OT: For Cathy F

Your alternative, please. Home schooling?

Yeah, cuz drug-addled rock stars are who you want guiding your children...

:-P

Natalie

No more than Lying Left Liberals indoctrinating our children and telling them that they can do anything but play 'sink the pork' and it's not really sex and it's OK.

Charles of Schaumburg

Translation: You'd feel just fine about teachers if their voting records were monitored, along with their church attendance. (Would certain denominations be prohibited? Would temple/synogogue count? Mosque?!)

Going out on a (short) limb: If only right-wing church-goers were allowed to teach, something tells me it wouldn't bother you if they not only stated their own various POV to the students - at any grade level, but actively pushed their agendas, no less.

Cathy

Actually what needs to be done is to make your job competitive and measurable.

You need to know you can be fired for being incompetent.

Your performance should be measured and graded.

It is. After teaching for 35 years, I still get formal, written observations.

Cathy

Not by people that count.....

Who would be people that count?

If you have to ask....you are part of the problem.....

Your answer makes no sense.

Who do you think Cathy was talking about, when she mentioned "written observations"? Who do you think reviews her performance in class?

Which would be,... you, I take it? ;-P

For my first dozen years of teaching, I worked in a very small district, with usually only one teacher per grade level - once in a while, two - for K-4. And a bare minimum for 5-8 (cooperative teaching - kids changed classes except for ELA, which was homeroom based), & 9-12. An incompetent teacher would've been rather noticeable. To say the least.

BTW - I do agree that incompetents should be let go. OTOH, there are three years in which to do that before tenure is granted. Tenure doens't guarantee job security, but it does go a long way toward preventing frivolous firings.

Cathy

My guess is: non-educators.

Cathy

Nailed you, did he!

Sorry, Cath, can't speak for Charles, but I for one don't want teachers passing ANYTHING off to grade-school kids except for readin', writin' and 'rithmatic.

Now it could be argued that the parent's are instilling whatever they happen to believe into their kids, but that's to be expected. Sooner or later the kids will 'smarten up' and start listening to other viewpoints.

The problem now is, a lot of teachers aren't *introducing* different ways of thinking, they're *indoctrinating* the kids! One school sent home a note, if your kids don't watch "An Inconvenient Truth" in school, they're going to fail! WHAT kind of CRAP is THAT!!! (Yes, I am well aware I've already made my feelings about Gore's movie known to all! ;)

Too much time spent teaching PC and not enough on what's *supposed* to be taught! No wonder we are now falling behind a lot of the Industrialized countries! (remember my little story about the banana and the condom in my daughter's 4th grade class?)

...

Dunno about in your district, but in ours, there are evaluations not only by the state, federal and county officials, but we parents as well.

I think teachers get quite enough s*it, without having even more unfairly pounded on them. For having bachelor's degrees, that get very s***ty pay, and have to put up with not only ever-more-spoiled kids, but their know-it-all parents.

I would rather be a garbage-truck worker than deal with the amount of stress for so little money, that they tolerate.

Instead of tearing them down, we should be trying to *help* them. They have a very important job.

Natalie, mother of 2

If you've been teaching for 35 years, that means you've been teaching since

Thanks for helping to make her a Senator, too.

Then they wonder why I will NEVER go to NEW York for any reason whatsoever. I've visited 25 states, and NY is not among them, and never will be.

I have been to Florida and DC. I never ever want to go to DC again, either, except to visit the museums. There must be something in the water out there, they're all a bunch of Democraps and think like you do. Thank you Bill Clinton, may your soul rot in HELL.

Charles of Schaumburg.

Reading (incl. spelling), writing (both penmanship - which is going by the wayside lately - and grammar and composition), & math are no-brainers. Well... one'd think so, but I've seen the pendulum sway w/ELA & teaching methods. (Lost its way, big-time, for too long IMO). Same thing, but to a lesser degree with math.

But... what about Social Studies & Science, then? No exposure to & knowledge of different cultures and various theories? No higher thinking skills to be employed after one encounters different POV and one then has to weigh the pros & cons and determine where one stands? No introduction of tangential skills & ideas to spark various interests for lifelong learning? I have to assume that's not what you really meant, but it does follow from what you posted.

IMO, a teacher can state his/her position on a topic (this applies more to MS & HS than elem.), but should *not* try to sway the students one way or the other. (Often, as you mentioned, the swaying comes from home.) Present the info, discuss it, & they will eventually come to their own conclusions.

Cathy

Take the needle out of your arm, chuckles.

When's the last time you sat in a classroom and watched what went on?