On Tuesday I went to observe other teachers. I took the day off so I could get observations done for my credentialling classes. It was a good experience but I still felt like I was working. I would have rather been at work. I went to visit my fellow student and friend John at his school and it made me thankful in many ways to work where I work. I got a small school. My largest class is 20. He's dealing with 30 kids. Kids had cell phones out, they're putting on makeup, they're eating food, they're chatting quietly. I mean there were some engaged students and they were great. But having to deal with that many kids... it's ridiculous.
Conservatives are always saying that throwing money at the problem isn't going to make it better. I agree. What would make it better would be applying more money in the right areas. I think one of the biggest things is class size. There should be 1 teacher for every 20 students. Capped. That means hiring more teachers and that requires more money. One of the greatest injustices of the American education system is the fact that public school funding is tied to property taxes. It is just fucking wrong. Especially when rich people start pulling their children out of public schools and then satisfy their greedy self-interest of lowering property taxes in their cities. Lower taxes lower taxes. It's a rich person mantra. But the last thing America needs is more uneducated people, then people do things like vote for Bush. Anyways... enough of my ranting.
After visiting John I went to my old elementary school and observed my old friend Jody. She was teaching 1st grade now. I had forgotten how squirrelly 1st graders are. They have so much trouble just sitting still. But it was good to see her because I often find that elementary school teachers have better pedagogy. They have to. They are forced to be far more structured and organized because of who they are working with. Jody was doing a good job and she had some rough kids. Shit rough elementary school kids can sometimes be harder than high school kids. You can't get interact in the same way.
After Jody I went to visit Allison and did an observation of a history teacher next door to her. He was terrible. I had trouble staying awake. And this guy had been doing it for years. He had typed out shit on a transparency in paragraph form and then was covering part of the transparency and moving things down as he read and lectured from the transparency. The students were copying shit down almost verbatim from his writing. Why not just make a printout and hand it out to them??? He was lecturing on the Reformation and he was thoroughly unengaging. I mean I know I got kids that aren't doing shit in my class... but I feel that I'm not as boring as him. His homework assignments were questions out of the textbook. It was wild. Conveyor belt education. But it was good to see him cause even though he's been doing it as long as he has...he still doesn' t have skills. This is why a standardized test can't tell if a person can teach. You can have content knowledge but it doesn't mean you can teach it. Not to rip on teachers, but like in all professions there are good ones and bad ones. I mean I refuse to believe that all CEOs are good. ;)
So today was Film Analy...Appreciation. But actually I really broke down "The Matrix" today. I mean I was stopping and pausing and explaining references in the movie. I actually did some analysis. We talked about the sanskrit terms of maya and ahankara. I talked about the biblical references. The buddhist references. The martial arts references. I just can't watch Keanu Reeves though. I mean he's soooo bad. Then I handed out the take home test. Take home test. I mean the class isn't exactly rigorous. So I told them that I never call anyone stupid but if they fail my class then they were stupid. There is no reason whatsoever to fail my class. Unless you never show up it's damn near impossible. Hmmmm.... perhaps I shouldn't be blogging this... but it's fucking true. And for anyone reading... you know you take breaks at your work.
It was raining today so no capoeira class. I put on a movie and then called up various teacher credentialling programs so that we could send out our flyer to them. I made up a flyer to recruit volunteer teachers and prospective teachers. This would help take the work load off of all of the teachers while at the same time providing valuable field experience to prospective credential students. Ok... we want to exploit cheap labor for a good cause.
It was raining today
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