Spirit of Teaching

There are a lot of answers being shared at this time of year due to all the standardized testing that is going on in schools, mostly on computers.

I wonder how much learning was done on computers during the school year???

There is a push-back movement against too much screen time happening in education.

I think that is great!  

At the same time, I wonder how many parents limit the screen time of their children?

Are we using technology only to find (and give) answers anymore and not be curious to ask questions? 

It seems to me that modern technology that is intended to connect people nowadays (cell phones, computers) has groomed society to always want to give answers, even though we think that we are seeking answers via Dr. Google.

There is a positive and negative to this. 

It is helpful to be able to easily find answers to questions we have about how something works or who can help us solve a problem we are having. 

However, the down side to that is that there seem to be so many people that want to just give answers all the time without even thinking about what the question really is or what the consequence of their “answer” is.

Many people feel like they are giving or “sharing” answers, but really they are just giving opinions or judgments.

I once posted on social media that a new Teacher Tales podcast had been released.

My guest was a Mandarin teacher who had come to this country from China.

My question to him, like with all my guests, was why did he become a teacher.

Some people did not feel his answer was a valid one, and without even listening to the podcast, shared judgmental comments and rude “answers” to my question to Tony.

I don’t understand this, and it is so heartbreaking to believe that people don’t listen with their ears (eyes in this case) and their hearts.

They just want to give answers and tell everyone what they think or “understand”…lowest level of Bloom’s Taxonomy of thinking.  Sigh!

Fred Rogers once said:

“It is important to listen with our ears and our hearts and to make sure

our questions are just as important as our answers.”

Fred’s wisdom is timeless and always meaningful and powerful.

Yet, in education, we are preaching Bloom’s and Maslow while at the same time restricting what can be taught and when, how it can be taught, why it can be taught and by whom.

Those questions of who, what, when, where, why and how are the basis of Bloom’s to get to higher order thinking skills…to evaluate, synthesize and fully process input/information.

ACTFL’s definition of communication is “knowing how, when and why to say what and to whom”.

Communication starts with INPUT and the receptive modes of listening or reading or seeing. 

But no one wants to stop and take the time to go through all the questions and process what they are interpreting. 

Just give answers…no questioning, at any level for many people!

Why is that, especially in the classroom?

(more…)

We love circle metaphors, right?

You know…the circle of life, like in the Lion King?

The circle is both an image and a metaphor of completeness and equality.

A circle is a container, a vessel of protection and safety whose boundary helps encourage sharing and confidentiality.

A circle is a powerful thing, and we use it often to express complex concepts.

“To come full circle”

“To go around in circles”

“To circle the wagons”

“To circle back around”

“Circle of influence”

Powerful images of circles: clocks, wheels, rings, coins, compass, life buoy, medicine wheel… 

It tells us that everything is just going to keep going round and round and come back again so that we can enjoy it more, try it again and get better or just know that we are not hitting a dead end.

This all leads to my idea about having a “Circle of Support”. This could be people and/or things that we surround ourselves with in order to feel complete and like we are enough.

From now until the end of the semester, it is a whirlwind of demands for teachers.

We have got to have our circle of support together to help us get through the holidays, the end of the semester and the end of another calendar year!

So, who can be in your circle of support?

(more…)

How much of what goes on in the classroom today could be considered “authentic” and not contrived, prescribed, manipulated and not “real”?

Authentic = directly from Medieval Latin authenticus, from Greek authentikos “original, genuine, principal,” from authentēs “one acting on one’s own authority,” from autos “self” (see auto-) + hentēs “doer, being”  (etymonline.com)

First of all, how many lessons and learning experiences in the classroom are on the computer, not relative to the student’s life, not created by the teacher nor delivered in a genuine way?

So many lessons are created by the district and mandated for teacher use in the classroom.

Teachers who don’t have time nor the desire to create their own lessons got to TPT.

Too many teachers are also just “page turners” and just go page-by-page from a textbook.

No creativity. No personalization nor customization nor meaningful connection to the context and real world of the students.

Why?

Too much work?

Too afraid given the current “witch hunt” that is going on in schools?

Don’t know how?

Don’t care?

Don’t have the resources?

Have no choice but to follow the prescribed and mandated curriculum?

Secondly, how many educators can “act on one’s own authority”?

In other words, how many teachers can actually be creative and add their own personal “spices” to the lesson “recipe” they are given by a textbook or the district?

How many authentic learning experiences are students having in the classroom
 that are going to engage, inspire and prepare them 
for their real world experiences outside of the classroom? (more…)