I assume the apostrophe in the headline is an intentional mistake intended as an ironic counterpoint to the principle/principal pun?
More importantly: does this post reference a specific case? Were there really 47 identical exams?
I used to read GED essays (TOEFL essays for ETS too, but that's another story). I was one of the readers of Mike Tyson's GED essay (you'll recall he was in an Indiana prison). I'm sure you can probably sympathize.
Oh. He got a 3 (out of 6).
At the risk of revealing my identity to any reader from my school, I MUST share this tidbit from today's PD. As an empowerment middle school we are creating five (5) asessments in each of the major subjects with some software gizmo called PROSPER. During the orientation the teacher, soon to be an Admin. running it said the following," we must put the kids in a constant state of teat taking."
At other meetings I was told how we have to have a portfolio for each kid and am assessment notebook with dated entries for each kid which will record what's already in the portfolio. How the assessments will be used as quarterly, mid term and final exams, even though Klein claims they will be stress free assassments. But of all the stuff i heard today the bit about test taking struck me as the reason retirement can't come soon enough.
That should read test not teat. Sorry!!!
The English Regents is such a joke. Basically all ESL instruction seems to be toward writing a "critical lens" essay. The weakest ESL students pass (everybody passes) and then go into mainstream classes where their needs are never met. They graduate, go to college and drop out because they were never given the tools they needed to succeed.
The saddest thing is that with the new Regents exams our students stop learning such things as punctuation, grammar and business writing.
GRant,
This post represents a first day message from a principal, and there is no irony in the title. The principal, alas, faces many interruptions.
The case is fictionalized, combining elements of three cases that actually occurred. Numbers varied. I will comment no further on this.
Rhoda,
You're right about the critical lens, which lends itself to the most plagiarism. This is because the kids must select two works of literature. Quite often they rpogram long quotes from spark notes or wikipedia into their "translating dictionaries" An easy fix would be for schools to provide translating dictionaries without bells and whistles, but in my school that's been rejected as too costly.
Now there are three other parts to the Regents, but I can usually teach kids to write minimally relevant 4 paragraph essays that earn 65. This by no means indicates they are fluent in anything but passing this single test, unfortunately.
There should be an alternative assessment for ESL students.
Today's PD went something like this: breakfast, brief message from the principal, then blah blah blah, lunch, blah blah blah, you have 15 minutes to get into your classrooms before you can leave for the day.
Only 187 more days to go.
15 more years, I wonder if you and I are in the same school? That is exactly my day! We stuck with Cashin and everything is "Core Knowledge this, Core Knowledge That, best thing since sliced bread, Yada, yada, yada."
I wonder what Randi and everyone over at the UFT offices first day was like.
Unitymustgo!
Randi and hacks sat in air conditioned offices. No one is making any pension appointments for the next 2 weeks because they have to get their "schedules made".
They get 2 weeks to get ready; we get less than 2 days.
Unity- We're with Cashin too (did you get your spiffy new "Core Knowledge" keychain?"). Our speaker was actually very good (she spoke about differentiated instruction), but I was just not in the mood to hear any of it.
Hope you had a fabulous summer. Welcome back! I'm excited about my 2nd NYC year and just going back to my school I realize that I wouldn't teach at another NYC school even if they paid me more...Well...maybe a private school. But that's a dream. Enjoy the 4 day wknd before workworkwork
What is everyone so negative for? I intend to have a great school year. It is such fun to sit in my air conditioned office while all those stupid suckers are sweating and toiling to get their rooms ready. I can't wait to see how many of those old slobs I can get rid of this year and hire new fresh blood and get 2 for the price of one. I'm all geared up to walk in and see how many U's I can give. I can take any lesson plan and find something wrong in it. That's why they pay me the big bucks. Thank you mayor mike for my new pay raise. I just love going back to school. The smell of fresh books and pencils excites me as does the smell of frightened teachers. I can't wait to strut my stuff and walk around with my notebook and pencil writing up those snails. I like seeing them sweat. When I was a teacher many years ago I liked scaring the students but now that is "child abuse". I would never raise my voice to a student, that is so politically incorrect. But I love berating teachers all day. That is why I became a principal. It sucks being a teacher. I love being me. Power to the Empowered. Oh and thank you Randi for making my job an even more delightful one.
Your Newly Empowered and Powerful,
Principal
Posted to feedback, ICE-UFT.org
Any news on the ATRs?
15 more years,
I feel ripped off! I didn't get no stinkin key chain. And I am so with you on the whole don't want to hear it thing. It's mind numbing at times. 90 percent of my focus is on thinking about what I could be doing with the time. Good luck to us all we are going to need it this year.
Unitymustgo!
Snorrt!
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