Thursday, September 21, 2006
Blah
So dissappointing to get my hopes up that my little school district was going to do something more sensible about writing instruction and assessment. More of the same old same old and next week I have to sit through another inter rater reliability training. Those don't work. I want to send the research that proves how wishy-washy inter rater reliabiltiy is, if I had it at my fingertips, to all the staff and to the curriculum director.
I didn't even get an answer to my email when the proposal for an afterschool writing workshop for teachers went by the wayside with starting school. I had to write and say let's try again next year when there was no plan or calendar confirmation. I felt very under-valued and can still work up a bit of a pout about it, except that I am too busy.
So much inertia in education and it is one of the forces that exhausts people. It drains the creative spirit, that's for sure. That's why veteran teachers and surviving new teachers often hole up in their own little classrooms -- just to get by and not waste bullets on ridiculous ideas like educational reform.
I feel like I was taken. The most gullible Pollianna this side of the Mississippi, I'd say.
My consolation? At least writing is beginning to happen in an organic way in my classroom, though this week we had to jam in a district prompt that wasn't appropriate for the beginning of the year...but, what else is new?
Why bother trying to improve things around you? I notice some of the best "collaboration" is when my teacher cohorts and I accidentally talk about something at lunch and a book gets shared or some bit of idea...
I didn't even get an answer to my email when the proposal for an afterschool writing workshop for teachers went by the wayside with starting school. I had to write and say let's try again next year when there was no plan or calendar confirmation. I felt very under-valued and can still work up a bit of a pout about it, except that I am too busy.
So much inertia in education and it is one of the forces that exhausts people. It drains the creative spirit, that's for sure. That's why veteran teachers and surviving new teachers often hole up in their own little classrooms -- just to get by and not waste bullets on ridiculous ideas like educational reform.
I feel like I was taken. The most gullible Pollianna this side of the Mississippi, I'd say.
My consolation? At least writing is beginning to happen in an organic way in my classroom, though this week we had to jam in a district prompt that wasn't appropriate for the beginning of the year...but, what else is new?
Why bother trying to improve things around you? I notice some of the best "collaboration" is when my teacher cohorts and I accidentally talk about something at lunch and a book gets shared or some bit of idea...
Writing Cats & Dogs: Mini-series Teachers Writing Project
