Week 8: Final Blog Assignment

Time Difference: Because we were asked to connect with professional international time zone was an issue.  The various hours affected the ability to communicate properly.

Importance: It is in my opinion that those who we communicated with on an international level responded at their own leisure. They did not take the nature of the relationship seriously. Because they are professors I assume they handled business first and the questionnaire often came last of their long “to do” list.

Question: It was often difficult to reword the questions we were told to ask. I think instead of questions we should have been given discussion topics and let the communicator share freely what he or she chose to share. Also, at times the communicator was not knowledgeable about the questions therefore they could not answer it effectively. 

My Goal: I would love to work with Teaching Aboard. The international relationship allows me to make an educated decision on exactly where I would like to teach. Also it showed that the United States aren’t as advance as many Americans would like to believe.

Sharing Web Resource Week 6

NEA opposed the House leadership’s plan and supported the Senate-passed bill providing tax cuts for the middle class. In just six months, across the board funding cuts known as “sequestration” will go into effect unless Congress acts.

 The NEA website has a "Take Action" link. This link takes you to a website that allows you to enter your zip code. You then select your U.S House Representative. You can select pre-written talking points to add to your message. After selecting or typing you message you simply enter in your information and press send. Often we want to speak up but do not know what to say. This allows us to have a voice without the fear of using the wrong words.

PRE-WRITTEN MESSAGES:

As a constituent and an educator, I want to express my deep concern about the "sequestration" cuts scheduled to go into effect in January 2013, and about any deal Congress may reach to avoid sequestration.

Any deficit reduction deal must take a balanced approach between reducing spending and raising revenues.

Education and other programs serving, children, working families, seniors, and other vulnerable populations already took a huge hit in last year's Budget Control Act. These programs must not continue to be the source for deficit reduction while millionaires and corporations continue to benefit from tax cuts and loopholes.

Unless Congress acts to stop the sequester, education funding will fall off a cliff, dropping to pre-2003 levels. America's elementary, secondary, and postsecondary schools have added 5.4 million students since 2003, and costs associated with K-12 services have increased 25 percent since 2003.

The sequester cut would dramatically impact 9.35 million students by eliminating services, cutting financial aid and increasing class sizes.

As many as 80,500 jobs could be lost in early education, K-12 and postsecondary education. Since July 2008, the country has lost 312,700 public education jobs. This means there are roughly as many local school jobs today as in December 2004. Yet, there will be 847,000 more pre k-12 public school students this coming school year than in the fall of 2004.

We cannot balance the budget on the backs of children. Those most able to do so must pay their fair share toward deficit reduction.

Please make sure that any deficit reduction deal is balanced and equitable.

Intentional Contacts

Poverty In School System

 Americans  have been working on closing the financial gap between those of the wealthy and those living in poverty. The lack of funds a family have has placed a great impact of the child education. Lack of resources makes it difficult for children to complete homework. Also, many American children only receive meals during the school hours. American schools offer breakfast and lunch to all students, depending on the family financial status these meals can be free of charge. During the summer many schools serve as a site for the Free Lunch program which feeds children up to the age of 18 free of charge once a day. 

 

My Question: Does your school system serve children breakfast/lunch?
Is there an academic issue for those that aren't wealthy?
What programs can families living in poverty reach out to for resources?

 

Carolyn Response:

We do not have formal meal programs in our school system, however many regions do set up informal programs based on need.

Most food is donated by local businesses or families to meet these needs.

We do have an extensive food bank system in our area, again funded through donations and some government grants.

Our food banks are set up like a grocery store, often in church basements, where families can identify that they are in need and "shop" on a weekly basis.  There is also a clothing / accessory store in most major communities, where they can shop on a monthly basis for needed supplies and clothing.

This is just one of the many social services that are available to families.

Bilingual

The American Early Childhood field was original based off the Caucasian child. It later included the African American children. Now today's classroom is filled with more than just black and white students. Hispanic children are becoming the majority in the classroom but aren't fluent in the English language causing the teacher to revise the lesson plans and include ways of teaching non-English speaking students.

My Question: Does your country speak more than one language? What is the native language? What language do teachers use to teach students?

 

Carolyn Response: Canada is bilingual.  We speak english and french.

In my region english is predominant, with very little french or other languages spoken.

We do have children who are non-verbal in our schools who use PECS

http://www.pecs-canada.com/pecs.php

Web Resources

The Opening Bell: National Education Association

Tennessee Report Points To "Systematic Failure" In Teacher Evaluation System.

The Tennessean (7/17, Gonzalez) reports that the Tennessee Department of Education has released a new report which found that the state's new teacher evaluation system "'systematically failed' to identify bad teachers and provide them more training." Moreover, the report "found that instructors who got failing grades when measured by their students' test scores tended to get much higher marks from principals who watched them in classrooms. State officials expected to see similar scores from both methods." The paper quotes the report, "Evaluators are telling teachers they exceed expectations in their observation feedback when in fact student outcomes paint a very different picture. This behavior skirts managerial responsibility." The piece notes that the student performance-based evaluation system is part of the state's obligations under its Race to the Top grant.

        The AP (7/17, Johnson) reports that as a result of the study, state education leaders are "considering changes" to the system, noting that the report "said about two-thirds of the state's teachers should be allowed to opt for a smaller portion of their evaluations to be based on such data. ... The recommendation seeks to address concerns raised repeatedly by teachers since the evaluation measure was first enacted as part of Tennessee's federal Race to the Top grant application in 2010." The piece notes that Education Commissioner Kevin Huffman "didn't discuss specifics, but he said his report - which is due to lawmakers next month - will also deal with value-added testing data." The Knoxville (TN) News Sentinel (7/17, McCoy) runs a similar report. 

Evaluations are the test teachers must pass to continue teaching at that particular school. I have been subjected to evaluations during my student teaching experience. Because this is a randomly done evaluations every quarter I believe it did not paint a clear picture of growth or areas that needed to be improved upon. It is my opinion that evaluations should not be done my "outsiders" that are not familiar with the teachers work ethics. Also the specifics of the evaluations are created my non-educators which can be misleading.

Sharing Web Resources

I am a member of the National Education Association www.nae.org

The mission of NEA is "To advocate for education professionals and to unite our members and the nation to fulfill the promise of public education to prepare every student to succeed in a diverse and interdependent world." 

The website covers a numerous amount of news concern education. Each news topic is separated into 5 categories:

1. Leading the News
2. In the Classroom
3. On the Job
4. Law and Policy
5. Safety and Security 

They also have tabs labeled 

1. Issues & Action
2. Tools & Ideas
3. Grants and Events

NAE Today: The State of Parent-Teacher Relationship is Strong

Summary: While the gap between home and school has made some closure there still remains a disconnect between parents and teacher. A survey done between Parent Magazine and National Education Association showed "88 percent consider teachers to a partner in helping their child succeed in school. Only 54 percent of teacher, however, believe parents do their part at home to assist them in accomplishing this goal." The finding were given to Parenting’s. Due to such an alarming disconnect a conference was held. "The panelists spoke to the audience about fostering a family-school partnership and offered solutions for bridging the gaps in communication as revealed by the survey."

A few pointers that were made at the meetings:

• Do not look for the "one size fit all" approach"
• Establish Trust
• Take initiative