Translation Services

      The article I found is about how the Philadelphia School District is beefing up their language – translation services for parents.  It’s their response to the settlement agreement with the US Department of Justice.  This steamed from a Feb 17^th memo from Obama’s administration that reinforces their 2000 executive order to develop and implement a system by with limited English proficient persons can meaningfully access the agency’s services and this is to include schools.

   In my opinion of this article I have mixed feeling because on one hand it’s a good thing because all parents’ deserve the right to be involved in their child’s school.  But on the other had I look at that their memo and granted parents should know what is going on at their child school, I just see that schools already have to deal with large budget cuts to save money, but now we are going to be spending money that could be spent more on the students, instead that money is going to be spent in creating school notices and forms in multiple languages.

http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2011/03/03/23language.h30.html?tkn=UTSFYf%2BtqU8FNNtIDI5atnVf7VWysozA7c3U&cmp=clp-edweek

Discrimination file still open after a year...

 

The initial article I found was about how there was an open discrimination file that was being investigated by the federal government in St Cloud school district.  It stated that this investigation have been open a year now and the Muslim civil rights group that requested the investigation still has not heard anything about how the investigation is going, even after a year of it being open.  After reading this I wanted to see if I could find any articles about the original claim and I did.

      The original article described that Somali & Muslim students were discriminated and harassed about their religion and race.  There was even one claim that a St. Cloud school bus driver left Muslim students behind at bus stops purposely multiple times. 

                When reading both articles it made me more annoyed because we are to be open minded as and to know that after a year that this investigation is still open and no one has heard any information of what is going on with it makes me upset.  I believe with it involves students an investigation should not take a year and have no response or answers yet.

http://minnesota.publicradio.org/display/web/2010/05/25/stcloudschool-investigation - original article
http://www.sctimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2011103010033 - follow up article

70 students in one class.

 

This article that I read what about a school in the UK that has classes that have 70 students in a class, they do have two teachers in a class and sometimes they do have teacher’s aids.  They say students are learning more than they did in years past where class sizes where smaller.  My only problem with this is that they may have two teachers per class with a few teachers’ aids, I still think some students would still fall through the cracks cause even with all the adults in a class I don’t think all the student would be getting the attention they need.

 
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/3397164/Class-act-for-70-pupil-lessons.html

Intercultural Development Inventory

With the Intercultural Development Inventory (IDI) results I was actually a bit surprised with where I scored.  I actually scored low where with me being in the military and having lived in another country for three years I thought I would have scored higher.  My only though is that maybe what caused me so score so low was my attitude and mind set.  Cause with me I look at everyone as human and it’s just their way of life.  I have a very relaxed attitude to different cultures, I show respect to other cultures but I look it as its their life and they can do whatever they want with their life.  And that is the only reason I could think of why I scored lower than I thought I would.

Bullied Video...

    Today I watched a video titled "Bullied" and as a future teacher I felt appalled by the attitude the main school staff and they way they looked at Jamie from the principle saying that Jamie should expect this treatment if he was going to be so open about being gay to later on in high school one of the faculty members just ignoring a teacher's and Jamie's request to do some thing about the bulling.
     I feel like they should have done more because they man not have physically taken an oath to help children, but becoming educators, I believe, we have been given the trust and respect from society and they children's parents to help and educate all children.  And with them saying that they are just kids.  Shows the kids that your approving of their actions towards Jamie and any other student that is bullied in school.

25 year old mother from Pakistani become a first grader...

Video:

http://edition.cnn.com/video/#/video/world/2011/01/21/sayah.pakistan.first.grade.mom.cnn?iref=allsearch

Article:

http://unhypnotize.com/world-news/45016-pakistani-mother-enrolls-first-grade.html

    This article is about a 25 year old mother that lives in Pakistani that enrolled in first grade with her two boys.  I love the idea of this article because after 25 years she took it upon herself to get an education.  Also, her husband is so much of a supporter of her.  It seems a little odd, but it just goes to show you that it’s never to late too go to school.

Freedom Writer's

Over all I enjoyed watching the Freedom Writer’s.  Erin, I believe, was the best influence in that school and in the students of Room 203 lives because she saw that she could make a difference and refused to give up.   Granted she thought she would have respect from the students right away because she was a teacher, but she was able to gain respect from them over time once she showed them that she was different from the other school staff there. She refused to take no for an answer from her buying the students books to the class raising of money for a speaker to come. 

                As for me, the other faculty members were selfish and have lost what it meant to be a teacher.  For example the teacher that was to teach the Jr. and Sr. classes throwing a fit like a child because the students wanted to stay with Erin.

                I believe Erin was able to make a difference in their lives so much because she saw the students as people and not as students with a trouble past that won’t make it far.  Once she got them to believe they could do anything with their lives, they started to see it in themselves.  Truly I hope once I’m a teacher that I could be able to make such a great difference in  students lives as Erin did.

Alternative teacher licensure

   Over all, I believe having an alternate path to receive a teaching licensure is great idea.  It's a great idea because it is speeding up the process to be able to produce more much needed teachers to reduce the student to teacher ratio.  Which would in turn give the teacher more time to spend with each student, so they have the best school experience as possible.  But I also have to ask, what would this speed up process cost in the long run.  Would this process produce less effective and less prepared teachers.  And if that is the case it would be the students who would be loosing the most in the long run.

http://www.kare11.com/news/news_article.aspx?storyid=900178

Why I Want To Become A Teacher...

Think back when you were younger and you were asked the question “What do you want to be when you grow up?”  How did you answer the question?  For me, every time my answer has always been to become a Special Education Teacher.  I have always loved being around children, but my reason is deeper.  For me, for almost my whole school experience prior to college, I was a student in special education for three classes.  Growing up and taking special education classes with my best friend who has Dyslexia and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, and seeing how some special education teachers interacted with her, showed how some where GREAT and some did not have the patience to deal with her.  Taking what I learned from being a special education student makes me believe that I would be a good special education teacher being I know how it is on the other side, sitting in the student’s chair.   Another reason for becoming a special education teacher is I would prefer to have a smaller student to teacher ratio, so I could connect more one on one with each student.  Along with this is that another friend of mine has a son that has a moderate case of Autism, he is such a great child.  I love working with him to get him to accomplish all his steps to continue with his beginning school years. Each time he finally accomplishes something he has been working at for a while, seeing his face just light up, just brings the greatest feeling ever to me.  And that is the three main reasons why I would love to become a Special Education teacher.