Being resourceful in teaching
Posted on September 11, 2006 - Filed Under Punch Forum |
Ms. Ric
11 Sept 2006
Memories of that “first year” teaching haunt teachers to eternity. My biggest mistake was including “required materials” in my syllabus. I didn’t think it was such a big deal to ask students to come prepared with their calculator, compass, protractor, and a ruler. I had an earful from my principal, parents, and yes, even from my Air-Jordan-clad students claiming they can’t afford ten-dollar calculators. I learned fast how to be resourceful - writing grants. Companies from all over the world are giving away free stuff to ANY educators every single day. (Check the Internet.) I once received a class set of disposable cameras from Kodak (Japan), yards of batik fabrics (from India), not to mention TI-30 calculators, seven PCs from Intel, and enough overhead projectors for the whole school from, of all places - the US Navy. Getting free stuff for my classroom is easy, but getting things copied? This has been the bane of every single schoolteacher’s existence. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but if there exist a problem at my school – it’s usually related to the copier. It has caused fallouts of unimaginable proportion! My school rents three copier/rizographs and buys enough paper to give deforestation a new meaning, but only allocates 3000 copies per teacher. On average, there are 150 students per teacher; a math test is about 3-4 pages long, with about ten tests per year. You do the math. Last school year alone, I forked out $57 at Kwik Copy for my finals. I would have loved charging my little darlings a buck per test, but I’m sure it’s illegal, and I run the risk of being on the headline. Teachers on the news are almost a daily occurrence. Sad but true, from sex scandals to money collection. Like any other profession out there, we have a few who are misguided and disheartened, not to mention corrupt. And it’s these few bad ones who give the rest of us such bad rap. It’s such an overused cliché, but most of us do enter this profession with one vision in mind: to help kids. Somewhere down the line, it became acceptable to pass the buck on our responsibilities, to think of average as the best we can do, and to think of ourselves as untouchables. Kids are impressionable no matter where we are. We are beyond hope … let us do.
Comments
Leave a Reply
