NYC Educator: Happy 2020!

NYC Educator: Happy 2020!

Happy 2020!

I want to wish every reader of this blog a happy, healthy and prosperous 2020. It's a new decade. Let's start clean and look forward.

Danielson is not the end-all be-all, especially if you're gifted with a Boy Wonder supervisor who wouldn't know a competent teacher if one were beating him over the head. Look at your interactions with kids and see who you're helping. Your help, in fact, is not limited to making kids pass tests.

I always recall my friend, a Chinese teacher, telling me about a conversation she heard in her classroom.

"I don't know what I'm going to do. I can't pass the English Regents exam."

"Why don't you take Goldstein's class?"

"Why? Is it good?"

"No. It's terrible. You will hate it. But you'll pass the test."

That was a kind of sideways compliment. Back then, the English Regents exam entailed writing. I made the students write until their hands were about to fall off at the wrist. What did they learn? Well, hopefully they learned how to pass that English Regents exam. Of course, they didn't learn how to pass the current Regents exam. More importantly, they CONTINUE READING: NYC Educator: Happy 2020!