Are there concrete proposals you could make to improve the education system in your country?

My response to an NEA (National Education Association; a nationwide teachers' union) International survey that came to me via email:

6/21/14

What would you need to teach better lessons?

TIME to collaborate with colleagues and mentors.  ANOTHER ADULT, could be a professional aide but credentialed teacher is preferred, to spend time with my same cohort of students so together we could assess their needs and develop services.  SUMMER TRAINING and practice for using the latest technologies in the classrooom.  ADMINISTRATIVE SUPPORT for discipline; students acting out need a place to go other than a corner of the room or another teacher's classroom.  At that time, they also need a qualified adult to talk to them and problem-solve their issues whether they are personal or academic.

           

26. Are there concrete proposals you could make to improve the education system in your country?

1.    Teaching is a delicate and interpersonal art.  The unmeasureable aspects of success as a teacher matter as much as the measureable.  TIME must be available for teacher and student to know each other.  On Saturdays, the (PAID) teacher could set up appointments of 30 minutes or more to be with each student as an individual.  After the initial meeting, the students could rotate to meet with the teacher on subsequent Saturdays, so that the teacher would have at least one 30-minute one-to-one encounter with each student each month.

2.    ALL school administrators– up to and including the Superintendent and Board of Education – need to have taught a minimum of 3 years in the classroom before taking the step of managing teachers. In addition, this essential connection to the child in the classroom should continue to occur a minimum of 3 days during each school year.  Why not save the district a little money by having the credentialed administrative staff be the first choice to cover planned absences for teachers?  This could initiate many invaluable interactions between administrators and teachers, and between administrators and students.

3.    Students need more than one trusted adult – this is usually classroom teacher – to rely on at school.  Teachers need more than their own life experience and professional perspectives to see each child more completely and fairly, so team teaching should be the rule.

4.    To this end, classes of 15 or greater should have two teachers.  To make this more economically feasible, a ratio of two teachers to up to 36 students could work.  Team teachers should teach together, meeting the needs of groups or individuals, 50% or more of each day.  The remaining 50% the class size could be split in half, with each group spending time with with one team teacher or the other.  This would allow each one of the teachers to specialize and provide better service to the students.  With the level of curriculum we are teaching elementary schools in the 21^st century, it is unrealistic to expect that one teacher can be expert in all academic subjects. One teacher may excel and have the greatest inspirational energy for math, science, technology, for example.  The other could be the best to teach language arts, visual arts, and P.E., perhaps. With team teaching, students would get the level of expertise that is required even in the kindergarten class these days.

5.    A student must have a basic level of health in order to learn well. Any school where student access to professional health care providers in the community is difficult NEEDS an onsite school nurse R.N., who is also knowledgeable about that school's population, and preferably can speak at least the two dominant languages of the community.

6.    USA is based on a lovely salad of cultures and languages. Like any people, our students have a vast array of capabilities, proclivities, preferences, weaknesses, and needs.  To allow each child to continually become his or her own “personal best”, some degree of academic tracking is necessary.  A student with the highest innate intellectual and academic abilities is just as needy of specialized instruction – and grouping with peers who meet and challenge them – as a student at the opposite end of the special needs spectrum, and just as needy as the mythical “average” student.  Without “Gifted and Talented” programs, we allow our future pathfinders to languish and become lazy, last-minute producers of work that is the best in the class, yet woefully short of the work they could produce.  Every American school needs education specialists to help GATE students.

7.    For the English language in America to have some continuity and predictability, teachers who teach English should be native speakers of the language, or at least have acquired articulate native proficiency with spelling, conventions, and pronunciation.  Ideally, all teachers would be speech models of standard American English. (Understandable accents add flavor and are acceptable, but a teacher with a limited vocabulary and facility with English grammar cannot help students gain the proficiency they need.

8.    English as a Second Language learners need to learn basic academic English before and/or in conjunction with learning subject matter. NEA survey, June 2014