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Tuesday, October 18, 2011

“I Just Want to Teach!” A Teacher’s Plea « Diary of a Public School Teacher!

“I Just Want to Teach!” A Teacher’s Plea « Diary of a Public School Teacher!:

“I Just Want to Teach!” A Teacher’s Plea

The other day I posted a status on FB, “They are sucking the joy out of teaching!” You know who “they” are. I have taught for 27 years, and never have I felt this way. It’s not the new principal. It’s all the next “new” things that have been lobbed at me from one day to the next. After I duck one, or get hit, depending on what innovative thing they have come up with, something new is thrown at me.

I sat at our last meeting, completely overwhelmed, when our principal told us that she wanted us to use data to develop carousel workshops, every week, for reading and math. My first thought was, in order to gather this data to use every week, I would have to test the heck out of my kids. My second thought, when am I supposed to teach? Teach! Remember when we used to be able to do that? My