tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15932919.post9116990089419424876..comments2024-03-26T07:07:14.304-07:00Comments on Teacher Tom: "Virtual Charter Hell"Teacher Tomhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14606781724784785338noreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15932919.post-29727651918436928072014-01-22T11:55:37.450-08:002014-01-22T11:55:37.450-08:00My post is to anonymous:
There is no irony. Online...My post is to anonymous:<br />There is no irony. Online education is not as big an issue for adults who handle themselves and use it with integrity. I have two online degrees.<br />I also have been teaching for a k12, Inc. school in Louisiana. I was forced to resign. What Bedortha says is accurate. <br />I was put on "Professional Improvement Plan' the week before exams. I was told to stay on the phone and call kids to get them to do work. I did this and managed to get a few to turn in assignments, but no real spectacular results. I was again called in and told that I was on the brink of being let go and they needed to see my passing rates go up (during exam week). I tearfully asked how, since those who had done the work or not had really just made their decisions by that point. I was told to do things like move honors kids from honors to regular courses if they hadn't done the honors work and to encourage kids who had never done anything to at least take the final and that could be their final grade. I was called for the "firing" the last day of exams 30 minutes before my grades had even been finished. I didn't realize because I was getting my kids, so I called back Monday and was given 20 minutes to decide whether I would be fired or resign. Interestingly, I never saw the final numbers for passing rates, even though I asked to see them. I had been given charts the two weeks prior with my numbers.If you look at my grade book, it is full of EXC. I refused to EXC major unit tests and papers. Most kids still failed who had done very little. I was told it was because I had not built personal relationships with families to get them to do the work. Um... I drove 6 hours to visit one family in a crisis and used another student's mailbox as a dropbox because she couldn't get to the internet. If building relationships was really the focus, I would have been given some recognition for that.<br /><br />I was asked why I had added more writing work to the curriculum. Did I not agree with the K12,Inc. curriculum? I said that no, there are holes and these kids do not come out knowing a process for writing. So I added it to try and create some accountability between first and last drafts. They need to learn how to write before college professors get them. I was told "These kids just want to pass high school. Our job is to make them feel successful". The implication here is that my adding some rigor and challenge to the writing as well as accountability meant the kids were less likely to do the work. I was told my job was "80% customer service and 20% teaching", which I find offensive as someone who has worked so hard to be a teacher, and a good one.<br />We were speaking two languages. I was in the room thinking I was being told I was not a good teacher and trying hard to think of how I could improve as a teacher, when all they were interested in was how I could improve in "customer service'. <br />What they were telling us to do at LAVCA was in absolute disagreement with what I was learning about in my doctoral classes. As a result of burnout, I have stepped down the pursuit of a doctorate and will be finishing with a Specialist degree in Teacher Leadership this April. Somehow, after all this insult, I don't feel like a teacher leader, although I know I could have been had I been allowed to pursue my ideas and had I been respected as a teacher rather than a customer service representative in a diploma mill. I am now an unemployed teacher struggling to find work in my field.Amyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17416421760253949938noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15932919.post-49165197000290723382014-01-10T16:31:49.727-08:002014-01-10T16:31:49.727-08:00Thank you so much for your incredibly useful, insi...Thank you so much for your incredibly useful, insightful, and enjoyable blog, Teacher Tom! <br /><br />I was wondering if I could possibly ask for a post some time on how you run your Circle Times? I'm currently running a preschool class for a bunch of kids from families who homeschool (although these kids themselves are too little to be official "homeschoolers" yet), and I'd love to know more about your circle times.<br /><br />I'm trying to model our mornings as closely as I can on the way you run yours, and overall it's been fantastic so far. (Like you, I have plenty of other moms to call on for help, since we're a co-op.) But the one part of our sessions that I'm still unsure about is the Circle Time. I have 13 kids, ranging from young 3's to 6.5, and I haven't found an approach to circle time that keeps them all engaged. And if the little ones aren't engaged, as I'm sure you can imagine, the discussion very quickly becomes less enjoyable for everyone. <br /><br />My instinct is that if a 3-year-old is clearly not interested in sitting in a circle, and is very eager to be up and doing and exploring, then we should let him? But at the same time, the older kids do seem to get quite a lot out of our discussions when we get a chance to get really involved in the conversation.<br /><br />I'd love to hear what circle time looks like for your three classes, whether you do it every day, how long you plan for it to last, whether you have it first thing in the morning or later on when the kids have had some wiggle-time, etc...? Currently we have 30 minutes of free play in a giant gymnasium, circle time, story-and-snack time, and then about an hour and a quarter of free-choice activity time, with five stations for the kids to roam between.<br /><br />I would really appreciate more details about the nuts-and-bolts at Woodland Park, but in any case, I can never thank you enough for all I've learned from your blog.Basbusa's Mamahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16445633400020003785noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15932919.post-72624724578917177372014-01-10T09:55:15.133-08:002014-01-10T09:55:15.133-08:00I find it slightly ironic that the teacher who is ...I find it slightly ironic that the teacher who is expounding on the weaknesses of an online school system proudly names herself as a student of an online PhD program in the signature.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com