The educational institution in which I am employed had a busy week (last week)...testing for two days and then hosted a project in which the students were involved in learning about history through interviewing veterans, which was an additional day. All of these activities took students out of some classes for three days. Please understand that although I am not a big supporter of standardized testing, I am supportive of the overall educational value them and the data it provides teachers. Additionally, the project, that has been going on for a number of years, is something that I think students will remember for years - hands on learning is the best.
"Tell me, I'll forget. Show me, I'll remember. Involve me, I'll understand"
Now, for the diagnosis...egocentrism is the inability to see other people's view points; now since every teacher lost time with their students, of course there is a concern that they get the material. In this instance, some teachers thought it would be OK if they allowed some students to miss other classes to take their exam because of the poor scheduling. This is not new...beleive it or not, there are teachers on campus that have the inability to see why I would get upset that my students were allowed to miss my class to make up a test for another teacher.
I am not shy...as many would tell you; so after emailing and walking over to their classroom to discuss this with them, they of course made it clear that they offered other times for them to take the test; but didn't seem to ask if they were missing another teacher's class. Now, there is always another side to the story, which I did get, however, the simple fact that the teacher offered the test during another teachers class is disturbing and this this not the first and only time that this has happened. It would be interesting to see what would happen if the shoe was on the other foot.
2 comments:
If the shoe were on the other foot, they'd (most likely) feel the same way--perhaps not respond the same way, but feel the same. There are some teachers that will ignore office slips for students, knowing full well that they'll get called up in a later class.
In these cases, you can become aware of which teachers work in a classroom, and which teachers work in a school. Your school has both, I expect, and they respond accordingly.
I struggle with this all the time,l especially since my subject is seen as a non-priority. I don't mind playing let's-make-a-deal with people, but what irks me is the assumption that it's okay to require kids to miss someone else's class to take care of business in theirs.
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