Easy Petros, do you think teachers are really hard done by? (We'd all like to earn $75 grand instead of struggling along on $60) The Gov't that is "****ing" them over has to come to us for the money! :lol:
YukonJack; petros said:
Saskatchewan teachers to walkout Thursday
- Thread starter mentalfloss
- Start date
Easy Petros, do you think teachers are really hard done by? (We'd all like to earn $75 grand instead of struggling along on $60) The Gov't that is "****ing" them over has to come to us for the money! :lol:
As someone who learned English the hard way, instead of being lucky enough to have it as a mother tongue, I know that the English language is rich enough so that no one, ever, would have to use asterisks, and if they do, it is not proportional to their politeness, it is to display their vulgarity, profanity and ignorance.
And before you say it, no, I will not go back where I came from, I have been here longer than you.
The epitome of 'politeness' posted a message where the asterisks outnumbered everything else.
Figures!
Yep schools taught me that too.
They said Dumb + lazy.
Have fun supporting me paying tax's.
xDDDD
Dumb, lazy, slow learner, doesn't apply himself - and a few more less-than-complimentary adjectives - the short bus, Special Ed.... Incredible what the label-makers toss about to excuse themselves from the kid who doesn't fit the slot size in modern education.
Too many more years ago than I really care to count, we had an old-time teacher who got to the front of that room without teachers' college or all the theory teachers absorb today. Every day, Ol' Gert - a fragile elderly lady who could still bring the biggest of farm kids to his knees - taught me what school marm is all about. Every day, she found the time in our Grade 4 to 8 classroom to give Tommy and Jimmy - twins from a very backward family - some special attention. Neither of those boys had a hope in hell of ever going mainstream ... but by the time they left school, they could write their names and function at very basic levels.
We need more Ol' Gerts.....
Better to work hard, rather than comment on what others deserve, or on motives that you can't possibly know with certainty. Nobody likes a complainer.
When I see that "Generation X" is the generation that sign their name with an "X" because the over-paid and under-worked and under-achieving 'teachers' did not teach them anything better, what I say is not a complaint. It is a fact.
And I could not care less if you like me or nor.
Yukon Jack isn't a hardnose and that is why he has spent years being belittled and bitter over unions and the people who will fight for rights that Yukon Jack wants but doesn't appreciate. He doesn't think workers should get paid their worth or be treated with respect and dignity. He wasn't in Canada and never fought for anything in Canada he has today. He is a freeloader on the backs of those who broke the oppressive chains of tyranny.
In spite of your the large number of video lectures attached to your post you still have not come up with any solution to what you consider the problems of education. You should understand that during the career of the average teacher (at least in Alberta) the teacher attends dozens of such lectures similar to those that you have posted. They are presented during teachers' conventions, at professional development days, and in special guest presentations. In short, teachers are more than familiar with the ideas proposed in your videos.
Why then, you might ask, are not more of these ideas implemented? Well, to a certain extent they are. In my classes I employed a large number of teaching techniques in which the students were allowed to take charge. These consisted of the running of simulation games (one game I helped develop for Grade 11 Social Studies took about two weeks to complete), posing a question and then breaking the class into study groups to come up with a variety of solutions, creating scenarios in which students were given a challenge and left to devise methods of dealing with it, and so on. The problem was, that interesting as these programs were for the students and the fact that they resulted the teaching of concepts that could not be used in a normal class setting, they were also incredibly time consuming. One of the constraints faced by every teacher is the fact that a certain amount of content has to be covered. Certainly there are many innovative ways to teach this content, but much of the time it is necessary to simply resort to traditional teaching methods in order to cover what the curriculum demands. It does little good to have an extremely entertaining and very popular class if the students in that class cover only a quarter to a half of what the Department of Education demands.
In short, as you have pointed out, schools and teachers are part of a system. No teacher I know of ever set out to teach a lesson in as boring a manner as possible, but frequently the constraints of time force teachers to present information in the most effective method possible. That method is often the lecture system; a form of transferring knowledge that goes back several thousand years. Not every student enjoys this approach, but studies have shown that when it comes to transferring information to as many students as possible in as short a time as possible, that the lecture approach cannot be surpassed.
You have made a number of other points I am not going to address because this reply is already long enough. Suffice to say that teachers and educational system are well aware of every point you have made and have been attempting for decades to implement programs that make education enjoyable and successful for as many students as possible.
Unfortunately, you are viewing the situation from the point of view of an outsider who only sees a small part of the educational system. There is a solution to this if you have the time and inclination. Invite yourself into the local school as a volunteer. You will probably find that you will be readily accepted once you have passed a background check. I suspect your view of the educational system and the job teachers are doing will undergo a radical change.
As I said before, teachers are well aware of the deficiencies of the educational system. One of the favourite "games" teachers like to play is discussing and solving all of the problems of the system in which they toil. I can't remember the number of discussions of this sort that I participated in, but it was probably in the hundreds. Unfortunately, for the most part the classroom teacher is really not in a position to institute major educational reforms. Such reforms can only be instituted by the powers that be in the Department of Education; a bureaucratic organization that most teachers regard as utterly useless so far as implementing any real change is concerned.
If you really want to be fair about criticizing the educational system, put the blame where it is deserved; on the Minister of Education and the ivory tower bureaucracy that tells the classroom teacher, what to teach, how to teach, and when to teach and which burdens teachers with as much bureaucratic nonsense as it can.
All the jobs in Education from the very top to the teachers are accessed by people that fit in the system.
Talking about what we should do gives humans the same brain stimulation then doing it. And takes way less work, and effort. Derek Sivers: Keep your goals to yourself | Video on TED.com
There is plenty of blame to go around relative to this issue and not limited only to the Minister of Education.
The forgotten group that does most of the bitching are the families and the actual students themselves. It's not uncommon for a segment of the parents to treat the education system as a state-sponsored day care system of which they expect everything and play no role whatsoever. This is not to say that no one else is without blame, both the gvt authority and groups like the ATA are also deeply at fault in this debacle as well.
In the end, as per the Alberta experience, the best thing that has developed from the education system is the evolution of the Charter and private school systems
Guess what. They are behind them too. Kids will be picketing along side their teachers.
The SK Govt made a big mistake and dropped education taxes on farmland to get elected and are expecting the teachers and urbanites to pay for it. There was a big stink at election time that this very scenario was going to unfold and it did and people aren't happy and support the teachers in the Province.
thats the problem with online debates that polarize. "hard done by", "over paid" "under paid" etc are all extreme positions.
In truth, the SK teacher are not collecting an extreme salary, and even with the 10% raise, if they get it, the raise will not provide them with an extreme salary.
All they want is parity and enough to catch up to the cost of living. It's not cheap to live in SK. It's cheaper to buy a home in Vancouver.
Oh, yeah! PARITY!
The unions always want parity of pay with some other employees, but I would like to see just one example in the entire history of unions where the union wanted parity of production. When was there ever a union saying: We really should produce as much as those others? Did any union ever wanted to match the break times and lunch times of those others whose break and lunch times were shorter? Or how about PARITY with those whose vacation time and retirement plan is not as good as yours?
Parity indeed. Nothing but a crutch for the lazy.
Lazy? For somebody who had the way paved for him on the blood and sweat of other Canadians you have absolutely no place to comment or tear down what somebody sacrificed to make YOUR life better. You have absolutely no respect for the people who built this country and that is despicable.
So you are back to the tried and true, aren't you petros?
Instead of giving me an example of any what I asked you, you come back with personal attack.
There was a time when I thought there was hope for you, but I guess I was wrong.
I would put you on ignore but you are too much fun.