education & tech

We found this post bookmarked in the old archives. It is a way of work for us to bookmark interesting information to look it over when we are not in a rush. If it wasn't for we had to reload our bookmarks, this post probably will never be commented.

I don't quite remember exactly when was the last time I read on Twitter that teachers were to quit their jobs. If is not for the recession, there would be plenty at this moment.

I came by Jane Byers Goodwin's blog, she is an experienced teacher in the public education system and she goes by @Mamacita on Twitter. Mrs. Bayers has written twice the post I am about to mention and Jane has good reasons to do it, it is time to stop rewarding the brats and disruptive kids in our schools. But as she says, problem begins at home when brats and bullies happen to be the very same parents. Read clearly, I am talking about the kids who can not help themselves to go to school or at least make a elemental effort to complete their assignments.

I will speak for myself, I was working on a Catholic school back in the 2003 and I had good reasons to relate to many teachers in public schools. A small but significative proportion of teens, youngsters or pupils just don't want to be at school. They say they are attending school not because of their own sake, but parents compelling them to do so. Under this circumstances, a teacher feels as he chose the wrong career, and for some, the solution seems to be to change level of work, form high school to elementary school or middle school. Unfortunately, that is not a solution, they are landing a new problem.

And many as Mamacita Jane writes, opt to leave their jobs:

...If you are not a teacher, it’s hard to comprehend the heartbreak these teachers feel: they love their students; they love teaching; they love every single thing about their jobs...except for the fact that they are required to endure what nobody else in any other profession would ever consider enduring. They’re required to watch the bright and promising students injured and taunted and threatened by 'other kinds' of students, and they’re required to see those 'other kinds' of students rewarded for things the nice kids do daily. They’re required to give exceptions to the undeserving and nothing to the deserving. After a while, their nerves are shot and their own self-esteem is in the dirt. Decisions they make are overturned, their authority is questioned and shot full of holes. Daily. They’re not paid enough to put up with this crap. Nobody is. This kind of thing should not even EXIST in our public schools. In the olden days, students were expected to behave and required to behave, and any kid who chose to 'act up' got punished at school and punished again at home for disgracing the family. Kids who continued to 'act up' were expelled. Life is full of choices.

I taught public school for 26 years and my salary peaked out at 49,300. After 26 years. It became sooo not worth it. A hundred thou a year would not have been worth it. The constant disruptions, the constant expectations that certain kids would not be held accountable, the constant accusations of favoritism and wrongdoing and the 23-minute lunch at 10:30 a.m. and the study hall with 48 non-participatory boys, many of whom had to sit on the floor because the room was too small for that many desks, the indignant parents who demanded...actually, demanded ANYTHING. Nice people do not DEMAND. And if someone is DEMANDING an exception, he/she is not a nice person. Teachers don’t leave because of the money. People don’t become teachers for the money. People become teachers because of the dedication and the love, and teachers leave because there is absolutely no support any more.

You are waiting to hear about a solution. Ask parents to assume full responsibility of their sons, so teachers can concentrate on dealing with teaching rather than babysitting or police students.

Until society, parents and after that teachers and administrators aren't able to straightforward their responsibilities, we will continue to pay tribute to those who act negatively, kill not only imagination but people and appear on TV not to educate but to abuse the social image they have.

If you want to receive my future posts regularly for FREE, please subscribe in a reader or by e-mail. Follow me on Twitter. For other concerns, Contact Me at anytime.

I was attending the all popular now #edchat and organized every Tuesday at 7 PM EST. on Twitter. It has been a great opportunity to know more participants, but also to learn a bit more about Differentiated Instruction (DI).

If you missed the online session, here we give you the opportunity to catch some tweets which we believe are worth reading:

We must not confuse DI with constructivism. Both are helpful, but they are not the same thing. @CorinaFiore

Criterion referenced tests do not force one dimensional teaching and are not designed to cause failures. @BeckyFisher73

Main objective of DI is to provide a learning environment that will maximize the potential for student success. @NMHS_Principal

Differentiated instruction without differentiated assessment is all talk. @TedPugliese

There is great power in choice. @blairteach

True differentiation is the opposite of standardized curriculum and testing. @concretekax

I've found that when I give my students options, they have a hard time figuring out what to do. They're used to being spoon fed. @jswiatek

I DO remember when we used to talk about creating life long learners! Did we succeed? @haretek

If you want to receive my future posts regularly for FREE, please subscribe in a reader or by e-mail. Follow me on Twitter. For other concerns, Contact Me at anytime.

The Independent

With his tips on tagging Web site bookmarks, shortening URLs and installing browser applications, Tony Vincent may have sounded at times Wednesday like he was talking to a group of Web developers.

But Vincent was talking to teachers, and the theme of the workshop was just as much about engaging students as it was technology.

Students are engaged in learning when it involves qualities such as choice, affiliation, novelty and variety, and a focus on products, Vincent said. The explosion of teaching technology on the Web fits right in with those values.

"Those Web 2.0 tools have so many of the characteristics of what engages students, because they do get to interact with each other, they do get to create," he said

Read on the original article by Mark Coddington.

If you want to receive my future posts regularly for FREE, please subscribe in a reader or by e-mail. Follow me on Twitter. For other concerns, Contact Me at anytime.

I read lots of information on the fly, but the article written by Doug Johnson caught my eye for the appealing context with which he discusses the cyberbullying against teachers.

Doug Johnson is the publisher of The Boo Skunk Blog. He posted a very controversial question: Can students cyberbully teachers?

To understand better the topic we want to rephrase Doug's question: At what point do the action of students become bullying?

As you might be thinking it has not a quick or easy answer. All the discussion taken on the Boo Skunk Blog turns to Rate-My-Teacher website. The same as when we are asked about the education objectives, answers will be so diverse as many teachers as we ask. One thing is true, cyberbullying is a plague, all, parents to teachers should be vigilant.

And here the discussion goes over power. The big guy picking on the little guy, as Johnson puts it. The disrespect many students are being pray of, not by teachers but stuff and in many cases administrators. Is a Vice Principal entitled to shout, give out unfair detentions or even suspend a student without a fair hearing of all the students involved? That's abusing power.

In many cases these are the reasons the poor kid in a very poorly designed strategy goes online to libel and cry for help. In other words, is a retaliation to what they are living in their classroom or school. Now, don't get me wrong, there are those little devils for whom school is a prison where they have to fight their way out. They require another kind of treatment we are not going to argue here.

There is not a proper definition to a retaliation against teachers under bullying. The cyberbullying can be easily interpreted as harassment, aggression, electronic aggression or most typically as lack of respect. You'd pick one.

Dr. Micheal Carr-Greg from Melbourne, and cited by the source of this post, as much as Nancy Willard of The Center for Safe and Responsible Internet Use provide advice as how teachers got so frustrated for this kind of experiences. Willard has promised to release a narrated report on cyberbullying for educators.

Before this goes out of hand, try your best to have students to perform successfully and to be happy at school. This is the best way to avoid the distress to be impersonated by someone, that in some cases don't even is your student but someone else looking to make your life so miserable.

Be yourself and feel confident you will never be in this circumstances. If so, look for help among professionals on safety and share the incident with authorities and all your colleagues as much as you can. Good luck.

If you want to receive my future posts regularly for FREE, please subscribe in a reader or by e-mail. Follow me on Twitter. For other concerns, Contact Me at anytime.

I don't pretend to criticize neither the teacher nor the application. What I try to, is to show experiences from which everyone else may benefit.

Simon Job of Maths Class, lived first hand, what happens when we give a tool to students for whom it is merely a way of communication.

What we really love from Job's post, is the blame he sets on blocking social intercommunication for misbehaving of his students while using Edmodo. He also recommends some ways Edmodo could be improved to work in schools.

Ways that Edmodo could be improved:


• An ability to "time-out" a student who is not using the site appropriately. I changed one student’s password as she was not using the site appropriately, she just signed up with another username.


• Set "operating hours" for your group. For example, a button for teachers to turn the discussion feature on/off – allows me to monitor my class, rather than wondering what they are talking about whilst they’re in English and I’m teaching another class. I see this as a way to slowly introduce social networking at school.


• Provide far better user-management for teachers.


Some other thoughts:


• A step too fast? Generally, the students at my school have poor social skills. We’ve identified this in the past and been actively working to improve the way they relate, respond and talk to staff and students. Maybe I took this on too early.


• In some ways, I think this is a consequence of the blocking of everything social approach that the Department has taken. We have not really had an opportunity in the past to deal with these issues, because students have not had access to social networking online.

If you want to receive my future posts regularly for FREE, please subscribe in a reader or by e-mail. Follow me on Twitter. For other concerns, Contact Me at anytime.