be a good teacher

It’s always rewarding knowing that a kid who usually has difficulty with instruction actually prefers to work with me because – somehow or another – I get them to really understand things.

This is both the good and bad thing about working with the girl I tutored today, Abby: she loves working with me, but is extremely stubborn when it comes to working with anyone else, which makes progression highly dependent on what I can get done with her. Of course, I don’t resent this at all – I just feel like if other people could actually get through to her, she would get to the level she needs to be at much more quickly. Earlier when I went over to her house, her mom told me that she and Abby had tried reading the book we were going to tackle this summer, Maniac MacGee, the previous night. Trying to get Abby to understand the book resulted in the two of them fighting and Abby telling her mom that she refused to read the book.

I would have been worried, except that Abby showed absolutely no signs of what had happened between her and her mom as I spent the rest if the time dissecting every tiny detail of the first four chapters (each of which consisted of about 2-4 pages) and explaining each one. What I found to be the problem with Abby was not that she wasn’t, or couldn’t be, interested in the book, it’s just that she didn’t understand a very large bulk of it – being able to differentiate between what was a metaphor/simile and what was actually happening, and then just what things were (for example, she didn’t know what a varsity football player meant, nor any of the terminology that went along with football).

In general, I had to be extremely sensitive to every word and, if I didn’t just quickly explain it in passing (“and he punted…or in other words, he kicked…the ball”) I asked her if she knew what something was – she’d usually say no, meaning that if I had just kept on reading she would have had to try and figure out what was going on without knowing it. And…since there was so much she didn’t know, I can see how she would get totally frustrated with someone trying to read the book to her without stopping to explain anything. BUT! Once I did get her to understand everything (even the theme of the book, which I was really proud of her for picking up on) she was completely captivated, and reacted very theatrically to my reading with gasps and giggles behind her hands.

Once her mom came home, I told her that it was very important that she understand the content before she even tries practicing reading it on her own – I said that to read the chapter to her and explain everything first would give her an idea of what to look for so that when she read it on her own she could get practice actually reading without worrying too much about trying to understand things. So that way, someone would read and explain things to her first, and then she would try reading it on her own either out loud or to herself.

So…there’s going to be a lot of experimenting this summer, but hopefully she’ll be able to progress enough that 5th grade will be at least a little easier for her. I told her that this was why we were working together during the summer, so that she had a goal and purpose in mind.

Eventually I’ll also be working with another really sweet kid named Liam, who is similar in that he takes a long time to process information, but he’s also very obsessive compulsive. The challenge with him will be trying to find a balance between pushing him enough so that he learns to speed up his thinking process, and pushing him too much so that he freaks out. I’ll have to really make sure that he understands my intentions and that I’m there to help him, not torture him. He’s on vacation now, so I guess we’ll see what happens once he gets back.

Wow! Earlier today my boss told me that she had received a letter from the parent of one of the kids who I work with and tutor privately. I was one of the recipients of a pink slip, so getting this kind of support will hopefully be helpful in terms of whether I’m going to get hired back for next year, and it’s also just really touching knowing that I’ve made this kind of a difference for someone. This is what it said (with names changed around, just because I like the idea of picking different names for people):

“Dear Special Education Department,
We are writing in praise of Ms. L, who has worked tirelessly throughout the year with our daughter Abby. L has been an outstanding Teacher’s Aide to Abby this past year. She has worked tirelessly assisting Fifi in learning many concepts that have been difficult for her to grasp. L has managed to do this with enthusiasm and kindness.

Not only has L been of great value to Abby this year, but also she has been willing to communicate with us on a regular basis. She has been our counselor when we have had fears about Abby’s progress and has always provided us with encouragement and listened to us when we needed to vent our frustrations. Furthermore, she has provided us with almost weekly emails keeping up informed of Abby’s worth with her.

It is my hope that L remains in the school district for many years to come. Although I would love for her to continue to follow Abby, it would be selfish of me to ask. Her skills should be shared, with other children (and their parents) who will certainly benefit from her kindness, skills, compassion and enthusiasm.

Thank you for providing us with L this year. She has enabled Abby to have a successful and very happy 4th grade year.

Yours sincerely,
The Parents”

Teaching has recently become a really big theme in my life – I teach special ed. at an elementary school, and about a month and a half ago I was selected to become part of an instructor’s training course for my dojo, which is insanely intense, involves a lot of teaching philosophies, and is open only to those who will dedicate themselves fully to being a teacher and thus becoming the ultimate role model for students. I love it, and it has definitely been intense, but it gives words and organization to some of the things I already believed about teaching.

Having compassion…
enthusiasm…
dedication…
responsibility…
etc.

This year I became very close with a student of mine who has ADHD and thus a very difficult time retaining information, which affects all areas of her study. Throughout my time with her as well as talking to other teachers of hers, I realized just how little faith some of them had. Some of them would just shake their heads when we talked about her, some would call her ‘hopeless’; it made me both really sad and really angry that those who are supposed to be the guides to these kids give up on them so easily, especially when the child WANTS to learn but simply doesn’t have the necessary tools to do so. It’s so sad how their self esteem disappears when they see themselves falling behind the rest of their class: I’ve heard a bunch of them call themselves ‘stupid’, which I immediately tell them that it isn’t true. I want so badly to see them confident and successful; it’s following up on this and sticking to it that seems to be the most difficult part for most people. So, this is what I commit to do: I commit to committing myself to guiding my students to progress.

i want to be good teacher by knowing what exactly the student without beating them

I am working on my secondary education degree now, but when i am actually teaching i really want to be able to teach my kids something real, and them to understand what i am trying to teach. I want them to like me and able to approach me and ask for help when they need it.

Filling in for another teacher to update a Spring course for the BAC. Then updating my own this Summer. Then TA-ing for Jim next Fall. And if things work out, maybe doing some workshops for a new company this Spring. That should keep me busy and give me the chance to keep honing my skills.

Learning more about learning styles. What my strengths and weakness are. How to appeal to a broader range.

I am a checklist person, so glad to have this summary to be able to check my lessons against.

- text for the verbal learners
- images and multimedia for the visual people
- podcasts or screencasts to reach the auditory learners
- group projects for the interpersonal students
- chances to reflect and philosophize for the intrapersonal students
- experiments and puzzles for the Logical thinkers
- over-arching goals for the Global thinkers
- examples for the Inducers
- theories for the Deducers

From BAC training course: “The secret is to encourage participation from the close-mouthed groups without intruding so much into the garrulous groups that you silence the students’ voices. But there is no formula for this. It takes practice, because a teacher’s entry into any discussion may reward and encourage the speakers, or it may silence everyone and smother the conversation. And it’s not always easy to know when you’re doing one or the other.”

I think I was approaching this all wrong my first time, feeling like I had to make comments to each students post on every discussion board. Need to phrase the topics in a way that is not so “what is the right answer” but elicits more discussion and discovery. As he says – “I want to encourage their independence but I can’t leave them hanging… the goal of my teaching is not just to hand students information but to help them learn the thought patterns and processes they can use later to correct themselves, solve their own problems, and find their own information.”

I’m excited to be starting my BAC faculty training course for online teaching _{albeit I am jumping in a bit late}

Great observation from the first week: “When learning with multimedia the brain must simultaneously encode two different types of information, an auditory stimulus and a visual stimulus. One might expect that these competing sources of information would tend to overwhelm or overload the learner. However, psychological research has shown that verbal information is, in fact, better remembered when accompanied by a visual image (Paivio, 1971).”

This rings totally true from my own learning experiences. Next time I’d like to include a voice over as part of the presentations. Or even better, images and voice bits embedded in the pdf text.

As a side note, I like the way they have posted key points directly into the online lesson and then embedded links they can easily go to for more info. Better than requiring students to chase down each link. Makes it easier to elevate the conversation, linking to explanations some but not all may be familiar with. Will allow me to use supporting articles to make a larger point. It makes for a lot of scrolling but the color boxes help organize the info.

temporarily..

going back to work after 4 months of maternity leave seems a tad abrupt. no doubt i’ld miss my little girl alot but i don’t want to feel so drained at the end of the day after facing a class of children and my boys then go home and not want to talk to my daughter. so i’ve decided to give it up only temporarily.. mostly because the organisation is shit anyway.. but then again if i were more conscientious about my work, i would probably have a more collegial working relationship with my fellow teacher.

i do miss how we started out, how i started out, the passion and enthusiasm for teaching, for the boys, for the project, the integration to work.. but i’m tired. i’m tired of the fund raising events.. having to work as a teacher.. suffering bullcrap office politics. i’m a real loser and non confrontational.. but some of them seemed to have developed alpha egos, some people quit because of this group. i’m going to quit.

i’m tired of working for non-profit. i am going to work for profit.. haha.. yes, that makes me some kind of capitalist scumbag. but hey, pampers is expensive.