Saturday, October 17, 2009

I Am Asking For A Lesson In Lesson Plans

Perhaps those who work within the teaching industry could help me out on this one.

How much time does a typical middle school or high school teacher need to develop a lesson plan?

Is there a sense of lessening demands over time, in other words, once you get the first one, be it day, week, month, or year, do the following time sets follow the template?

How much time does a typical middle school or high school teacher need to adjust, modify, or review and revise their lesson plans?

My last question for the day is, do the typical middle school or high school teachers write lesson plans for the class, or one for each student?

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Richard

Teachers have NO TIME.

They can write all the IEP's they want but they will NOT be properly executed because teachers do not have the time.

Sorry but that is the truth.

Hell, I have not even looked at the IEP's for my own ESE students.

I am sure this will surprise and sadden you but most teachers don't look at IEP's.

I am not making this up.

You want to know something else?

Administrators don't even push teachers to look at IEP's

PRO On HCPS said...

It doesn't surprise me at all.

Sad isn't the word. It's mad.

Taking the situation as you described it, noting that teachers and administrators do not respect the IEP's because of lack of time, what do you think happens when a parent comes along and advocates for the implemenation of the IEP?

If the IEP is not being followed, teachers can not simply isolate themselves from the administration and expect the parent to understand that it's the system, not the teacher. Teachers can not tell the parent that they, the teacher, are the case manager, or the one responsiblie for the implementation of the IEP, and then expect parents to not be mad at the teacher and only be mad at the system.

What part of this do you think I don't get?

PRO On HCPS said...

What happened to the IEP assistant?

What happened to the ESE specialist?

What happened to the liason?

What happened to the countless number of ESE supervisors and directors?

Are you saying this is just a house of cards?

Anonymous said...

I am saying that teachers I have worked with do not look at IEP's unless they have meetings scheduled with parents and sometimes even then they don't.

It goes without saying that I am speaking for myself and my own observations.

The IEP specialists and case are overworked, under-trained and subject to the same time pressures as the rest of us.

The system is broken. It is people like you that keep the heat on. You must not stop. Unfortunately way too many who are paid to keep things "looking good" and sweep any problems under the rug.

Its all about pushing paper Richard. Teachers really do try to do their best for children but they are stretched to the breaking point.

Surely you must know that what I write is true.

Go to any school and ask teachers if they have read the IEP's of kids they teach.

Oh wait. You will be directed to an IEP specialist or a case manager. No, you will be told that all is well and the documentation will be in order.

IEP's are written mostly w/o parent OR regular ed teacher's input IEP meetings are held during the school day when parents are working and regular ed teachers have classes to teach.

You know the drill.

The meeting invites are sent out with the little check box where parents can conveniently check that they can be held w/o them.

I think IEP's are written using a template. After the IEP meeting, IEP specialists and case managers fan out and gather the perfunctory signatures from regular Ed teachers and the documents are buried in the Cum file where they never see the light of day.

Surely you already know this right?

House of cards? What do YOU think?

PRO On HCPS said...

You seem to have it down exactly.

Do you know how easy it is for a trained person to see through the paper work? My analogy of it is when the property appraiser goes out to assess a piece of property that the owner has claimed has cows on it, and there are no cow patties. It is easy to expose paper work when one goes into a classroom.

Sooner or later, there will be another issue that can be used to expose the system. Those of us who understand the system also understand how the system banks on the odds that they won't be caught.

That is why I have little remorse when they get caught.