Missed Josh's Blog for Education Improvement Day.

[labelleizzy]

fools_and_irish challenged those of us in education to talk about what we would do to improve the education system as it currently exists in California/USA.

I have one thing to say to that: train the teachers better.

• Give teachers concrete skills and a chance to practice them under supervision until they have attained mastery - AS LONG AS IT TAKES for them to attain mastery.
  
• Train teachers in the social skills-of-connection with kids, because kids are looking to like and love their teacher, if you give them a chance. They also learn best when they like their teacher.
  
• Make sure each teacher has enough mastery of his/her subject that they can give lectures and develop lessons without having to copy from someone else or from a book or website. A teacher who doesn't know their stuff can't foster the trust of the students - they know something is fake about that teacher, and the learning situation goes south.
  
• Correlation to the previous point - for the Gods' Sake, DO NOT PLACE SOMEONE IN A ROOM JUST TO HAVE A BODY IN THAT ROOM. Have a qualified confident teacher teaching that subject. Some principals and some personnel offices get so desperate for teachers they put whoever in, and as shipoffools999 so gracefully put it, it's like they throw the fledgling in the room with the students, close the door, and pray for a good outcome.

Another thing I have to say to that: TREAT the teachers better.

• Half an hour lunch? You're kidding me, right?
  
• Healthy food on campus.
  
• Frequent chances to network/collaborate with peers. And either feed us or give us paid release time.
  
• No Stupid Inservices. If you need to educate us on some particular topic, don't shove all of us into the library and have someone lecturing us. Teachers bring tests to grade to those things, and tune out. If it's important enough to train us, it's important enough to do it RIGHT, or to optimize our time. Small group work. Online material and tests to make sure we absorbed what we are supposed to know. We're professionals, treat us like that. Save the cattle calls for pep-rally teambuilding efforts. Boring inservices are INSULTING.
  
• ** Encourage continuing ed, ON CAMPUS. Each one teach one, right? If each teacher WAS PAID and taught an after school class once or twice a month in their specialty, FOR OTHER TEACHERS, you'd network out, teachers would be less isolated, we'd have more fun, more loyalty, less stress, and duh, we'd learn something. Why do you THINK we're working IN EDUCATION?? I would totally have gone to a modern dance class taught by Kelly C., or a history class by Thatcher P., or an art class by Barbara B., math class with Mr. S., weightlifting with Cesar O. (and not just cos he was cute!), and I would gladly have taught a class on pantomime, improv, stage makeup, and we woulda had FUN!!! Teachers are LEARNERS. Work with that. Build on that.
  
• ** Each school should have at least one full time substitute teacher on staff. You could apply to have that sub cover you for the morning while you went to the dentist, catch your 6th period if your kid needed picked up from the other school cos she was puking, you could apply to have help (if the sub wasn't otherwise engaged) to do research, help decorate your room, help you organize your paperwork and lessons or help you grade papers or record grades. Teaching is often damn LONELY. MITIGATE that. We are all social creatures, few people really like sitting or working alone in their room. The morale improvement ALONE would be TREMENDOUS.
  

I know I have more ideas but these are the ones that brew in my brain.
To sum up:

Give teachers RESPECT
Help teachers LEARN
Make teachers CONFIDENT
Remember teachers are ARTISTS and PROFESSIONALS. (Treat em like it!)
Let teachers have PRIDE and help us to BUILD COMMUNITY.

Here endeth the lesson.

HEREis Carolyn's contribution.