Posted by Zhel on 4/06/08
PLEASE ELABORATE
Ans: I am pleased to elaborate, although I am a bit
surprised that in an article full of provocative statements,
you chose to question two tongue-in-cheek, off hand comments
I threw in at the end. However, since you were specific, I
will answer in specifics even though, as I indicated in the
article, few educators would likely have experienced what
would happen if students had input into the process of
teacher or class selection (or anything else in their
educational experiences).
Quote: "On opening day of school, teachers stand by their
door with a clipboard to sign-up students for their class.
Teachers who do not have anyone signed-up by noon can get
the newspaper want ads free as they leave the building."
1) So, if there are two "cool" math teachers, kids signs up
for two math classes and has no courses in social studies?
Ans: You can have whatever scheduling policies you want or
need to satisfy the powers that be. But I suspect two cool
math courses would trump one unwanted social studies course.
2) There is a finite (or almost finite) number of students
that can fit within a room. There is no way 100 students
would fit in a room designed for 25. So, they would have to
be rearranged to someone else. Who would choose the
kids that should be turned away?
Ans: There may be finite numbers of students who fit in a
room but there are plenty of rooms and facilities that will
hold a 100 students. It’s better to find a place for 100
students than to rearrange the kids chosen schedule. As
for who would choose the kids that should be turned away—as
I suggest in the article, give the problem to the kids.
3) What if the whole school wants to be in particular
teacher's classes? They can't.
Ans: Sure they can. If the whole school wants particular
classes, that’s beautiful feedback and should be responded
to immediately with high priority and with whatever it
takes. I once taught the entire ninth-grade class of a jr
high school (527 kids) in civics class daily for a year in
an auditorium that held 1500. It was the best class I ever
taught because I was terrified I would lose control. But, I
learned that a teacher cannot control 527 kids by rules,
dirty looks, threats, tests, or even extreme “carrots and
sticks”. I also learned teachers cannot control a typical
class of 25, or even fewer, except on one basis: That they
are willing to control themselves in relation to what is
being offered. Students also control those students around
them if they are being disturbed.
4) What if the schedules overlap? The student cannot be in
two rooms at the same time. What if the only way such a
schedule can be made is where students from widely different
grade levels are supposed to have different courses at the
same time in the same teacher's room?
Ans: Scheduling is the least of the problems teachers and
students have. Scheduling is a problem chosen by
administrators who run schools for the convenience of people
who run schools rather than those whom it serves. Who could
possibly believe that one period of each subject, each day,
every day, all year, every year would be a good way to learn
a subject? That having bells ring every 47 minutes,
indicating that bells are more important than interrupting
subjects? School schedules are primarily for planning the
use of teacher-specialists, not for how kids learn (What
does the school do with the English teacher while the kids
study math for 8 weeks. I taught in a school that ran on a
student-teacher controlled, variable, flexible plan where
each kid was scheduled each day.
5) How do the students know who is the best teacher for them
if they did not already have them? What happens to the new
teachers? They probably get judged by the looks only.
Ans: How could students know good teachers when the school
system, choosing them on the basis of credentials, courses,
grades, tests, knowledge, etc. doesn’t know? I would
suggest that after a week or two, students would go through
the selection process again. By that time they would have
learned about their teachers and would have heard from other
students about their teachers. New teachers, not otherwise
selected, could assist teachers with an overload. But they
would have to adapt to the selected teacher’s approach and
then be judged when the reselection is offered.
In the NY Times Best Seller list a book entitled “Blink”
quoted research that showed the evaluation of teachers by
students who had been in the class a full semester was
precisely the same as students who had seen only a 10 minute
clip, without sound, of the those same teachers. Other
research shows that when a speaker begins, the audience
takes only 78 seconds to decide whether they like the
speaker and only 97 seconds to decide whether they will
listen to more. And psychologists show that in personal
interaction, 85 to 93 percent of the message is nonverbal.
6) What if you have the misfortune that kids think you are
the "cool easy" teacher (because it happens that the other
teacher is the harsh-grading yeller) and all the discipline
problems sign to your classes?
Ans: The easy teacher would no doubt be the lesser of the
two evils, but no kid I have ever known wants to spend a
year bored by an easy class. The appropriate choice would
be “neither of the above”. I would hate to sit through even
a day of stuff I already knew and that offered nothing new
or of interest. Kids enjoy being challenged by relevant
content, not by the threat of tests. They do not like
anything that is too difficult or too easy. To make it
relevant and challenging, have the kids participate in the
selection; kids don’t think of things they don’t think of
and they don’t think of things that are stupid.
(7) I think the answer to many of these questions would be
some kind of election process, where the teacher candidates
present their platform to groups of students; but it would
be difficult to arrange before the first day of school.
Ans:I suspect you couldn’t trust them anymore that you could
politicians and their campaign promises. By using the first
week or two of school for an orientation, sampling period
the selection could be made. Reselection could be made
whenever it was needed or decided on.
Quote: "If a student dislikes a class and wants to transfer,
s/he is free to leave, taking his or her share of the
state’s daily attendance allocation fund to give to the new
teacher. Teachers aware that every kid in class could walk
out permanently at any time would have a different attitude
toward their teaching responsibility."
(8) As I am not in the USA, I know nothing about "state’s
daily attendance allocation fund". I know that over here we
are paid by the number of classes, not by the number of
students. I had a class of 16 and a class of 26 and I got
paid the same. So this part wouldn't matter at all in my
area.
Ans: Teachers are not paid per pupil but schools are. There
is a per pupil allowance paid to the schools on the basis of
average (total) daily attendance. That’s why schools are
concerned with the seven million students that are absent
from school each day, and the 1.2 million that dropout each
year. My suggestion was that since the schools get paid to
teach the kids, those teachers who are doing their share be
paid accordingly. If teachers saw they were losing money by
not teaching, that might help them improve. In the long
run, there is no such thing as a good teacher; there is only
a good school, which uses its resources in the best interest
of the students. Fortunately, all teachers are not alike.
(9) On the other hand, if it comes to the point when a
student wants to transfer from my class, I think that we are
comparing the benefit of a few dollars to the benefit of
not having an energy-consuming power struggle that disrupts
the whole classroom dynamics over and over again. I would be
very happy to see such a student placed in
another classroom so it is a gain-gain situation for
everyone (including the other students).
Ans: You’re right. You, or any other teacher, would not
object if “a student wants to transfer”, the hassle would
come when half or more of the class, including your best
students opted out.
With joy in sharing, billpage@bellsouth.net
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