"Do you teach or do you educate?"
I have wanted to become an educator for as long as I can remember. My first grade teacher, Mrs. Crawford was the best, and she still serves as my inspiration today. However, I did not find out until later that I would prefer teaching high school students over younger kids. Mrs. Crawford was the first person outside of my own family that I felt really cared about me. I have had a few other wonderful teachers over the years, but sadly I have had more bad ones than good. This fact serves as my other big inspiration.
I feel like high school is my calling, because good high school teachers are educators to students who are on the doorstep of adult life. I feel like the opportunity for influencing students in a way that will have long term impact on their lives is an opportunity especially reserved for high school teachers. The decisions faced by teens who have recently graduated from high school, could have serious implications on the rest of their lives. That is not, however, meant to take away or demerit the importance of elementary educators. All and all, I just think high school seniors are old enough to be privy to the facts about facing life beyond the shelter of their parents or caretakers.
Tom Johnson's Don't Let Them Take The Pencils Home is a post of dialog between school teacher Tom and Gertrude, the School Curriculum Instructional Interventionist Academic Specialist. I'm not all together sure about what that means. Anyway, Gertrude is telling Tom that when their students take their pencils home, they test lower than the students who do not on the standardized tests at their school. I gather that they mean computers and the internet when they speak of pencils. Tom argues that the research Gertrude bases her conclusions on is shady at best, as all conclusions have been based on measurements of "drill and kill" methods of instruction and testing. Tom believes in integrating his classroom with technology, and introducing his students to the world outside the school building through the internet. He says that they should take their pencils (computers) home, and through special assignments and parent involvement, they can learn with them at home just as well as they can at school. If the students choose to use them for social purposes, so be it. They will be learning nonetheless.
I wasn't sure, but I do believe this post was actually written by John T. Spencer. John has a number of education reformation post on Blogs like Education Rethink. He says, "This post was largely influenced by Larry Ferlazzo's latest post and my own experience with 1:1 computing and my friend Javi's experience with a Parent University." Larry's post talks about the actual studies that have been done about the relationship between test scores and students either having or not having a computer at home. One study said that students who have computers at home from the time they are in the sixth grade until they leave the eighth grade show a decrease in test scores over that same time period. Based on my own experience, I would be willing to bet that test scores drop in general from the sixth to the eighth grade, because puberty alone does more than enough to influence test scores in the negative.
Overall, I enjoyed the post. Although, I had to read it more than twice to fully grasp what was going on. I also think that John should have posted Larry's study above the post so that it made a little more sense the first go round. Furthermore, I would have changed the title to "Shady Test Have Shady Results." In conclusion, I do think there may be a link between low income homes and low test scores, but I don't think it's fair at all to assume that computers contribute to this in a direct way. Maybe, the problem is, the methods being utilized for teaching and testing at present are not congruent with the methods being utilized for learning and understanding. Teaches today are trying to build a Corvette using the parts of a Model T with the tools of a caveman. What do you think test scores are going to do? No-brainer!
ROLL TIDE!
Tom Johnson's Don't Let Them Take The Pencils Home is a post of dialog between school teacher Tom and Gertrude, the School Curriculum Instructional Interventionist Academic Specialist. I'm not all together sure about what that means. Anyway, Gertrude is telling Tom that when their students take their pencils home, they test lower than the students who do not on the standardized tests at their school. I gather that they mean computers and the internet when they speak of pencils. Tom argues that the research Gertrude bases her conclusions on is shady at best, as all conclusions have been based on measurements of "drill and kill" methods of instruction and testing. Tom believes in integrating his classroom with technology, and introducing his students to the world outside the school building through the internet. He says that they should take their pencils (computers) home, and through special assignments and parent involvement, they can learn with them at home just as well as they can at school. If the students choose to use them for social purposes, so be it. They will be learning nonetheless.
I wasn't sure, but I do believe this post was actually written by John T. Spencer. John has a number of education reformation post on Blogs like Education Rethink. He says, "This post was largely influenced by Larry Ferlazzo's latest post and my own experience with 1:1 computing and my friend Javi's experience with a Parent University." Larry's post talks about the actual studies that have been done about the relationship between test scores and students either having or not having a computer at home. One study said that students who have computers at home from the time they are in the sixth grade until they leave the eighth grade show a decrease in test scores over that same time period. Based on my own experience, I would be willing to bet that test scores drop in general from the sixth to the eighth grade, because puberty alone does more than enough to influence test scores in the negative.
Overall, I enjoyed the post. Although, I had to read it more than twice to fully grasp what was going on. I also think that John should have posted Larry's study above the post so that it made a little more sense the first go round. Furthermore, I would have changed the title to "Shady Test Have Shady Results." In conclusion, I do think there may be a link between low income homes and low test scores, but I don't think it's fair at all to assume that computers contribute to this in a direct way. Maybe, the problem is, the methods being utilized for teaching and testing at present are not congruent with the methods being utilized for learning and understanding. Teaches today are trying to build a Corvette using the parts of a Model T with the tools of a caveman. What do you think test scores are going to do? No-brainer!
Evan,
ReplyDeleteYou understood the sarcasm behind John Spencer's blog posts and you found out that he made up the fictional character of Tom Johnson. You have written a good analysis of the assignments this week. Keep up the good work!
Evan,
ReplyDeleteYou did a good job with summarizing and relating to each post. I agree that there is a correlation between family income and test scores. When the right approach is taken, students in poorer families can close the gap that is placed between them and their wealthier classmates. I saw this firsthand my first year to teach. A few years before I taught there, the school was a low performing school. The teachers worked diligently and had attended numerous professional development sessions. By the time I got there, the school had gone from a low performing school to one of the highest performing schools in Mobile County. I think it is wonderful that you want to be high school teacher. I have always admired the ones that want to work with older students. Good luck the rest of the semester!