Excellent and, frighteningly accurate. Oh, another method (step in the process you described) that admin uses to punish teachers is by having endless meetings with them. They pull them in and ask why there are so many Fs and Ds compared to other teachers, and what are they doing to support the students to enable them to pass. All of the onus is on the teacher. The old Soviet adage is what happens with most teachers these days: We pretend to teach, they pretend to learn.
I think for us in California, yeah, they can waste our time and annoy us like the little gnats they usually are but it's so hard to fire us. In other states, it's a lot easier to say a teacher isn't following directives and get rid of them.
You know I'm blackpilled on all this, but I'm stupid and angry so I'm just going to keep fighting.
This all sounds horrifying and nightmarish and a complete 180 from how public school in the 90s was!
Lately I was feeling a little sad about how my kids will never experience going to school like I did, getting on the bus every morning, opening their books and reading. But it sounds like they actually are getting my school experience at home. We read together everyday everything we can get our hands on, we do math with mental tricks, counters, writing equations down on flashcards to help memorize. Science experiments are done in the kitchen or outside and this year my eldest 2 will be doing a science fair!
I don't know how other parents aren't up in arms about all this going on at the public (government) schools. Don't they remember how it was for them? Everyone knows that too much screen time is bad for kids (and adults too), so why are they letting all these devices do the work for the kids??? WHY?
I know the stereotype of schools are as glorified daycares nowadays, but why are the parents putting up with it? Don't they care that their kids are effectively dumber than they were at their age? This AI learning is too dystopian to me.
I'm trying. Thank you for commenting and adding your voice. Unless people like you and I can get parents to understand WHY the schools suck (and it's not the obvious things like LGBTQ insanity or CRT or SEL), we have no hope of course-correcting when AI inevitably shows up in every American classroom.
Keep up the good fight everyone. Not sorry I packed it in after last year. The story sounds too familiar. But what’s really at the bottom of it all? AI crutches are laughably, tragically counterproductive. But, besides the detritus of over-the-top bureaucratic woke-ism there are deeper reasons for the damned mess, and, with the damage done, superficial band-aids aren’t going to fix the leaking ship. Anyone care to weigh in? Personally I’m putting the blame on the admin suits, but they’ve had plenty of help.
I’m very thankful that I can be one of those teachers fighting this and doing more traditional practices in my classroom. What you describe is all around me in my middle school but I get to be an island of different in my room. Grateful for however long it lasts!
I read Hegseth’s book. Good stuff. The concept of paideia left a lasting impression with how I make sense of the state of our world currently.
I pulled up this article and called a higher maths kid (average academically, lazy AF in my class) up to my desk. I asked him if he used Gauth for math. "Nope. ChatGPT all the way." I pulled up Gauth in front of him - blocked - but ChatGPT isn't and neither are several others.
My second question was "Do you pay attention to the way problems are broken down?" "Yes - I have to."
I have not used AI as a tool in my classes, but even if teachers want nothing to do with it, it's unavoidable. No blocks tells students "you can and should use this 'tool'"!
One of the things our district is doing with the new "ban" on cell phones (by district choice, ranging from complete ban on campus to "teachers tell kids to put in pack" - guess what our district is doing?) is to close district wifi to everything but district devices. But not the guest wifi. So now we'll have a bunch of kids on guest wifi...nice work, DO!
This hits close to home. I see it daily. I would love to teach the same way I did 15 years ago, but that wouldn’t be “nice” or “trauma informed” or “equitable” or any of the new communist buzzwords thrown around by brainwashed teachers and unbelievably incompetent administrators with EdD’s who think they’re the modern day equivalent to Socrates.
That video should help you see how hard this would be to train teachers to do after they've been accustomed to being "guides on the side" for at least the last 15 years.
The books hre are more how-tos for teachers, but they'd help you understand in more grnular detail.
I have loved your posts but it’s hard to believe Pete Hegseth has any solutions for America. I am definitely taken aback we are discussing a book by him here. Trump is dismantling the Dept of Education as we speak and it’s not because he wants high quality education for all Americans, I can guarantee you that; it’s in service to tax cuts for the rich, end of story.
You don’t have to like Hegseth’s politics. He’s basically echoing ED Hirsch in saying that kids need the greats of western civilization. He’d like it to incude Christian values; you and I both disagree with that, if I’m not being too presumptuous to infer that based on your post.
As far as the DOE goes, I think you may need to read up on what it does and does not do. Communities need to control their public schools, not the federal or distant state DOEs. The federal DOE has done a terrible job with FAPE and college loans, while state DOEs like those I Chicago, Albany, and Springfield countermand what families and communities want for their children through onerous regulations.
thanks for writing this! it's so well written. i can't help seeing myself as the teacher you described. even some of the phrases you used are the same as i did: student accountability, equitable grading (i called equity in grading), and the roles of principal. i wrote my stories in a narrative, which i think will go very well with your theoretical analysis.
Just keep asking questions, especially of people who are highly enthusiastic and think THIS, finally, will be the magic pill that solves all our trickiest problems around our most important moral obligation: the education of our children.
Well that was depressing. 😭
Excellent and, frighteningly accurate. Oh, another method (step in the process you described) that admin uses to punish teachers is by having endless meetings with them. They pull them in and ask why there are so many Fs and Ds compared to other teachers, and what are they doing to support the students to enable them to pass. All of the onus is on the teacher. The old Soviet adage is what happens with most teachers these days: We pretend to teach, they pretend to learn.
I think for us in California, yeah, they can waste our time and annoy us like the little gnats they usually are but it's so hard to fire us. In other states, it's a lot easier to say a teacher isn't following directives and get rid of them.
You know I'm blackpilled on all this, but I'm stupid and angry so I'm just going to keep fighting.
Fighting is all we can do. We might not personally benefit from the effort, but hopefully our posterity will.
LOL. I’m just trying to effect my own children’s social deaths early so they learn to live with pain. MWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Self-amusement can take many forms. LOL. Traumatizing our children is one of the privileges of parenthood.
This all sounds horrifying and nightmarish and a complete 180 from how public school in the 90s was!
Lately I was feeling a little sad about how my kids will never experience going to school like I did, getting on the bus every morning, opening their books and reading. But it sounds like they actually are getting my school experience at home. We read together everyday everything we can get our hands on, we do math with mental tricks, counters, writing equations down on flashcards to help memorize. Science experiments are done in the kitchen or outside and this year my eldest 2 will be doing a science fair!
I don't know how other parents aren't up in arms about all this going on at the public (government) schools. Don't they remember how it was for them? Everyone knows that too much screen time is bad for kids (and adults too), so why are they letting all these devices do the work for the kids??? WHY?
I know the stereotype of schools are as glorified daycares nowadays, but why are the parents putting up with it? Don't they care that their kids are effectively dumber than they were at their age? This AI learning is too dystopian to me.
Nailed it. As someone who has taught recently, after the introduction of ChromeBooks, this sums up everything I experienced.
I'm trying. Thank you for commenting and adding your voice. Unless people like you and I can get parents to understand WHY the schools suck (and it's not the obvious things like LGBTQ insanity or CRT or SEL), we have no hope of course-correcting when AI inevitably shows up in every American classroom.
Keep up the good fight everyone. Not sorry I packed it in after last year. The story sounds too familiar. But what’s really at the bottom of it all? AI crutches are laughably, tragically counterproductive. But, besides the detritus of over-the-top bureaucratic woke-ism there are deeper reasons for the damned mess, and, with the damage done, superficial band-aids aren’t going to fix the leaking ship. Anyone care to weigh in? Personally I’m putting the blame on the admin suits, but they’ve had plenty of help.
I’m very thankful that I can be one of those teachers fighting this and doing more traditional practices in my classroom. What you describe is all around me in my middle school but I get to be an island of different in my room. Grateful for however long it lasts!
I read Hegseth’s book. Good stuff. The concept of paideia left a lasting impression with how I make sense of the state of our world currently.
I pulled up this article and called a higher maths kid (average academically, lazy AF in my class) up to my desk. I asked him if he used Gauth for math. "Nope. ChatGPT all the way." I pulled up Gauth in front of him - blocked - but ChatGPT isn't and neither are several others.
My second question was "Do you pay attention to the way problems are broken down?" "Yes - I have to."
I have not used AI as a tool in my classes, but even if teachers want nothing to do with it, it's unavoidable. No blocks tells students "you can and should use this 'tool'"!
One of the things our district is doing with the new "ban" on cell phones (by district choice, ranging from complete ban on campus to "teachers tell kids to put in pack" - guess what our district is doing?) is to close district wifi to everything but district devices. But not the guest wifi. So now we'll have a bunch of kids on guest wifi...nice work, DO!
This hits close to home. I see it daily. I would love to teach the same way I did 15 years ago, but that wouldn’t be “nice” or “trauma informed” or “equitable” or any of the new communist buzzwords thrown around by brainwashed teachers and unbelievably incompetent administrators with EdD’s who think they’re the modern day equivalent to Socrates.
I am enjoying these posts. Your last paragraph mentioned books about the return to direct teaching. Do you have any recommendations?
Oh yeah! Just remembered. Probably the most well-known book for normal humans is Pete Hegseth's book about education. https://amzn.to/3QaWIcI
Oh, and here's a good video of what it looks like in practice: https://x.com/Mr_Raichura/status/1878445428397469859
That video should help you see how hard this would be to train teachers to do after they've been accustomed to being "guides on the side" for at least the last 15 years.
The books hre are more how-tos for teachers, but they'd help you understand in more grnular detail.
Just Tell Them
https://amzn.to/42PO2jA
Direct Instruction: A practitioner's handbook
https://amzn.to/42Q8Pn4
The Power of Explicit Teaching and Direct Instruction
https://amzn.to/42NpVSs
Explicit Direct Instruction (EDI): The Power of the Well-Crafted, Well-Taught Lesson
https://amzn.to/4aRKsY5
I have loved your posts but it’s hard to believe Pete Hegseth has any solutions for America. I am definitely taken aback we are discussing a book by him here. Trump is dismantling the Dept of Education as we speak and it’s not because he wants high quality education for all Americans, I can guarantee you that; it’s in service to tax cuts for the rich, end of story.
You don’t have to like Hegseth’s politics. He’s basically echoing ED Hirsch in saying that kids need the greats of western civilization. He’d like it to incude Christian values; you and I both disagree with that, if I’m not being too presumptuous to infer that based on your post.
As far as the DOE goes, I think you may need to read up on what it does and does not do. Communities need to control their public schools, not the federal or distant state DOEs. The federal DOE has done a terrible job with FAPE and college loans, while state DOEs like those I Chicago, Albany, and Springfield countermand what families and communities want for their children through onerous regulations.
thanks for writing this! it's so well written. i can't help seeing myself as the teacher you described. even some of the phrases you used are the same as i did: student accountability, equitable grading (i called equity in grading), and the roles of principal. i wrote my stories in a narrative, which i think will go very well with your theoretical analysis.
You should link your stories in your comments on my articles so others can read them. :)
yeah right. the link to my book starts from here, if you are interested. very similar to what dissident teacher has described on this article. https://open.substack.com/pub/yellowheights/p/unbalance-an-immigrant-teachers-life?r=535i4b&utm_medium=ios
Just keep asking questions, especially of people who are highly enthusiastic and think THIS, finally, will be the magic pill that solves all our trickiest problems around our most important moral obligation: the education of our children.