Meeting Overload

I had my first teacher meeting on Wednesday. Four hours of information, that could have been boiled down to two pages of hand-outs and a 45 minute discussion. But, hey, at least the room was cool. In the next two weeks I'll spend probably 20 to 30 hours listening to someone else talk. (Hence, the poll at right - What do you hate about meetings?)

This year is different in that I will have 12 or so computers in my classroom - one for every 2 students. We're working on lesson plans that encourage cooperative learning and help students define their own learning needs. It sounds impressive in theory. In practice I'm not sure it will hold up to high stakes testing requirements. We'll see. I'm willing to try new things, I really am. But I've begun to believe that we are too quick to change from one program to the next in our search for ways to teach poor, language challenged students. The result is we expend vast amounts of energy, a considerable amount of money, and rarely give the programs a chance to prove their worth before abandoning them for the next new reform. It's generally not teachers who make these program decisions, either. It's people long out of the classroom who answer to legislators and the public. They feel they must do SOMETHING, so they dump what we're doing now for something else, hoping that it will magically solve all our problems in one school year or less.

Each summer I rejuvenate, rethink my role in the education of our children. And sometimes I feel like I must be getting too old for it all. I know too much. I've seen the ebb and flow of too many "promising, research based" programs that were never very promising, and never had full financial backing anyway. Ever in Utah do we commit to a program, then pull the financial plug on it, hoping individual schools or teachers will buy the necessary workbooks, CD's or other equipment from their already dismally small budgets. If I hadn't seen it all 31 times before I might be able to convince myself that this year with 12 computers it will be different. As it is, I will accept the help of those computers for the sake of my sweet 10-year-olds, and stuff my jaded personae in a desk drawer. It's the kids that make teaching fun and special and important, anyway. Cheers to all of you and welcome back to school!

P.S. If you want to read a clear, concise argument against vouchers, see the book on the right by Pedro Noguera, a past professor at Harvard, currently at New York University.