[nobe-l] Teaching

[nmpbrat at aol.com]

For whatever its worth, you are not alone in how you feel about education and teaching today.  Teaching isn't what it once was...not even back when I started teaching 14 years ago.  The expectations and demands on teachers is overwhelming and it is driving many, even those who have won awards for "Teacher of the Year" and such, out of the profession.  Teaching seems to be more about data and numbers than it does about the students.  My students are not a number....and their life experiences, traits, learning styles, abilities, personalities, etc. cannot be measured in numbers.  The people who are making the laws, regulations, expectations, etc. of the teaching profession have not spent the time in the classroom (if at all) to have any idea of the challenges we face in today's classrooms.  I've heard many a colleague say "I didn't go to school to be a data analyst or clerical professional....I went to school to be a teacher" or "If I didn't have a family to take care of, I'd leave the teaching profession because teaching isn't what it once was".  It's sad...but true.  Burn out in the field of teaching in today's world is real.  It seems as though no matter how hard you work or the number of hours you put in, it never seems to be good enough.  
Although I have contemplated the idea of leaving the profession, my love for teaching has still outweighed those thoughts.  There are moments and victories with my students that I hold on to that remind me of why I chose to enter the profession to begin with.  I just continue to hope that the pendulum swings back the other direction while I'm still teaching and those making the decisions come to realize that things are not always measurable when dealing with living, breathing human beings.  



-----Original Message-----
From: adrijana prokopenko via NOBE-L <nobe-l at nfbnet.org>
To: nobe-l <nobe-l at nfbnet.org>; Professionals in Blindness Education Division List <pibe-division at nfbnet.org>
Cc: adrijana prokopenko <adrijana.prokopenko at gmail.com>
Sent: Sat, Mar 19, 2016 9:51 am
Subject: [nobe-l] Teaching

Hi all,

 I am a teacher of English in Macedonia and I think I am getting to
feel that I am constantly caught up in paperwork, so much so that I no
longer feel as a teacher any more. Every year the ministry of
education comes up with all kinds of projects, so that we have more
paperwork to do and besides the annual programs, daily lesson plans,
students individual plans, a portfolio for each one, daily notices of
how each one is doing, weekly reports and grades sent out to class
teachers and parents, we now have something like ecology planning and
information technology planning no matter what subject we teach. We
need to incorporate this into our lesson plans as well and on top of
all, we need to do reports that headmasters and psychologists were
helping out with, that have to do with counting lessons and putting
more and more of all this online, which is another trouble because
their system and website are not working well for sighted people, let
alone for blind people. Since this is a state school, we are not
allowed too much flexibility and can't participate in choosing what
and when we teach. The textbooks are constantly changing, so I keep
brailling each again and again as it comes out and feel that each one
is less suitable for my students.  In addition to this, we get more
and more students with other learning difficulties and facce with
shortages of braillers, so I often find myself brailling for each
students all that I need to let them have for each class twice, so
that they have a copy and home and not lose it or misplace it and a
copy they need to use in class. All this is draining me too much,
because I am getting to feel that I also do other peoples work and I
am getting to feel less joy when teaching, because now besides
teachers, we need to do other things, which is not bad, but when
considering that teachers are no longer being protected by schools or
through the government, it is just very easy for totally blind
teachers to get into all kinds of trouble that they never dreamed of.
Many students bring their cel phones and other devices to school, not
letting them go during the lessons as well and it makes the whole
thing very disruptive and teaching is becoming impossible to do while
all this is going on and when teachers feel they can no longer manage
things much in a way they think they know how. Our school's policy is:
"Just teach and get away with it" because we got less and less
students and we may be closed one day" and parents and students know
this, so some just relax and keep giving more trouble. I was never a
quitter, but am getting to wonder if others experience the same and if
there are other similar jobs to this that are as fulfilling, but not
so stressful to manage and not so much grade related? I love working
with children, but am getting to feel that all this is now for nothing
and it is a terrible feeling.

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