Sildenafil + Tadalafil più economico senza prescrizione medica Quanto tempo per Sildenafil + Tadalafil generico per lavorare? Comprare Sildalis online Acquistare Sildalis Sildenafil + Tadalafil
Stendra Super Force generico all’ingrosso Valutazione 4.6 sulla base di 352 voti. Nome del prodotto: Stendra Super Force Categoria: Disfunzione Erettile Nome commerciale: Extra Super
To view this content, you must be a member of Ben’s Patreon at $10 or more Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to
To view this content, you must be a member of Ben’s Patreon at $10 or more Unlock with PatreonAlready a qualifying Patreon member? Refresh to
Subscribe to be a patron and get additional posts by Ben, along with live-streams, and monthly patron meetings!
Also each month, you will get a special coupon code to save 20% on any product once a month.
Unlock with Patreon
30 thoughts on “When Attacked – 4”
I’m about to find myself in there. Our Spanish 2s are weak because of my teaching. 🙂 Let’s do it!
You were by far the strongest teacher I saw in our Illinois workshop last August, Jeff. Keep us posted on those “weak” Spanish 2s.
That’s because I read your books!
Jeff, whoever would say such a thing in your school, that, “Our Spanish 2s are weak because of your teaching,” really has some bad blood. Those kind of insults we don’t tolerate from our students. Now you’re getting them from adults. It’s vindictive.
I imagine you have wonderful educators in your building on your side. Don’t let the bad blooded ones drag you down!
My story is this. Two teachers went behind my back and started asking another colleague if she thought that our “weak 2s” were because of the way I was teaching. Of course this colleague was with me at Ben’s clinic in Peotone, IL and she said “absolutely not.”
However, she told me about the discussion they had and I told the gossipers that I would be happy to talk about it whenever. They declined.
The “standard” that “my” twos are weak on is subject/verb agreement. That is the only complaint they have. Which to them is the whole curriculum. It’s a joke. One of them is a bully and the other one is just afraid of change. Set in her ways and never going to change.
I’m certain that this discussion has reached our department chair. There is no way it hasn’t. I started to compile a list of PD that I have done in the last 4 years and it’s lengthly. I’m sure it quadruples their PD.
They have no leg to stand on other than the fact that I don’t devote myself whole-heartedly to the archaic and idiotic curriculum that we made up 9 years ago when we got the textbook.
Like Tina said, I don’t think this is going to end the way they want it to.
My one liner back to those two people would be along these lines:
“I’m sorry, but I am unable to become your opinion of what I should be.”
They are right though. My kids are weak. I am hurting them. They can’t keep up with their peers. Their grades are lower this year than they expected.
The thing is what I’m doing shouldn’t hurt them. It should help them. But since our curriculum is so worthless this is what we have.
I’m not saying anything we don’t know here.
If our curriculum ever changes it’s not going to be to invisibles or TPRS in general. It’s going to be to thematic units of the AP curriculum. Even then, at least my kids won’t get killed for not being able to conjugate.
Jeff you said” hey are right though. My kids are weak. I am hurting them. They can’t keep up with their peers. Their grades are lower this year than they expected.”
This is because you have been inclusive of ALL students. Something as innate as being primed to learning a language is being destroyed in the traditionalist classroom. So you have kids just memorizing. They get used to it and they even drink that archaic kool-aid.
The two ways are so at odds. The old way is done. However, as Ben has said before Good vs. Evil. Krashen says we are at war.
Oh my! That is also my situation! Tell us all about it! Why are you getting called over to meet? Is it voluntary?
I went from the meeting with the principal at my school down to a meeting with the French teachers at Lincoln, our feeder school, the “Harvard of Portland” as my principal calls it. They are worried that my students are not ready for their second year classes. Well, admittedly, the students I sent them this year were NOT. They had a terrible experience before I arrived at their school last year and were the most cantankerous bunch of naysayers and complainers that I have **EVER** encountered or hope to meet again. It was terrible trying to get them to engage with ANYTHING. So, they now judge comprehension-based teaching on this group of kids.
I do think that next year’s kids will be a lot stronger and allay their fears. But also that they need to be educated on the standards, the teachers there. NOWHERE are lexical sets or grammatical accuracy required. NO FREAKING WHERE. Ad for them to keep my students from accessing second-year French by means of a test that is not even aligned to standards, and focuses on the “airport” and “train” and “school” and “house” wordlists and making adjectives agree and putting the right letters in the -er and -re and devoir and pouvoir and such, well I will fight them till the end on that. Last nigth I asked them to show me the standards that specify that the kids need those “skills” or knowledge. The half time teacher whips out the textbook with an air of satisfaction, saying, well, here are the standards, in the district-adopted text. I pulled up the district best practices document which states “the textbook is not the curriculum”. She asserted that the textbook standards were ACTFL’s. I pulled up ACTFL’s standards. NO GRAMMAR IS MENTIONED. NO LEXICAL SETS APPEAR. They have no legs to stand on and no one has ever come along to point that out. But if their misapplication of the wrong set of standards is harming MY KIDS and MY REPUTATION and MY EVALUATIONS and MY PROGRAM, then they will soon find themselves in a battle they cannot win. They will wish for the day when they could have just said, OK Tina, you win, we will just accept your weird little French speakers into second year. Just send them to us and we will work with them…instead they are going to soon be under the same microscope I am. Because if I am going to be examined in their light, they will soon be getting examined in my light – the light of the actual STANDARDS, DISTRICT EXPECTATIONS, RESEARCH BASE, and THE REALITY OF HUMAN BRAINS.
Now I’m so curious to see how much of a fight they’ll put up. Cuz, we all know you’re going to win, Tina. But how they heck are they going to respond? Please let us know!
Well they said we should observe each other’s classes. I said ha ha you can just watch mine on YouTube lol. But seriously folks, we are setting up two collaboration days. I’ll watch them. They’ll watch me. Then we’ll sit down with the standards and writing samples. I will have ten minute free writes. They’ll have ten minute writings on the chapter three prompts. Describe your school day and teachers. They couldn’t envision what a free write would look like. I said I tell them tell a story or describe something. They still wondered how they know what to write about. That right there is super indicative. I already heard back from the Lincoln principal that she’s in support meaning she’ll get subs for them. I CCd the department of dual language instructional coach and the assistant director. Asked what standards we should use and what assessment we should use and what if any lexical sets and grammar points we should use FROM THE STANDARDS. That was a trick question. Cause THEY ARENT THERE. I do feel somewhat hopeful. Doug told me he’d watched two of my videos. Monica said she’d tried narrating a TPR Story supplement from the textbook. It was to her first years. She was really surprised that the kids could say twelve sentences about the comic of the four pictures. I just smiled and said well the stories seem to make the words stick better. Maybe I can get them to try out some of the readings I wrote that use vocab from the chapter lists. Like Le Cahier méchant. A gripping tale of school supplies who have to learn to get along. And Le Prof idéal. A tragic take of a teacher who gives no homework and lots of candy. Then he gets sick and the sub is terrible. Or Le Prof qui adore parler. A cautionary tale of a sports-obsessed science teacher who never talks about science cause he’s obsessed with this two favorite teams. Maybe they’d see results with these readings. I created them to give that eighth grade group some CI last year. Though they didn’t really want to engage with it…
Wow, Tina. It sounds like you were ON POINT in that meeting. You are pretty much my hero. No question you’ve got this and don’t need any help in handling it.
In a meeting with a paid curriculum consultant this week (who shockingly seemed pretty supportive of my program and really did seem to ‘get it’ btw) my vice principal interrupted our surprisingly productive discussion around essential questions to say that she never liked her French classes in HS because she didn’t like to speak but when she got to Latin they were always diagramming sentences and she really thought that “made sense” because it helped her with her English and that I should think about teaching more grammar. I did not even know where to start with a response because there was so much wrong with her understanding of SLA. Luckily the consultant was very dismissive of her and we just kept going. Ha!
It turns out I think this consultant is going to be my ally in changing the minds of my principal and vice principal. She’s sympathetic to the revolution for sure. They don’t believe much of what I say but if it comes from her it might as well be the voice of God. LOL!
I hope to be able to pass along some admin-friendly materials that she and I create together. I’ll keep everyone posted!
It’s funny you mention this paid curriculum consultant, Beth. I had one of those a couple of years ago and I swear, if it wasn’t for him, I would have lost my job. It didn’t seem like my admin was going to listen to me then, and they really never have listened to me at all.
Isn’t it just lovely how your vice principal likes his idea about diagramming sentences so much. Seriously, I think you have to have fallen in love with yourself to be an administrator. We are lucky when we work under one that has a sense of humility. I’ve had a couple of them. They really make a difference.
This is great news!! I sure hope to find allies in the district folk. I mean our adopted standards and best practices documents support me and they came from DO. AKA Puzzle Palace. The hindquarters.
“But if their misapplication of the wrong set of standards is harming MY KIDS and MY REPUTATION and MY EVALUATIONS and MY PROGRAM, then they will soon find themselves in a battle they cannot win.”
DAAAAAAAMMNNNNN! That’s fire right there! They should best leave it alone. Now they caused a fight. It’s all cause they do not even listen. Rule #1 was never learned by these teachers.
Today I dreamed that Tina called me during school while her kids were making posters explaining how people learn languages. One poster said, “Babies don’t take quizzes and they learn English all right.” Some kid even got on the phone and lectured me on how kids don’t need textbooks to learn a language. Maybe it wasn’t a dream….
There is another important statement to be made, at least in California:
If this meeting will in any way have a negative effect on my evaluation or position, then I need to have a union representative in the meeting with me.
Then don’t answer any of the questions until you have a union representative present.
(Of course, you have to be a union member.)
I’ll add that in, Robert.
I did a little checking. These are called the Weingarten Rights and come from a 1975 Supreme Court Decision in NLRB v J. Weingarten. They are not just for California but for any situation with union representation.
Here is an article in Wikipedia about Weingarten Rights:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weingarten_Rights
I’m having my Union look into the practice of soliciting student gossip in the hallway to inform my eval. Yesterday the principal called my room during instruction. A kid answered. It’s his student job. She asked him Does that rule about doing your half mean you guys only have to do half the work? That got me pretty hot. Calling my room during class and once again soliciting kids’ input? So weird!
I will probably bring the building rep to my next eval meeting. She’s looking into instructional freedom and the notion of getting these little tidbits from kids. Also she’s looking into Can they force me to align with a program that’s not aligned to district best practices documents, state, or national standards? Seems unconscionable to me. This is starting to feel like kind of a fun fight. If such a thing exists. A battle of wits. Never go up against a Georgian when death is on the line!!!!
Wow, Tina. This is so problematic on so many different levels; I’m so sorry. It sounds like every problem you encounter you have really strong language, resources and backup to get your point across. As Ben says, language instruction is due for a change. Change is painful. But man, oh man, if you get this group on board, that could do WONDERS for our district.
Cannot WAIT to see how this all pans out.
Thank you Lady of the Lake. Or the Angel of the Bye and Bye.
Nope on the Bye and Bye. She’s the Lady of the Lake.
Not sure. She’s been my angel.
Lady of the Lake!
Tina, I think she will find out that it is permissible for an administrator to interview students as part of an investigation into teaching practices. Those interviews, however, should not be the sole or even primary input for evaluation.
Beyond that, though, there are larger issues, and you need to be wise in your dealings.
1. It was incredibly unprofessional for your principal to call your room during instructional time to talk to a student about your teaching. She disrupted the educational process for something that was neither urgent nor supportive of the teaching that was going on.
2. This principal has de facto begun an evaluation of your teaching outside the parameters of the normal evaluation process. It may well be within her realm of authority to do so, but it has consequences.
First of all, do not engage in any conversation with this principal about any aspect of your teaching without a union representative there. The principal has, under the Weingarten decision, three options:
1. Wait for the union representative.
2. Stop the conversation.
3. Inform you that she will not accept the presence of the union representative and ask you if you wish to continue. At that point, you have the option of continuing the conversation or not.
If the principal continues the conversation without your consent or a union representative present, she is violating your rights and puts both herself and the district in jeopardy of an unfair labor practices lawsuit by the union on your behalf.
DOCUMENT EVERYTHING!!! As soon as your are able, after something happens, write it down with date and time (as close as possible) and a description of what happened. Your principal may or may not be documenting her actions, but you need to document them for your own protection. There needs to be a record of her asking students about your teaching in the hallway – a public place and one not suited to an investigation – as well as the disruption to your instruction because of the phone call. Write down as much as you are able exactly what has been said, when and in what setting. Your report to us is a good start. If your principal is not documenting these interactions, then your comments written immediately after the incident will be much stronger testimony than her faulty memory at a later date.
Several years ago, I had a confrontation with our head counselor about my program. At the end of the conversation, I returned to my room and wrote down my recollection and understanding of what was said, how it was said, and the import of it. I then sent it to him with a message that this was my account of the meeting. He had three days to address in writing any errors in my report. After that I would consider it an accurate record of our meeting. I never heard from him, but I would have produced all of that documentation had it been necessary. (It didn’t make him look very good.) And I would have challenged any other account of the meeting as unreliable.
You are, in fact, in a battle not only for your professional life at this school but for the well-being of your students, and you need to think strategically. Facts, research, and logical reasoning are unlikely to persuade them, so when this goes higher up the chain, you need to have evidence of the unprofessional and unethical behavior that is going on.
My administrators know that my position is that I owe my employer faithful service, including following explicit instructions unless those instructions are illegal, immoral or unethical. I consider any instructions to give my students anything less than the best teaching of which I am capable to be unethical and would therefore be unable to follow them. Teaching from a grammar-based syllabus is not the best teaching of which I am capable. Teaching a course in “Spanish language appreciation” when the course is billed as “Spanish” and the course catalog indicates ability in the language as the end goal, is a form of bait-and-switch and morally reprehensible.
I give you my great admiration for taking your stand at great risk.
Oh, a couple more things on the Weingarten Rights:
– the conversation must stop when you invoke those rights; don’t say another word or they could construe it as giving up those rights. Keep repeating the following:
“If this discussion could in any way lead to my being disciplined or terminated, or affect my personal working conditions, I respectfully request that my union representative, officer, or steward be present at this meeting. Until my representative arrives, I choose not to participate in this discussion.”
– Pressure to continue the discussion after this is not only unethical and unprofessional, it is also illegal.
– You cannot be disciplined for invoking your Weingarten Rights; the Wikipedia article puts it this way:
Rule 3: If the employer denies the request for union representation, and continues to ask questions, it commits an unfair labor practice and the employee has a right to refuse to answer. The employer may not discipline the employee for such a refusal.
My administrators know that my position is that I owe my employer faithful service, including following explicit instructions unless those instructions are illegal, immoral or unethical. I consider any instructions to give my students anything less than the best teaching of which I am capable to be unethical and would therefore be unable to follow them. Teaching from a grammar-based syllabus is not the best teaching of which I am capable. Teaching a course in “Spanish language appreciation” when the course is billed as “Spanish” and the course catalog indicates ability in the language as the end goal, is a form of bait-and-switch and morally reprehensible.
This is beautiful Robert, thank you.
Ben wrote:
Another safe thing to say, instead of getting into an argument defending your position (you will lose) is to simply state that it is your professional opinion that the field of foreign languages is due for a change, that too many people think that they are bad at languages and have intensely disliked their experiences as second language learners, and that if nothing else, this is a matter that goes beyond personal preferences and is, in fact, a matter of our national best interests and even our national security.
I just read an interesting article:
Joseph M. Vocolo. “What Went Wrong with Foreign Language Teaching in High School?” in Educational Leadership, January 1974, pp. 294-297.
http://www.ascd.org/ASCD/pdf/journals/ed_lead/el_197401_vocolo.pdf
Note the publication date: January 1974.
The author discusses the deplorable state of foreign language instruction in the schools. He does not take the part of any one method but notes that the ESEA, which replaced the NDEA as the national education bill, provides virtually no money for foreign languages. As Vocolo puts it, foreign language is now foreign to the curriculum.
Following a discussion of the attitudes prevalent among administrators and foreign language teachers toward inclusion vs elitism (hint: elitism still runs strong), Vocolo presents ideas for programs that would, if employed, be effective at retaining students because they experience success in the foreign language classroom, and the programs meet the needs of the community. Furthermore, study of a foreign language could be a valuable school and life experience for high school students.
Vocolo presents six values of studying a foreign language: 1) stimulus for growth in language arts; 2) enriched knowledge of the world and broadened social understandings; 3) increased knowledge and awareness of the American heritage and the diverse strands that comprise it; 4) better international understanding; 5) recognition of the universality of the human condition; and 6) sympathetic comprehension of foreign people through insights into their values and behavior patterns.
There is, however disagreement as to who should benefit from these values. There are three positions:
1. Only the college bound
2. Only those who cross a threshold based on prognostic tests, grades in English, and general grades
3. Everyone. However, “The high attrition rate [in foreign language programs] suggests that this last view is little different from the first two [in its effects]. Moreover, it is shattering to see the large percentage of pupils who experience failure and frustration as they exit from foreign language study convinced that this subject is too difficult, not important, boring, and a waste of time.” [p. 296]
As a result, students consistently rank foreign language as their least favorite subject, and parents rank last among 48 different goals for their children “the ability to read or speak a foreign language”. (At least this was true in 1966 when Gallup conducted a poll.)
At least four different plans have shown success in addressing this issue:
1. The curriculum is a continuum “through which pupils may pass when they are able. All pupils are not forced to complete one year or Level I at the same time. This approach is based on the simple basic concept that some pupils need more time than others to reach the same levels of achievement. The positive results of this program showed a decrease in pupil failure and an increase in foreign language enrollment.” (Michael E. Hernick and Dora F. Kennedy. “Multi-Level Grouping of Students in the Modern Foreign Language Program.” Foreign Language Annals, December 1969)
2. The McCluer Plan: individualized teaching, programmed materials, team teaching, and flrexible scheduling. “The stress of this program is on the recognition of individual differences among pupils and an attempt to adapt a program to meet the interests and abilities of each pupil.” (Fred H. Wood. “The McCluer Plan: An innovative Non-Graded Foreign Language Program.” Modern Language Journal 54: 184-187; March 1970.)
3. The Fearing Plan: non-graded foreign language classes similar to the old-fashioned one-room schoolhouse. Students are grouped according to achievement in the various language skills. Levels have meaning only in terms of credit and enrollment “while the instructional program focuses on the learner and the development of foreign language skills. The dropout or failure problem vanishes, because under this arrangement only success is experienced as the pupils progress through the program. The ungraded concept offers exciting possibilities for the development of meaningful and successful foreign language programs. (Percy Fearing. “Non-Graded Foreign Language Classes.” Eric Focus Report #4. New York: MLA-ERIC Clearing House, 1969.)
4. Interdisciplinary approach: integrate foreign language with other areas of curriculum. Examples:
a. world history course taught in German (Helmut A. Keitel. “Development and Dissemination of Materials for the Teaching of World History in a Foreign Language.” Modern Language Journal 54: 112-15; February 1970.);
b.Puerto-Rican culture, history, and literature taught in Spanish for language arts and history credit; more than a dozen similar attempts. (Barbara Ort and Dwight R. Smith. “The Language Teacher Tours the Curriculum: New Horizons for F. L. Education.” Foreign Language Annals, October 1969, pp. 28-74.)
This was published in 1974, and many of the successful examples come from the 1960s. That’s over 40 years ago, and we continue with the same elitism and failing programs today. My study for the Short History of Foreign Language Methods showed me that the schools change their methods only when the demand from parents and others is great enough to force them to do so.
Schools are not beachheads of innovation; the7 are bastions of institutionalization.
As much as I hate to admit it, the education reform movement is right about one thing: the educational system needs to change. Unfortunately, they are consistently wrong about what needs to change and what the change ought to be.
Here are a couple of quotes from the article:
“… the National Association of Secondary School Principals, in a thorough and very influential report, championed the cause of foreign languages. (National Association of Secondary School Principals. “Modern Foreign Languages in the Comprehensive Secondary School.” Bulletin of the NASSP 43 (248): 4 September 1959.) This report recommended that all pupils, whether college bound or not, should have the opportunity to elect foreign language study and continue it as long as their interest and ability permit. Note that their statement said all pupils and implied a sequence of study to be determined by the interest and ability of the pupils. Yet, we know all too well that we never did reach any more than 30 percent of the nation’s high school pupils, and less than six in 100 stayed on for four years of study.” [p. 295]
“The fact of the matter is that many foreign language programs are simply not meeting the needs of the larger community and its children. When less than 25 percent of our nations secondary school population are in foreign language study and when only six percent of those remain long enough to profit substantially from the experience, then we can scarcely expect resounding support from the administration, the school board, and the taxpayers.” [P. 297]
“The question that the foreign language profession has yet to resolve is the gulf between words and actions; that is to say, the values we ascribe to foreign language study are simply not in harmony with programs which evolve as courses of study in secondary education.” [P. 297]
And hardly any African Americans continue on with foreign language study. I was at an interview for an alternative school in Chicago the other day, a school for students 15-21 that need credits to graduate from HS. The principal and assistant principal loved what I was describing about the CI approach. I’m hoping they offer me the job. I know it will be a pay cut but it’s worth it for the sake of feeling like I’m part of a meaningful community AND get to teach without holding back.