According to Pew Research Center, 77% of US adults now support in-classroom phone bans for middle and high school students, marking the second consecutive year that support...
I agree teaching often feels totally pointless. I have to remind myself, as a teacher in a low-socioeconomic status school, that I could very well be one of the most responsible and accessible adults in some of these kids lives and take solace in that. I try to at the very least be a positive male role model (the boys need one) for my students even if they aren’t necessarily always learning the content I’m trying to teach them.
I totally agree on your last point as well. The standards to be a teacher are way too low. I work with several adults that should never be allowed to be responsible for educating children. Those people make all the rest of us look bad.
Keep up the good fight, and since you seem like a thoughtful intelligent person, don’t forget you can transition out of the profession. When the inevitable furloughs, increased class sizes, further lowering of standards, etc happen, don’t let them convince you that you have to stay a teacher. At some point the parents of the kids have to step up because they are the most influential, even if the kids have shitty home lives. The parent-child bond is different than the teacher-student, and its a shame so many parents are shitty, but that doesn’t change that they are their parents.
This will be my 6th year working in education.
I agree teaching often feels totally pointless. I have to remind myself, as a teacher in a low-socioeconomic status school, that I could very well be one of the most responsible and accessible adults in some of these kids lives and take solace in that. I try to at the very least be a positive male role model (the boys need one) for my students even if they aren’t necessarily always learning the content I’m trying to teach them.
I totally agree on your last point as well. The standards to be a teacher are way too low. I work with several adults that should never be allowed to be responsible for educating children. Those people make all the rest of us look bad.
Keep up the good fight, and since you seem like a thoughtful intelligent person, don’t forget you can transition out of the profession. When the inevitable furloughs, increased class sizes, further lowering of standards, etc happen, don’t let them convince you that you have to stay a teacher. At some point the parents of the kids have to step up because they are the most influential, even if the kids have shitty home lives. The parent-child bond is different than the teacher-student, and its a shame so many parents are shitty, but that doesn’t change that they are their parents.