Homework #41, The Joys Of Researching.

How to become a teacher:
Dr. R. J. Kizlik, "Tips on Becoming a Teacher" http://www.adprima.com/tipson.htm, Updated February 13, 2010:
"Good teachers: are good at explaining things, keep their cool, have a sense of humor, like people, especially students in the age range in which they intend to teach, are inherently fair-minded, have 'common sense', have a command of the content they teach, et high expectations for their students and hold the students to those expectations, are detail oriented, are good managers of time, can lead or follow, as the situation demands, don't take things for granted, have some "hard bark" on them..." You get the point. I was wondering if there was an actual guide to how to be a teacher, and what tips would be recommended, and I found these things in the bold print of the website. I'm still wondering if teachers actually read things like this, or if it's all just taken for granted.

I know that our school is sort of unique, and how the teachers do their own things. Well, mostly. Like our whole digitalization unit, and how instead of desks we sit around in a circle so that we can all awkwardly make accidental eye-contact with each other. We have internship, and no school on thursdays. We have a roof garden. We have days where students teach mini-lessons or act.. etc. I guess every teacher does something different, but if anyone needs help that website might be useful.

A great lesson to learn, for inside school AND outside school. You can watch the video, or read it.
I saw this guy perform once upstate new york one time, and he was as amazing as he is here. So check it out, here. Or the words, here. I just thought this poem was a great example on why people can't always just use spell check, and how they still need to read over what they type to try and catch the mistakes as well.

I think this website is a great source, and that finding out things about learning in school is a great way instead of reading text books. A good lesson is that wisdom can be found everywhere, in books, in poetry, in painting, not just in school. Also, this guy Taylor Mali is a teacher, and has a great attitude towards teaching, and his kids. He has a whole book on poetry called What Learning Leaves, which discuses how it's like being a teacher and how it's like to be a student as well.

The problem with teenagers these days, and their lack of thinking and expressing themselves:
The video, here here. Words, here. This whole poem captures the way a big percentage of teenagers talk these days, on purpose or just because they were infected by the way other people speak. After I saw him perform this I realized how much I say "like", without even meaning to. He has stickers that say "this is a like-free zone", and stickers with the word like in a circle with a slash through them. Some lines that stood out to me are: "it has somehow become uncool to sound like you know what you're talking about? Or believe strongly in what you're saying?" I know how in movies there's often the really smart character (like in Grease) who gets laughed at by the not so smart characters. It depends on the group, but sometimes the incredibly smart people get laughed at, and the other people don't.

And this whole other chunk:
"I entreat you, I implore you, I exhort you,
I challenge you: To speak with conviction.
To say what you believe in a manner that bespeaks
the determination with which you believe it.
Because contrary to the wisdom of the bumper sticker,
it is not enough these days to simply QUESTION AUTHORITY.
You have to speak with it, too." This poem should really be read by all teenagers. This is a really good example of what Jacara said, that "we just dumb ourselves down". There are also a ton of movies for example with the girl who dresses in a way that shows too much skin, and purposely acts like she doesn't know anything, but then she comes in wearing her glasses and carrying books and the other kids look at her and think "Woah, what happened to her? She's a hot mess." What's happened to us? Why is it considered by a large amount of us that it's uncool to be smart?

"What Teachers Make":
video, here. Words, here.

Chunks of this poem:
"I make kids work harder than they ever thought they could.
I can make a C+ feel like a Congressional medal of honor
and an A- feel like a slap in the face.
How dare you waste my time with anything less than your very best."
and..
"I make kids wonder,
I make them question.
I make them criticize.
I make them apologize and mean it.
I make them write, write, write.
And then I make them read.
I make them spell definitely beautiful, definitely beautiful, definitely
beautiful
over and over and over again until they will never misspell
either one of those words again.
I make them show all their work in math.
And hide it on their final drafts in English.
I make them understand that if you got this (brains)
then you follow this (heart) and if someone ever tries to judge you
by what you make, you give them this (the finger).

Let me break it down for you, so you know what I say is true:
I make a goddamn difference! What about you?"
He's a good example of a teacher who has the right kind of attitude. I remember sitting there and feeling like he was calling me out for something that I'd done wrong, even though I hadn't done anything. I was really sick this day and my dad had dragged me out of bed to see him perform, which I was so grateful for him doing. Taylor Mali is a very passionate poet, performer, and from his poetry he seems like a very passionate teacher as well. I got to speak to him for a couple minutes and he seemed like a really great person. This is a great example of being a teacher that is largely out of the box, instead of teaching the typical text book stuff. He makes a "goddamn difference! What about you?"

Robert Frost once said, "Education is the ability to listen to almost anything without losing your temper." found here. Patience and to be able to hold your temper are some very important things to have, that a lot of people aren't very capable of doing. Robert Frost is saying that to be able to listen to anything without getting mad is to be educated. To be able to listen to stories, or lectures, (or anything else,) without getting mad, is what education is according to him.

This reminds me of the "In Death" series by Nora Roberts that I've been reading. The main character Eve is able to sit and interview tons and tons of people daily, and she has to keep her temper even when she's talking to people who piss her off, or who she thinks are the killers. Because if she and the other characters in the book weren't able to keep their temper while interviewing murderers, then they'd scare them away and they wouldn't be able to build a case against them because they'd have no evidence.

Wisdom, found once again in poetry:
"Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference. " works to the rest of The Road Not Taken, by Robert Frost, here. This poem tells a story of someone standing at a fork in the road, and seeing one path that is over grown, and one that's been walked on often. Then, instead of taking the road that everyone else traveled, he took the road "less traveled by." Taking this metaphor into real like, he's talking about there are so many times where people take the easy road, that everyone else has already taken. Because it's the easy way out, or because people know that other people have taken that path and been okay. Yet he decided to make his own way in life, instead of doing what everyone else before him had decided to do.

This is like how it would be for a kid in a family of dentists and lawyers to decide to become a poet or a musician instead of to continue along with the family tradition. The parents had probably decided that the kid would follow along in their footsteps, so the kid's decision to become an artist would be taken as shock and disappointment. This situation is told a lot in many stories. But instead of deciding to do what everyone else has already done, it is more important to follow your dreams, and/ or your gut, and do what you want to do.