No Teacher Left Behind
Creating Opportunities for Teachers to Continue Learning
Should all teachers across the country use certain practices?
The schools, themselves, should have a standard curriculum that keeps them at high standards with the rest of the schools in offering the best education, but it should not come at the cost of the students education to attain those standards. No child learns the same so teachers should not be asked to teach in the same manner. The goal of education to make sure that every child has the opportunity to excel and reach their highest potential. In order to achieve this goal, teachers need to get to know their students. By using assessments through out the year and asking three simple questions this can easily be attain. Teachers need to ask what level the student is learning at? At what pace are they learning? and What intelligence is the student's preferred learning intelligence. If they ask these three questions, they will be better able to make lesson plans that will help their students excel in their learning careers.
How would you suggest we, as a nation, provide consistent learning opportunities for teachers and ensure that they are not left behind in learning about new techniques and strategies?
Teachers, like many other professions should in fact continue their education throughout their careers. As a nation, we should be offering teachers more opportunities to go back to school. The price alone on education is outrageous! Teachers do not make a ton of money, yet they are expected to spend quite a bit of money to attain and keep their jobs. In California, if someone would like to become a teacher they not only need a Bachelor Degree, but also need a credential, to past the CBEST test and pass the CCET test as well. That will cost an average student around $41500.00 and that is just to become an elementary school teacher in a public school. Now if a teacher wants to get an even higher education it will cost them even more. As a nation, there should be more opportunities for teachers to continue their education and not have to break the bank on the way there. We want teachers to be knowledgeable and continue learning the best practices to teach our children to the best of their abilities. We should be offering them conferences and online classes or ways to take classes for free as long as they are teaching.
Should there be a consistent standard for all teachers to meet, just as students must pass high stakes tests?
I do not believe that standardized testing tells us much more than what someone was able to memorize. Therefore, I do not believe teachers should have to take a high stakes standardized test, just like I do not feel it tells us much about our students. I do however, feel that teachers should have to go to mandatory training every year. At these trainings they should learn the most update practices of teaching, or new innovative ways to teach. Conferences like TED talks would be beneficial to require teachers to go to even if it was through teleconference.
Teachers should also be made aware of what the standards are for their classrooms and given trainings on how to make sure those standards are met without teaching to the test. They could even do peer to peer trainings where you take a few experienced teachers and pair them with the newer teachers. The experienced teachers can give the new teachers insight and advice on their classrooms; where the new teachers can bring in their new ideas on teaching for the experienced teachers to consider implementing in their own classrooms. It would bring the teachers to feel more like a community and hold each other to the standards making sure they are being met.