Silence of the lambs

It is that time again. Yes, the dreaded back to school.  We teachers lead a truly schizophrenic existence.  You go,go, go on the treadmill throughout the school year only to settle in for 8-10 weeks of complete relaxation during the summer.

 By the way, kudos to Matt Damon for sticking up for his mom and other teachers recently during a Save our schools Rally at the white house.  If you want to understand the problems with education check out Waiting for Superman On Demand or Net Flicks.  There is no easy solution to the problems with failing schools.  But cutting the fat at the top of the ladder in the county office is the best place to start.  Other good ideas are getting very strict on discipline, getting rid of no child left behind, making parent involvement mandatory, starting ethics training in elementary school and making the firing of a poor teacher(the lemons) possible.

Good teachers spend almost as much time out of the classroom in preparation of lessons and grading papers as they do in the classroom.  Good teachers think of new and creative ways to deliver their subject matter, no matter how long they have been teaching.  There are so many hoops that the idiots in the county office want teachers to do -just to justify their own, higher paying job.  Why should you be paid more to work in the county office?  I mean you don't have any face time with students, you sit at a desk and think of crap to make teachers do that will supposedly enhance their teacher skills.  Guess what- you rarely learn  anything that is truly eye- opening.

Why do we sit at meeting after meeting during preplanning and do all the stupid exercises that are supposed to get us to delve into the minds of our students? We just sit there and take it. A faculty meeting should be a place where discussions take place and ideas are shared among the faculty.  As a lamb of the faculty you have to sit there and be quiet and wait for the the slaughter (or else).  One meeting I had this week actually had an activity that required some of us to "cross the river".  We were in a science lab room and were not allowed to touch the floor with our feet while going from the front to the back of the room.  I raised my hand and said- "I have an AARP card- do I really have to do this?"  Afterwards the idiot gym teacher, that got demoted for sexually harassing a parent, made fun of the women and how their titties and asses were hanging out all over the place while they were crawling over the tables.Why do we just sit there and take it?  There is such a culture in schools.  You are constantly treated like children and if you disagree you become the non- team member and therefore you learn to just close your mouth and go with the flow.  Isn't that what went wrong in Nazi Germany?  Think about it!