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The Future Deconstruction of the K-12 Teacher

Posted by samzenpus on from the we-don't-need-no-education dept.

An anonymous reader writes: English teacher Michael Godsey writes in The Atlantic what he envisions the role of teachers to be in the future. In a nutshell, he sees virtual classrooms, less pay, and a drastic decrease in the number of educators, but thinks they will all be "super-teachers". From the article: "Whenever a college student asks me, a veteran high-school English educator, about the prospects of becoming a public-school teacher, I never think it's enough to say that the role is shifting from 'content expert' to 'curriculum facilitator.' Instead, I describe what I think the public-school classroom will look like in 20 years, with a large, fantastic computer screen at the front, streaming one of the nation's most engaging, informative lessons available on a particular topic. The 'virtual class' will be introduced, guided, and curated by one of the country's best teachers (a.k.a. a "super-teacher"), and it will include professionally produced footage of current events, relevant excerpts from powerful TedTalks, interactive games students can play against other students nationwide, and a formal assessment that the computer will immediately score and record.

I tell this college student that in each classroom, there will be a local teacher-facilitator (called a 'tech') to make sure that the equipment works and the students behave. Since the 'tech' won't require the extensive education and training of today's teachers, the teacher's union will fall apart, and that "tech" will earn about $15 an hour to facilitate a class of what could include over 50 students. This new progressive system will be justified and supported by the American public for several reasons: Each lesson will be among the most interesting and efficient lessons in the world; millions of dollars will be saved in reduced teacher salaries; the 'techs' can specialize in classroom management; performance data will be standardized and immediately produced (and therefore 'individualized'); and the country will finally achieve equity in its public school system."

10 of 352 comments (clear)

  1. sage by One+With+Whisp · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And who answers questions about the lectures?

    performance data will be standardized and immediately produced (and therefore 'individualized')

    What? How is that individualized in any way? Is this not the very inverse of individualized?

    1. Re:sage by nbauman · · Score: 5, Interesting

      The people who put down public schools and experienced union teachers are "visionaries" but they don't have facts to back them up. If you want the facts, do a Google search for "Diane Ravitch."

      Ah yes, a single data point proves everything. Sorry. No.

      I have had exceptional public school teachers that cared about the students, knew their material, and provided a rich, learning environment. I have had hideous public school teachers that made it obvious that they hated the students, wished they were elsewhere, and only because thy had been on the job so long and were tenured that it was too late to change careers at that point. I have had public school teachers at almost every point in between.

      I'm extremely glad that you had only exceptional experiences with public school teachers. But please, don't start pretending that you're representative of all public school students' experience or that your teachers were representative of all public school teachers.

      Do your homework. I said do a Google search for "Diane Ravitch." Do I have to do everything for you?

      http://dianeravitch.net/

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

      Ravitch was assistant secretary of education under GWHB and Bill Clinton. She believed in testing and charter schools and getting rid of unions. The Wall Street Journal gave her a column. But she knew how to understand data. And the data said that charter schools were failing and the testing was unscientific gobbledygook. So -- unlike some people -- when the evidence went against her, she admitted she was wrong. She has more data than you knew existed. For example, she knows about the NAEP http://nces.ed.gov/nationsrepo... which actually did a good, scientific study of charter schools and found that they were on average worse than public schools. And I'm not going to find it for you, you can look it up yourself, although you're probably too lazy for that.

      There's plenty of data. And it doesn't do what the "visionaries" say. Most of this stuff has been tried before, and didn't work.

      I didn't say that I had only exceptional experiences with public school teachers. I had good teachers and bad teachers, like every institution. but most of them -- enough of them -- were good. I found more dedicated people in the public schools than I found in private businesses.

  2. Here is what I don't get... by toonces33 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Say some kid doesn't quite get what they were talking about in the lesson, and has additional questions. Where would that kid go? The local tech wouldn't be of any use - the kid's family would need to hire an outside tutor or some such. And if the family can't afford a tutor, well that's too bad.

  3. The exact opposite of what we need by Skarjak · · Score: 5, Insightful

    At a time when we are realizing that students aren't all the same and we need to adapt our teaching strategies to each of them, this dude brilliantly claims that the future is to sit them all in front of a screen with no support. We need to hire more teachers, not less. Size of classroom is one of the most important variables for the effectiveness of teaching.

  4. Re:edu-babble by ckatko · · Score: 5, Funny

    We interrupt this class room broadcast to bring you "Waffles, Tastey Waffles," from Delicious Corp! If your mom doesn't buy you some, she's cheating on your father!

  5. Re:edu-babble by plopez · · Score: 5, Insightful

    God save us from educational reform. We have had 30 years of it and things only get worse and worse. Less relevant course work, too many tests, talent driven out of the system, destruction of decent school lunches, no PE, etc. All that is left is sports and tests. The last 30 years has been an exercise in how to destroy an educational system.

    --
    putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
  6. Re:This plan has holes by cas2000 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    not necesarily morons, just slaves to fashionable management ideology.

    what's pushing this is the management class's absolute loathing of skilled individuals. they demand that every worker be a replacable component and they simply don't care that that means loss of productivity through loss of experience, skill, and talent.

    they have this attitude towards workers in education and every other industry - whether for-profit or not-for-profit. it's what they're taught, and it's what they believe.

  7. As a K12 teacher, I have to say . . . by Toddlerbob · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The TFA is an excellent example of that fraction of the population who has no idea what a K12 teaching job actually entails, but somehow thinks they understand it completely. As one of the respondents in this thread (who did understand it) put it, real teaching jobs will be one of the last to go, as they entail interaction between human beings. It's in the interaction that the best teaching happens. That's why K12 classes need to be smaller, and not like my 200+ member Biology 1 lecture at university forty years ago.

  8. Recipe for failure by ortholattice · · Score: 5, Insightful

    My step-daughter was literally math-illiterate upon entering college - very poor math SATs, couldn't multiply 1-digit numbers without a calculator, and didn't know that a+b commutes but a-b doesn't. I spent several hours a day 3-4 days a week with her, and through tremendous effort and lots of tears she earned all A's in Calculus 1 and 2 and Statistics. There is simply no way she could have even passed without my help (and a boost of self-motivation by a short stint in the real world earning near minimum wage with no college degree and no future).

    Rich people will hire tutors to do the same thing. Poor people can't afford to and rarely have anyone like me around to help. So the rich will get ahead regardless of ability; other than a few exceptionally talented ones, the poor will get further behind, continuing the cycle of failure and poverty.

    There is something about individual interaction that can't be duplicated with a computer or projection screen. A 50-to-1 student/teacher ratio with little individual one-on-one instruction is going to make things much worse.

  9. Every tech revolution... by jim_deane · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Every technical revolution in education since Edison's wax cylinder phonograph or prior has been prophesied to replace classroom teachers.

    A brief list:
    The Gutenberg press.
    Edison's phonograph.
    Classes by mail.
    Voice radio.
    Television.
    Two way video.
    Multi user computer terminals.
    Microcomputers.
    Multimedia software.
    The internet.

    This too will become a minor fad, blossom, fade, and find a very minor place in the ongoing art of education.