And so I may return...
Please forgive my lengthy respite. I have no excuse.
Today ended my first ten-day run as a high school english teacher. Visualize, if you will, the scenario I have landed myself in. Do you remember what happened when there was a sub? Bad things. I remember in the ninth grade, in French class to be specific, a sub put on a movie for us to watch. Several resourceful students stole the remote and wreaked havoc on the next 45 minutes of that poor sub's life. Every time that she would walk away the movie would pause or rewind, all controlled by a inconspicuous contraband remote.
Such is my life these days. Through this experience I have reached several conclusions that may prove benefitial to society if implemented.
Firstly, not every high school student should be forced to learn to read complex literature critically, or perform intricate algebraic manipulation. Students should have the option of learning trades. While no willing student should be excluded, all defiant students must be removed. Every single defiant and distruptive student ruins the education of dozens of quiet, hardworking peers with distracting shenanigans. If they don't want to think they should be learning to fix cars.
Second, there should be a public high school admissions process. An eighth grade exit exam, followed my careful placement would help alleviate the above problems. Not everyone should go to college, contrary to popular belief. There is nothing disrespectful in working hard, and many suffering trades do not require higher education.
Thirdly, kids need to unplug their darn selves and read. Students have all sorts of electronic communication and media devices on their person at school. They constantly ask to listen to music. They 'text' rampantly, but cannot focus enough to get through twenty pages of a well written story. Many have no ability to concentrate because of total media and commercial saturation. America needs to wake up to the fact that pandering to the teenage market is simply unethical.
End of rant.
On to the topic of further edumacation for myself, I have no idea what I am doing. I have given a lot of thought to the PhD recently, and my brain slowly curdles at the idea of devoting my entire life to something specific. While I remain magnetized by life's little mysteries (like why do ants always hi-five each other) devoting myself to the rather dry and impotent world of the biological ivory tower may prove to drive me insane. The price of teaching, perhaps, is that insanity.
Stay tuned. I am pretty into mathematics these days.
Today ended my first ten-day run as a high school english teacher. Visualize, if you will, the scenario I have landed myself in. Do you remember what happened when there was a sub? Bad things. I remember in the ninth grade, in French class to be specific, a sub put on a movie for us to watch. Several resourceful students stole the remote and wreaked havoc on the next 45 minutes of that poor sub's life. Every time that she would walk away the movie would pause or rewind, all controlled by a inconspicuous contraband remote.
Such is my life these days. Through this experience I have reached several conclusions that may prove benefitial to society if implemented.
Firstly, not every high school student should be forced to learn to read complex literature critically, or perform intricate algebraic manipulation. Students should have the option of learning trades. While no willing student should be excluded, all defiant students must be removed. Every single defiant and distruptive student ruins the education of dozens of quiet, hardworking peers with distracting shenanigans. If they don't want to think they should be learning to fix cars.
Second, there should be a public high school admissions process. An eighth grade exit exam, followed my careful placement would help alleviate the above problems. Not everyone should go to college, contrary to popular belief. There is nothing disrespectful in working hard, and many suffering trades do not require higher education.
Thirdly, kids need to unplug their darn selves and read. Students have all sorts of electronic communication and media devices on their person at school. They constantly ask to listen to music. They 'text' rampantly, but cannot focus enough to get through twenty pages of a well written story. Many have no ability to concentrate because of total media and commercial saturation. America needs to wake up to the fact that pandering to the teenage market is simply unethical.
End of rant.
On to the topic of further edumacation for myself, I have no idea what I am doing. I have given a lot of thought to the PhD recently, and my brain slowly curdles at the idea of devoting my entire life to something specific. While I remain magnetized by life's little mysteries (like why do ants always hi-five each other) devoting myself to the rather dry and impotent world of the biological ivory tower may prove to drive me insane. The price of teaching, perhaps, is that insanity.
Stay tuned. I am pretty into mathematics these days.
posted by nicholas at 4:25 PM
1 Comments:
hi,
sorry if i have the wrong person. i was looking for georgia lange from moorpark, and your blog came up. we were friends in high school. i'll be in the area this summer, and i wanted to see who was still around. if you are who i think you are, could you please pass along my info to her? i'd love to meet up with her for coffee or whatever.
thanks so much,
jess.
jcbaker44@hotmail.com
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