Chalk

Last Monday's class we just finished watching the movie "Chalk". I really enjoyed watching this movie because it showed different things that teachers can do wrong. First there was the first-year History teacher who lacked discipline, people skills, and any charisma. He had major issues connecting with the students and dealing with any unplanned situations. My favorite scene from him was when he freaked out on one of his students for having a cell phone out in class. I think that first of all this teacher was in the wrong profession, and secondly he needed training on how to keep appropriate discipline in the classroom. Then there was the P.E. teacher who was extremely pushy and demanding about unimportant things. Although she seemed to connect to the students well, she bothered the faculty often times about less important issues such as students being tardy to class. I think that this teacher would benefit from relaxing and making an effort to be civil with the faculty. The new vice principal in the movie seemed the most on track, but still had issues with her family and handeling certain teacher situations. I would suggest that she put her family first in her life instead of her job, because it seemed like her relationship was on the line. Lastly there was the casually-dressed teacher who was very self-indulgent and wanted to be the students' friend. One of the worst things I think he did was pulling two students out of class and telling them to stop using big words in class because it made him look dumb. I have personally had a teacher like this and nothing is more frustrating than an insecure teacher trying to look good. I found his attempt at winning the "Teacher of the Year" award humorous, but very unprofessional. I think this teacher needs to be put in place by his boss and told to dress professionally and act appropriately. Overall I found this movie to be very entertaining and at the same time educational for our Educational Psychology class because we were able to see some bad teaching techniques and create suggestions for better teaching.

Interview of Parents

The final group of people we interviewed as a class were some parents of students. The first question asked dealt with how parents knew when to get involved with teachers. Steve said that part of education is the kids learning how to deal with situations on their own. He said that the only time he's been involved as a parent was when bad grades were involved. I think that as a teacher I would want my students' parents to be aware and updated in their education, but not overly protective to the point where the kids can't handle any teacher conflict themselves. Rebecca stated that creative, dynamic, informed, and active teachers help out a lot in motivating the kids. Mary Kay stated that she really appriciates teachers who would really try to help kids learn and suceed no matter what. As usual the No Child Left Behind Act was mentioned, but this time I found the responses to be more negative. Rebecca spoke first of how frustrating student teacher conferences have become since teachers have begun using graphs and data to explain how their children are doing. She said that assessment is good for schools, but if it was more individually focused it would be of more value. Steve went on so much as to say that the conferences are useless and he does not attend them any longer. He agrees that the data is just too much and confusing and it's just not working. Mary Kay thinks that the NCLB Act has good intentions, but it's just not working. I think that this is a problem that I never even realized before we interviewed these parents. Since we can not change the act, we need to educate the parents about what the data and graphs mean and make sure that during conferences the teacher still discusses the individual student, not just statistics. Many other topics were discussed during the interview, but the part that stuck with me towards the end was that although teacher salaries aren't ideal, the retirement is excellent for teachers. Overall I found that hearing the parents perspective on some of these issues helped me realize some other sides to the issues we have been discussing in these class interviews.

Decorah Teacher Class Inteview

This Monday evening our Educational Psychology class interviewed three teachers from Decorah from different fields. One was the high school voice teacher, the other was a 5th grade Math teacher, and the last was a special education teacher. As usual, different questions were asked concerning their teaching experiences. The first question was "what surprised you about teaching?" Some points made by all three of them were that it takes a lot of energy, it requires patience and willingness to change, and at times your great "ideas" can get squashed. I imagined that that would be true for a beginning teacher that they would have so much energy and a bunch of ideas that sometimes may be turned down. Working with colleagues was also mentioned and they all agreed that it is important for teachers to have good relationships with them not only to have a social life at school, but because if you don't like a particular faculty member, the kids pick up on it. I definitely agree, because I know that I had some teachers that didn't get along with other faculty members and let the class know, and I find that being very unprofessional, not to mention something that could get a teacher into trouble. As with the other class interviews the No Child Left Behind Act was brought up. Many similar things were mentioned, but I found it interesting that Jason (the choir teacher) had to incorporate sight-singing into his curriculum to help kids on standardized tests. I think it's nice to know that as a choir teacher I will be able to help in some part of helping students achieve high standardized test scores. Some other points that they made that stuck with me was that it is very important to be willing to contact or communicate with parents. Also Jason mentioned a saying that Weston Noble had said, "You have to be a life long learner." I agree that teachers need to keep updated and not be afraid to change or be wrong in some situations. Nothing is worse than a teacher who isn't updated, hasn't ever changed his/her curriculum, and will never admit that anything they do is wrong. Overall I thought this class interview gave me a lot of insight of what the first few years of teaching is like, how you develop as a teacher, and how to deal with all of the situations that are thrown at you as a teacher.