Wednesday, August 18, 2010

Not My Job

From the comments to I Hate Reading Logs, a never-ending source of blogging material, comes this gem. This is from a self-described "8th grade English teacher in a very high-achieving public middle school in California":

So, when I said that it is NOT my job to instill a love of reading, I meant it. If you look at the California State Standards for English 8, it does not state that I’m to make kids love reading.

FUM: If we graduate kids from high school who will never willingly read a book again in their lives, the kids are not well-educated. I don't care what their grades or test scores are, or what college they got admitted to. A school that turns kids off of reading is a bad school. A teacher who turns kids off of reading is a bad teacher.

My job is to teach them how to analyze literature in preparation for their high school and college English and Literature classes.

FUM: Ah yes, the preparation theory of education: the purpose of school is to teach kids how to go to school.

How about teaching kids something which is actually worth knowing for its own sake?

10 comments:

  1. Of course, that teacher is right. If her (his?) kids don't score well on the standardized tests, she'll probably get bad evaluations from her boss -- thus less chance of promotions or raises, and a harder time getting hired somewhere else. If the kids end up hating both reading and learning, on the other hand, nothing bad will happen to her.

    But it would be nice if it occurred to her to question whether that situation is actually good for the kids.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Chris, you're right, but that doesn't make the situation any better.

    It's infuriating to me that an English teacher can write, "it's not my job to teach kids to love reading" and not see a problem with that.

    ReplyDelete
  3. I just read through some of that teacher's comments. In all fairness, it's pretty clear that she's not approving of the fact that the state doesn't care whether your child likes to read. (She's critical of the state education boards that "long ago forgot what the product is.") I don't agree with a lot of the other things she says, but I was wrong to suggest that she hadn't questioned whether the job requirements imposed on her by the state were actually good for the kids.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Chris, as a veteran of way too many StopHomework discussions, I can tell you what's going on. She's using the state requirements as an excuse. "It's not my fault 75% of the kids in my class don't read! It's the state's fault!"

    She wants to have her cake and eat it too. She wants to avoid conflict by positioning herself as "on the same side" as parents. She does this by trying to find a common enemy (the state requirements.)

    If you read back, you'll see that her initial position is to blame parents for everything that's going wrong. She says her students don't want to read because their parents allow them to watch TV, and if they don't want to fill out a reading log it's because the parents have "poisoned" them with a sense of entitlement. She says:

    ***
    The idea that “requiring” a kid who likes to read will dissuade them from reading is absolutely ludicrous and tells me that the parents in those circumstances have, quite honestly, failed.
    ***

    and this:

    ***
    I can hope that you aren’t poisoning your children with an inflated sense of entitlement because you think an exception should be made.
    ***

    ReplyDelete
  5. Chris, after a few years on the venerated SopHomework blog, I have come to exactly the same conclusion as FUM.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I have to concur with FUM about the sequence of defenses.

    When I have questioned reading logs and related approaches to reading, I am first met with, "Well, why don't you want your children to read?"

    After I patiently explain that my children do read, that in fact they have always loved to read, and that the school's approach will hurt that, the next line of defense from the teacher is the argument that teachers are required to assess outside reading (i.e., "It's the state's fault.")

    The longest conversation I had with a teacher on this topic (this was in person) ended with her essentially throwing up her hands and saying, (this is verbatim): "Then how do you propose to get them to read?" (they meaning all of her students).

    Makes my head spin.

    ReplyDelete
  7. ***
    When I have questioned reading logs and related approaches to reading, I am first met with, "Well, why don't you want your children to read?"
    ***

    Right. You gave me a flashback to the conversation I had with the then Head of School at my daughters' school, shortly after the log incident.

    Head of School (worried tone of voice): You know, she'll be expected to do a lot of reading next year.

    Me: She doesn't have a problem with READING, she has a problem with reading LOGS!

    Educators, oy. And notice the constant interest in next year, as opposed to this year.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Yes, points all taken. "I was only following orders" isn't a great defense.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Wouldn't the students be better prepared to analyze "their high school and college English and Literature classes" if they actually loved reading? A child who loves reading will put themselves into the shoes of the characters in the novels. This will help them think about and analyze the story. Can a child who doesn't care for reading every be good at analysis? Maybe they can. But it seems to me that a love of reading probably has to come first. A good teacher should be able to generate excitement about the material. If she doesn't believe that is her job, I don't see how she can be truly effective at doing the preparation she seems to think is her only job.

    ReplyDelete