Z....
Again, your post seem to be saying that we can not measure teachers because of all the variables etc... but then you say that we need to keep teachers 'for a properly trained workforce'... if you can not measure how a teacher does, how do you know if they are properly trained
I am not a policeman or firefighter, but I do think they are measured... someone can chime in on that...
Your quote "The difference between good and bad teachers in regards to teaching often comes down to whether the district administrators are any good, because they are the ones who set up the climate and the on-going training to keep teachers up with the latest research based strategies."
SOOOO, you admit that there ARE good and bad teachers... that is progress IMO... before you seemed to imply all teachers were the same.. because we could not 'measure' if a teacher is good or bad.. now that we KNOW that there are good and bad teachers... HOW DO WE GET RID OF THE BAD ONES
My sister was a teacher for 40 years also... and I remember her telling me once that the number of children who had this problem or that problem had increased may X over the years... it seems that the admin wanted as many children labled as 'damaged' so they could show that they could not educate them the same because of the variables... I think one of the is ADHD... she said she did not see any difference over the years... but the number listed skyrocketed... so this seems to be CYA on their part...
You're not listening to what I'm saying to you about how things work here, and you are twisting my words. There is not much point in my continuing. I was making a good faith effort to try to explain the circumstances. But if you have an agenda, and don't want to be confused how things really are, there is no real point in continuing.
I said, that we need to address the variables like we do in any other manufacturing or sales event,
not that we cannot do that, but that we have to in scientific manner. That's what I said.
I said that teaching is not a static enterprise when it comes to training. Research on what are most effective teaching methods scientifically has only appeared over the past 10 years or so, before that it was this opinion or that opinion. I said that there are good and bad teachers, but its because they haven't had the appropriate training to be "good" teachers. That's what I said.
I said that there are good and bad teachers but not the way you took it out of context. And I explained exactly how we might go about looking at that context, through training and making sure that they are not being inappropriately stigmatized by student variables that they cannot control.
I tried to explain that all this labeling and many other things have no bearing on education because they are mandated by State and Federal governments under threat of losing federal funding, which for most districts is many millions of dollars. These things are often brought up about what's wrong with education, when education actually has no ability to "Fix" these things.
Those who have their own agenda for how they believe things are, are really not interested in discussion how things might be fixed, and aren't worth my sharing discussion.
I've been involved in this business a long time, and I've spent a lot of it in a very very progressive district which focuses a lot on the most effective teaching methods. One of those schools is a national Blue Ribbon, and the other has consistently ranked in the top in the county in all measured levels of performance, behavior and academic. I know what has to be done to do it right, and I know why its wrong when it is wrong. In the two schools that I have, there are no bad teachers. Some teachers are less successful than others for various reasons, either the variables of kids in their classes, or training. Some of these can be adjusted, but many we have no control. One or two really low scores on a standardized test can bring the averages down for an entire class. We need to know if there are elements for which we have no control and either develop control or allow for them statistically(the food industry for example, has a certain allowed number of rat hairs in food, though it less for dog food than human food).
If you wish me to explain how it works, both in a good way and in a bad way, I'm happy to take the time. Very few teachers have the big picture. I do. I've been suspended between management and in the trenches teaching, assisting both sides in direct interventions with children for almost the whole 40 years. I have to personally deal with the variables of which I speak and try to fix them because that is the primary role of the elementary school counselor in my settings. I know both sides and how it has to work to be effective.
I will not argue with people who seem to have an agenda that doesn't respond to facts, or to people who imply or directly state that I am a liar or that I have some ad hominem problem because they don't agree with me. It just gets my blood pressure up, and the easiest way is to move the person to my IL. If anyone finds that I don't seem to be responding to them, then its because I THINK they seem to have an agenda and are not interested in a rational discussion about how things are and can't be changed, and how things could be and might be changed, or that they are just angry and are looking for an educator to bash(not everybody had a good experience in school, I surely understand that since I was one who did not have a good experience until I got to graduate school). When I find the agendas or the bashing, I just expand my IL. Its made things so much more enjoyable here. I can see that there's been a large number of posts that I'll never see by people who got on my IL very early on. And now I just smile and move on, since I know what they are probably about. And you will, too, since I won't seem to be responding to you directly any more......
Z
