Being a teacher without a classroom means that I’m on a corporate schedule, which means much shorter holiday breaks.
But when I was a teacher in a classroom, I got two weeks off.
Except for the bag full or grading I brought home.
And the plans that were due the morning I got back.
Actually, let’s be honest, teachers never get breaks.
I talked my way into working remotely one summer.
One of my jobs required a lot of time on the computer and I talked myself into working from home.
I thought it was a brilliant idea. I could work in my workout clothes rather than getting dressed in work clothes. I could sit on a couch rather than at a desk, but after about day 2 I realized there was something about the work environment that made me more productive.
I wonder if the online schools that are proliferating right now are seeing better or worse results than we are seeing in the classrooms. How do students respond to this working remotely idea?
My teaching environment is much different than my previous four years of teaching.
I don’t work on a hall with colleagues surrounding me in a school filled with students and principals.
It’s just me and my car.
My time between classes isn’t taken up by requests for tech support or meeting reminders. In my time between classes, I reflect on what went well and I get to think through my coming lesson.
I’m not busy with the busywork of school.
Many teachers don’t get a break because their planning periods are eaten by unaware colleagues or principals. They are so busy they don’t have time to eat lunch or get a cup of coffee.
Is this intentional? Is this to keep new ideas from simmering?
Are we being distracted or busied to keep us quiet?
We had a guest speaker from Zimbabwe come to speak to our youth. She is studying in Ohio, but told her story about the economic 360 that Zimbabwe experiences.
She was in boarding school. The government ran out of money and couldn’t pay teachers. She and her classmates had to teach themselves.
She said there were two or three teachers who stayed and taught without pay, without materials.
What would you do?
It’s hard being a teacher without a readily available community, especially if you are in need of materials or resources. My thought is that maybe we could swap goods in order to help each other out.
You can fill out the form if you have a request or if you have materials or resources that you think might benefit other teachers. The Resource Exchange page will serve as the record keeper.
Hope this helps us all!
When you work in a public school in the high stakes atmosphere that is engulfing our schools, you begin to believe that teachers are all the same. You begin to believe that teachers are supposed to increase student achievement each year. We are supposed to copycat the progress of the previous teacher.
That’s not teaching.
And it’s gets just as repetitive to students as a copycat repeating his every word.
Each year, each teacher is unique.
So too, should each year of a student’s education be.
