Skip to main content

Failed Experiement

In November, I was very focused on house hunting and felt that I was moving away from education in the blog... so I split into two blogs. This one was to remain focused on education and the other was more focused on personal things. What they evolved into was something that was only partially satisfying.

For me, being a teacher involves my personal life. They overlap. My students have gotten the blow by blow story of house buying through my my purchase. It came as quite a shock that buying a house is not like buying a lamp or a car - one cannot walk in with a check and walk out with the keys, at least not if the buyer is an average citizen. My students remembered that I participate in Bloomsday (49 days to go!) and am some sort of marathan walker. Not really, but the fact that I would purposely walk 7.5 miles for an ugly T-shirt is something really intersting. At the same time, I can tell you who made their own prom dress and which kid will probably give you their really cool artwork to hang up in the class. The personal connection builds into trust, and in turn, builds into learning. Without it, the teacher is just another adult talking at them.

As a result of all of this serious pondering, I recombined the two blogs back into one. Like it or not, this me.

Comments

Lady Strathconn said…
When my husband and I closed on our house I left school early. One of my students called out to me "I hope you get a good one." I think she thought we were going to "Home*Mart" to grab one off a shelf.

Popular posts from this blog

“They Don’t Get It”

I hear that a lot these days. It used to be mostly from various teens trying to negotiate the drama unfolding in their lives as they wandered into that no-man’s land between adult and child. These days it’s from adults trying to navigate the education scene these days. So many people talking and no one listening. The other day I was reading a post by a blogger I’ve been following for several years. Before there was such a thing as “blogging.” We all know spring is IEP review season. This blogger wrote about his daughter’s. Among the various elements, there was the discussion about the state assessment tests. She did not pass. There was discussion about what this means… and why said student needed to pass this test. Would she be taking a modified test? While reading, all I could think about was what would happen to that child as she entered middle school and high school. A history of not passing the assessment test vs. teachers who will now be evaluated on how many students pass t...

Summer Notes

Books to Read: New Kelly Gallagher   Make Just One Change: Teach Students to Ask Their Own Questions  by Dan Rothstein and Luz Santana  Notes for Art: Group Project for the First Day Expectations from group project exit question

The Cruelest Month

I know T.S. Eliot favored April as the most cruel, but we teachers know that May is… even more so these days. Most importantly, it is the final testing month. National ‘assessments, state ‘assessments’, district ‘assessments’, school ‘assessments’… on and on. It’s impossible to actually get anything done. Toss in graduation activities, planning for the upcoming year and the 2011 bonus, lay-offs and transfers, and you have to wonder if it wouldn’t be better to save money by simply shutting down school entirely except for a few test proctors. Meanwhile, there seems an air of hopelessness permeating the education world. Plans to lay-off thousands are coming to fruition. Schools are being closed, despite protests. Charters are increasing where they can whether they should not. Unions have lost a lot ground and teachers are trying to decide if it’s even worth it any more to continue talking about education . ( not that I blame anyone for that, we all have lives to live ) For myself, I...