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I am sure there are a few good teachers out there somewhere but across the state I taught in there was no sign of there being one. Narrow minded self interest people are not the ones we want to be role models and teachers for our children. Our teachers in our schools are the lastest in a production line of teachers coming from Universities with teachers who have never been in a classroom ouside the university other than for minor observations or some student teaching as required by most states. Once they receive enough education they run back to the safety of the higher education net and past on their vast amount of knowledge learned in their short time in the real world.
You know a teacher works an average of 175 days a year depending on the job and location and this with a full years pay. Now when I say work I actually mean from say eight in the morning until three in the afternoon with some breaks thrown in again depending on the subjects they teach. Now I know children of all ages can at times be monsters and sometimes dangerous as hell but if given the correct training and having the abilities to cope with the stress then a teacher has a pretty good life. Of course the teachers we have now are going to say they work twice more hours than that due to the state and federal paperwork required and I agree there are some extra hours needed, But we are talking about people with at least a bachelors degree and most will have a masters in their field. Don't take long to figure out who is the dumbass in the classroom. Classrooms of today are full of useless games and techniques that teach only a few of the better students, not the majority of the students who will enter the work force as blue collar workers and skilled labor. If anyone out there thinks this nation can survive on lawyers and doctors then be ready for a big letdown. We haven't taught basic skills in years and without a doubt never will again.
My field was industrial education and as believed by most teachers and administrators not really part of the school curriculum. Maybe not but at least I taught the students how to be productive citizens when they could be taught. It takes a lot of basic math skills to learn industrial technology education from designing a timed video to building a piece of furniture and as I developed my programs I found the students had no basic skills to work with. This is from the sixth grade to the last year of high school. Most of the groups from the sixth grade to the eighth grade could develop videos using minutes and seconds to time the video correctly. Any program I developed using fractions was a total waste of time as they could not do fractions of any type. When I say they I mean ninty percent of the students. I finally had to start teaching a small course on fractions before the students could begin their work on my programs.
More in a few days on education but let me leave you with one last thought. Afterworking with these problems for a couple of years I started studying why the problem was there and where was the root problem. I will go into that also later. I emailed the head of the state department of education at that time and received a reply that the state did not teach those subjects in depth as the workforce did not depend on such skills anymore. Well guess we are so smart we don't need carpenters, nurses, general contractors and other workers who keep our society going and trying to do so with pride in who and what they are.
If you believe this is bunk or nonsense or what ever take a chance to prove me wrong. Take two math problems into a classroom in any grade from the sixth grade to the last year of high school and see how many can give the correct answer with all procedures shown on how they worked the problem. Depending on the grade there should be at least 90% correct answers coming from the eighth grade through high school. Make sure the problems are given without any notice. Remember their bosses someday won't give a days notice on a project he wants done and done right.