[nobe-l] Teaching

Sun Mar 20 02:52:59 UTC 2016

You are right, 9 years when I started working, things were a bit
better in many ways, now you can't even get to know the students well,
but have to grade them and evaluate them. I at times think it is
better that I open my own private language school, but that would be
very costly and if you do that, you will work day and night and not be
able to plan your life in any way at all and you may never know how
many and if you will have any students at  any time, so it is very
risky. I am not sure how teachers who have families cope with taking
care of their children and working so hard, it would depress me to
death if I had children and didn't have any time to spend with them
because of paperwork.

On 3/20/16, Kayla James via NOBE-L <nobe-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> That does sound a little sad, but I still want to work with children
> somehow.
>
> On 3/19/16, nmpbrat--- via NOBE-L <nobe-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
>> 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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