PBS Episode 1

The first part of this episode started with students reciting the pledge of allegiance. The longer I am involved in the education system, the more I wonder why we still have to stand up and pledge to the country. It’s mostly the part about God that really gets under my skin. For a country that isn’t supposed to have government involved with religion, we involve the two together at every corner. Anyway, education in its infancy was pretty interesting to say the least. They eliminated any books from Britain and focused on learning things about the United States.

Dame schools were one of the interesting things I found about this episode. A school for just girls where they learned how to behave like women. Men were the only ones to really receive any sort of education and African Americans either didn’t have an education or they had to risk a lot for some education.

Schools in the early days focused on memorization of spelling or passages in texts. It’s funny how this is the case because you still see that kind of thing today in schools. Back then, they didn’t have any clue about MI surveys and how each student learned differently. As the years have progressed, things have definitely gotten better. It’s more noticeably progressed in the last 20 years and before that you would still see remnants of the old ways. It’s unfortunate because even today you will still see older veteran teachers that stick to the way things used to be and don’t feel comfortable changing what they already know or they don’t agree with how things are progressing.

Diversity, Learning Style, and Culture

In the opening text of this article it talks about how too little has changed in the last 50 years. Recently I have finished student teaching and learned a lot about being in a school environment from an adult perspective. The biggest observation I have made is the fact that most teachers there are from another generation. Of that generation, it seemed like only 30% at most had adapted to change. I believe it is entirely possible that things haven’t changed much because a lot of people still in schools today teach the way they were taught. One teacher told me that she was only a few years from retirement so there was no way she was going to change anything. There are plenty of people of different generations that are willing to change but in some ways the system isn’t ready for that change. The article talks about diversity and how it’s easier to teach to sameness than it is for difference. In Maine, 97% of people are white. It could be that sameness that gets teachers to teach in one way to all the students. It is something as simple as seeing similar visuals that gets people to treat everyone the same. Basing things off appearance is a long tradition that human beings have. If some people can’t see right away that someone learns differently than they lump all in the same group. Fortunately, future teachers learn about this in school about how to find those diversity’s and differences. Differences and diversity was the biggest thing that I got out of this article because I see a problem with it in more than just a school setting. I believe it’s something that is so important and something that needs to be focused on in school. If it can start in the school than it can go much further than just in the classroom.

A Nation at Risk

In the beginning of the Nation at Risk article, it talked about different risks in the American world. One of the things was the American industries aren’t top of the line anymore. Things are being replaced by other countries overseas that can make products better and cheaper. This takes jobs away from Americans and takes us off the top of the developing world in some areas. The biggest risk is the intelligence of the American people. It’s important to have citizens that can all reach a common understanding of complex issues. Unfortunately, our education system isn’t always set up for everyone to succeed. Throughout the article it brings up many different educational points that the American people are lacking in. All of this was back in the 80’s. So how have we improved?

Some states made a step in the right direction by switching to a standards based education. It was a bumpy road and mistakes were made. That being said, it was a smart choice that could work towards fixing those mistakes and gradually improve. The biggest thing for me that I notice was the cost of getting an education. Getting a solid and up to date education can cost a lot of money. Even average schooling can be costly. If this isn’t a problem that gets addressed soon, then any progress we’ve made could hit a plateau simply because it will cost too much to get an education. On top of this, performance in high school hasn’t gotten any better since the 80’s and it could have actually gotten worse.

There is still so much that needs to be done about the education system and I don’t know if we will ever be able to solve all of the problems. If we fix one, there’s no guarantee that two more won’t take its place. I’m hopeful, however that we will be able to make improvements in the system but only if we really put the time and effort into it. It will likely cost a lot of money too.

Teaching Hope (Disillusionment)

In entry 78, I had a thought back to when I was doing my student teaching. I didn’t run out of the room crying or anything like that but my mentor teacher and I did have a class that was unexpectedly thrust upon us without any sort of consideration as to how we felt about it. In the end, the class was my favorite to teach of them all. But just the thought that at any point a class could be thrown my way without either the proper support or be even in my content area. I’ll never forget what the principle said to me before I left the school I student taught at. He said, make sure you apply for a health teacher, phys. ed teacher, and a science teacher. As if all of it was the same. On at least one level, I could relate with this teacher in the entry.

Entry 94 was interesting because it was about a teacher outside of school. I remember when I was student teaching and how I would sometimes think about the students in my class and how a conversation I had outside of student teaching related to one of my students. When that happened, I would have to tell whoever I was talking to about it because it was so relevant to me. The part where she says he won’t really understand what she means is so true. I’m fortunate enough to have a girlfriend that completely loves that I’m going to be a teacher and supports me all the way. The life of a teacher is a rewarding and underpaid endeavor and sometimes I wonder how I ended up enjoying it so much.

PBS Episode 3

In episode 3 you see a lot of interesting things. The biggest theme that I took away from it was, equal rights. Not everyone had equal rights. It was only the wealthy white male that had everything going for them. Some states had segregated blacks and whites and made different schools for each of them. All of the funding went to the white schools, while all the black schools got all of the old things from the white schools. This was hard to watch because it also explained how many of the black teachers were more qualified because they had their masters and the white teachers didn’t. If you were any race other than white, then you were treated differently and not in a kind way. You were looked down upon and were thought to less smart. When black students were finally allowed in white schools after much protest, they were ridiculed every day and had to go through a never ending battle just to get an education.

Episode 3 also talked about women’s rights and how a student athlete named Dorothy, fought for her right to play sports and wrote a letter to the government. The letter spoke about how she was being discriminated against and how it wasn’t right. This girl could play basketball with the best of them and she wanted to have all of the same opportunities that the man had.

The same thing went for any student that was disabled. Why shouldn’t they receive the opportunities as everyone else. Why are they not allowed at school because the school doesn’t support people in wheel chairs? Having laws in place to protect these students is great but it’s also insane to think that we needed to put the laws in place for people to act like decent human beings. 

Teaching Hope (Engagement)

Entry 55 caught my eye because I always had a thing for music in the classroom. I thought the entry was going to be about music because of the way the teacher set up the story. As I kept reading, however, I realized that music didn’t have very much to do with the story. It was more about a teacher’s attempt to reach the students in a different way than they were used to. The bit about racism caught me by surprise. It sort of came out of nowhere. I still get surprised when I find racism still in the world because we should be so far past that and yet, children are still taught by an older generation about how black people don’t belong here and they don’t deserve equal rights.

“I don’t need anyone” or “I need someone so badly”? Entry 61 has a lot of different thoughts going on. The biggest one is, worrying about all of your students. Knowing that one of them is in trouble but you have seven others in your class that have their own set of circumstances. How do you reach that one student? How do you reach all of them? Can it be done? The entry ends with a great answer. Step-by-step. It’s going to take a lot of work and you’ll have plenty of challenging days but taking on the challenges one at a time and not giving up is the best thing you can do.

PBS Episode 2

As I watched the video of how the school systems used to be, I thought to myself, boy am I glad that I didn’t have to deal that. It was interesting how at the time there were people who thought education were very important for life but there were just so many thought the opposite that it took a long time for the education system to get anywhere. To start, it was easy for the students and teachers to get sick because they were all crammed into a single classroom for extended period of time. So not only were the classes extremely boring, but you were likely to get sick just by going to school. There was a time when it seemed like they were going to be excepting to all immigrants in schools and it seemed as though they were even proud of the diversity in the school system. As time passed on however, there started to become a divide between the races. Others were thought to be less smart based on where they were from in the world. The entire idea of IQ testing at the time may have seemed smart and a reliable way to tell who the truly intelligent student is. That being said, the whole system was just made up to give some notoriety. It was a hoax that never really did anything for the American school system. To give the generation some credit, they did eventually create a better school system that lets students move from class to class and funding was at one time poured into schools because the powers that be realized the importance of educating the youth of the country to keep it strong.