Cumulative ideas and Teacher Salaries

 

The money is provided for the teacher's salaries.

An educational blog post is meant to inform the audience. The person who posts the blogs do research to find important information on the topic. The research gathered comes from reliable scholarly sources that have the correct facts to pull from. The blog is a source that feeds information to the audience that has been gathered on a specific topic. As mentioned by Wang Hong in an article about blogs, blogs are educational collections of information about a specific topic.  

After reading and writing several of blogs over this semester, I have learned a lot about several interesting topics. I have found that I am very interested in the ideas of teachers’ salaries. I have read some of my classmates’ blogs on this topic. They brought up several interesting points in their discussions. They all have decided to go into teaching because of a passion that they have had since a certain age in their educational career. They, just as I, are disappointed with the pay that teachers receive. Teacher salaries do range differently throughout different states and counties.  Some counties pay a lot more, but the number is usually still disappointing. Increasing salaries would not only help provide comfort for the working teachers but allow many students better educations. I am tired of the judgement and comments that follow when I tell people that I wasn’t to be a teacher. Grace mentions a similar conversation that she had with her dad. I agree with her that the future teachers in America are not doing it for the money. 

Overall blogging has been very informative for me. It has allowed me to research different topics that I find interesting and write about them. I would use a blog in my classroom as a way to communicate with parents and keep them informed on what is going on in the classroom. My students will be too young to be able to read a blog post. 

Teacher Salaries

Teacher teaching a young child.

Teacher Salaries are a very popular topic surrounding the field of teaching. Teachers have fought for years to better their pay. It is a nationwide issue that has been an important topic in the news for a long time. Teachers have staged many walkouts and marches to bring awareness to what they are struggling with. Many of these teachers will discuss their salaries as 'barely enough to live'. Statistics even show that starting salaries for teachers have dropped extremely in the past 3 years. As this is not being fixed, many teachers are getting a second job just to make ends meet. This is a problem as these teachers are being very overworked and are still constantly battling money problems. Society sees this so the question is when will the change come? 

It is not a secret that teachers are not paid much compared to other careers and not nearly what they deserve in such a hard field. Teaching is a very demanding job as you work from around 6 in the morning to 6 at night. The hours, emotions, and energy that teachers put in every single day should reflect better pay. I know that teachers get paid differently based on the schools that they are a part of. I would like to work at a school of religion but that is going to take a toll on my pay as they are paid even less than public school teachers. Teachers are judged by society for doing a so-called easy job or a job with no pay. We need to change this. More and more teachers are quitting because they are not treated in the way that they deserve to be. As I tell people what I am in school for, they stick up their noses and ask me if I am sure that I want to do this. Of course, when people talk to me that way it hurts my feelings, but I then remember what I am doing this for. I do not care about the pay I will receive; I am doing this to make a difference. I am saying all this to say that there needs to be a change. No one would be where they are today without their teachers. It is a crucial career and needs to start being treated as such with a better salary and a more positive society. 

Cyberbullying

Cyberbullying is a type of bullying that takes place on a digital device. It can be on a computer, phone, tablet, or anything that you can communicate on. The bullying that takes place on these devices can be anything from making fun of someone's appearance to calling someone mean names. The most common places that this occurs are social media, texting, emailing, and online games. It can happen to people of all ages. Not all cyberbullying happens in middle school, but it can even happen among adults or be an adult to child bullying situation. It is a worldwide issue that has been discussed since the beginning of devices becoming popular. There are now laws in place to try and prevent or stop the bullying in place. All states are held to standard as they must respond to bullying. Another thing about this form of bullying is that it could be your closest friend bullying you but it could also be an anonymous person or someone you have never met. That is scary as a child when a stranger to trying to contact you. Adults can take advantage of the uninformed child by getting into communication with them and then the bullying or inappropriate behavior can begin. 

Snapchat has been a major platform for cyberbullying

I think cyberbullying is hard for children to understand. This is because children do not see how the internet is forever. It is not just something that you can delete in a week. Once you put something out there it is out there forever. Everything about the internet is forever even Snapchat which appears to disappear in 60 seconds or 24 hours. I think the creation of Snapchat started a whole new world of cyberbullying. It was confusing at first because you think that everything on the app disappears. News later came out that everything can be pulled up and shown on the internet later. This was a major topic between my parents and me as I was growing up. Nothing that you put out there can be taken back no matter how sorry you are. This needs to be shown to young children in an attempt for them to not be hateful on the internet. They should take their relationships off social media and have face to face conversations. Cyberbullying cannot be prevented completely but the more knowledge the children have the more we can try to prevent it. 

Classroom Management

Classroom management is a crucial job of teachers that allows for effective teaching. An article posted by The University of Northern Colorado states, "Current research indicates that students in classes of teachers classified as most effective can be expected to gain about 52 percentile points in their achievement over a year’s time". This shows that classroom management is not just a tool to keep children from running wild but it is effective in improving their learning and development. There are many ways that a teacher can achieve this in their classroom but it is important that they get to know their students and their needs before they decide on a classroom management system. This is because some children work better with positive reinforcement while others can work better with a strict classroom structure. The teacher must base their actions on those of their students. 

Classroom Management Pinto Beans Tool

Classroom management is an area that varies depending on the age group of the students and the teacher's preferences. I will be teaching young children and in my experience, they work well with reward systems and positive reinforcements. My mother is a current 3rd grade teacher and she just shared with me her new classroom management system. It seems to be going very well for her so far. She gives each child a small ramequin of pinto beans every morning and the goal for the children is to keep the beans throughout the day. Whenever a child blunts out during a time when they should not be talking, they lose a bean. At the end of the day the students dump the beans that they have left into a big jar on her desk. The jar is marked with goals all the way up to the top like popsicle parties, extra recess, and no homework. I love this idea for the certain age group that she has. They are old enough not to play with the beans but young enough to love the idea of rewarding their positive behavior. This is an idea that I will take with me into my classroom in the future.