Last Post - Our Teaching is Essential!

 Looking back at this year, there is something you should know.

    Upon reflecting on this past year and the role we play as educators, a common theme of broad understanding comes to mind. We've often pondered whether our students should have to take all of the courses we require or if we are doing the right thing for kids who may never be headed to college. 

    Most of us know, however, the disservice we have done by only focusing on the testable skills (language arts and math) as we've struggled to incorporate science, social science and citizenship skills. High stakes testing and the push to squeeze it all in has left educators frustrated and exhausted for decades. 

    But there's another reason these singular-minded priorities are fatal for our students. Throughout the pandemic, we have seen the need for innovative and flexible thinking. The ability to jump into and out of new information and make sense of it has been crucial. A lack of ability to adjust has wreaked havoc and even death.

    David M. Perry, a journalist and historian words it well in his article entitled "If you graduated this year, here's something you should know."

                        

    "Throughout the pandemic, I've been struck by how often our challenges have emerged not from a lack of scientific expertise or access to resources (in this country at least), but from a lack of understanding of how fields of knowledge overlap and depend on each other -- and from failures to acknowledge how humans work as individuals and groups."

 

    This can be great advice to teachers to continue the good fight! A colleague words it well when she reflects (tongue in cheek of course) on her teaching priorities as a Science teacher...."I taught students, not Science."

    A reminder to us all that we are equipping our students to be in a future that is impossible to predict and one in which we are all so very connected.

    Peace out!

    ~ Jeri