And why the lack of parental involvement? What is the cause of that? Could it be the constant attacks on the traditional family structure? Could it be the declining rate of two parent households, whether it be through divorce or having children out of wedlock? Could it be the lie told to women that you DON'T need a spouse to help raise the kids? Now I am not saying some single parents don't do a great job - but it is by no means ideal. Now the Liberal posters will attack me and call me names because my ideas are rooted in a religion and belief system that they find to be outdated and not in line with their secular beliefs.
Regardless of the parental involvement or not there have to be standards, and teachers that don't perform should be dismissed. Perhaps the baseline is the scores in the school or district, but we can't just let poor teachers - and YES they DO exist - get by because parents don't support them.
Great questions.
I don’t see any “attack on the family structure.” I see a sad migration from the concept, but not an attack. It is the way things work now. Jobs are not permanent. People HAVE to go from company to company, place to place, usually removing many from family.
I can only see a coincidental association between the breakdown of family and falling education. If education were to become a societal positive that the culture valued, then it would likely not matter if the family unit was less than preferable.
My opinion is that a great deal comes from the loudness of those that show disdain for education. What is heard is that education is bad and that it is teachers fault for being overpaid. That give children the idea that teachers are not to be listened to and that education is not worth their time.
I agree that our education system needs improved, but only a part is highly qualified teachers.
It is harder or impossible to get someone to do what they don’t want, or stop what they want. Generally, no one can help an alcoholic until they want help. Trying to force them to stop MAY be possible with far more effort… maybe.
In the same way if society puts credit toward education and makes clear it is a desired outcome, and parents show it as well, then students will care and try.
I agree that less qualified teachers should not remain. However, there are more factors involved.
One, teachers are still individuals and teach differently and sometimes two people just can’t work together. One child might do best with a strict teacher, while another with a more relaxed exploring thinking type teacher. But, what is more important is parent expectations.
If you have a parent, or parents that pay no attention but report cards and get mad at the teacher because little Johnny got a C, they usually claim it is the teacher’s fault and don’t care that little Johnny failed to do any homework assigned.
If you don’t change your oil or plugs regularly do you blame the mechanic and say he is bad because your car broke down? Do you blame your doctor because you got sick? Would you blame the manufacturer for making a bad product when it is really the metal coming to him is far below reasonable quality?
I can’t judge who is a good mechanic or not, I have to let those that are trained to remove the bad ones. I can’t really know who is a good doctor or not and expect that other professionals will deal with them.
The biggest problem I see to teaching to the test is that educating children is not manufacturing where you can take a piece and put it under a microscope to see if the lines are performing as required. All teachers and all students are different individuals with different personalities. You can have the best of the best teacher and might be unable to do a great job with some students because of external factors. Take the best teacher from Oakland County and put him/her in downtown Detroit and I bet that teacher will no longer seem so fantastic. It is hard to teach when the kids are preoccupied with hunger or survival.
I agree some teachers should not be. My grandson had one I disliked in the extreme. Not cooperative with me or his mother. Strict and rude. He did terrible with her. To m e she was a failure, but other kids did well with that strictness and didn’t have parents that wanted to be involved that would be insulted.
Then, my daughter had algebra in 7th grade. Every single day she would come home and not have a clue what was taught. I would only have to spend five minutes explaining it and she would get it. To me it said the teacher was failing since she easily got it when explained a different way. It was clearly a failure of the teacher. But, still does that mean the teacher was bad if he/she got through to most of the others with the same technique?
I guess what I am saying is that teaching is not exacting and concrete and able to be simplified to one test. Obviously, tests matter, but they are not the end all be all of whether a teacher is at fault or the student.
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Topic: Chicago Teacher Strike (Read 863 times)
