Tag Archives: Teachers

A Simple Question, Which Requires a Very Complex Answer

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When I first went to instructor training, about the first words out of my instructors mouth was that, in order to teach, the teacher must motivate the student. That is to say, before any student will learn he must want to learn. Indeed, the rate at which any student will learn will depend on the motivation of the student.

That, however, is only the beginning. The second thing, at least to some degree, the teacher must take what he knows and place it in the students mind. This, to be sure is an art within itself. There are a myriad of things standing in the way. For the young man, perhaps baseball, football and basketball. A few will be thinking about cars, and of course girls. Young girls, of course, have their own distractions such as that good looking quarterback.

Before lunch, everyone thinks of hunger and what they will eat. When they get back from lunch, it is a matter of keeping them from falling asleep. As it nears the end of the day, there are hundreds of things which distract child and adult alike. They are anticipating their afternoon plans, whatever they might be. This makes Friday afternoon one of the most difficult times to teach.

Teaching and learning is not just passing information from a teacher to a group students, though. It is easy to think of it as such, but it is so much more. Ultimately, it comes to a point where the teacher teaches, not what to know or think, but how to learn and think. In the end, the student will know so much more than the teacher. It is the way knowledge grows in a society. After we finish school, we must know how to teach ourselves. It is the ultimate thing that a teacher can teach. I suppose close to 95% of what I have learned, I learned from doing or reading. I only learned about 5% in school.

It certainly starts with reading and writing. The person unable to read and write is seriously hampered in our current society. It is not enough for the cobbler apprentice to learn the craft of making shoes. Nowadays we make machines that make shoes. Then too, some people must occasionally repair those and other machines.

It means thinking beyond knowing our current world but what it will be decades from now. The current teachers might teach Edgar Allan Poe, but more important, how to write even better than Edgar Allen Poe. It must be new, different and, of course a joy to read.

At one time, society didn’t believe that bridges could be made from steel. One day, someone built a bridge from steel and they’ve been doing it ever since. I would hope the really great teacher would prod people into such things in a wide variety of various fields far beyond the knowledge of the teacher’s knowledge.

However, the basics cannot be overlooked. The things a child learns in the first 6 grades may very well determine the success of the students later. Indeed, the teacher that teaches the more advanced subjects relies very much on how well the teachers teach in the the lower grades.

Then too, just how great a teacher might be somewhat based on what is expected of him. Is he supposed to teach physics or how to fix an air conditioner. Each has his own problems and each has its own methods. Each student is different and presents a different challenge. For instance, try telling a sixth grader learning algebra the importance of being able to represent values with letters. Quite frankly, I am still at a loss of knowing the importance of knowing anything about the fictitious character of Silas Marner. Let’s face it, for some teachers, their task is simply improbable at best for some students.

Perhaps two of the biggest requirements of the really great teacher is really strong determination and very thick skin. I’m sure a love of teaching and the subject they teach is important.

Then, oddly, occasionally, you see a student react to something you teach and you see that little light inside their mind come on. As an instructor, I have seen it happen. It makes the difficulty and frustration worth it.

Daily writing prompt
What makes a teacher great?
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The Experts

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I actually did have some college. I had 1 semester in electronics, in which I carried a B+ average. I really should have stuck it out but there was a lot going on back then an I ended up in the Marines. There were downsides, but the Marines did give me the equivalent of a 2 year degree in electronics. By the way, they did teach me a few other things too, such as how to shoot.

Going back to the college, I had a teacher that said a thing that really stuck with me. He said that an expert is someone who knows a whole lot about very little. His argument, of course, was that we should never zero in so much on learning one thing such that we remain ignorant in all others.

It is so true and, as I go through life, it only becomes clearer to me how true it is.

However, it is also true about turning things over to so-called experts, people who know a whole lot about so little. So I ask, are teachers experts? Have they become highly knowledgeable on teaching while not really knowing what they should teach and why.

I have seen teachers I could not understand. I have seen English teachers that sent notes to parents with subject verb disagreements. My son’s teacher accused him of losing a book later found in the teacher’s lounge. Now just what does all this teach our kids?

We have turned our government over to experts who know how to write laws without knowing what kind of laws are needed. Some of them have never run a business or even held down a real job. A great many of them don’t understand the basics, such as the law of supply and demand.

Some experts seem to think they know about gender changes when they never learned the difference between wrong and right.

As you can well imagine I can go on, but you get my point, or I hope you do. I suppose you might be one who wants to turn the world over to a bunch of people who have a great deal of knowledge on very little.

It’s All Important

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When I was in high school, I noticed the first 15 to 20 minutes of every class started the same, more-or-less. The math teacher told us that the world would nearly come to an end, if we didn’t learn math. Of course, all communications would cease if we didn’t learn English. It was a little more difficult for the chemistry teacher, but he did manage to open with a convincing argument for us to all learn chemistry. Finally, of course, the history teacher had to come up with the impossible task of making us realize the importance of learning about what the Egyptians did thousands of years ago.

In all honesty, I wish I had paid a lot more attention to my history teachers. Believe me, if you are in high school, pay attention to history. I know it is hard to believe it, but it really is important, boring as it may be.

When I was in school, I wondered why all the teachers wasted all the time. The fact is, I for one would have much rather been playing baseball. I’m very sure I had company. The reason we were there was that we had to be there. It was kinda senseless to explain why I should be there.

Then I went through instructor training while in the Marines. The first thing the instructor taught us was that students learn better when motivated. One way to motivate is to explain the importance of the subject.

Voila! The light was turned on. I finally understood why all those teachers wasted all that time trying to increase my interest, which, by the way never worked. I mean, the reason I was occupying that desk instead of trying to throw a 90 mph fast ball was entirely because it was required of me.

Nonetheless, I did learn very much in that first day of instructor training. I learned that everything is important to special people. Some folks get horribly upset when I use rather instead of whether. To them, proper English is all important. To a mathematician, knowing when to use a sin or cosin is all important. Hopefully, I don’t need to go through the whole list. Maybe you get the idea.

My point is this. It’s all important, depending on who it is.

I have noticed, from time to time, some will take this to an extreme. Some teacher or professor put the idea in someone’s mind the importance of the subject is all important, and they just might have a tendency to think too highly of himself.

Some doctors do have a tendency to think heart surgery is more important than everything. On the other hand, that doctor might not think so if there is an area power failure and someone needs to get out in the ice and cold to restore power to the hospital.

The computer wiz might like to think how extra important he is, until he is suffering heart pains and he is waiting for an ambulance.

Then again. There are those as me. I walk into a place where they make a wonderful sandwich for me at a reasonable price and I am very much impressed. Believe me. I know how hard they work.

It is the way our economy works. When there is an important need, someone will do it, even the thankless ones, as like garbage collectors. They, too are important

Why Can’t My Son Go to the 4 Grade

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WRONG QUESTION!!

I was watching news last night and I heard a woman complaining, Why can’t my son go to the 4th grade?

I understand her grief. I understand her desires. My older son spent time in a California school. He also spent some time in a Memphis school. It is the primary reason we moved to Desoto County.

My advice to that woman or to anyone who has his child in Shelby County schools, get them out! just as fast as they can.

Many things can be done to improve the schools, but that would take time. You don’t have time. Besides, I don’t think they want to improve the schools. Their purpose is to take your money and gain power. Some teachers try, but, for them, they are swimming upstream. When they make the other teachers look bad, the union reps have words with them.

At this point, I’m not sure Desoto County schools are that good. I saw signs of degrading the last few years my sons were there, decades ago. Today, I would do what I could to keep my dependents out of any public schools completely.

Moreover, my advice to this and all parents in Shelby County is to ask the right questions. My question, above all, is why is it that OUR children can’t read. I emphasize OUR, because we aren’t talking 2 or 3, or 5 or 6. We are talking thousands. Shelby County schools are some of the worst performing in Tennessee and the US.

If it were individuals, we could say the child is the problem. The fact is, it isn’t the failure of the students I’m concerned with. It is the failure of the system, one which has money flooding in, and failure flowing out.

The long term solution, vote Republican. Get those dems out of there just as fast as you can. Fire teachers who can’t or won’t teach. Better to have 8th graders who can teach than a PhD who can’t.

Finally, minimize control by teachers unions.They have no business at all in the control of the schools, teaching methods or what is being taught.

Motivate Teachers

Posted in Abuse of Power, Dummycrats, Elections, Important things, Politcal Opinion, President Trump, Unions by

Please permit me to become just a little radical.  Allow me to propose a literacy test before voting.  To be sure, it would be restrictive.  Some people would not be allowed to vote simply because they can’t read or write.

In truth, I don’t really suggest such a thing.  It would be wrong to restrict an American from voting because they can’t read.  That, to be sure, is true no matter what color their skin is.

However, consider the following, if you will.  Probably within a decade, the literacy rate would approach 100%.  The dummycrats would not like the idea of any of their voters being kept from the voting booth.  I have a feeling, given the right prod, the dummycrats would suddenly find a way to encourage the teachers.  Suddenly, all those excuses that they give us for their failures would disappear.

It is no secret that the dummycrats rely heavily on the African-American vote.  Yet, they stand in the way of every attempt for the Republicans to improve the schools.  I have my suspicions for this,; but I’ll let you figure it out for yourself.

The point is this.  We have bad schools and bad teachers because there is a lack of motive to improve them.  If we provide the motive, then the schools will improve…likely overnight.

As I said, I don’t really suggest removing the right to vote for any rightful citizen.  However, wouldn’t it be nice if the people voting would at least be able to read and write at a sixth grade level.  Wouldn’t it be nice if they had at least a basic concept of The Constitution.  Do we really want people voting who have no idea what the constitution is, let alone have a basic idea of the three branches of government.  Wouldn’t it be a good idea if they knew and understood at least the first 10 amendments, also known as The Bill of Rights.

To be sure, there are other problems besides teachers.  However, the teachers have the kids for at least 6 hours a day.  Shouldn’t they be required to do more than babysit?

Many, perhaps most of the teachers have master’s degrees.  Yet they are abject failures.  I have only a high school diploma and, if I were given 30 kids 5 hours a week for nine months, I assure, I would at least have them reading on a 3rd grade level.  Double that time and I they would have a good understanding of The Constitution.  If I can do it, they, with their degrees ought to be able to do it at least as well.

 

One more quick word.  At the beginning of the 1900s, most of our teachers had only 12 years of education.  They actually did a pretty good job.  Some would say better than today’s teachers.  It is the type of thing that happens when the federal government gets involved.  In the old days, the schools were, for the most part, locally controlled financed and controlled.  The schools didn’t have as much money, but what they did have were teachers who taught and students who learned.