[nobe-l] Teaching

[Kathy]

Adrijana,
  Thank you for this honesty. Indeed, it seems that issues that complicate the beauty of teaching are rising up in all parts of the world, not just the little corners that we each inhabit. When the best and most hard-working teachers feel this burdened by the paperwork and regulations and assessments and evaluations, you know there is a problem. We all know every profession has people who will complain about something all the time, but when the most committed feel that stress and discouragement, it is truly alarming. Thankfully, we have safe places like this list where we can be honest, and hopefully, the sharing lightens the load at least enough to remind you that you are not alone and why you came to the profession. 
Kathy and Nacho
 
> Date: Sat, 19 Mar 2016 14:49:18 +0100
> To: nobe-l at nfbnet.org; pibe-division at nfbnet.org
> Subject: [nobe-l] Teaching
> From: nobe-l at nfbnet.org
> CC: adrijana.prokopenko at gmail.com
> 
>  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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