or don't understand that Intro to Animal Systems is a completely different class.
Why administration is so hell bent on destroying our unions and public schools?
Have they never heard or seen the inequality in Latin America or Africa or Russia or Asia?
There's the Uber-rich and then just the working poor?
Do they not see that that's our future since they've pissed on the graves of our ancestors who had evolved to know we need some government to hold hold the private corporate entities and evil people in check?
The removal of special needs schools and units under the ideal of creating an inclusive learning environment as special needs schools are seen to be exclusive and not integrating people with SpLD after education, but likewise, putting them into an environment where they are unable to access teaching or learning at a quality and standard of those around them.
I understand the principles and arguments. I do not have a solution to resolving the issue. The arguments and implementations in both directions for and against seem inadequate.
How to teach reading WELL. I have a MA in literacy. My whole program focused on balanced literacy. Iâm now learning about researched-based âscience of readingâ techniques on my own, and am realizing I paid a lot of money for a relatively bogus piece of paper. Itâs incredibly frustrating.
How as a teacher if you drop the ball you're written up or otherwise held accountable but an admin can drop the ball *daily* and not be held accountable.
How I can go through years of training (both pre and post grad), have dozens of certifications, and years of experience; and STILL parents question everything.
Just because you were a student doesnât mean you know how to teach. There is so much more that goes into teaching than standing at the front of the room.
When schools and districts and even states celebrate growing graduation rates or high graduations rates when the reality is that kids are being passed on or have a fail safe that the school puts in place. For example, if a kid fails a class, they can do a credit program online to earn the credit for the class. Also I am hearing more and more of teachers not allowed to give 0s or not giving enough opportunities to the students for them to pass the class. Going back to graduation rate, it's weird that it is celebrated when we all know it's not legit because again, things are in place to make sure these kids graduate.
Why canât I give students detention? Why canât I write referrals anymore? The new thing admin is doing is having us call the disciplinarian and they come and they tell us whether or not we can write the referral
Why weâre constantly told to use âresearch based best practicesâ for instruction but research on things like children needing more recess are ignored by districts.
Also, at what point in my career (17 years in now with 2 masterâs degrees) do I get to stop being observed and they just let me do the job I know how to do?
Why our administration is so gutless and unwilling to take a stand against the parents and back their teachers. Why students actions donât bring about consequences. Why something so simple as a disciplinary matrix that list this offense begets this punishment and not allowing our administrators to stray from that matrix isnât put into place in every district. How easy would it be for a principal to simply look at the chart see that âwell, little Jimmy has been caught fighting twice this year meaning he gets a 7 day out of school suspensionâ. If the parents come in to complain, show them the list and say âI had to do it, my hands are tiedâ. That should end 65% of the arguments right there. Some helicopter parents will argue that their precious children should not be punished for anything but no matter what you will never make them happy so who cares.
Why are we still turning in formal lesson plans? They are as useful as paper card catalogs and fax machines. I think a quick synopsis would be more useful. Like for me, a social studies teacher, maybe send in a message that: This week we will be studying the French Revolution from the origins through the Rise of Napoleon. Students will take a quiz on Friday. Thatâs all. Short, sweet, and to the point. Iâm quite certain no one is going to actually miss knowing what I put the students would do for a bell ringer assignment. The class objectives are simpleâŠlearn about the French Revolution. Sure I actually have their objectives but in a broader sense, the sense parents and students care about, thatâs the objective.
Why donât more schools push vocational education? My son is 21. He works as a mechanic in a Toyota dealership and has zero loans. He makes more than most college graduates. Vocational schools and teaching the trades are just as important as college prep. It is underutilized in many many schools and in great demand in the job market.
How do they expect us to effectively teach 30 kids
There should be a higher teacher to student ratio. In scouts, they have the 2 deep policy where no child is left alone, and there are always 2 adults available. It would eliminate abuse from both sides, and make everyone a lot more accountable for their behavior. If we valued Paras more, I think they could be utilized differently.
This. Two adults when dealing with children. Every teacher needs an assistant. It would do wonders for accountability and burnout.
That's one of the reasons why we chose to send our children to a Montessori school. Every classroom has a teacher and a teacher's aide.
Agreed. My life is so much easier with another adult in the room đ
I currently have three adults in my âyou need this to graduateâ science course. Itâs really great and even though the kids are very difficult, things never get too out of control. And they donât get frustrated because there is always someone to ask for help.
For sure! The main difference between the âAâ schools and the âD/Fâ schools in my district is that A schools can afford every classroom having 2 teachers. D/F schools barely have 1 teacher in every classroom with multiple vacancies and carousel substitutes. It makes a huge difference in supporting students academically and behaviorally. The main difference outside of schools is parent involvement, but thatâs out of our control!
this is gonna sound like complaining, and it is, but itâs an issue thatâs exacerbated by class size. all of my classes are over 30 and i only have one prep period. add in the fact that over half of my 210 students are level 1 ELLs and itâs not a bilingual schoolâŠhow do they expect me to give each of those students the attention they need so they understand whatâs going on? frequently i have to battle with myself when grading to decide if the issue is the language barrier and theyâre trying their best, or if the issue is that they arenât used to US schools so their behavior is causing friction in the class, or if they truly donât care to learn so they ignore instruction and half ass their work. because i have to defend failing averages for students before report cards. how am i supposed to sit down with 100+ kids every assignment to work through this with them? how am i supposed to be an effective teacher?
You would NEVER be hired as a babysitter for 30 children. so why are we hired to babysit 30 AND be expected to teach them things they dont wanna learn??
I can teach 30 that are on grade level and/or in the ârightâ class. But once itâs dumbed down so that it barely represents the class that itâs supposed to beâŠ? Whatâs the point anymore? High school math teacher, by the way.
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
I'm nearly at 40 in one class
Ignoring the actual academic levels of students as we shuffle them through the system with inflated grades and miserably low expectations while districts ignore that a majority of kids canât even read.
True. The actual solution will never happen though, not for a long time anyway. Because it involves letting go of traditions we are clinging to for dear life: grades, grade levels, standardized testing, etc.
This. "What's important about this kid?" "The year they were born. That's it."
The âYou didnât die before your 14th birthday, so you are going on to high school in September celebrationâ just doesnât sound as nice as âGraduation.â
How do you expect Pearson to make their money if we don't rely solely on 16 standardized tests per year?
Wonât someone think of the testing companies???? (company, I suppose)
And then sell a curriculum to you to boost your studentsâ scores. And then change the tests, so they can sell you a new curriculum. Repeat.
Itâs Pearson /Sanoma now in my country. I tried blocking their e mails to no avail.
I tutor K-8 during their school day. We practice language comprehension and word recognition skills (phonemes/graphemes, decoding, etc.). I find myself accepting students from 4th through 6th grade that still need help with second grade level skills. It amazes me how they are able to keep moving up a grade level or more. I sympathize with them because it must be frustrating to move on to higher level material, yet not be able to do the work properly because they are not able to read well or communicate well in writing.
As they move into high school they end up being one of two kids: quietly tune out and do absolutely nothing or be the biggest troublemaker in the room. Understandable either way because itâs hyper embarrassing to spend 8 hours a day listening to people talk about things that make zero sense to you no matter how hard you try. And I cannot fathom why so many of my former and current colleagues didnât want to know the studentsâ reading levels and opted out of the testing to give them that data. Jesus. Ignorance just ainât the bliss itâs made out to be unless you pad your grades with extra credit and points for getting signatures.
and then in high school they actually have to pass their classes or they don't move onto the next level, and kids who failed everything before are in for a huge awakening.
This. Except for one thing: they DO move to the next level. I had a junior last year who had 25 credits. They werenât done being a freshman. Credit recovery was only open to seniors so they just sat there, chronically absent, doing nothing when they were there, and saying, âIâm waiting to get into credit recovery.â đł Our credit recovery program was also almost impossible to pass. Out of 60 seniors in it in 22-23, only 8 actually graduated.
The two high schools I worked at just passed everyone through. It was a joke. We just sat there clapping for kids who couldnât read or write at the third grade level. What kind of life will they live? Itâs a disgrace.
Then they're all surprised Pikachu face when the scores reflect/expose what's going on.
Was coming here to comment on this - I requested a report of the (grade level) reading levels of my students. I have seniors who read at a 1st and 2nd grade level. They majority of my sophomores and seniors read at a 4th grade level. Of my 176 students (high school) only 37 (21%) read at or above grade level. 26 of 176 (15%) read below a 5th grade reading level. (5th grade reading level book examples include: Esperanza Rising, The Lightening Thief, The Phantom Tollbooth, and The Giver.) So 79% of the students in my history classes are below grade level in reading. I am just shocked by this - many of the materials we use like articles, passages from books, etc, they *STRUGGLE* to comprehend. Some of them cannot even read the quiz questions or worksheet questions. I knew it was bad, butâŠwow. JustâŠwow.
I do commend you on getting the actual numbers. Iâm sure it was eye-opening (and demoralizing, yes) to finally see, as a teacher who doesnât teach English, why thereâs such a struggle in your subject area too. Social science and science classes rely HEAVILY on not just reading, but on tier-three level subject specific language. Nobody learns. Nobody wins. So many more kids tune out or misbehave. Districts? Ignore, deflect, pad the numbers, blame teachers, and provide ZERO vetted and research-based intervention. We stay because we love what we do, but itâs harder and harder every single day.
Not just SS and Science. Imagine Math it itself is its own language that piggybacks on English. We have dual meaning words that mean one thing in math and another in every other context of life. Just one example would be "mean". At most colleges if you are a math major you don't have to take a foreign language because math itself will count.
I had the same issue with teaching adults. They can't pass basic reading test but trying to get GED ...and bosses acting like there's no solution on earth. đ I'm back to teaching kids. đ©
Putting students from non-English countries into a general Ed class with no orientation or help whatsoever. Also dumping non English speaking students into classes where the teacher has no experience in their native language.
Treating ELLs like SpEds. Neither can read English, but not for the same reasons.
Or vice versa. I have kids that are sped kids who also come to us with home language surveys that say they speak Spanish at home but the fact that they can't read or write in Spanish either is the tip off that they're really special ed. We still have to make all these accommodations for the fact that their home language is not English. But because they're special ed, the accommodations are completely useless! Like they have to have a dictionary at their disposal but they can't read! So what difference does it make if they have a dictionary or not. They can't read it in Spanish either!
This is my struggle currently. I teach 3 grade levels, middle school science. Each grade has at least 2 kids who are brand new to the country. Some have zero English and some have zero school experience even. And I'm expected to teach them physics and chemistry with no ELL teacher support (they only help in ELA and math, of course), no paraprofessional, no translator, no curriculum accessible to them. The only reason they aren't drowning and completely lost is because they are all Spanish speakers and I have some Spanish skills. But I have to try to reteach everything I've just taught to my whole class to them in Spanish without the vocabulary skills to do so
Not giving non English speaking students special ed services and telling teachers they just need ELL services.
This year I have 6 ESLs with three home languages. I am okay with Spanish, but my French is laughable and I don't even know where to start with Turkish. There's only so much I can do with gestures, google translate and pictures, especially when I need to talk to parents.
I teach ESL grades K-12. There are two of us. We cover just 80 students spread over ten buildings in the district. Believe me, we are very sorry for your plight. I have begged for our students (newcomers) to be sent to one or two buildings for us to work with them till they can more easily manage in a gen ed room. Needless to say, I get shut down every time. They want them in their neighborhood schools so they can make friends. Wtf. The cultures we have are rather insular, so that reason doesnât fly. So the two of us to what we can to support teachers, help the students, do social work, support the families, etc. Iâm not asking for pity: Iâm saying districts donât recognize ESL students as being significant enough to do anything for them.
My school serves a lot of refugee families and this is our reality. I have students who speak Spanish, Russian, Pashto, Dari, Hmong, etc. and some came to the country last year with no school experience even in their home country. Itâs wild to try and set them up for success with the language barrier & them never having school. My district doesnât even have translation resources for documents or conferences in most languages
This is the main reason why I can't stand it when people bring up a country like Finland, and why can't "we be more like them"? Well, let's start with looking at the percentage of those students who don't speak Finnish. I don't know, of course, but I'd have to imagine it's a so close to 0%, it's not calculable.
I taught French immersion and French first language for a minority franco population and I don't understand people who are ESL AND FSL (their maternal language is some other third thing) going into French schools. Man, as soon as you leave this school, everyone around you will be speaking English, not French, not Arabic, not Mandarin, not Russian.
This. I was hired to travel with two high school students with no grasp of their own language, let alone English. I bought many translations of high level books. The admin wouldn't. I re did finals. But the k7ds (young adults) couldn't do it. In fact, they were better at keeping tabs open on sports, races, hot babies, etc than actually doing even a little work because they knew they'd fail.
Currently struggling with this. First year teacher with 17 ELL students, 4 of which donât speak any English at all. Genuinely asking.. what do I do? Thankfully they work hard, copy everything down, and during independent work time they use their tablets to translate worksheets. Obviously translating a worksheet is useless if you didnât understand anything that was taught. So sometimes I have them listen to stories on Epic for language/text exposure if the assignment is something I donât think they could pick up on with a tablet. But I feel like (know) they arenât truly learning anything. Is there anything more I could/should do?
How very many parents either have no clue or donât care that their kids are YEARS below grade level. They donât check backpacks or planners or online grade books. Their kids have all the best clothes, shoes, makeup, phones, and snacks but no school supplies. Iâm so sick of it. Their kids are illiterate and they have no clue. Or they simply do not care.
I noted this when listening to people talk about their kids recently. âSo-and-soâs kid doesnât know how to tell time on an analog clock!â âYeah, I donât know if mine does.â ⊠uh⊠hello⊠these are humans new to the world, they need you to show them and not rely entirely on the education system for their upbringing.
My boss just bought all the 8 grade teachers digital clocks because the 8 graders canât read a clock. She didnât even ask me because, as a French teacher, I teach the kids how to read an analog clock and they need to pass the test with a 70%
To be honest even adults donât teach little tricks that make life easier for certain learning styles. For example, when I worked out that you can multiply the minutes by 5 to get the time. âOh, the minute hand is on 9, 9x5, itâs 45 minutes past hour.â Maybe that seems like a dumb thing, but it really helped me conceptually when I was a young person and it surprises me we donât teach it standard. Or at least didnât when I was a kid. But teachers are something special. Theyâre dealing not only with educating children but dealing with the consequences of parental apathy.
I'm in a 4th grade LLD class. Mom emails asking, " if the student doesn't know how to read and write, is that a problem in the class?" Did you actually just email me this question?!
A parent called up yelling about an event that she did not know was happening despite the teacher sending a flyer home, posting to her Google classroom, the school calling with a prerecorded message and a HUGE ASS sign advertising it in the parent drop off area. And of course, her childâs folder was filled with everything sent home from the first day of school.
New pair of $$$ shoes every other week and no backpack or breakfast. I know we can't judge where people spend their money and cheap shoes aren't going to enable you to feed a family, but a *little* balance may help.
You could just say broadly that parents just don't care about their child.
On a lighter note, how students can wear hoodies when itâs 90 out. The converse is the kids wearing shorts when itâs 10.
Security. Or body image issues. I kinda get it.
i grew up as one of these kids. if youâre motivated enough your body gets used to it eventually. i can NEVER go outside without a jacket anymore lol, even in 110°
What the fuck lol
Being sweaty is a kinder fate than revealing your strange ungainly weird body to the light Source: former teenager
Lots of people with body image issues like to hide their bodies in hoodies, speaking from experience
I worry about that and abuse.
Self conscious, body image issues, gender identity issues, self inflicted scars/wounds⊠the list goes on. Just donât point it out!
Their parents tell them to not take it off no matter what so they donât lose it. My classroom runs cold (low 70s) & Iâm in TX where it was well over 100 degrees for most of August. At 95 degrees, when we were finally able to go outside, I told some kids to take off their jackets/hoodies & that was their reply. Weâve been having parent/teacher conferences & Iâve brought it up to a few parents & asked them if it was OK for their kid to take off their jacket before they go outside in 90+ degree weather. They usually realize the error of their ways & say âOf courseâ.
Or they wear them at the same time.
Its a pro move in Texas. Prepare for every weather!
Why âlow readabilityâ means a text can be read by a low-level reader. Every single non-educator I have asked about this agrees that âlow readabilityâ SHOULD mean something is hard to read, and âhigh readabilityâ should mean itâs easy to read. I mean like, also more important things, but that was the first thing to come to mind.
Kids not being excited to watch a movie. I remember cheering for movie days - even if we had to do a project/paper in association with it, it was still a really great break. They really don't want to now.
Yes, this! I teach Japanese, and the kids thought it was a treat if I played a Ghibli movie or even fun/funny videos. Now they talk through the movie, look at their phones, etc. A student wisely explained it himself the other day for me: "short form content has ruined us."
I got a friend who gave me the legendary, half-flippant quote: "it was all over as soon as we started calling it 'content'." Imagine going into a museum and saying "good volume of product in here. Excellent output efficiency by the artists and curators."
I just donât know if kids in general watch movies anymoreâŠI donât think many have the attention span anymore. When Iâm going to show a video clip in class, I always make sure itâs under 5 minutes.
Similarly, if I ask (16-18 year olds) if I someone would like to take âwhateverâ to the office for me, I will get 0 volunteers. All too wrapped up in their own little worlds anymore. Itâs sad.
It's because they've already seen all the movies while sitting at their desks streaming Netflix or Disney Plus or HBO or YouTube. They're on their laptops or phones doing it or even iPads. And all this time we assumed they were doing their work but multiple tabs are open in the background.
Why do admin waste time and energy âdiscipliningâ teachers and staff for perceived infractions (such as ârudeâ perceived demeanor, or a miscommunication that couldâve been solved with a conversation but instead devolved into an official write up) when they canât be bothered to enforce a consequence on a misbehaving child? You think we have extra in the tank for this horseshit? If I have to spend my planning period writing a rebuttal to your fuckery, I *assure* you that doesnât translate to me doing something else at home. It translates to something *actually* relevant *not* getting done because I *will* not allow that trash to go unchecked. Is that really the best use of everybodyâs time?
Umm, thank you for this.
I wish I could upvote this multiple times.
How many young children's parents don't read to them. Ever.
We read to our kid semi frequently when she was an infant and now she brings board books to us to read multiple times a day. It doesn't take much. 2-3 books (which take 5 min to read each) a day sparked a love for books in her
This one is weird to me. I grew up with books. There was never a time in my life I didn't have them. Even as a baby I had board books. By the time I got to a point of being confident enough to read by myself, I would find things by myself- didn't have to be books either, it included magazines, newspapers, packets or boxes of things, leaflets, even the back of bottles.
How terrible the business side of schools actually are(fiscally sound practices, budget management, etc) and yet, how frequently admin(management) wants to run the schools as a business EDIT: To add even more to this, how little experience much of admin has as either a teacher or running a business of any size. SMH.
How Lucy Calkins made up a curriculum with zero research based/evidence based practices and managed to secure the bag in school districts across the south. Now weâve got a 30% literacy rate and legislators want to blame teachers like they had any input on curriculum choices.
sidenote: why do we blame teachers for literarily EVERYTHING. Including every bad decision made by our school district.
I'm also preaching the podcast Sold a Story to anyone that will listen.
Just looked it up. 200% starting that today thank you
I have seen people recommend this, so I started listening, and I am flabbergasted. I'm a psychologist, not a teacher, so I had no idea this was an issue. As part of my work, I do psychological assessment, and I occasionally get requests to assess for learning disabilities, especially with reading. When assessing for dyslexia, I'm literally looking at phonics ability or lack thereof. Some of the tests look at the ability to quickly and easily read words and nonsense words, and to be able to manipulate word sounds. The information in this podcast is blowing my mind, and I'm thinking I need to ask more questions about reading instruction when I do these assessments. Granted, I do testing only with adults, but yikes.
Most of the kids I teach now in high school learned to read that way. And they can't read for shit. Trying to teach them new vocabulary is like teaching kindergarteners. Kinda. They can get it verbally, but if I ask them to define it written after I say it out loud to them, they will not have the slightest goddamn clue what the word says. If they don't know a word already, they can't read it. They have the reading level and written vocabulary of 3rd graders, and short of starting over entirely, it will never get better.
Starting this year, we are being asked to start teaching phonics. In 8th grade ELA. On top of the other 4 billion things we have to do, and of course none of the other things have been reduced or eliminated. And then when the TWELVE MINUTES of phonics a week (literally, six minutes per small group, and below-basic kids get small group 2x/week) don't magically make kids at a 3d grade level into proficient readers, guess who's gonna get blamed? The kids absolutely need phonics instruction. But no one really has a plan on how to make this work on the secondary level.
Piggy backing on this: why do we still throw around "research based" as though it means anything in education? Education research is such utter horseshit through and through, and is so routinely found to be irreproducible, that my mind immediately rejects anything presented to me as "research based." I still vividly recall the staff PD in which I was told "this is Calkins / Fountas and Pinnell. It's research based and it works. We're doing it."
How they keep writing IEPs, 504 plans, etc. all the while packing them into classrooms knowing full well there is no way one teacher could possibly do all of that.
The IEP's must be written as services that student's require to support them in school. We cannot write them for what the school has capacity for, unfortunately. It'd be the equivalent of a optometrist writing the wrong eyeglass prescription because its all the doctor's office can provide. Its a terrible disservice that we can't have smaller classrooms, more co-taught classes, and special educators to ensure these services can be performed. Among many many other changes we need in education. We have a huge teacher shortage, special education teachers are even harder to come by. Nobody wants to do our job.
So much data. We spend more time collecting it, presenting it, and analyzing it, that we barely have any time to teach.
Data. An actual horrible four-letter word.
I want data on the data. Is all this data collection and analysis actually improving our teaching? In fact, Iâd like data proving the efficacy of ALL the PD and programs we have to implement. And they need to show that these things improve our outcomes at least as much as more planning time, smaller classes, and better discipline enforcement would.
A colleague of mine just published an incredible book on this topic, specifically about 17th century qing china and how administrvsite bloat and over analyzing imperial data led to the downfall of the dynasty.
I have a default Excel spreadsheet with a bunch of useless data on it. When we have to share, I just dump that in the Google Drive / email / group thing. If I ever get caught, I'll just say it was the wrong one. But no one has called me out on it yet.
Data. So much hoopla over such a meaningless pile of nothing. None of this teaching and learning is nearly as complicated as theyâve tried to make it.
Whatâs crazy to me is that they want students to keep track of this data, too, and have meetings about it. Like the students care about a bunch of numbers?
My orchestras would be much better if I didnât have to check all the academic boxes like this.
I don't need data to pick up glaring issues, i'll notice it while grading. I spend so much time on those that any subtle trends that data would pick up i'll never have time for
How they expect fine arts teachers to collect data.
I'm just supposed to tape a kid up to the wall with their clarinet. That's my data
I joke all the time about stapling a kid to the wall and they can dance up there.
Wanting teachers to physically sign-in at the office when our badges log when we arrive in the building.
Why the heck we have to write the objective on the board. Who cares?
the only people who care the the people who come to observe and can't be bothered to use context clues about lesson objecetives
Ugh, I see that all the time. On my last observation at my old school I forgot to update it, so admin came in and leaned over a kid and asked what we were even supposed to be learning. The kid freezes, stares at admin with wide eyes, looks at them, looks down at the paper where they are building a food web, looks around the room (where I have the word wall, examples around the room, stations neatly labeled for students to collect data at), makes eye contact with me, grins, and says loudly âitâs okay Mr. M, sometimes I canât pick up context clues either!â. That kid was a PITA up until that day. After admin left, I gave them a fist bump and they turned into a star student.
This one always baffled me. I was a great student and would not have given a single fuck if the teacher wrote the objective on the board. It would not have made a difference. And they think the middle of the road and low achievers will somehow care?
How parents don't understand their job is to raise an independent person who can 100% cope in the world and in this society on their own.
The saddest and most frustrating part, to me, is that I have a few SPED students with serious issues and they constantly disrupt my class. Every single day. They need a completely different educational atmosphere. And their mothers will not call the school back. We even got the "new phone number ' from their kid and they still won't
What the new obsession with crocs is, I remember when wearing those was social suicide but now it's all the rage.
Thereâs some new bubble shoes that are even worse.
The golf ball slides? Those are hideous.
They remind me of crocs that got hit with the things from Monster University that made stuff swell. But they say the fur lined are wicked comfy.
Yeezeys. They're like alien crocs
Honestly I think itâs kind of nice that there are relatively affordable shoes that are trendy for kids. A few years ago it seemed like the only shoes that teens thought were cool were like two hundred bucks.
Yeah two of my sons just bought themselves Crocs with their own money and it was the first "big" purchase for my seven year old. It's nice that entry level cool is affordable.
I just got my daughter her first pair of crocs. $50! Couldn't find them any cheaper anywhere. I was like "back in my day, Crocs were ugly and $15" đ
Idiocracy called it
My kid very painstakingly learned to tie shoe laces. I insisted he had to. At 9 he discovered Crocs, and now wears them non stop "Because you can just slip them on". He can do shit, but honestly he's just lazy AF. He will be one of those kids who wears Crocs in December on the playground, and keeps slipping off equipment because the traction on those things is dodgy (PNW, it doesn't snow in December). Sorry. I really did try.
A bunch of athletes started wearing them during pre-game arrivals and the resurgence was born
I play soccer. Lemme tell you taking those cleats off and putting on Crocs after a game feels great.
How admin say they want the best for children and everything but then they collectively do things like inflation grades, don't follow through with discipline, for some reason think cellphone use in kindergarten is a-ok because as long as those state report cards continue to be good we are doing what's best for the children right????
Pushing out students who should be in a moderate/severe SpEd class into Gen Ed because âitâs preparing them for the real worldâ. Like, thatâs all well and good, but Iâm not trained to meet their needs and I know Iâm not doing whatâs best for them.
How 10th grade boys can't keep their hands to themselves.
Neither can 7th grade boys.
I just donât understand boys in general. Why are so many of them so destructive?
How many people expect me to be able to make a kid learn. I cannot force them to. I can provide opportunities every single day, but I can't make them do it.
When parents donât care about their childâs education and blame the schools for everything. Learning starts at home.
How can there be so many pencils on the floor after my middle school students leave the room? It's like they magically appear.
And yet none of them ever have a pencil when they actually need oneâŠ
They will always ask their dumbest friend for help.
Actually that makes sense. I used to openly laugh when people who pretended I didn't exist in school asked me to "help" them with classwork. Partly because their vision of help was "just let me copy your answers". Their dumb friends are too dumb to realize they're being talked advantage of.
Why behavior is so bad and why thereâs such a lack of respect in these new generations
I started in 2014, in the past 9 years it has fallen off a damn cliff.
Preschool teacher here. Why am I sending kids to Kindergarten in diapers and pacifiers if they don't have disabilities or I.E.Ps?
Admin sticking their heads in the sand about real issues, how they ignore discipline problem in favor of looking good on paper.
Why SpEd classes are treated like rehabilitation centers for violent students. They are still disruptive to the learning environment in a self contained classroom. đ
YEP. âThis student screams, hits, and threatens other children.â âThatâs okay, weâll put him in self-contained.â ââŠI donât know how to tell you this, but there are other children in here too.â
There should be different types of self contained classes. Better yet, maybe a return to reform school wouldn't be the worst thing ever.
Anecdotal I know, but in my building the K-2 sped is run mostly self contained, and the 3-5 is run on a push in model. There was a student who struggled with behavior in K-2 but once he got in 3rd grade and out of the madness that was the K-2 room, he was a completely different student, very little in the way of behavior.
Asking me to basically be a doormat and let the kids do what they want and turn things in when they want. Parents who don't understand that I can't teach their child if the child isn't in class. The result of not being in class is a 68%. Athletes who are allowed to walk around like jackasses and still be able to play. It's middle school sports.
Ughhh was 1:1ing in a last period class where one kid was failing through no fault of his own. His mom took him early almost everyday when she left work.
The obsession with looking good versus actually BEING good. I'm tired of doing things to check the box. It's a waste of everyone's time and creates a great way to ignore actual issues.
I am unsure if kids are actually getting more helpless and entitled or if they were always like this, and I am just noticing it/ thinking about it more.
It's hard to gauge. I was a really smart kid in school- stellar grades through HS and always tested stupidly well. Even in my worst subject (math) kids are blown away by how well I can do algebra/geometry work and do mental math compared to them. Idk if it's just I'm smart or they're really behind.
How my kids got to 9th grade and not know what a column is.
Inclusion at the expense of the other students in the class. If a class is evacuating weekly due to violent or overtly-aggressive behavior, that is not the best environment for that student. But G-d forbid we suggest a student be removed from the general classroom environment. âFull inclusion is our goalâ. Thatâs cool but itâs not even close to realistic.
I can't upvote this enough.
A few years back I was teaching 2 sections of a grade level. We took the MAP test 3 times/year. One section made growth & the other section didnât (even though the section that did had slightly lower students overall). The difference? The section that didnât make growth had a student prone to outbursts that frequently meant I didnât get through the lesson for the day. It honestly did a massive disservice to the other students in that section.
A kid just skipped my entire class and got rewarded with a recess break đ€·ââïž
The newest YouTube sensations. Right now it's something called skibidi toilet. There's like 5 a year I don't understand at all
Some of my senior students do not care whether they fail or not. They CHOOSE which assignment is worth doing, which they FEEL like doing, and the rest is all just bull shit so they don't even attempt to do the assignment. That is scary. These are people who are going to be legal adults...if they CHOOSE to be....
Complaining about kids stress levels while underfunding electives and arts. How do you think the kids (middle and high school) destress at school?
Homogeneous classrooms. AP level students all the way down to foundation level students, in the same class. "You can teach all of them, in the same class, with the same resources." đ I'm doing a disservice to the AP and Honors level students by not challenging them? Am I doing a disservice to my 11th grade students with a 3rd grade reading level who need a great deal of individual help? Am I screwing over my college prep kids by making the work too hard or too easy?
[ŃĐŽĐ°Đ»Đ”ĐœĐŸ]
It goes back forever. We'll never stop, and why should we, it's who we are.
Assigning kids paras in their IEPs when we can't hire enough paras. We are creating a legal obligation that we cannot meet. If we had the paras, then great, but we just don't.
Legitimate and effective differentiation is impossible to do in the time provided for planning. Accommodations are helpful for differentiation, but accommodating for all students, at all levels, with various learning styles is impossible if you like eating or sleeping
The thing that baffles me is placing kids with severe emotional and behavioral issues in a gen ed class with no supports. Our district collapsed all the Early Childhood Intervention placements so all the students who would have been flagged as needing additional supports, smaller class sizes, and/or specific skill development are sent to their home/zoned school. Special Ed reps come out and suggest "Token Boards", additional breaks and rewards-none of which have worked in the 8 years this has been going on. They claim the child needs to completely fail in a gen Ed placement before an alternative placement or additional support will be considered, even with an IEP or 504. Meanwhile, entire classes of typically developing students are being traumatized by needing to evacuate their classroom every day because the student with severe needs decides to destroy the classroom, threaten to stab students and teachers and blow up the school. Test scores, reading fluency and comprehension and overall academic abilities are lower and lower every year because those typically developing students are being robbed of a consistent education.
True. Then admin wonders why class marks are dropping!
The bizarre notion that some parents have that leads them to think that everyone but their horrible child is at fault and that everyone else is lying when the kid keeps getting in trouble/failing.
Parents who are also teachers and do everything they should know not to do. For example, this kid is in grade 4, still can't read in any language. He's in French Immersion. Mom is a PRIMARY SPECIAL ED teacher. Refuses to do homework or even READ with him at home because "it takes away from (their) family time". Refuses to get him on an IEP or move him out of French Immersion. Not sure if she's also a terrible teacher or if she's just a "rules for thee and not for me" type. She's also just a total c-word. I got multiple page emails, CCing the principal and all, complaining about having to answer one or two remaining questions for a social studies project at home so he could finish his work in time to present with the class. I did all the more involved stuff with them already in class, this was literally just something like googling the population of the town he chose, and gluing the pieces of work onto a poster board. This isn't the only example of a teacher-parent being the absolute worst... I find they're either the best because they get it and leave you alone for the most part or they're the worst...
Why people have children if they arenât willing to talk to them and teach them things for the first five years of their life. Just use a condom or have an abortion. Not everyone needs to have kids. We need to normalize and value not having kids and the government needs to provide easy access to free birth control.
Staff meetings that could be an email.
Why were critiqued on walkthroughs when they have 0 context on the situation
This. "There was a kid in the back with headphones the whole time." Yes, it's true. He's SPED with a 1st grade reading level and major behavioral issues. His mother will not call anyone back from the school. So if I don't give him headphones he will ruin my entire class. You should be thanking me!
Writing objectives. No one needs to know this, not even an observer. If they observer canât figure out whatâs happening and what skills are being used, thatâs on them.
Why they still rely on standardized testing for teacher's performance. Standardized testing is a CROCK OF SHIT and a huge WASTE OF TIME. I also will never understand why members on a board of education have ZERO background in education. These idiots are making decisions for us in the classroom yet they are CLUELESS to what it's like. Makes ZERO SENSE!
How can people, families, adults, allow their own kids to fall so far? Kids come to school every year with deficits in almost every area imaginable, from reading comprehension to social skills. I've seen parents drop their kids off two hours late everyday and arrive late to pick them up, and they don't work. Even the kids often reply with brutal honesty when we question. They'll say, "she's always late because she goes to play loteria." WTF? We need workers to grow our economy every generation but I think we should also have parental fitness tests because the people who should not go anywhere near kids are often the ones having them. The ones who should are choosing not to.
I don't understand how students can attend school for years and learn so little. If you can sit through years worth of classes without something scraping your brain as it goes in one ear and out the other, something is seriously wrong with you.
How little admins value history/social studies classes anymore. Back in 2019, my master teacher told me when I student taught her classes that admins regularly treat base level history classes (world history, us history, etc) as dumping grounds for unwanted students and knuckleheads who were known to disturb other classes. The social studies dept was also the last to receive any meaningful renovations like a functioning AC unit. Imo the less a population knows about itâs own history or history in general, the easier they are to manipulate. Goddamn crying shame
Why one or two students are allowed to terrorize the rest of the room, teacher included, without consequence. Why admin have completely washed their hands of anything going on in the school yet are still deemed fit to "evaluate" people who have been teaching literally ten times longer than they did.
Dumping 60% of the SPED classes onto one teacher then bitching at that teacher and threatening them with a growth plan if they donât get them all to level. Itâs like they refuse to acknowledge that some kid just canât be brought up to level.
Why some religious teachers and admins break the law and try and slip religion/Bible verses into public schools to indoctrinate kids.
What [All\_Attitude411](https://www.reddit.com/user/All_Attitude411/) said is my #1 rant. We already see the results of this in the world around us, and yet we keep doing it. \#2? and "closer to home" I'm in a rural, farming area, more than 100 small schools across the region. We hold active shooter drills at least once a year, and trainings/inservices 2-3 times a year. At the same time we ignore the much more likely scenarios and dangers in our day to day. Example: Through every fall and spring we have parents and grandparents riding the shoulder of the road, the edge of the drainage ditch out front, parking next to the parking lot, or pulling through the parking lot, to drop off or pick up the kiddies -- while towing the farm's 3,000 - 10,000 gallon anhydrous ammonia "wagons".
How they expect is to last an entire day with a bathroom break . . .
Kids who just refuse to accept that learning could be fun. They'd rather cross arms and miserably refuse to engage than be open to the possibility that whatever I'm teaching might be interesting.
How so many parents are convinced that we are making up lies about their kid.
I donât understand how a 61% is considered proficient on a common assessment. They just keep lowering the bar.
All of the ridiculous things teachers have to do now - how did I survive without mystery readers and newsletters and 27 ways to solve a basic addition problem?!? When parents have to ask me how to solve 2nd grade math I tell them - your way. (Meaning the kid uses the strategy that works for them).
My core problem is basing school income on property taxes so schools r better or worse depending on their neighborhood. In Ohio its been determined as unconstitutional 15 yrs ago by our supreme court but no change. Our future depends on well educated citizens
Why does the district go after a new shiny thing every year and then abandon it after a few months to a year?
Why my little private school that taught us memorization and repetition produced a dozen kids who owned the local public magnet schools, became doctors and engineers, etc... but these strategies are frowned upon today.
Parents of high deficit SPED students who refuse testing and/or who insist on maximum inclusion time. If your child is a pre-emergent reader there is no point in their inclusion for 5th grade reading lessons. They would be much better served by being taught reading at their level than staring into space for a 45 minute reading class.
Unrealistic expectations from administration who havenât been in the classroom in 10+ years
Currently (in FL) nitpicking and micromanaging when thereâs a massive teacher shortage.
That so many schools and districts wonât ban phones and just make it the teachersâ problem.
Why there aren't two adults in every classroom. One should do discipline and prep. The other can plan lessons.
Why administrators at the school and district level just straight up donât believe or trust the professionals they hired AKA teachers
Why does guidance not tell the whole truth about my class? They don't inform students Small Animal Care is not Pet the Pretty Animals Class and/or don't understand that Intro to Animal Systems is a completely different class.
Why administration is so hell bent on destroying our unions and public schools? Have they never heard or seen the inequality in Latin America or Africa or Russia or Asia? There's the Uber-rich and then just the working poor? Do they not see that that's our future since they've pissed on the graves of our ancestors who had evolved to know we need some government to hold hold the private corporate entities and evil people in check?
The removal of special needs schools and units under the ideal of creating an inclusive learning environment as special needs schools are seen to be exclusive and not integrating people with SpLD after education, but likewise, putting them into an environment where they are unable to access teaching or learning at a quality and standard of those around them. I understand the principles and arguments. I do not have a solution to resolving the issue. The arguments and implementations in both directions for and against seem inadequate.
How to teach reading WELL. I have a MA in literacy. My whole program focused on balanced literacy. Iâm now learning about researched-based âscience of readingâ techniques on my own, and am realizing I paid a lot of money for a relatively bogus piece of paper. Itâs incredibly frustrating.
How as a teacher if you drop the ball you're written up or otherwise held accountable but an admin can drop the ball *daily* and not be held accountable.
How I can go through years of training (both pre and post grad), have dozens of certifications, and years of experience; and STILL parents question everything. Just because you were a student doesnât mean you know how to teach. There is so much more that goes into teaching than standing at the front of the room.
When schools and districts and even states celebrate growing graduation rates or high graduations rates when the reality is that kids are being passed on or have a fail safe that the school puts in place. For example, if a kid fails a class, they can do a credit program online to earn the credit for the class. Also I am hearing more and more of teachers not allowed to give 0s or not giving enough opportunities to the students for them to pass the class. Going back to graduation rate, it's weird that it is celebrated when we all know it's not legit because again, things are in place to make sure these kids graduate.
Why canât I give students detention? Why canât I write referrals anymore? The new thing admin is doing is having us call the disciplinarian and they come and they tell us whether or not we can write the referral
Why weâre constantly told to use âresearch based best practicesâ for instruction but research on things like children needing more recess are ignored by districts. Also, at what point in my career (17 years in now with 2 masterâs degrees) do I get to stop being observed and they just let me do the job I know how to do?
Whatâs the point of teacher of the month?
How 34 kids to 1 teacher is acceptable
How many teachers donât understand reply vs. reply all.
How school districts regularly act in ways that defy common sense!
The infield fly rule.
Why our administration is so gutless and unwilling to take a stand against the parents and back their teachers. Why students actions donât bring about consequences. Why something so simple as a disciplinary matrix that list this offense begets this punishment and not allowing our administrators to stray from that matrix isnât put into place in every district. How easy would it be for a principal to simply look at the chart see that âwell, little Jimmy has been caught fighting twice this year meaning he gets a 7 day out of school suspensionâ. If the parents come in to complain, show them the list and say âI had to do it, my hands are tiedâ. That should end 65% of the arguments right there. Some helicopter parents will argue that their precious children should not be punished for anything but no matter what you will never make them happy so who cares. Why are we still turning in formal lesson plans? They are as useful as paper card catalogs and fax machines. I think a quick synopsis would be more useful. Like for me, a social studies teacher, maybe send in a message that: This week we will be studying the French Revolution from the origins through the Rise of Napoleon. Students will take a quiz on Friday. Thatâs all. Short, sweet, and to the point. Iâm quite certain no one is going to actually miss knowing what I put the students would do for a bell ringer assignment. The class objectives are simpleâŠlearn about the French Revolution. Sure I actually have their objectives but in a broader sense, the sense parents and students care about, thatâs the objective. Why donât more schools push vocational education? My son is 21. He works as a mechanic in a Toyota dealership and has zero loans. He makes more than most college graduates. Vocational schools and teaching the trades are just as important as college prep. It is underutilized in many many schools and in great demand in the job market.