Schools are Schools, Business is Business

Schools are not businesses. It is important to recognize this. There have been quite a few CEO types who suggest that if we just used a business model for our schools, all would be well. After all, that is what they did, and they are all wealthy. Of course, when they had materials show up at the shop that didn’t work, they sent them back, and demanded the right material. More effcient production made more money. Simple. Works well. Schools do not make widgets. We have no profit motive, and absolutely no control over the raw material–students–who show up. We cannot send that ones who “don’t work” back for better ones that do. We don’t even know if the work we do each school year works. Our ultimate stamp of success comes when our students do well in the next grade level, and then graduate from high school. We do have some control over whether the teachers are doing their jobs well. The popular myth that tenure equals lifetime employment is simply false. In the technology arena, we are even more handicapped. In Todd Oppenheimers book, The Flickering Mind, he details, albeit from 2003, some of the technology issues schools deal with that businesses would nerver tolerate. Search around technorati and you will eventually find more on this subject. All this being said, I think we do pretty well with what we have. Any CEO who bet his company on the school model would be out on his ear quickly.

Laptops for all, especially if I have a hand in selling them to you.

Technology in the classroom covers many things: projectors, camera’s, video and dvd players, computers, printers and so on. Has it really done any good? Like most things educational, the answer is neither simple, easily and honestly compiled, or static, as in yes or no. Each introduction of new and better technology, from Microsoft’s “Anytime, Anywhere Learning” initiative in 1995, to the addition of blogs and social networking today, promises the learning public great leaps in functionality and applied knowledge. I have been teaching for over 30 years and have been through all the exciting techno advances. One thing stands out: schools are poorly equipted to make the best use of the plethora of technological advances. The most glowing reviews, if you follow the trail back to the source, lead to either companies or people who stand to make money from the product or gadget they trumpet. This is not to say that there aren’t success stories out there. I love the technology that is available today. I am also intensly aware of my small districts lack of resources to keep up with the what is the black hole of funding: computers, networks etc. Now, I think we do a very good job with what we have. Certainly, others think there is good to be had out there too. The real question is “Does all this stuff really help learning?” For me, the answer is yes. I’m not even selling anything. I just think that it does. I can’t prove it, I just know that children today are using the avaiable resources, will continue to do so, and we have a hard time either providing what they already use, or even keeping up with them. What do you think?

Technology and the classroom

Schools today are in a constant catch-up mode when it comes to current technology. Even understanding what it is can be confusing. Consider that teachers are, for the most part, trapped in a classroom all day with between 20 to maybe 40 children, varying in age from 4ish in Kindergarten to 18ish at the end of highschool. How exactly are we to keep up with the children who are living each new moment of the ever expanding technological universe? The speed at which things are changing is amazing. To describe the changes as geometric in quantity is to underestimate the pace of technology change. The sucess of a classroom still rests with the skills of a good teacher, whether technology is employed or not. A poor teacher in a technologically advanced classroom will most likely produce a poorly educated class. A good teacher will prevail whether the classroom is devoid of techno gadgets or rich with them. In order to keep up with the children we teach it does seem important to at least understand what they do with what is out there. Cell phones are hardly simply phones anymore. The reach of the internet connected computer and child is global in a very real sense. What do you know? Let me know. It is an interesting thought, no?

NCLB

Oddly, in spite of the title, are things really any different? Care to list some of the things you think are different due to NCLB? Anything you’d like, just please do provide some back up or justification for your position.

Weight in school

For years I have been certain that I know the true reason for the descrepencies in educational pay scales–the reason the university profs make more than the high school teachers, who make more than the elementary school teachers, who make way more than the head-start, state pre-school teachers. Is it because the university folks have MA’s and Phd’s? No. I have an MA, and have had colleagues who have had Phd’s (I teach Kindergarten). Teaching credentials? No. I have 3, and my university professors friends have zero. Time in the classroom? No, I don’t think so. I’m pretty sure that I spend more time teaching than the university types. Research? Well, I don’t get paid to do research, but I do research to keep current. Writing, getting published? I do both, so that couldn’t be the common thread either. Enough of this suspense! Here is the reason, and if you use it somewhere in your writings, speeches, etc. please credit me: Weight is the reason. It is the only common thread from Kindergarten to University teaching. Teachers are paid by the pound! Think about it: my Kindergartners weigh less than any other student in the public or private school systems. They weigh more, mostly, than pre-school/headstart children. I get paid more than pre-school teachers, and a lot less than university teachers. Again, the difference is simply the weight of the children as opposed to the weight of the adolescents or adults in the higher grades. There you have it. Completlely. More weight equals more money in the teaching profession. If I could find a link to put here I would, but really, where else have you heard about this?

Time for writing

Where do you find time to write? A good and fair question. The answer is simple: whenever I can. I do have to remind myself quite often to just start writing–the rest of the chores can wait. Since I teach all day, I have to be careful when I get home not to just grab a cup of coffee and vegetate. My Kindergartners are vacuums of energy! So, if I am home alone, I figure out what leftovers we have, or what I can put together quickly for dinner, and hope that I can keep myself focused enough to ignore reality long enough to get some writing done. Sometimes I’m successful, sometimes not. I suspect that this may be true for a lot of us who write. Right? Let me know your thoughts.

Behind? Really?

I have been teaching for a while now. I’ve worked with adults, adolescents, and very young children. I keep hearing how far behind the rest of the known world we are. I have a hard time reconciling that bit of lore with this: the United States has won more Nobel prizes than any other country on the planet. I don’t know about parallel universes. How can that be if we are in such rotten shape? One of the things that we have done well, among others, is teach our children how to think, and how to do so independently and creatively. NCLB demands teaching to the test, despite all claims to the contrary. Maybe we will fall behind. Always, however, check out the “facts” for yourself. There’s more to learn education. Any thoughts about this out there?

Hello world!

Amazing. Last week I picked up the book “Clear Blogging” by Bob Walsh and here I am in the blogosphere. I am happy to be here and in the blog.