teach a man to fish and

[lunabee34]

wisdomeagle asked me about the best/worst parts of teaching.



I'll start with the worst so I can end on a high note. Some of the worst parts of teaching include:

1. Trying to compensate for a broken system. K-12 is not effective in the United States. I know the first impulse is to blame the teachers, but I don't think that's true. I know tons of K-12 teachers, and they're all good teachers who are dedicated to their students. Just like any job, teaching draws its share of bad apples, but not to a greater degree than any other profession. I think most teachers care about their students and want to help them succeed. What's wrong with K-12 is a post in itself, but some problems include a focus on standardized testing to the exclusion of all else (and standardized tests that often privilege bad writing and/or thinking; I had to quit grading the essay portion of the SAT because according to the rubric I was given, I had to give students high scores whose writing didn't merit them; it blew my mind and made me sad); a schedule of rotating classes that used to be permanent fixtures of each school day (Emma has a teensy bit of science every six weeks or so and a teensy bit of social studies every six weeks or so rather than learning these subjects each day); the glorification of athletics (usually male-dominated sports); the expectation that school systems do way more with less money; and public perception (fueled by lawmakers) that teachers have some kind of cushy job in which they do nothing but sit around all day while their students fan them and feed them grapes.

What this means is that by the time I get students, many of them are not reading and writing and well, their critical thinking skills are underdeveloped, and they are under-prepared for college level work.

Higher education is broken as well, though. My googlefu is failing me at the moment (I can't remember whether it was a newspaper article or a blog post), but I read something where a professor described speaking in front of a group of lawmakers, and he opened his speech by saying something like, "I don't expect anyone to ever put me on a committee in charge of establishing health care policy for this country. Because I'm a teacher. So why am I talking to a group of people charged with establishing education policy who have never taught before or worked in education in any capacity?" That right there is the crux of what's wrong with higher ed, IMHO. Legislators are inevitably either lawyers or business people, and they tend to want to remake higher ed in the image of the business world. This creates several unfortunate consequences, however. In a business model, a consumer pays for a product. In this case, the students are paying to have me share my expertise in a subject with them and for the educational resources provided by the college where I work. But what students believe (and I think sometimes legislators also believe) is that they are paying for a grade. If they pay their tuition and fees, come to class, and make some attempt at the assignments given, they ought to earn the grade of their choice. In addition, we all know that the corporate world is full of business people trying to find loopholes, some way to get away with something that they really know they shouldn't, and this attitude appears in the classroom when colleges adopt a business model. Professors have to become amateur lawyers, writing iron-clad syllabi that cover every contingency and documenting every interaction with students.

I could go on here (about the problems associated with assessing teacher performance, about the dangers of the kinds of assessments used to measure student performance, about the ethics of a system that relies so heavily on graduate student and adjunct professors), but you guys get the idea.

2. Trying to compensate for a student's life circumstances. I teach many students who grew up in terrible circumstances, surrounded by violence and drugs and poverty, and went to sub-par school districts. Many of these students are first generation college students who don't have any sort of support system and who sometimes have family members who actively discourage them from attending college or carving out adequate time to complete their assignments once they've enrolled. I teach many students who are supporting their families financially because their parents have been laid off or because they are single parents themselves. I teach many students whose life circumstances break my heart and work against their success as students. Some of these issues can be solved with career counseling, psychiatric counseling, and other resources provided by the college, but others just *are* and there's nothing I can do to solve them.

3. The myth that everyone needs to go to college. I think we have done the young adults of this country a great disservice by perpetuating the erroneous idea that the only path to success includes college. Plenty of lucrative and rewarding job opportunities do not require college degrees, and college is not a good fit for some people. I think college should be accessible and affordable for every student who wants to attend, but I think high school counselors should do a better job of directing students who would thrive in a vocational/technical school setting to those institutions. NPR ran a great story today about a high school student who plans to become a mason. She finds the work fulfilling, she will make excellent money, and her job opportunities will be numerous. Now please don't misunderstand me. I am not reducing the value of a college education to the economic advantages a degree usually confers. I am not discounting the importance of intellectual curiosity, of learning things just because you're interested rather than because you have to. I am also not discounting the role that a well-rounded education plays in creating an ethical and responsible citizenry of critical thinkers. However, I do think we have to be realistic, and in this economy, many of our students cannot afford to go into debt for a college education that they don't really need to accomplish their career and life goals.

4. Watching students fail, especially the ones who are sincerely trying their best. This is probably the worst worst part of being a teacher. Sometimes students just aren't capable of the work required for a particular class. They attend class, they ask for help, they go to tutoring, they come to office hours and writing conferences, and they take advantage of every opportunity presented to them, and they still perform poorly. As an academic advisor, I sometimes see students who passionately want to be psychologists but who can't pass biology or algebra after numerous attempts. These students have a clear sense of how they want to form an identity based on a profession and the contributions they want to make (many times these students are driven to certain professions by events in their lives, like a nurse who was kind to them when they were ill), and it's my job as an academic advisor to guide them to professions that can still help them achieve those goals but which fall within their skill set. In the past, I have taught remedial courses that students are only allowed to attempt a set number of times, and telling students on their final attempts at remediation that they haven't performed well enough to progress is one of the most difficult tasks that comes with the job.

Now for the good stuff.

1. Watching students succeed. I get a thrill out of students figuring out how something works. I love when they get excited about what they're reading, when their writing improves, when they can see the relevance of what they're learning to their lives.

2. Knowing I've actually made a difference in someone's life. The most rewarding part of teaching for me has been teaching a student in remediation and then teaching that student again in a regular comp class. So many times, we don't know what happens to our students after they leave our classes or whether we've had a lasting impact on their lives. But in these cases, I have tangible proof that I have helped someone get that much closer to achieving her career and life goals. It doesn't look like I'll be teaching remedial classes any longer, and while most of me is glad that I won't have to struggle with the challenges those classes can pose, the rest of me will miss watching my Learning Support students thrive after they exit the remediation program.

3. Exercising my creativity. From course design to classroom management to class activities to essay topics and exam questions, teaching is a profession that requires constant creativity. I teach the same classes over and over again, and that could become boring, static, and dated very quickly; instead, I constantly change the texts I'm teaching, the assignments I'm offering, and the teaching methods I use. I don't ever want to stagnate as a teacher, and I'm sure my students feel the same way. We've all had that teacher who is still teaching the same course he taught in 1982 with the same faded handouts and examples and assignments. Bleck. LOL That's terrible teaching. Instead, I strive to answer a series of questions with my pedagogy: How can I help the students connect what they're learning to their chosen majors and their lives outside academia? How can I help them see the relevance of what they're learning to their lives? How can I more efficiently accomplish the housekeeping tasks that are necessary to a classroom? How can I innovatively deliver content and integrate the use of technology into my classroom?

4. Learning something new each semester. I have probably read Wuthering Heights 20 times. I've taught it at least four, and every time I read that book I find something new. What's especially exciting is that more times than not, the students point out the something new to me rather than me finding it on my own. Every semester a colleague shares a new assignment with me, or I am asked to teach a course I've never taught before that requires me to do research. I love that my job allows for growth and personal development in such a concrete way.

Comments

[executrix]

OT for the post, but http://smittenkitchen.com/blog/2013/12/eggnog-florentines/#more-11208 is a recipe for pecan Florentines filled with eggnog buttercream, which I think would kick ASS on your holiday table.

[lunabee34]

OMG WHY IS THIS NOT IN MY MOUTH RIGHT NOW?

Srsly.

[executrix]

I bought what I *thought* was a DVD of a Canadian production of Merchant of Venice, turns out to be an audio CD. It seems like every other line is an innuendo--"Your Worship was the last man in our mouths." I don't think they were talking about cookies though (although in the play about the Moor of Venice, Cassio *is* a Florentine.)

[lunabee34]

I feel like somebody wittier than me could turn Neapolitan into a joke here. IDK LOL

[cloudsinvenice]

This is such a great post; I know a lot of people who teach but I never understood before the extent of the problems caused by legislators - or rather, the reasons why they're a bad fit for the task of making the education system work. I suspect teacher friends in the UK would echo that.

[lunabee34]

I suspect you're right.

The other problem that I didn't really go into is that the budget for education is always being slashed at all levels. So less money from year to year. But there's constant discussion about how America is behind other countries in reading, writing and math and about how our students are performing poorly and how broken the system is and someone that conversation is never connected to dwindling funds. You get what you pay for. I guarantee those legislators would never go to a dentist who only had ten dollar to spend on equipment. They'd lose all their teeth! LOL So why they expect better results from schools after giving them less money is beyond me.

Who is in your icon? I love all the kitties.

[cloudsinvenice]

It's this guy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Patrick_(dramatist)

I actually found him very randomly; there's a tumblr called blackandwtf for strange old photos, and one was the original that my icon is cropped from. :)

[lunabee34]

Oh cool! Thanks for linking me. :)