Goals of Education

On TeachersCount blog, I saw a post about the Goals of Education. It made me think a lot about my personal goals. The post discusses the imortance (or rather, not importance) of standardized testing. Beyond school, standardized testing will not matter. How we are able to function and thrive in society has nothing to do with the number we get on a test. The post says that the goal of education should be to provide students with the skills they need to be thriving members of society, regardless of the path they choose. This idea can be used in the classroom to help teachers differentiate learning. As a teacher, I believe it is my job to make sure each student is provided the skills they need for anything they want to do: not just a test. I think it would be a good idea to ask all of my students their goals, and to understand these goals and develop lessons to touch on each of their goals.

You can read this blog here.

Math Teacher Wants to Change Grading.. Just Not Sure How Much.

On twitter I saw a tweet with a link to an article about grading. Being as I am still a student, the ins and outs of grading are very important to me because they literally determine my future. Growing up I was made to believe that grades were a reflection of my intelligence. If I had a bad grade, a B or below, on a test, I believed I was stupid. That was the only reasonable explination in my mind. As I grew older, I started to realize that my grades literally had nothing to do with my intelligence. I could be the smartest kid in the class and have the worst grade over things like homework and tests. Just because a student does poorly on tests does not mean they are stupid. I want all students to know that grades are not a reflection of them. Education needs to look more toward advancing students abilities and knowledge and away from numbers that literally reflect nothing and can destroy a childs motivation and self-esteem.

You can read this article here.

What should we teach the teachers who will teach tomorrow?

I read-or rather listened to- a blog on Cool Cat Teacher that discussed educating educators. I found this interesting considering I am currently in that position. There was a link to a sound clip of Vicki talking to a man named Jim Ryan, Dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. They began with discussing the importance of education. He noted that many sociatal problems stem from educational opportunity. He also said that effective teachers not only know their subject matter very well, but know each individual student well and are able to reach the top, middle and bottom of the class. "Students tend to learn best when they are able to engage with the material," he said. That was probably my favorite quote from the clip. I agree that students need to be able to be a part of the lesson, not just listeners to a long lecture.

You can Listen to this blog here.

Blended Learning

On twitter, I found an article about different studies regarding Blended Learning. At first, I was confused because I had never heard the term "Blended Learning," but it is actually very simple. Blended Learning is a teaching method that uses, at least in part, technology and allows the student to move at their own pace. This gives students control of how quickly or slowly they learn information. The article aimed to expose teachers to different studies that could further explain the effective, or ineffectiveness of Blended Learning. I personally think that technology is a must in this day and age but I wonder if allowing students to move more slowly inhibits them to not get work done. I do think classrooms should be modified to allow students appropriate time to learn (which is hard with standardized testing) but I do not know where the line must be drawn.

You can read this article here.

An Open Letter to My Students

I read a blog today about PARCC testing. The teacher wrote an open letter to her students apologizing for making them take this test. She does not believe the test is beneficial and seems very torn up about having to administer it. This made me think about when I will have to administer standardized tests. I agree that they are not helping students-rather substantially hurting them. As much as I would love to rip up all of the tests, I won't be able to. As a teacher, I will be responsible for administering these tests, watching children struggle and be stressed out. I will be responsible for stressing my students out. That is not what education should be about. Administering standardized tests will be one of, if not THE, hardest part of my job.

You can read this blog here.

4th Grader Destroys Common Core by Asking School Board One Question

I was scrolling through twitter today when I saw an interesting Article Title. It said "4th Grader Destroys Common Core..." I was instantly hooked. Upon following the link, reading an article and watching the video, I felt as though everyone should watch this video. It features a little girl standing at a podium before her school board. She explains her problems with high stakes testing, making points about the secret material on the test, a document she has to sign to take the test and the stress it puts on children as well as other interesting points. The test requires students to sign a form stating that they will not discuss the test with their parents. 4th Graders are signing a paper restraining them from talking to their parents about their education. I feel uneasy just thinking about that. Not only did the girl wish to oust the test, but she had a different plan for the school board to test students. She suggested three tests throughout the year that reflect what the child has actually been learning in the classroom. A fourth grader successfully came up with a better method for education than our government can.

You can read this article and watch the video here.

How bad is the Student Debt Crush?

Being as I am currently a student racking up debt, Education Nation's tweet about student debt hit home really fast. The tweet brought me to a website where I watched a short, thirty second video about student debt. I was not surprised to find out that tuition has gone up eighty-nine percent in the past couple of years. I found it interesting that student loan debt is higher than credit card and car loan debt. Of course, most people won't spend $33,000 (the average student loan debt) on their credit card but to know that more people are in debt for bettering themselves as compared to people spending money on god knows what strikes me as a little crazy. The last few seconds of the video go on to convince people that they're making the right decision by going to college, which I agree with but it also makes it seem like students will have no trouble finding a job and paying off their loans when they graduate. This, sadly, is not the truth.


You can watch this video here.