challenges in education

Challenges in Education
The morning school bell rings across the country and it is another day for elementary classroom teachers. They have worked hard to prepare a classroom that is inviting and educational. As the students come in the classroom, teachers are faced with daily challenges that did not exist twenty years ago. Teachers today must engage student that are used to multitasking, deal with the general lack of respect that is exhibited toward them, and teach the fundamentals with an ever-changing curriculum.
Students today are bombarded with a constant barrage of information and they like it. This poses a problem in the classroom. Of course, teachers always want to engage students to learn but, today’s students are distracted learners. Teachers can no longer ask students to sit at their desk and read a book. Granted, they could ask that and the likelihood of that happening would be very low. Conversely, if they let the student go sit on the floor on a pillow while music is playing in the room, the outcome is better. Beyond that, students do not work on math worksheets. There are smart boards with interactive problems, and computer games that make the students utilize math and tons of manipulatives to work with to help understand a problem. For these reasons, teachers must use all the tools available to them to teach in today’s technologically driven world. Webster’s dictionary defines respect as a “feeling or understanding that someone or something is important, serious, etc., and should be treated in an appropriate way.” Twenty years ago teachers and parents demanded respect from the students and this is no longer the case. For example, students are argumentative. If they are asked to do homework quite often they will say they did not have time or were too busy with sports. At the same time, parents will ask the teachers to excuse their child’s homework and be upset if their child is given a zero. Furthermore, parents are very litigious regarding school. If they feel as though a child is being unjustly punished they will call a lawyer. Twenty years ago, teachers were regarded with honor and respect and student’s feelings and rights were not the first priority. However, today we ask teachers to take direction from the students. Overall, students like discipline and order. Teachers just need parents and administrators to get on board.
Every year there are new ways to teach fundamentals and every year teachers are implored to adopt them. To illustrate, ‘Singapore Math’ is a technique used to explain and model word problems. Educators in Gwinnett county must include this method in their math lessons. Reading is no longer phonetically taught, it is based on context and picture clues. Furthermore, science teachers must tie in social studies and math into their lesson plans to satisfy the common core modules. Educators agree that the fundamentals are sometimes lost in the complexity of the curriculum. Aside from all of these challenges, teachers still love their jobs. Their students walk in on the first day of school ,a ‘blank slate’, and one hundred and eighty days later they can hopefully read better, challenge themselves with math, and have a better understanding of the world around them. Above all, educating future adults is a very rewarding profession and the hope that each one of them brings to the future was placed in them by a loving teacher.