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Teaching: A Thread
1. Teaching has been made overly & unnecessarily complicated from the top down over the last 20 yrs. And now, w/teaching F2F & virtual at the same time, it is a profession at the breaking point, bc teachers are at the breaking point.
1. Teaching has been made overly & unnecessarily complicated from the top down over the last 20 yrs. And now, w/teaching F2F & virtual at the same time, it is a profession at the breaking point, bc teachers are at the breaking point.
2. Pre-2000 or so, it wasn’t too bad. There were still a lot of things wrong: e.g., teacher support & retention, but I started teaching in 93 & I distinctly remember just being allowed to teach. There was a bit of paperwork, but nothing too overwhelming, even for a new teacher.
3. We had to create school mission statements. I had to attend a series of 6 meetings so we could ALL craft one. I wondered why a SCHOOL needed a mission statement. Was anyone really unclear on what a school did? District printed them on vinyl banners & were promptly forgotten.
4. 6+ hours spent on a completely unnecessary mission statement that no one needed. But that wasn’t enough: we had to add goals. Another school year doing that in meetings. And it was bullshit.
5. Then personal mission statements. Personal goals. Teacher evals became hugely complex & complicated. And these are just 2 examples. In any school day, I spend more time on paperwork & emails than I do teaching. That’s wrong. New systems are introduced each year.
6. There used to be just fire drills and tornado drills. Now there are 7 types of drills with code words and different actions for each. You must memorize them all. I’m all for safety, but it’s more & more & more.
7. There are meetings (school & district level) for leadership teams, content areas, entire faculty, CIC, another required committee, ARDs, 504, etc. Better not miss one. Also, your lessons, which have been made INCREDIBLY complicated, must be placed in 4 different espaces. FOUR.
8. I haven’t mentioned the overly complex systems for attendance and grading. I don’t have the energy to even approach those in this thread.
9. I forgot about social contracts! B/c teachers aren’t trusted to be professionals, we have to create a school-wide contract that lays out how we should treat each other. That took 3 meetings. Everyone has to sign it. Then we must create a social contract w/each of our classes.
10. There are videos & documents which detail how to do this. You must watch the videos, read the documents, and attest that you have done both, then you can create social contracts w/each class that everyone must sign.
11. I’ve had to attend multiple speeches by/about Flip Flippen. We have to create our “why” statement every yr. Then our S.M.A.R.T. goals that will help us fulfill our why. I’m 50 & have been teaching for half my life. If I don’t know why I’m teaching by now, I’m sunk.
12. Before Flippen, there was a series of (highly paid) people. I don’t remember their names-it’s a blur, but districts create extra work for teachers with each new speaker. Instead of feeling inspired, you wonder what the hell else they’ll make you do this yr bc of *this* guy.
13.Positive Behavioral Support & Restorative Practices are hot now. But PBS, w/all the training we did, is on the way out. Now it’s “push in,” “walk & talk” & other approaches WE ALREADY KNEW, but someone packaged and sold them to districts, so that’s MORE trainings & paperwork.
14. These examples (and Lord, I could mention so many more) are all systems, processes & products that teachers are required to spend hours on each school year. I want to point out right here & now that exactly NONE of them have ANYTHING to do with planning, teaching & assessing.
15. But even planning, teaching, and assessing have been complicated by many orders of magnitude. Different/additional curriculum systems each yr, different/additional expectations each yr, new expectations for instructional delivery, ever more complicated & frequent assessments.
16. Every teacher reading these tweets knows all this and could add hundreds more examples. But my purpose in writing these are two-fold: for the people who weren’t aware just how complicated & complex a teacher’s job has become, and for district admins.
17. For the former, if you’re wondering why teachers are being broken by adding F2F & virtual at the same time, now you know. Our job was already untenable. To add a huge piece to it means we have to stop doing large pieces of the other stuff or kill ourselves trying to do it all
18. It was already too much. It was already a house of cards. Now we’ve put a rock on that house of cards. It cannot stand.
To district admin: even before this, you made teaching so incredibly difficult that teachers were leaving the profession right & left. Then you have the GALL to bring in a highly-paid motivational speaker to “help us find our passion”! Save the money and TAKE SHIT OFF US.
20. Got so bent out of shape, I forgot to number that one.
21. Here’s the obligatory I love teaching part. But district admins should be thankful there are teachers who manage to juggle all the bullshit & still love the teaching part. But teachers have turned themselves (w/the encouragement of society) into martyrs & I’m not down w/that.
22. I’m a 24 year veteran & here’s what I’ve had to do to survive teaching in these times: start teaching an elective in my department (I still have 3 grade levels), but at least it’s a start. It’s an intense elective, but it got about 30% of the pressure off me.
23. I walk in when I’m required to & walk out when I’m allowed. I don’t take work home (teaching an elective helps!). I use my time wisely at work & if I didn’t get it done by 4:05, it will get done tomorrow. Or Monday. I’m no longer sacrificing my time w/family for work.
24. Elective or not, I’m still required to do 99% of the “other” stuff of teaching. Bc I can’t clone myself, stuff’s gonna slide off that plate. Teacher evals? I used to kill myself making sure mine were excellent. Now as long as I am acceptable on the impossible T-TESS, I’m good
25. Just want to stop here and point out I have a bachelors and masters degree and 24 successful years in my field and I make $66K a year. That’s just wrong. My masters only adds $1000 a year. And I’m in a good district, w/a yearly retention bonus, extra $250 in September, cont
26. etc. Can you imagine any other profession in which you have an advanced degree and 24 years experience and are still making below $70K? Hard to, isn’t it? It’s a crying shame. But the powers that be & society expect you to put up with everything because “you love the kids!”
27. I do love the kids. But I don’t love them enough to eat cat food when I’m an old lady. Despite my love for the kids, this is still my career, and I still expect to retire and not be poor.
28. Speaking of retirement, I can do so in 4 yrs, when I’m 53. I used to think no WAY would I retire at 53! But now? I’m counting down the months. I will most definitely leave at 53. I will do something else for the next 10-15 years. Not this, though. Not the way it is.
29. I remember in the early to mid-90s when it wasn’t nearly as complicated. It was still hard, don’t get me wrong. Teaching is difficult enough WITHOUT all the added BS. But I can remember writing lesson plans, delivering them, & assessing their work.
30. There’s always been some paperwork: special ed, posting grades, etc. But grading was the biggest paperwork load back then.
31. I’ve only briefly mentioned the additional huge workload of teaching F2F and virtual at the sane time, which is something I do 7 times a day. I’m too tired to discuss it further, I just wanted the general public to understand why we’re past the breaking point now.
