Building from ground zero

Today was a cool high school observation that has made me do a lot of thinking. This teacher started as an English teacher and then moved into the News/TV production. He started with minimal tools to work with and now has a News studio, servers lots of computers and other equipment. The thing that amazes me is how he developed his knowledge. HE is a organized teacher who knows how to deal with students by giving them important assignments. That is definitely one thing that I need to remember is people need to feel important and not just another person in the class.

But the thing that it made me think about was, what will I do when I am teaching. How will I develop a program from where it is when I get there (maybe nothing) to a magnificent production where all the students feel like they are making a difference. These students can do amazing things if you let them. I think that is one marvelous thing that I am seeing in most of the schools that I have been to is that students are really being let go. Teachers are letting them think for themselves and the production standards are going up. I think that is fantastic. I think back to my high school years. We hardly had anything. We had several business electives, wood shop, architecture/drafting, computer classes, and that was it. These schools blow me away. What can I do to do that? I want to go back to my high school and check out what programs they have now. It would be interesting if I could end up student teach there or something. Kids these days are blowing us out of the water. I need to catch up so that I can help them.

What an incredible future that we have going for us!!!