Josh poses a question about teaching outside of certification

There is an increased concern over budgets in school districts around the state.   As a result, schools have slowly down-sized and there is fewer faculty and staff even in the face of increased student enrollment.   Unfortunately, my observation is that teachers are being moved around and forced to teach subjects in which they have little or no experience and, additionally, for which they have no certification. If you were a  first or second year teacher and were asked to teach a class outside of your discipline or certification how would you approach this situation?    What questions would you ask and where would you begin to ask those questions?  

Josh Getka

Lauren has questions with regard to the new antibullying law

There is a new Harassment Intimidation and Bullying (HIB) law that has been recently been enacted in New Jersey.   This new law makes schools responsible for bullying that occurs in schools, but also for any incidents of bullying that happen off school grounds.   Moreover, these off-campus bullying incidents for which schools are now responsible need not take place during school hours.   Do you think this is a reasonable requirement to place on schools?    Or, do you think that this off-campus bullying should be taken care of by parents?     Following is a website with additional information about the new law.    

http://www.njea.org/issues-and-political-action/anti-bullying

Matt asks is ADHD a fictitious problem?

I  don't mean to say there is no such thing as attention deficit disorder, I am not qualified to say that there isn’t such a thing.  I know that there are a great many psychologists and pediatricians who think there is.   But I also realize that this topic is still a matter of great debate.  What I do know, for a fact, is that kids are being routinely medicated.   And it may not be their fault.   Children are being besieged with information and forced to give their attention to a variety of stimuli:   computers, i-phones,  advertisements, hundreds of television channels.   

Are we penalizing our students for getting distracted?  It seems to be that it is not a coincidence that the growth of ADHD has risen in direct proportion to the growth of standardized testing. And what is happening, I believe, is that our young children are being given drugs that shut down their senses.      Why is this happening?   Shouldn’t we be waking them up?   

Now the big question is how do we set about waking them UP?   How do we set about to cultivate divergent thinking skills of our students?  How do we cultivate their ability to see lots of possible answers to questions that are being posed?    Divergent thinking requires that our students thin laterally rather than in a linear fashion. 

Students need to be encourage to answer more abstract questions and to see the multiple answers that exist in the more  sophisticated questions posed by the teacher.   In essence,   we need to encourage students to think at higher levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy Ca they do this if we are prescribing “calm-down” medicine?     My question is this………….in an era of ADHD how do we educate our students so that they can benefit from and hone their divergent thinking skills?   How do we keep our students involved and learning interactive while at the same time covering the prescribed curriculum and preparing them for standardized tests?   

Are teachers effective if students scores improve or are kids just "smart?" Lisa asks the question.

The NJDOE’s Excellent Educators for New Jersey pilot program has taken off, with 11 school districts helping to shape this new system of teacher evaluations. Its core principles include:

Evaluations based equally on both learning outcomes (including, but not limited to, standardized test scores) and effective practices (classroom performance)

Replacement of the “satisfactory/unsatisfactory” ratings with a four-tiered scale of “ineffective,” “partially effective,” “effective,” and “highly effective.”

Criteria favoring student progress rather than absolute performance for our highest-need students.

While I do believe that this program’s parameters are more meaningful, I think NJ can do better for its teachers and its students. I remain unconvinced that standardized test scores have any place in teacher evaluations. Generally speaking, the schools with the students who score in the highest percentages, advanced proficient and proficient scores, do not necessarily house the most “highly effective” teachers.  It is generally true, however, that schools in which students score in the higher ranges on standardized tests, are located in districts in which there is a higher socio-economic class.  These students usually produce higher scores on standardized tests.  We could address this “class” issue by emphasizing individual progress, and giving students grade-level entrance and exit assessments for evidence of significant learning and skillful teaching. Such evaluations would indicate the amount of individual learning that has taken place that year -for each student, with his/her assigned teacher - measuring student and teacher progress from September to June.

What are some other suggestions for finding out if teachers are teaching and students are learning?