This Is Why I Teach

Hi Cathy,
Well it is decided on my end. If it works out for you, I will be delighted to continue working with Miss Dennis.  After this first couple weeks, I could not be happier.  Emma is easy to talk with, she comes up with great suggestions for how she can assist me during class.  She is a breath of fresh air!  She has already made a presentation and conducted an entire lesson for my French 2 students.  She also writes mini messages and lessons on the board for whenever we have a few spare minutes between activities.  She has ideas for working with French Club too.  Just wanted to let you know how things are going.
Happy weekend,
Jill

Sometimes

Sometimes I reflect on my life: Where I've been, what I've done. I remember riding the metro in Paris and seeing the Eiffel Tower in between stops. Like it was no big deal.

I have to remind myself that I've touched that. I've been there. I've been to the top and back. Paris holds no secrets from me anymore.

It's so weird to think that, you know? I know so many people who dream about doing just that; seeing the Eiffel Tower in Paris. And I've seen it more times than I can remember or count.

And yet I've never seen the White House...

Kristine Jo

I feel liKe a donKey Kong game trying to use K in all of the words that I Kan. It has a certain impliKation that is liKe an inside joKe, but trying to use K-words is putting a smile on my face, much liKe my Konversations that Kreated this Konundrum. SpeaKing in Kode is fun, and I hope you are Kareful when Krossing the street beKause it Kan be dangerous. Knowing that only one person Kan understand this maKes it that much more fun. You Know who you are. :D

Conceptual Understanding

We are supposed to be teaching for conceptual understanding.

Teaching for conceptual understanding will cover the discreet materials that are required for standardized tests and then go beyond.

Supposedly not knowing the requirements for becoming a president but yet knowing how to form an opinion with the presidential candidates based on their platforms would be successful conceptual understanding.

A politician took a standardized test and failed it miserably. If the standardized test was on the conceptual understanding, would he have been able to pass it?

If the discreet materials are what we are testing for in standardized tests, but not what we want students to retain due to conceptual understanding, then why are we testing over those materials in the first place?

OUR EDUCATION SYSTEM DOES NOT MAKE SENSE

Looking Back

I have no idea what my first memory is, but I have quite a few that date pretty far back:

~*~*~

I remember when I was in kindergarten, I would be home before school and work with my mother on these place mats that had me learning how to make shapes, letters, numbers, etc. I remember that the heart shape was not on the place mats, but I tried making them anyway. I couldn't get the bottom to point, but I drew a whole page of them wanting to show my kindergarten teacher because I was so proud of them, even though none of them were really right.

I remember going to Disney World and not wanting to ride the merry-go-round but my parents taking us on it anyway. After that, it was the only thing I wanted to ride.

I remember being afraid of elevators and having to be held when on them.

I remember the first time my mom painted my fingernails. Or rather, she attempted to. It was a bright red polish. She got done with one hand and and wanted me to let it dry before she went to the other. I ended up begging her to take it off because I was afraid that if it dried my fingernails would be red forever and I might want to change my mind after it was too late.

I remember one time my dad sent me to my room I was so mad at him I set thumbtacks in front of my door for him to step on.

I remember my parents singing to me before going to sleep. The Itsy Bitsy Spider was my favorite song for them to sing.

I remember being invited to my preschool best friend's house down the street where we had pizza and jello eggs.

I remember my mother used to be the one to cut my hair. It would make my face itch from the stray hairs.

I remember getting sent to my room without finishing my dinner because of the way I was eating my roast beef sandwich from Arby's.

I remember my sister and I getting caught eating dirt in the backyard and being told if we wanted dinner we could go back outside and eat more dirt.

I remember cutting my own hair. The story goes that I couldn't reach all the way back so it looked like I had a rat tail. The story also goes that I cut my hair because I wanted to show my imaginary friend, Minnie, that it would look good short. See, this one is interesting, because I remember saying that. I remember saying that was the reason. However, I feel like I made that up, but I can't remember the real reason. Where's Freud when you need him hmm?

I remember crying because my mom made me wear my hair in a ponytail for soccer and I didn't want to.

I remember cutting the hair off of my dolls for a "haircut" and always crying when my mom told me it wouldn't grow back.

I remember my mom making us pick up our toys in the living room before she vacuumed. I either forgot or I just didn't and the next thing I knew I couldn't find my favorite teddy bear. I was convinced for a good half hour that she vacuumed it up.

The heads of two of my barbies popped off. When this happened, I stuck them away in a drawer so my parents wouldn't see that they were broken and insist I throw them away. Even though I didn't play with them once their heads were off, I didn't want to throw them away.

I remember our neighbor across the street babysitting us and her giving me mentos and absolutely loving them.

I remember thinking there was no way we could afford to buy a Barbie because it was listed at $9.99 but I didn't see the decimal point, so I thought it was $999.

I remember intentionally smelling ashtrays because I liked the smell.

I remember always going to my grandmother's house for my birthday and insisting that my cake be pink.

I remember one day I had a doctors appointment to get shots but before we left Rugrats was on and it was the episode where Tommy went to the doctor to get his shots.

~*~*~

I honestly have no idea what order those could go in. Some of them are so insignificant that I almost question their validity. But they're the first things I actually recall remembering.

Why Do I Want to Teach Again?

And She's Back!

Hello bloggers, I have returned from my hibernation of blogging. Or would it more appropriately be deemed a hiatus? Either way, I have returned in full force!

Last you heard I was in Paris enjoying life, and almost three months later here I am. Unfortunately, I put an exorbitant amount of pressure on myself to keep my blogs up to date that when I miss that I become intimidated to come back. Because, you know, I have so many people that rely on my posts being in a timely manner and full of information that if I don't follow that I might as well stop altogether! But at the same time, I blog for me, and I know this. I blog when I know I have something on my mind and the only way for me to sort it out is by writing about it. So either my life has been content enough to where I haven't had a need to blog, or I'm just really good at keeping things in and I don't need to blog until it's all about to explode.

And who knows which one I'm demonstrating?

I suppose the biggest thing on my mind is the fact that it's my senior year of college. Wrapping my head around it is....excruciatingly hard. Part of me is jumping for joy that I can see the light at the end of the tunnel...part of me is scared shitless that I can see the end of the tunnel, and part of me is absolutely frustrated that I feel like I'm the only person on track to graduate in May. I feel like I'm surrounded by either underclassmen or senior who are taking extra semesters to finish up. Now don't get me wrong, I definitely believe that there are some people who need to take the extra time to finish up, and I certainly wouldn't chastise someone for choosing to take more time in order to graduate with something I know he/she'd be happy with, but I'm feeling a little selfish when I say I am disappointed that I feel alone in this aspect.

The biggest thing that's been on my mind is my future. I've had a rude awakening as far as our education system and the real life opportunities that are not as guaranteed as they want you to believe when you're choosing your major your freshman year. I was told my freshman year that getting a teaching degree from Ball State, no matter what subject area, would guarantee me a job once I graduated. I did everything I was supposed to do, I even did it all in four years. I'm in my second to last semester and I'm told that they can't find a teacher for me to do my participating teaching with, and I can't student teach until I get through my participating teaching.

And honestly, hearing that makes me want to just quit. You know I'm sick of it. I wasn't told that some French classes were only offered certain semesters of certain years and ended up blocking myself out of taking french for two semesters. Now I find out that I haven't been told that the direction of education has made world languages (minus Spanish) nearly impossible to place, let alone find jobs for in the future. Excuse me? Whatever happened to making strides towards globalization? Whatever happened to needing language experience to get advanced high school diplomas, or even into colleges?

It was during this time that I also found out that more and more schools are switching to an "8-Step Plan" that gets standardized testing scores up as well as increases attendance and graduation rates. This plan essentially makes every single teacher adapt their lessons to better prepare students for the standardized tests, be it going over specific objectives and seeing where students struggle and where they don't, or taking time out of your art class to teach a basic algebra lesson. Yes, that's right, non-content classes are being told they have to give 20 minutes of class to teach either a 9th grade algebra lesson or a 10th grade English lesson.

The reason why more and more schools are doing this? Because they're seeing the numbers. They're seeing the test scores go up and in turn the attendance and graduation rates go up as well. And as we all know, the numbers don't lie so it must be the most beneficial option in the world!

Please realize the above paragraph is meant to be read in complete sarcasm.

I really want to do a coloration study to see how many of these students who have benefited from the 8-Step Plan have graduated college in 4 years. Because, it sounds like by the time they graduate high school, all they know how to do is 9th grade Algebra and 10th grade English. So when they get to choose what they think they want to do for the rest of their life, they realize that they've had absolutely no exposure to a range of electives and end up making a rash decision out of the blue because they feel the need to decide. Then, when they realize they've made a terrible choice and need to start over, they end up taking more than four years to graduate, the universities don't get funding, and tuition rises year after year in order to make ends meet.

All because some stupid politician saw that numbers went up therefore nothing else could possibly be wrong with this plan.

And to think, I want to congratulate myself for completing 16 years of education by sentencing myself to a life-long career dealing with this bullshit? I truly must be out of my mind.

I've always been able to convince myself that I'm doing this because I want to be part of the solution. I want to be able to show that I have a clue about education and know how to create solutions to the current problems we face.

And this is the first time I've wanted to just graduate and never step inside another classroom again.

Hello senior year. How I am looking ever so forward to seeing how you pan out these next coming months.