Blame the teacher

I read the thread below entitled, "for once, blame the student." I agree with that to some extent, but often times, it's the teacher that is to blame. When I was in high school, I wanted to learn, but often times I had suck teachers that didn't give a damn about being there. I had to teach myself. Pretty sad that they were being paid to do absolutely nothing. Had I not taught myself, I wouldn't be where I am today.

[Midtowner]

Apparently no one taught you to read a thread before you commented on it. Your very proposed topic was discussed in that thread.

[MadMonk]

I've had both good and bad teachers, but I was taught that it was MY responsibility to learn the material, regardless of the teacher. Its true that some teachers don't give a damn and are just killing time until retirement, but its the ones that do care that make the biggest difference. Out of all my teachers in H.S., I can only recall the names of a few and they were the ones that really cared and took the extra time to help you if you needed it.

Thank you Mrs. Phelps (Putnam City, H.S.)

[bandnerd]

Teachers are facilitators. We are not there to learn the information for students. It is the job of the student to do the learning, and they need to be the ones to ask for help, come in for help, read the material, etc. Yes, we go over the information, give different ways to understand, explain things, and more, but ultimately it is up to the student to decide whether or not they want to learn.

Yes, there are bad teachers. There are bad students. Bad parents, bad presidents, bad CEO's, bad retail workers and bad custodians. Good teachers get a lot of flak for what the bad ones do, and it's really frustrating for us when we know that there are more good teachers than bad but no one acknowledges that.

[dirtrider73068]

Originally Posted by Survey

I read the thread below entitled, "for once, blame the student." I agree with that to some extent, but often times, it's the teacher that is to blame. When I was in high school, I wanted to learn, but often times I had suck teachers that didn't give a damn about being there. I had to teach myself. Pretty sad that they were being paid to do absolutely nothing. Had I not taught myself, I wouldn't be where I am today.

Yea I had a bad teacher before, math and I was not good at that at all, in fact I had to take a special algebra class that was split up because it was learned slower. Theacher before was great I loved her, she would stay and explain it till everyone in the class learned how to solve it. Well next time aroudn I had another teacher, his idea of teaching was to say here is the work go do it, and shoved his head into is stupid sports page of the paper, needles to say everbody in that class got A's cause we would cheat, adn get the teach edition and copy the answers. But I got tired of that, because I wasn't learning anything, so I went to the princapal and file a complaint, told him it wasn't fair I wasn't learing anything. Well to much my gladness that teacher soon left, I hoe they fired him. We need more teachers like the one I had she was great, cared about her students learning and passing, she even tutored me in her spare time, includeing her useaul class time. Now how many teachers now will do that?

[dirtrider73068]

Originally Posted by bandnerd

Teachers are facilitators. We are not there to learn the information for students. It is the job of the student to do the learning, and they need to be the ones to ask for help, come in for help, read the material, etc. Yes, we go over the information, give different ways to understand, explain things, and more, but ultimately it is up to the student to decide whether or not they want to learn.

Yes, there are bad teachers. There are bad students. Bad parents, bad presidents, bad CEO's, bad retail workers and bad custodians. Good teachers get a lot of flak for what the bad ones do, and it's really frustrating for us when we know that there are more good teachers than bad but no one acknowledges that.

I was willing to learn but if the teacher doesn't help me learn or when I have a problem and doesn't get up from behind his desk and put down his paper, what good is the teacher? If I have a problem and can't solve it then the teach needs to come over and try to explain so I can pick up what I am missing not totally do it so I don't learn anything.

[Midtowner]

Originally Posted by dirtrider73068

I was willing to learn but if the teacher doesn't help me learn or when I have a problem and doesn't get up from behind his desk and put down his paper, what good is the teacher? If I have a problem and can't solve it then the teach needs to come over and try to explain so I can pick up what I am missing not totally do it so I don't learn anything.

If everyone had that attitude, there would not be a single person with an advanced degree anywhere in the world

[bandnerd]

dirtrider--you had a bad teacher. I have had them, Midtowner has had them, everyone has. We all move on and get over it. I'm sorry you had a bad experience. With the whole NCLB thing happening now, all those teachers will probably be forced out anyway. I can honestly say at my school, we do not sit behind our desk staring at papers to grade. Sure, I sit behind my desk sometimes, check the email, but if a kid needs something I'm right back up to help them. I don't like to hover because I feel it makes my students nervous (especially when they are taking typing tests!) so I give them space.

If you actually read my post, you would see that I said that teachers are facilitators...we give you the means, you have the choice to do with it what you want. Did you actually ask for help? Did you bug the teacher constantly until they helped you? Some teachers aren't as nice as me--I'm willing to help as much as humanly possible, others are a little harder to get help from--but that means you just have to try a little harder.

If you have kids, hypothetical or real, and a teacher is ignoring them, then speak with the teacher. If that doesn't help, go to the principal (but not before talking to the teacher).

[dirtrider73068]

I had tried to talk to that teacher adn he reasoning was look in the book it shows you how, I told him I still don't understand how the book explains it. I was always wanting to learn things, but some stuff, espeacilly math I was slow at it, an dit took alot of time and patience for me to learn it.

[bandnerd]

I understand--I was the same way. And my teachers didn't help me all that much. Truth was, because of a vision problem I had and will forever have, I was worse at math than I should have been. I recently learned that from the special services person at my school (because she has a very similar issue). My mom didn't even know. My teachers wouldn't have even known what to do anyway...well, I digress. The point was, I learned how to do it anyway. It took a lot of time and patience (which I have very little of, especially with math) for me as well. And for my mother. I asked my older sister for help, but she didn't want to because she hated it more than I did.

I made all A's in my math classes. I stopped at Algebra II, though.

Your teacher was crappy, and I'm sorry for that. However, we can't go saying "blame the teacher" all the time because not all teachers are like that. "Blame the bad teachers" is fine, but don't paint us all with that broad bad teacher brush.

[MadMonk]

bandnerd, they have computers on teacher's desks now?!? Haha, I'm getting old.

With me, my "bad" teachers would only help if you asked, and then only minimally. Being a little shy, I was a little intimidated to ask some teachers for help. The good ones either observed or sensed that about me and approached me and didn't allow me to slide by with mediocre work. Yes it was up to me to do the learning, but it was really nice to have some motivational help as well.

[bandnerd]

lol yes, we all have computers at our desks at my school...and seeing as I teach computer applications, well, I have quite a few at my disposal Plus the journalism lab, the writing lab, and the library are all well equipped.

Thank you, grants and donations by large local companies!

Back to topic haha.

I believe tenure is the problem. After several teacher's reach tenure, they can simpoly sit back and not worry about doing a superb job any longer. What's the point? Their job isn't going anywhere.

[bandnerd]

Those teachers shouldn't be teachers in the first place. Why would you put yourself through the torture of making teenagers and children do stuff they don't want to do if you don't really REALLY love your job?

Originally Posted by bandnerd

Those teachers shouldn't be teachers in the first place. Why would you put yourself through the torture of making teenagers and children do stuff they don't want to do if you don't really REALLY love your job?

That's beside the point. The fact is there are many teachers that don't do their jobs and are protected by tenure.

Many people are in jobs they don't enjoy. That's simply part of life.

I'd have to say my worst teacher was my computer teacher at my high school. She needs to go, but administration doesn't see that.

[bandnerd]

And yet those people keep on doing those jobs, too.

Sure, smooch them for the money, and don't work for it.

[bandnerd]

Do you hate all teachers, because that is the impression I'm getting.

[Midtowner]

Originally Posted by Survey

That's beside the point. The fact is there are many teachers that don't do their jobs and are protected by tenure.

Many people are in jobs they don't enjoy. That's simply part of life.

Tenure is one of the few attractions to the job of teaching. Until you've been close to a teacher, you have no earthly idea what they go through at work. Needless to say, it's very political.

Tenure is a win-win for the teacher and the school district. Tenure keeps teachers who otherwise would leave a school when they had an administrator, coworker, or student they didn't like. It also protects the teacher from a lot of the spurious demands by parents, administrators, government officials, etc. that they have to put up with on a daily basis.

If they don't do their jobs, thanks to NCLB, it is highly evident. Fortunately, teachers who don't do their jobs are not the majority. There are very few people on this earth who would go to school for that long, and learn the types of skills that teachers learn to make a pittance of $30K-$40K without any hope of making more.

The tenure system isn't a great system, it might not even be a good system. The only reason we use it is because it's better than any other conceivable system -- and that's why it has withstood the test of time.

Also, I'd like to repeat a statement which deserves repetition. If everyone blamed teachers for their own shortcomings instead of choosing to rise above the circumstances, there would be very few successful people today.

[bandnerd]

Thank you! Much more eloquently said than I could do it...and a lot nicer, too.