What if the NFL played by Teacher's Rules?

Here is an article that one of my friends put up on Facebook and the title was very intriguing to me. Think about this for a second, what if players could never be cut from the roster as long as they have been playing with the team for 3 years. What would this alternate league be like? If the players were never getting cut and their pay was increasing each season, then the product of the players on the field would decline as well as they probably wouldn't want to risk getting hurt on the field. If the players are guaranteed a spot, wouldn't they work a little less harder because they are guaranteed a spot? Right now of course this isn't true because players give it their all every week to be better than the other team and to make the most money. The only way a player could be cut is if they retire or if there are cases of misconduct against them. This can be turned around and relate to the American public education system. It is true that when a teacher is in a school district for 3 years they are offered a permanent job there where they cannot be fired unless they retire or there is misconduct against them. The salary of a teacher and how good they are at their job have nothing in common. A eighth year teacher can be making more than a first year teacher, but that is only because they have been there longer. That does not mean that the eighth year teacher is better than the first year teacher. Some teachers that have been in a school district for a while and know they can't be fired may do just the bare minimum because they know they won't lose their job. Teachers that help the learning process should be rewarded other than those teachers that  don't get the job done. I know there are plenty of those teachers out there, especially in the physical education department. For example, when I observed in a middle school in 256, 2 out of the 3 physical education teachers had been at the school for 20+ years. The other teacher was younger and she had only been there for around 5. The way the 2 older teachers handled their classes was not the way that I thought they would. The unit was volleyball, and they set up the nets and threw the volleyball out for the students to play. From what I observed, I didn't see much teaching going on, although I was only there for a week. But the attitude of the teachers that were there for a longer time made me think that I could do a better job than they could. They had a mentality that they were there for a long time and what they have done in the past years has worked so they are going to keep doing it. Students need to be exposed to teachers that are motivated and love their job and are going to get the students involved. These are the teachers that should be rewarded for their hard work and dedication to the subject they are teaching.

What is YOUR Reason for Teaching?

One of the graphs that caught my attention in Chapter 1 was Figure 1.1 on page 4. For some reason I thought that the highest reason for teaching would be the salary for teaching or the long summer vacation. Those are probably misconceptions that I thought about being around teachers for such a long time. I thought what motivated them most was their time off for holidays and that they would be getting paid more teaching than they would at any other job. After looking at this graph it makes the most sense now that 70% of teachers have a desire to work with young people and that is why they enjoy their profession so much. It is satisfying for a teacher to teach young people a subject that they do not know much about, or a subject that they enjoy. I know that I remember a few of my teachers from high school because they made such a big impact on my life. That is the kind of teacher I want to be for my students, and my driving force for becoming a teacher is to create bonds with my students that will last forever. I want them to walk out of my classroom learning at least one thing during the year. If they remember one thing from that year then I will feel accomplished that I did my job. I feel as though some teachers are in certain professions for the wrong reasons. Many individuals that I talk to think that physical education is an easy major because we play games all day. Some teachers may be in the physical education field because they may not do much in their schools. It is more than just rolling the ball out to the students and having them play games on their own. I believe that it is about making an impact on your students and incorporating all 3 domains into learning. One of my reasons for teaching is also because I am extremely interested in physical education because it has been a huge impact in my life. I have always participated in sports for as long as I can remember and always looked forward to physical education class no matter what grade I was in. Most of my middle and high school memories were made in physical education, and this was where I enjoyed myself the most and where I was able to succeed. I wanted to major in something that I had an interest in, not something that I was doing just because I had to decide what I wanted to do for the rest of my life. This is something that I know I'll be excited to go into work every day and learn new things from my students and create life-long bonds with them.

Urban Legends About Teaching

There are 2 urban legends that are written about in Chapter 1 that can be analyzed. The first being Teachers are born, not made and All you really need to know is the subject you are teaching. During the past 3 years at college I have learned all about the teaching profession and I have been able to observe my fellow classmates as they teach. I do believe that there are certain students where teaching comes naturally to them. They need a little bit of corrective feedback while teaching lessons to make them become better than they are at that point in time. There are students in my classes who need a little more work than others. But I do believe that many of them can transform themselves into better teachers with practice and the right suggestions. If they listen to these suggestions then they have potential to be just as good as their other classmates. I don't think that it is correct to say that only teachers are born and it is impossible to become a teacher if you are not born with certain skills. Everyone can work at it to become better because practice does make perfect. With a lot of practice, these individuals that are not "born" teachers can very well become just as good as someone else who has been teaching for numerous years. To go along with this is the second urban legend about all you really need to know is the subject you are teaching is that sometimes teachers that know too much about what they are teaching are not able to relay the information back to their students. They sometimes have trouble teaching their students because they know the information, but it is hard to explain it to others. I have encountered a few teachers in college that are very smart about their subject matter, but have a difficult time teaching the class because they are masters at what they are teaching. Sometimes it is easier to teach a subject that you don't know much about to your students. I believe you need to know just enough to be able to teach and also you must be skilled in the art and science of teaching also known as pedagogy.  To be a successful teacher you must know about your subject and be able to teach your students about it. My main goal as a teacher will be to make sure that my students are successful at the subject no matter how much extra time I must put in to help them achieve their goals.