Well, I had my blood work today. I put it off because it was a fasting one and I can't fast for blood on a day I work and because I nearly faint. I didn't faint, but I have a heck of a mark on my arm. And it is Friday. I don't want anyone thinking I am a junkie, so it will be sleeves for me tonight.
I just noticed that a lot of my Photo II kids posted on Pinterest today. I was out and i pinned late - around 10.00 am. The first pin fro a student was 15 minutes later. Um, not during her class. I noticed many of the pins were during period 8. I have Photo I period 8. While I love the enthusiasm for this kind of journaling, I think I need to address the time to do this. I also have to guess most of them were doing it on their phones. Yipes! Again, love the diligence and enthusiasm, but we need to work on timing.
So I have noticed a trend among the younger teachers - or younger than my generation. Many get their master's degrees in administration. And some do so very quickly after getting their first teaching jobs, even starting the program prior to even getting tenure. I see some problems with this.
One problem is that if you rack up the credits, that moves you across the pay scale. People might see justification in paying top dollar for administrators, but if you are unlucky enough to be cut or RIF'd, you have just priced yourself out of the market, kiddo. My college advisor educated us in such a way that she taught us all about these types of things. We learned about hiring practices, pay scales, etc.. I think we are the only ones who learned this.
The second problem is that there seems to be a rush to go from the classroom to the administrative office. I have a great deal more respect for the person who puts in 10-15 years in the classroom before looking to move up. That is an individual that can make crucial decisions regarding policy with first hand knowledge. In education, that is key. There are already way too many people making policy decisions with no educational or pedagogical knowledge whatsoever. Having an administrator who is merely hungry to climb the career ladder is not beneficial at all. Mistakes are made. Ill informed choices are made. The teachers and students pay for those mistakes. Trust me.... I am seeing this in action.
Another problem is similar to the law school problem. Law schools have been graduating tons of kids over the past couple of decades. One issue: There are no jobs. I had to recently show a student a Forbes article regarding the plight of the unemployed law school graduate. Now, are there really enough education administration positions to accommodate all the kids going for these master's degrees? Not that I can tell. The number of applicants for admin positions is similar to the numbers for art jobs. Not promising. Too many qualified candidates, too few positions. Many of them are qualified on paper, but...
Are they ready for the position? I read. I read a great deal. One thing I have noticed: Many people are ignorant of grammar, punctuation, even what are real words and what are not. And I cannot stand when people give the excuse "Well, I'm not an English teacher." No, you are not, but as a teacher with higher aspirations, you need to be able to write and speak well. You will be engaging with the community and public, parents, guardians, town and state officials. I am talking about the teachers with administrative certification who believe "supposively" is a word; whose who use the phrase "he did real good on the test"; those who mumble when speaking; those who use your, you're, they're, their. and there incorrectly. And do not blame auto correct. That excuse gets old.
We are a profession under fire. When I was in school, teachers were still respected. I thought of my teachers as so knowledgeable. They were so smart. They knew about so many subjects and when they did not have the answer, they admitted it and researched it. We are now a profession that is picked apart for a myriad of reasons. We need to show that we still deserve respect. Rushing up the career ladder and out of the classroom with not a care for the students does not endear one to the public. It just makes us look money and power hungry. Poor grammar and speaking skills make all of us look stupid. When a teacher's words are passed along or heard and there are those "supposively" and "they're/there/their" types of mistakes, they are noticed. The thinking is that if you have no command of basic skills, how much do you really know?
And no, I am not being a "grammar nazi". I am just reacting to the stupidity and foolishness I see - actions that the teacher hating public will jump on with relish every chance they get...
Friday, January 23, 2015
Saturday, January 17, 2015
Groups
We just completed a portrait shooting assignment in Photo I on Friday. I always pair the kids up for this. This time I had them interview each other so they could get to know each other better, Ten questions. The photographer had to use the answers to inform how he/she designed or planned the shoot. The subject was to have no input. The viewers are to get a better idea of what the subject is like based on the resulting images.
Did this count as a "group" project? Apparently to the kids it did. I had a few ask if we were going to do more group projects because they liked it. So does pairing kids count? You know, in the grand teacher evaluation, rigorous reformy movement? I didn't think so based on my readings of these stupid rigor demands, but the kids see it as cooperative when they have to work with others, even one other person. But, hey, the opinions of students do not count. These reformers want to see a teacher (boss) give a task (job) to a grouping of many students (employees) and have them complete the task (job) sufficiently. Much of this testing and observing and evaluating is developed by corporations that are interested in having schools produce amenable workers.
However, if they came into an art room, they would see the kind of group work and cooperation that benefits society, not CEOs. Things like assisting each other with loading film in the camera, developing rolls of film cooperatively, sharing darkroom stations, taking turns to clean up the darkroom with a partner or partners, gathering together to talk about a classmate's really cool print and how she got that, gathering together to figure out how a classmate can improve his print, setting up and taking down equipment, mixing the chemistry for a project.
Having to do some dinky group report or presentation has its merits, but it is not the only way we have our students work cooperatively. I guess I would be fine if the end goal of this group work was teaching our students to be good, cooperative citizens of the world. However, with all the reading and research I have done, I know that is not it. The goal is to create good little minions who will follow what the boss says. I can't be a party to that.
Did this count as a "group" project? Apparently to the kids it did. I had a few ask if we were going to do more group projects because they liked it. So does pairing kids count? You know, in the grand teacher evaluation, rigorous reformy movement? I didn't think so based on my readings of these stupid rigor demands, but the kids see it as cooperative when they have to work with others, even one other person. But, hey, the opinions of students do not count. These reformers want to see a teacher (boss) give a task (job) to a grouping of many students (employees) and have them complete the task (job) sufficiently. Much of this testing and observing and evaluating is developed by corporations that are interested in having schools produce amenable workers.
However, if they came into an art room, they would see the kind of group work and cooperation that benefits society, not CEOs. Things like assisting each other with loading film in the camera, developing rolls of film cooperatively, sharing darkroom stations, taking turns to clean up the darkroom with a partner or partners, gathering together to talk about a classmate's really cool print and how she got that, gathering together to figure out how a classmate can improve his print, setting up and taking down equipment, mixing the chemistry for a project.
Having to do some dinky group report or presentation has its merits, but it is not the only way we have our students work cooperatively. I guess I would be fine if the end goal of this group work was teaching our students to be good, cooperative citizens of the world. However, with all the reading and research I have done, I know that is not it. The goal is to create good little minions who will follow what the boss says. I can't be a party to that.
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Coffee!!!!
Holy crap!!! So go ahead and threaten cutting budgets, people. (Well, it hasn't happened, but that is the scuttlebutt in the halls.) I will use coffee!!!
So I have known about caffenol for awhile, but through this great Dutch alternative process site, I found links to sooo many great processes including this great site:
http://www.caffenol.org/
Hot damn! I am all set to have my kids pick a process from the Dutch site and go with that for a full fledged assignment. Process with beet juice? Go ahead. Skip the wine, of course... Washing soda? Got it... Photosynthesis and plants. Yes! Scanography? A way to use all the old, beat up scanners. So excited... Hope the kids will be too.
So I have known about caffenol for awhile, but through this great Dutch alternative process site, I found links to sooo many great processes including this great site:
http://www.caffenol.org/
Hot damn! I am all set to have my kids pick a process from the Dutch site and go with that for a full fledged assignment. Process with beet juice? Go ahead. Skip the wine, of course... Washing soda? Got it... Photosynthesis and plants. Yes! Scanography? A way to use all the old, beat up scanners. So excited... Hope the kids will be too.
Sunday, January 11, 2015
Some good things this week. First, this was the best return after Christmas break ever. The kids got right o work. Amazing. I barely had to struggle to get anyone to work. Usually the first couple of days back, you fight to get anything done. The kids whine about being back and being too tired. I really think that a full week and a half and not returning right after New Year's Day made the difference. If I was an administrator or board member, I would never have school start up again on January 2 ever. It is a waste. This was the most productive return I have ever had. My kids worked me so hard I was pooped by the end of the week. Perfect.
Next, I saw a great post online. A former student is studying radiology. She said she is excelling because she knows how not to over or under expose her x-rays. Then she credited taking photo with me for teaching her this. I was flabbergasted. It was so kind of her to do that. But it also taught me that there are subject areas that benefit from what I teach and I am clueless about them. I always go on about the physics and chemistry of what we do, but there are other things I never even thought about. I know that my area is one of the first to go when cuts are needed. I know that some people are foaming at the mouth trying to get my classrooms for the dreaded influx of autistic students (the panic in the building makes me sick). However, apparently my class does more than make pretty pictures. This won't help me keep my darkroom or my program, but it helps me emotionally.
So Friday night was fantastic. We are meeting more nice people and I am even running into a couple of people I used to know. I had such a great, long conversation with a gal I used to know years back. My friend and I said the people, music, and small crowd made it like a nice little basement party. Fabulous.
So, I go to the bar and the bartender already knows. "Tap water?" "Yes, thank you." I do leave him a tip though it costs nothing. No one I associate with there ever gets sloppy drunk. Some of us just get water the whole night. As we are driving home, there is a car pulled over on route 280, driver door open, driver leaning out puking on the roadway. Cops? Not one in sight. Now lets compare this to earlier in the week. Went out with not-my-types this week. Drunks outnumbered sober people. Voices were way too loud. I was one of the first to leave, as has become my M.O.. From what I gather, not everyone who drove themselves home was sober. The luck of these selfish people is astounding.
Now, I have grown up as the loser. I didn't do drugs. Strike one. I didn't drink. Strike two. And I didn't screw around. Strike three. I have my reasons for the choices I make, and in a world where everyone bares their souls, I am keeping all of my reasons to myself. When I got to college, there was a faction of ladies at the radio station that sneered at those of us who did not live by sex, drugs, drinking. I found a couple of people who lived like me. The issues seemed to go away when life in the work world started. I have always kept to myself on the job, focusing on work, not socializing. Then I got this job.
I take the opportunity to let my students know that I don't drink to get drunk and I do not do drugs, never have. I think they need someone talking to them honestly. I don't sugar coat anything. I want them to have someone they can look up to. Having to spend an evening with a bunch of "adults" drinking crap, being obnoxiously loud, talking about drugs, and whatever else is not my cup of tea. And then seeing those same people pass themselves off as figures of authority to be respected and obeyed the next day? I am getting tired of it.
I don't like having to prove myself as someone to be taken seriously at work. I have had colleagues get the message across to me that I am not respected ( I teach "fluff"), emotional (hello sexism, we call it anger), and not taken seriously because of my opinions and beliefs (hello to the jerks who did not even read my ISS proposal). However, if you want to find a teacher who is a good role model for the students, loves them deeply and cares for their well being, wants to teach them the subject as well as how to be good citizens of this world, it sure as hell is not going to be many of my colleagues.
I grew up with a mother who spent most of her time criticizing my tastes in music, clothing, extra-curriculars, and friends. And I still get this from so-called friends at work. On the surface, these perfect, normal looking people are mother's dream friends for me. They look and act normal. They are not freaks. They love their sports, love their arena concerts. love contemporary movies and TV. Text book perfect normal. And very critical of people like me. Now, I go out Friday night and I feel I can be myself again. I am not criticized for who I am. Many of us keep this part of ourselves hidden from colleagues and family. People do still judge based on your tastes and how you look. We play a part during the week just to get by. Yet it is ironic that we have to hide our tastes from the majority of people for fear of being judged. The music we like, how we dress, how we dance, the art we like or make, the way we do our hair or makeup all make us fair game for ridicule. However, at that same time, those who judge us are busy at the sports bars drinking themselves into oblivion, reminiscing about their drug days, maybe still popping pills, and driving home drunk with a gold card in their pockets to get off scott free if they get pulled over.
I'll take my freak friends. You can shove your normalcy. I know I lead the kind of life that my students will be able to look up to and I am not a hypocrite in the classroom.
Next, I saw a great post online. A former student is studying radiology. She said she is excelling because she knows how not to over or under expose her x-rays. Then she credited taking photo with me for teaching her this. I was flabbergasted. It was so kind of her to do that. But it also taught me that there are subject areas that benefit from what I teach and I am clueless about them. I always go on about the physics and chemistry of what we do, but there are other things I never even thought about. I know that my area is one of the first to go when cuts are needed. I know that some people are foaming at the mouth trying to get my classrooms for the dreaded influx of autistic students (the panic in the building makes me sick). However, apparently my class does more than make pretty pictures. This won't help me keep my darkroom or my program, but it helps me emotionally.
So Friday night was fantastic. We are meeting more nice people and I am even running into a couple of people I used to know. I had such a great, long conversation with a gal I used to know years back. My friend and I said the people, music, and small crowd made it like a nice little basement party. Fabulous.
So, I go to the bar and the bartender already knows. "Tap water?" "Yes, thank you." I do leave him a tip though it costs nothing. No one I associate with there ever gets sloppy drunk. Some of us just get water the whole night. As we are driving home, there is a car pulled over on route 280, driver door open, driver leaning out puking on the roadway. Cops? Not one in sight. Now lets compare this to earlier in the week. Went out with not-my-types this week. Drunks outnumbered sober people. Voices were way too loud. I was one of the first to leave, as has become my M.O.. From what I gather, not everyone who drove themselves home was sober. The luck of these selfish people is astounding.
Now, I have grown up as the loser. I didn't do drugs. Strike one. I didn't drink. Strike two. And I didn't screw around. Strike three. I have my reasons for the choices I make, and in a world where everyone bares their souls, I am keeping all of my reasons to myself. When I got to college, there was a faction of ladies at the radio station that sneered at those of us who did not live by sex, drugs, drinking. I found a couple of people who lived like me. The issues seemed to go away when life in the work world started. I have always kept to myself on the job, focusing on work, not socializing. Then I got this job.
I take the opportunity to let my students know that I don't drink to get drunk and I do not do drugs, never have. I think they need someone talking to them honestly. I don't sugar coat anything. I want them to have someone they can look up to. Having to spend an evening with a bunch of "adults" drinking crap, being obnoxiously loud, talking about drugs, and whatever else is not my cup of tea. And then seeing those same people pass themselves off as figures of authority to be respected and obeyed the next day? I am getting tired of it.
I don't like having to prove myself as someone to be taken seriously at work. I have had colleagues get the message across to me that I am not respected ( I teach "fluff"), emotional (hello sexism, we call it anger), and not taken seriously because of my opinions and beliefs (hello to the jerks who did not even read my ISS proposal). However, if you want to find a teacher who is a good role model for the students, loves them deeply and cares for their well being, wants to teach them the subject as well as how to be good citizens of this world, it sure as hell is not going to be many of my colleagues.
I grew up with a mother who spent most of her time criticizing my tastes in music, clothing, extra-curriculars, and friends. And I still get this from so-called friends at work. On the surface, these perfect, normal looking people are mother's dream friends for me. They look and act normal. They are not freaks. They love their sports, love their arena concerts. love contemporary movies and TV. Text book perfect normal. And very critical of people like me. Now, I go out Friday night and I feel I can be myself again. I am not criticized for who I am. Many of us keep this part of ourselves hidden from colleagues and family. People do still judge based on your tastes and how you look. We play a part during the week just to get by. Yet it is ironic that we have to hide our tastes from the majority of people for fear of being judged. The music we like, how we dress, how we dance, the art we like or make, the way we do our hair or makeup all make us fair game for ridicule. However, at that same time, those who judge us are busy at the sports bars drinking themselves into oblivion, reminiscing about their drug days, maybe still popping pills, and driving home drunk with a gold card in their pockets to get off scott free if they get pulled over.
I'll take my freak friends. You can shove your normalcy. I know I lead the kind of life that my students will be able to look up to and I am not a hypocrite in the classroom.
Friday, January 2, 2015
I treated myself to a couple of purchases this vacation. One of them was a book and two cd set from the label Dust-to-Digital. They release historic music from the US and around the world. They also make beautiful sets of music and books. My introduction to them was a Christmas cd hubby gave me a few years ago. It has songs from the 1910's to the 1950's, from US blues, jazz, and gospel to Carribean, Italian, and Ukrainian. What a find! Bessie Smith, Leadbelly, Lighting Hopkins.... Real gems.
So I had a lot of trouble picking and went with "I Listen to The Wind That Obliterates My Traces" which is a book of vernacular photographs of people with their musical instruments. The author put this together from his collection of old photographs. They include a variety of processes - tintypes, cabinet cards, ambrotypes, and such. The music dates to no more recent than the 1950's. The photos - so far - look to date from the mid 1800's and on. What a treasure trove of history. I keep thinking of a strange picture I found among my grandma's stuff. It looks to be in a rural setting and is a bunch of people with instruments. It could be Hungary or West Virginia or Ohio or who knows where (Great Grandpa was a miner and they moved a bit before settling in Brooklyn). Dad does not recognize anyone and never saw the image before. It is a mystery, like most of the images in this book.
I am devouring it slowly. I am also being bitten by a certain bug again. The bug that makes me want to go to Somerville and to that certain antique shop with the big basement and buy up a ton of old forgotten pictures. I guess it runs right in line with my love for graveyard and gravestone preservation. I have a hard time with thinking about all theses forgotten people and feel like I am keeping the spirits alive in some way. (I also resolve to get off my butt and visit the forgotten graves from my paternal side this year, but that's a whole other issue.)
Now, of course my teacher brain never takes a vacation. So I keep thinking that there must be a way to tie this in to a project assignment. The kids live in such a throwaway culture. Heck, people rarely even print the images they take nowadays and rarely buy actual music, like vinyl or cd's. The left behind music and photographic images are the only traces left by these people from the 1800's and on. But what are we leaving behind? Digital image and music files? Will the technology to read, listen, and view this stuff even exist when we are gone? And then what? How do people learn about and from us if we leave no trace behind?
I struggle with this a great deal. I mean, I know I leave no mark on the world when I am gone. But the remnants of others before me have had a profound impact. If all that is left behind is a bunch of intangible, technologically dated stuff, how will anyone be affected the way I have been affected by those before me? And how can I take these thoughts and have them coalesce into a meaningful thing for my students? Oof....
So I had a lot of trouble picking and went with "I Listen to The Wind That Obliterates My Traces" which is a book of vernacular photographs of people with their musical instruments. The author put this together from his collection of old photographs. They include a variety of processes - tintypes, cabinet cards, ambrotypes, and such. The music dates to no more recent than the 1950's. The photos - so far - look to date from the mid 1800's and on. What a treasure trove of history. I keep thinking of a strange picture I found among my grandma's stuff. It looks to be in a rural setting and is a bunch of people with instruments. It could be Hungary or West Virginia or Ohio or who knows where (Great Grandpa was a miner and they moved a bit before settling in Brooklyn). Dad does not recognize anyone and never saw the image before. It is a mystery, like most of the images in this book.
I am devouring it slowly. I am also being bitten by a certain bug again. The bug that makes me want to go to Somerville and to that certain antique shop with the big basement and buy up a ton of old forgotten pictures. I guess it runs right in line with my love for graveyard and gravestone preservation. I have a hard time with thinking about all theses forgotten people and feel like I am keeping the spirits alive in some way. (I also resolve to get off my butt and visit the forgotten graves from my paternal side this year, but that's a whole other issue.)
Now, of course my teacher brain never takes a vacation. So I keep thinking that there must be a way to tie this in to a project assignment. The kids live in such a throwaway culture. Heck, people rarely even print the images they take nowadays and rarely buy actual music, like vinyl or cd's. The left behind music and photographic images are the only traces left by these people from the 1800's and on. But what are we leaving behind? Digital image and music files? Will the technology to read, listen, and view this stuff even exist when we are gone? And then what? How do people learn about and from us if we leave no trace behind?
I struggle with this a great deal. I mean, I know I leave no mark on the world when I am gone. But the remnants of others before me have had a profound impact. If all that is left behind is a bunch of intangible, technologically dated stuff, how will anyone be affected the way I have been affected by those before me? And how can I take these thoughts and have them coalesce into a meaningful thing for my students? Oof....
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