Educators(Each One Teach One)

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Comment by LaTonja Henderson (Lulu) on April 29, 2008 at 11:43am

Hi Fellow Educators, I'm counting down the days until SUMMER! Unfortunately, that will be the last day of May! The school year is getting longer and the summers are getting shorter! I remember when I was in school we had about 2 3/4 of a summer break!

Comment by Cheryl Henderson Ralph on April 28, 2008 at 7:30pm

I'm joining as a future educator. I just found out I passed the GACE exams. If anyone in the Atlanta area has any advice for someone looking to become a high school biology teacher please let me know.

Comment by Stephanie Harris-Reed, Ed.S. on April 28, 2008 at 4:18pm

Any advice? I am feeling burned out after 11 years. I need to get my fire back. Any suggestions??????????

Comment by Dr. Winston Bishop on April 28, 2008 at 9:22am

Good morning, Colleagues. I trust that all is well with you. I, too, was once worried about the quality of teachers, but then I had to step back and redirect my thoughts. Our profession has been inundated with external forces that are not in our immediate control. Even though education is a state issue, the Federal Gov has placed guidelines on it; we have created short-term readiness programs to counteract the shortage because people a frustrated with pay; the lack of governmental and parental support has created a frustration that concludes "they are going to do what they want anyway" kind of attitude. I suggest that we, create more formidable mentoring programs, have grade-level planning time to discuss curriculum and student performance; have grade-level administrative meetings so that there will be a source of support; provide new teachers in your building with a binder of common assessments; cooperative learning strategies-preferably Kaegan; look at ways of interpreting data; have new teachers to explain what students need to know and be able to do; how do they know they know it; and what are they doing when they do not know it. These are some things we have control over. We have been without resources for years, and like the professionals and survivors we are, we make the adjustments and build an opportunity for success. Usually we have know control over the hiring of our fellow "professionals", but when they get in our buildings, it is then our time to SHINE! Remember, they are responsible for the students that will hopefully have good jobs and pay our social security. Let get them ready for the task!

Comment by Katina Jolly Terry on April 26, 2008 at 12:52pm

Teaching and cultivating young minds is definitely not a job it is a calling and everyone does not have. That is why only the chosen should teach. Teaching is in my heart.

Comment by Jason D. Etheridge on April 25, 2008 at 6:42pm

This is more of a calling than a job. You with me??

Comment by Teleshay Idrell-Hall on April 24, 2008 at 6:53pm

Teaching is my BUSINESS!!!

Comment by Chanda D. Gordon-Austin, Ed.S. on April 23, 2008 at 8:53pm

Fellow Educator's Please Read... This is out of control!
Mother, daughter charged with attacking Atlanta teacher


By LAURA DIAMOND
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Published on: 04/22/08

Police arrested a high school student and her mother on battery and other charges after the girl's teacher was brutally attacked.

Atlanta police charged Georgia Thornton and her daughter Sequita with attacking Felecia Williams, a teacher at Southside High School, on Feb. 28.


Fulton County Sheriff's Office
Georgia Thornton


Fulton County Sheriff's Office
Sequita Thornton


The mother, 44, was charged with battery on a school teacher, disrupting public schools, criminal trespass and theft by taking in connection with the attack, according to the police report.

Sequita, 17, was charged with battery on a teacher and disrupting public schools, according to the report. Atlanta school officials also permanently expelled the girl and ordered her to pay $500 toward the teacher's medical expenses, said Joe Manguno, spokesman for Atlanta Public Schools.

Williams said Tuesday she had met with Thornton previously to discuss Sequita's grades and sporadic attendance. Williams asked a school police officer to observe a meeting a couple of weeks before the incident because she was afraid for her safety, she said.

On the day of the attack, Williams said the pair walked into her classroom during first period and began arguing about a book. Williams asked them to leave, but the mother pushed past her and grabbed a book off her desk, the teacher said.

When Williams, 40, tried to get the book back, the mother pulled the teacher's hair and threw her to the ground, the police report said. Then the mother and daughter stomped on the teacher, according to the report.

"She was swinging me by my hair, and my shoes flew off my feet," Williams said. "Then I was on the ground, and they were both pounding on me. I was terrified. So were my students."

Georgia Thornton disputed the facts in the police report Tuesday and said Williams hit her daughter on the day of the incident. Thornton said she had been meeting with Williams because the teacher wouldn't give her daughter the correct grade.

"That teacher, she had it in for my daughter," Thornton said. "I raised my daughter not to disrespect adults, so I took care of this situation. Yes, I hit her. I do what I have to do to protect my child at all costs."

The attack against Williams is among several violent acts against metro area teachers this year.

In January, Gwinnett school police charged a seventh-grade girl with simple battery after school officials say the girl beat a teacher so violently she broke the woman's glasses.

A note circulating in the Tri-Cities area in south Fulton describes attacks against six teachers at Paul West Middle in East Point over the past two years. No one signed the letter and school leaders say they don't know who wrote it.

Susan Hale, spokeswoman for Fulton schools, said a couple of the incidents described were initiated by teachers who grabbed students' arms to pull them in or out of classrooms. Another attack occurred when a teacher walked into a special education classroom to help a co-worker and was smacked with a chair thrown by a student with emotional and behavioral disorders, Hale said.

There's increased hostility against teachers as some students become more brazen, said Mark Perez, the Fulton County representative for the Georgia Association of Educators.

"We expect there to be a system in place to protect them from this violence," Perez said. "We are seeing people leave the profession because of this."

Teachers who have been attacked say it is difficult to return to work.

Williams has not returned to work since the attack and doesn't expect to go back this school year. She said she has severe neck and back pain. She suffers from panic attacks and is consulting a doctor.

She's been teaching for 15 years. This is her first year at Southside High where she's teaching a new class, video broadcasting.

"I love teaching and see myself going back to work," Williams said. "But it won't be at Southside."

Williams said school officials didn't do enough to prevent or break up the attack.

The school district declined to provide additional information about the incident because of the possibility of a lawsuit, Manguno said.

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Comment by Chanda D. Gordon-Austin, Ed.S. on April 23, 2008 at 8:50pm

Grady,
Thanks for the knowledge. I will be looking into this for several reasons.. the most important being that I am a new parent and I am constantly watching her diet. I also believe that diet has some impact on behavior disorders.. We didn't have ADD growing up.

Comment by Grady L. Mackey III on April 22, 2008 at 7:36pm

Concerning the comments about teachers lacking skills in the classroom: I think you all will agree we have all had a bad teacher here and there, but look at how wonderful you all turned out. I’m sure each and everyone of you has made A&M proud! However, I would like to remind us that there are influences on students today that were not present when most of us were elementary and secondary schools. I am a resource specialist, have worked as a dean, and have been in special education my entire career. I’ve noticed the changes in classroom management over the years, but I also know teachers are better trained today than they were when we and our parents were students. I, too, wondered why many teachers displayed such poor classroom management skills having been so much better trained, especially here in California (and I do not believe teachers here are in any way any better trained than teachers in the south). I began to look at the other influences, as have most of us have, that have to be factored in. Students have drastically changed in their behaviors, I’m sure you’ll agree. Those influences: family structure, environmental influences, and diet are, in my opinion, more the culprit than the lack in teacher skill, though that is also a factor. Just for argument’s sake, I hope all of you will investigate the influence of diet on student classroom behaviors for which teachers are blamed for having poor classroom management skills. In my unofficial investigation and research I have found a neurotoxin which contributes greatly to teachers’ lack of ability to manage the classroom. It is a chemical used in the embalming process. It is in all of the chips our students eat for breakfast on the way to school. It’s in the fast food they eat for dinner and, sometimes, lunch. It’s in some chewing gum. It’s affect over a long period of time seems to be quite detrimental. We all know of it, and have ingested it. It is called monosodium glutamate or MSG. There have been more than 17or 18 medical studies done on this compound since 1978. I hope you all will research this for yourselves and factor it in when assessing the abilities of teachers. MSG is thought to cause a myriad of problems to the young and old. Please research the affects of MSG.

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