The Worst Teachers

[Are_grits_groceries]

First I'd like to clear up what I believe is a widepread misconception. Teachers do not want 'bad teachers' to keep their jobs no matter what they do. The point of disputation has always been what is a bad teacher and how shoud it be measured.

I have known some teachers who I thought needed help. A lot of teachers never get any assessment and real instruction in how to improve early in their careers. They develop habits that aren't helpful in reaching students. Some of them would never be good teachers, but some could be effective with some assistance.

I KNOW they have college degrees and X amount of hours in classrooms to prepare them. However, once you stand alone in front of your first classes, it can be a whole new ball game. I think 6 months of substitute teaching would give them invaluable lessons in classroom management. That is always a crucial factor in teaching. I don't care how well you know your subjects, if you can't control the students, you are GONE.

Students try everything when there are substitutes. Even the better students can be horrible. The real troublemakers can be downright lethal. Trying to control students is hard work, and it can damage psyches and dreams. I substituted many times and I learned some invaluable lessons.

One lesson I learned was that I needed to memorize the students' names as fast as possible. I eventually was able to learn them after one look. This trick helps for 2 reasons. One is the fact that if you can call a student by their name, it pins them. They know they have been made. It beats saying, "You in the blue shirt." In addition, if you know their names in a nanosecond they think you possess supernatural powers.

Another problem in getting rid of some teachers is the failure to document what they did that was unacceptable. Administrators can be too lazy to do this. When it then reaches a certain level, they have only innuendo and gossip to rely on about prior problems. When I was disciplining a student, I better keep a record of the steps I took to ameliorate the problem. If not, I had no leg to stand on when asking for further help from others.

Yes there are times when teachers keep ther jobs even with execrable records of their performance. They should have a true hearing about their jobs. However, there as to be a point at which others quit excusing their behavior.

A lot of people think they can teach. Everybody will be in classrooms for years. It may appear to be easy. Compare this to other professions. A lot of jobs are in fields that people never really understand. They rarely claim to be able to easily step into these positions.

I myself have never figured out a truly fair way to evaluate teachers. I do know it is more complicated than test scores. Unfortunately, the relationships between teachers, administrators and others have become very adversarial. Nothing will improve unless this situation does.

I learned another invaluable lesson when I taught. I had to call parents at times to talk about their kids. Starting off with a litany of what they had done wrong wasn't productive. I began each conversation by saying, " I need your help." I really did, and many times they needed mine.

[raccoon]

1. I think teachers are a much maligned group. I couldn't do that job--dealing with the students would

be bad enough, but also dealing with so many parents who think the sun shines out of their kid's arse....

I know there are some bad ones, but I think they are in the minority.

[no_hypocrisy]

2. Veteran Substitute Teacher checking in.

I wholly endorse your points.

I've had a fourth grader explicitly tell me that his mother was on the Board of Education and was going to have me fired.

I've had older classes sit in the wrong seats so I couldn't report any individual for transgressions. I figured out their ploys early on and announced to the class that I was keeping a diary and noting their height, hair color and length, eye color, and what they were wearing.

I also have had to be able to know when was the appropriate situation to remove a child from my classroom as they were openly challenging me for control of the class. I remember taking a 13 yo girl to the vice principal's office for a severe transgression. We encountered her classmate, who, upon hearing why she was going to the VP, told me that she told the original perpetrator to perform the act. And to take her instead. I took them both. At a different school later that month, my reputation for no-nonsense substitute teaching preceded me because I couldn't be manipulated by the kids.

I expect the kids to try to knock me off my point and I won't let them do it.

[Are_grits_groceries]

3. I had a conference with a parent one time when I taught in Northern Virginia.

First,she announced she was an opera singer and had to fly to NY. Okaaaaaaay. I wanted to tell her I could whistle part of an aria in 'Carmen' but I held back.

Then she kept saying over and over, "I talked to Mrs. Fields."
I finally couldn't take it any more and asked,"Which one. Totie or the one who makes the cookies?"

(Fields was a school board member. I then got serious when I realized this. I told the mother if she was going to a school board member, and I was being besmirched unfairly with only one side of the story, the next meeting would be with my lawyer. Never heard from Mrs. Fields. BTW I was serious. I don't play.)

[no_hypocrisy]

4. That's how you do it.

BTW, I'm not afraid of any school board member as they don't hold any mystique with or fear in me. My mother was a trustee and later the president of my town's Board of Education and I understand their mentality. And I haven't held back my opinions.

[meaculpa2011]

5. I've been designing performance...

evaluatuion programs for thirty years.

An effective progam must be objective, consistent and IT MUST BE MODIFIED REGULARLY.

The last element is crucial. People--especially bureacrats--are expert in scamming elaluation systems.

The value of evaluation is performance improvement, not punishment.

If you do not measure, you cannot improve.

With that said, my personal experience is that teachers resist evaluation reflexively and shun professional development like the plague.

My wife ran a professional development program in NYC's largest school district. She went back to the classroom after two years of banging her head against the wall.

[Are_grits_groceries]

6. I think the reflex is partly caused

by all the bashing. It is not a new phenomena. Teachers don't trust those doing the evaluating too. I was evaluated by an admin who I had had an argument with.

As far as professional development goes, ditch that phrase. It is a nebulous concept that can really mean anything. I wasn't fond of PD. That depended on the design of the course and those who presented it.

At times, it was a waste and conducted to play CYA by some admins. At others, I did feel I learned a lot.

I can tell you that anything that involves teachers using their own time has a hard row to hoe. I spent enough of my 'spare time' doing work for school anyway. If I am going to spend my time on something else, it better be worth it.

I am making NO judgement on you, your wife or any of your work. I know people care and try to help.

(I am also not against measurement. However, there are so many scales and things to measure)

[meaculpa2011]

12. I agree that the reflex...

is justified. I've never conducted teacher evaluations, but my experience tells me that most evaluation methods in education are purely subjective. Your case is typical and I've heard it described many times. I've conducted programs in a variety of industries. Data is always collected and analyzed by third parties. Observations are conducted at random and by unknown evaluators (not possible in education, I grant you). Most times, supervisors don't know who the data is matched to since the objective is to determine areas that need improvement and design programs that focus on these areas.

My wife conducted technology serminars during school hours. Even at that, teachers considered their "prep" periods to be free time that they were not willing to sacrifice. This was at the dawn of the computer revolution (she has a doctorate in computer-aided instruction) and many teachers were techno-phobic.

There is a dirty little secret in education that I'm reluctant to mention. It has to do with the fact that women now have opportunities that go far beyond teaching and nursing. This wasn't the case in past generations.

[1monster]

10. Surely you jest!

my personal experience is that teachers resist evaluation reflexively and shun professional development like the plague.

These days, teachers have two hours every week of develomental programing, plus several days per school year of new ways to teach, hold the attention of, stimulate, and otherwise be better teachers. I've talked to many of them after one of the big deals and heard from them that they were impressed with the ideas and programs put forth and that they would be trying them out in the classroom, or modifying the ideas to fit their students.

Unless your wife was following the teachers back to the classrooms, how could she know whether or not the teachers were acting on her suggestions?

[MichiganVote]

14. Ok, but seriously, how many people really welcome performance evaluations? Esp. by numbnuts who

often don't perform their jobs well? I agree with the modification of evaluation systems however most school administrators
who actually DO their jobs are so buried in paper and maladjusted kids these days, its a joke to assume they can manage the new evaluations today.

They can't and they don't.

[Creideiki]

7. Who creates the list of the worst parents?

Or the list of the worst school administrators?

[1monster]

8. The bit about substitute teachers is right on. I don't know how many times

I've had a disruptive kid look at me in shock and say, "How'd you know my name?!"

I've been subbing for ten years and can handle most situations without resorting to writing referrals or sending one or more students out of the room. But the one that still stymies me are the tag teamers...

One student in one part of the room will start disrupting. As soon as I turn toward the unknown disruptor, a student sitting on the other side of the room will pick up. Turning toward that, a third student will throw something or otherwise disrupt, always making sure to be sitting innocently when I look in that direction. Meanwhile, the rest of the class knows who the culprits are and sit there laughing and denying that they knew who was doing it.

In the end, there is nothing to do but call the dean -- and that is embarrassing because it makes it seem like I don't know how to do my job.

[izquierdista]

9. It also helps to be tall and athletic

If you are 6'2" with shoulders significantly larger than your waist measurement, kids (and other people as well) defer to your judgment and give you respect. I probably get more than my fair share of respect, because I don't look like someone who is easy to take advantage of. I notice this when I'm waiting in line, and see someone of lesser stature receiving a commensurate lesser level of respect. It must be something deep in the human psyche that they look to strong tall men to be at the top of their social hierarchy.

This explains the bias toward the taller of the two Presidential candidates. Karl Rove knew he was up against the odds versus Al Gore and John Kerry, hence the voter purging and other dirty tricks. That's why Obama is not going to have a hard time in the fall campaign; he looks the part, and none of the others quite make it.

I was always the tallest kid in the class in elementary school, and all through my school years I never got bullied. Well, I take that back, there was one time, but after the bully found out I was just as big as he was and fought back, he went for easier pickings.

I realize that a lot of the deference I am given is due to my stature. I try not to take undue advantage of it, saying things like "no, go ahead and take care of her, she was in line before me". I guess that disqualifies me to be a CEO or Republican, since I don't overplay my hand. But back to the subject of teaching, you can get the necessary amount of classroom respect by things like demeanor and body language. Children sense fear and weakness and will pick on those who show it. If you project strength and confidence, they will gladly fall in and follow your lead.

[Are_grits_groceries]

11. There oriental concept of 'face' is alive and well.

The worst thing a teacher can lose is 'face.' I guess you could call it cred. I never reacted wildly to anything except spurting blood. Someone could slam the door, and I didn't flinch. Some kids will do anything to make a teacher lose face. Once it's gone, it is hard to gt it back.

Attitude does matter. I could scoot through the halls one way and never be noticed. I could walk and act a slightly different way, and the kids took note. Physical size is not necessarily a part of the equation.

A new teacher who was almost 7' tall began at my school. His class was down the hall from mine. I constantly found his students out there doing nothing. He could not control them. They never messed with me.

(one of my favorite tricks involved trying to catch kids out of class. A group of them were always outside, and they stayed 2 steps head of the Narcs. I wasn't going to chase them. I brought in my camera with a telephoto lens and aimed it at them if they were in my view. They moved because they knew I would get them if I could)

[Snake Alchemist]

13. same in business. tall people usually have

Last edited Sun Feb 26, 2012, 11:33 AM - Edit history (1)

Higher salaries and are much more likely to be promoted.

[Igel]

15. 3 kinds of bad teachers.

The first are those who lack classroom management skills. They teach nothing that anybody finds useful.

The second are those who don't know their subjects. I don't know how many times I've corrected materials sent out to my team by another teacher new to the course because they were factually wrong. I'll have to fix a real howler tomorrow on my classroom computer's copy of stuff I was given Friday. I observed one teacher who had assigned problems and then went over how to do them. The way he had taught them gave the wrong answer. The solutions he presented in class gave the wrong answer. (Fortunately, he lacked classroom management skills so there was no actual misinformation learned.) He had trained in biology. He had no business trying to handle angular momentum when it was neither in the standards nor the scope and sequence (nor his competency).

The third are those who mistrain their kids and put blinders on them and call it "enlightment". They may teach them to find the right answer in solving a math problem, but they train them that there's only one way to do it.

Even worse is when the teacher provided a kid with an officially-sanctioned excuse to not learn. A teacher may raise the kid's consciousness in ways that prepare them for 1960s Selma but not 2010s Houston. I had one kid tell me she was a "tactile learner" and incapable of learning any other way, as though the idea was learning styles were all or nothing or had any decent experimentally-sound research to back it up. ("Research based learning" is the new buzz-word, as though what education folk did back in the 1960s through early 1990s was entirely based on introspection and dice-rolling.)