[nobe-l] Teaching

Sun Mar 20 03:03:40 UTC 2016

This isn't very encouraging news. I guess I'll just have to see what
God has planned. Surely with special education, you can work
one-on-one a little bit. Or else how can we blind students learn as we
do now? Maybe I should be a rehabilitation teacher; I don't know, but
I want to work with kids.
Has anyone on this list ever been a Golden Apple scholar? They mentor
new teachers.

On 3/19/16, adrijana prokopenko via NOBE-L <nobe-l at nfbnet.org> wrote:
> 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.
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> NOBE-L mailing list
>>> NOBE-L at nfbnet.org
>>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nobe-l_nfbnet.org
>>> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
>>> NOBE-L:
>>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nobe-l_nfbnet.org/nmpbrat%40aol.com
>>>
>>> _______________________________________________
>>> NOBE-L mailing list
>>> NOBE-L at nfbnet.org
>>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nobe-l_nfbnet.org
>>> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
>>> NOBE-L:
>>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nobe-l_nfbnet.org/christgirl813%40gmail.com
>>>
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> NOBE-L mailing list
>> NOBE-L at nfbnet.org
>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nobe-l_nfbnet.org
>> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
>> NOBE-L:
>> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nobe-l_nfbnet.org/adrijana.prokopenko%40gmail.com
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> NOBE-L mailing list
> NOBE-L at nfbnet.org
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/listinfo/nobe-l_nfbnet.org
> To unsubscribe, change your list options or get your account info for
> NOBE-L:
> http://nfbnet.org/mailman/options/nobe-l_nfbnet.org/christgirl813%40gmail.com
>