Ten Things a Teacher Should Know In the 20-Teens

With the recent explosion of technology, the field of education has already changed and will be even more drastically altered with the completion of the next ten years.  Although technology may affect the impact of education, its effects ripple out into other avenues.  Consider the following ten topics, listed in no specific order, if you are teaching or intend to be teaching during the next decade:

1. When you talk to students, you talk to their parents as well

Call them what you may: concerned, helicopter, or even Kyōiku Mama, parents today are more involved with their students' academic lives.  From a college standpoint, 90% of the phone calls I answered when working at a major University's Admissions Office were parents checking in on their student's status and orientation. Today if a high school student does poorly on a test, it's becoming more common to hear from the parent than the student, asking what happened and asking what challenges to overcome. Whether it may be to appease or to support such parental involvement, schools are now implementing an online system that allows parents to check their students' attendance, grades, and teachers' websites at their leisure.  Parents seem to love this, as one district claims a 50-70% usage, boasting that "the communication between the school and home has increased dramatically, and the parents absolutely love it."  Pardon me, but what ever happened to the communication between students and their parents?

2.  Students Live and Breathe Technology

Branded as "Digital Natives," today's youth are one step ahead of the sharpest of sharp company executives when it comes down to finding information, communicating or adapting to new and emerging technology trends.  After all, how hard is it really to grasp technology when your new Christmas gift as a toddler is Fisher Price's version of the iPhone?  After students leave your class, they check their email, DVR their favorite show while they video chat with their aunts, and text their friends all the while playing Farmville in the background on Facebook.  Can we honesty expect students in today's world to learn without technology in the classroom?  (See last week's post for a great example of this.)

3. Explore How to Teach, Not Just What to Teach

With technology and resources changing so quickly, a teacher might need to learn how to teach all over again.  What with wikis, forums or even Youtube, students have realized their ability to impact their world, and their input might even be crucial for a teacher's retention rate.  After all, the students in this year's class may not learn the same way as students two years previous.  When Jane goes and watches the History Channel about a Civil War special before going to see a flick about Johnny Depp robbing banks--only to then catch the latest webinar about her favorite rock group to finally follow it up with a Youtube video about how a Science Olympiad project was completed, chances are she didn't read too much that day.  Textbooks are still required and completely relevant, but this might mean scrapping the 10-year-old lesson plans from when Netscape was the most-used browser of the day and one-button-square mice were in.  To a group of students that may not get the recommended daily dose of human contact, some simple Dale Carnegie tips might completely alter the atmosphere and success of your classroom.

4. Your Personal Life May No Longer be Personal
For the young professionals just leaving college and entering the education realm, it would be very wise to alter your privacy settings on Facebook and go through those pictures you were tagged in your freshman year of college because, if not, one of the above mentioned parents will be sure to find it and let all of your supervisors know.  Social networks are a part of our lives, and it's becoming tricky to draw and keep to the line that separates them from our work lives.  (See a previous post about Twiducate, an alternative that could be very effective for you and your students.)


5. Generation Z has Ended.  Generation Alpha has Begun.

Articles on the Generation Z'ers have circulated enough for this blog to save its breath, but when families begin to relocate due to new careers and students' schedules becomes just as busy as their parents', a teacher's ability to teach a student may be indirectly affected.  After National Honors Society, church, sports practice, transportation challenges (i.e. walking home), and study groups for major projects, the daily lesson might not receive the attention that it needs.  Just as Generation Z was granted with a list of attributes and needs, teachers must now get used to a whole new list.  Since they will be receiving them before the decade's end, Elementary school teachers will need to keep up with the articles on Generation Alpha, the newest generation that just began their reign this year in January.

6. No More Assuming What Your Students Know

There's an interesting, recent story from a local Social Studies 9th Grade Teacher in Macomb, Michigan: "After displaying a world wall map for the class, I invited a few students up to the map and began asking them where a few countries were.  After discovering some difficulties with a few less-known countries, I started to ask a few major countries.  To my surprise, Brazil became a challenge to point out, as was other well-known countries like Egypt.  One thing that I've learned from coming into the 9th grade is that I've stopped assuming anything about what the students know from their previous schools."  And this can be for any subject, not just Social Studies.  Is it normal for a junior to not know how to FOIL or a senior to not know how to balance a chemical equation?  But who is to blame?  The teachers?  No Child Left Behind?  Changing Schools?  Technology (i.e. calculators)?  Parents?  All of the busy schedules?  Quite possibly a combination of all of the above.

7. A New Subject to Teach in the Classroom: Integrity
Technology has begun to play a concerning role with the ease of acquiring information on the internet.  Even one freelance writer mentions here in a blog post the frustrating increase in students cheating on papers with sites like ifreelance.com, which is virtually impossible to track.  Colleges and Universities especially notice the increase in plagiarism the past 5 years, as noted by Yale just a few months ago.  With thousands of dollars and a degree at stake, it's a bit easier than high school to establish the risks involved with cheating at the college level.  With that being said, plagiarism might be one of the hardest non-required topics to teach for high school teachers today.  Ironically, we can also use the internet to combat plagiarism, as seen with resources such as www.plagiarism.org or this university website that includes www.TurnItIn.com.

*Edit 4/20/10:  Just came across this March article on technology being used to cheat and what can be done about it.


8. Pressure from the Top Down - NCLB

Also known as the hovering axe over a non-tenured faculty's head, No Child Left Behind is a looming reminder of the need to optimize grades and student retention.  But at what cost?  If the lesson has corners cut from it, then not only are the students who wish to excel being restrained, but the disfigured lesson ends up forcing more catch-up work onto the next teacher's workload.  Instead of doing that, teachers are now exploring books on tape, podcasts, and other various supplemental materials that can reach different learning styles that allow their students to stay on the same learning plane.

9. Teenage Angst: More than Just a Cry for Help

Not to dwell on an ominous topic for too long, school violence is still becoming a growing concern.  CDC's report on youth violence from last year brings forth some thoughts to address.  More than 1 in 3 students had been in a fight the previous year and an estimated 30% of 6th to 10th graders in the United States were either a bully, a target of bullying or both.  A sign of the times, one may suppose.  With the surging popularity of UFC and other television or music influences, an extra task for the 20-teen teacher might be that of which to convince an influential teen that conflicts can be resolved outside of fisticuffs.

10. Hire a Financial Planner

Everybody acknowledges that being a teacher comes with its financial challenges, but recently it appears that a few more issues have arisen.  The leash on education's funding has, without a doubt, gotten awfully tighter across the board.  School districts are pushing back textbook adoptions, extra paper cannot be purchased, and state budgets are getting slashed.  Not only would it be difficult to have upgraded materials for your classroom, it might even become difficult to upgrade the teacher's salary.  Countless examples of wage freezes are occurring to help school districts cut costs.  The Bureau of Labor Statistics provides insight to the teacher's salary, explaining "Median annual wages of kindergarten, elementary, middle, and secondary school teachers ranged from $47,100 to $51,180 in May 2008; the lowest 10 percent earned $30,970 to $34,280; the top 10 percent earned $75,190 to $80,970."  So what can a teacher do to improve her pay?  Student organization involvement can add a few hundred to the pocket, or coaching sports might give a 10% raise in states like Michigan.  Not all states allow this, however, as coaching is becoming a full-time position with impressive salaries like those in Texas, where one head coach is paid more than the school's principle.  Toying around with an inflation calculator, there's been about a 25% increase in cost of living since the year 2000.  The last time education cuts were this bad, the teachers in the early 70's were experiencing very similar inflation rates and challenges.  But now, tack on a global economy with an incredible state of consumer debt, this is an experience that will challenge the financial fortitude of many.  If venturing into the education realm as a new teacher with a $30k salary (which was the equivalent of $37k in 2000), developing multiple streams of income might be a safe bet.

Reach out and iTouch their education

Who would have ever thought to hear this in his lifetime?  "Sometimes barred from the classroom owing to perceptions of security risks and student 'distractions,' smart phones and iPods are now making their way into the K-12 space, and with teachers' and administrators' blessings."  Would you allow an iPod Touch (also called iTouch) in your classroom?  ...A resounding "no!" is heard from those who shook their fists at the dawn of the cellphone, while the reluctant "yes" comes from the progressive individuals who understand that fighting technology is futile.  I recall the years when even if a cell phone accidentally fell out of your pocket, a hall monitor would be sure to enforce severe consequences.  Now it seems that you'd be hard pressed to talk to a 5th grader that doesn't have one.

But how do you regulate something with such incredible freedom?  "The games, the games, the games.  What an incredible distraction an iTouch would be in the classroom!" says the teacher that disagrees wholeheartedly.  Something tells me these are the same teachers who would be shocked to hear that their students are already playing Tetris on their TI-86s.  If students are interested in class, they will pay attention.  If students are bored in class, they'll find anything to occupy their attention.  It seems hard to justify that if there's a color screen involved that the situation would be any different.

As a matter of fact, not much really is all that different when looking at our first referenced article again: "after the stimulus money runs out, we're going to be in trouble in terms of federal money for technology.  The next logical step is for the devices to come into school."  Is this not what happened with TI calculators already?  Parents and students don't think twice to drop $100 retail for a calculator.  So let's compare prices.  An ebay search will show that many 8 gig'ers are $100 and possibly even less.  A refurbished or returned iPod Touch could run just as low, while a brand new 8 gig is only $200.

But why compare this to a TI if an iTouch can't replace a TI.  Or can it?  Not only is there a fully featured calculator app available, but there's also a graphing calculator app.  Texas Instruments has just started to perspire.  Because then what?  Now we can put the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution on the iTouch for students to search and discover that the word "democracy" isn't in any of the founding documents.  Next we put maps and atlases on the iTouch so a student who is talking to her friends about a different country can become their resource to show how densely populated India really is.  And then to add a frosting to the cake, we can throw in a fact of the day, word games, math games, and a combo dictionary/thesaurus to wrap it up.  Education publishers are just getting started.

Schools have already begun to purchase classroom sets of iTouches and have developed lesson plans around them.  Even at $200 a pop, a set of these technological marvels is a drop in the bucket compared to the money a school is used to spending on a computer lab or portable laptop station.  Get those lesson plan thinking caps on; it's time to start learning to teach all over again.

*UPDATE* 8/12/10 Although this article was written before the launch of the iPad, we had no idea this shift into the realm of education would happen so quickly.  Here is an article of Apple moving forward, striking deals with schools who adopt iPad sets.

No more answering the "Why am I learning this?" question

Ever had 5 minutes extra to spare at the end of your lesson?  It's happened before: it's too late to start a new topic and the students don't want to open their books if they'll need to pack them back up just as they get a feel for the homework assignment.  What's more, it's Friday and they're starting to get antsy.  What can a teacher do that could be anything but a reprimand to get them to settle down?  Simple, just open up a quick 5 minute video from The Futures Channel.

It's brain candy for the curious; it's a "How It's Made" for the career explorer; it's an academic YouTube for the classroom.  Learn how they used probability to locate one of the biggest underwater treasure finds to date; learn why it's profitable to pursue a green career, or even why math is so important for the art of baking.  These short clips will seize not only the students' attention, but yours as well.  With a 250% increase in internet traffic in 2007 alone, this site is becoming a popular choice among teachers for visual supplementation since it surpassed 10 million views.

Although a good handful of videos are available for public viewing, the expansive collection is available upon subscription to Defined STEM, the partner company that creates these videos with The Futures Channel (STEM is an acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics).  Pricing is definitely in favor to a teacher subscribing by the year, and the list of convincing feedback is exceptional.  Trouble getting students excited about math?  The site helps portray a dimension of the working world that students are typically unable to see, as noted by a teacher on the feedback page: "I show the videos to my Geometry and Calculus classes and we discuss the need for mathematics in the occupations highlighted in the videos."  Now when students continue to ask why they have to learn how to solve equations or why biology is an essential component to their daily education, a teacher no longer needs to reply with the traditional "so you can be a well-rounded student," and instead can just show a video on the application of whichever topic is up for discussion.  As a matter of fact, why not preclude your Skype guest speaker with one of these fantastic videos?

Extra educational tidbits give the site more flavor, as math teachers and fans of Stand and Deliver actually have the opportunity to see videos from and about Mr. Jaime Escalante's experience in education.  Collections of the best movies are available for purchase as well for those not seeking a subscription.  For the teachers that have difficulty adding supplemental educational elements into their tight curriculum, The Futures Channel is the perfect fit to maintain a great sense of edutainment.