"Teaching will become a job, not a profession. Young people will typically spend a year or two as teachers, then move on to other, more rewarding careers. Federal and state policy will promote online learning, and computers will replace teaches. Online class sizes will reach 1:100, even 1:200; the job of monitoring the screens will be outsourced, creating large economies for state budgets."
I have some fundamental disagreements with this passage above, most notably, the idea that young people will move on to more rewarding careers. I disagree because personally there aren’t too many careers out there that would/will give me more fulfillment than teaching. It is the main reason I’ve worked so hard to become a teacher. I graduated college without an education degree and worked several years in different fields. I left bigger paychecks because I enjoy working with students and helping others. I have an appreciation for learning and sharing with others and frankly, I’d be hard pressed to find a better career than this one.
Now don’t get me wrong, technology is here to stay I know that and I’m okay with it. I know that technology will shift our roles in education, but I find it hard to believe that we the teachers will be replaced. I do agree we could see the day where online learning becomes big and some classes are into the hundreds of students with one professor in charge. That being said, where I find this hitting the hardest is beyond secondary level education. I still believe most of our kindergarten through 12th grade schools and classrooms will have teachers working in them. However, let me elaborate on a statement I mentioned earlier, that our roles as teachers will change.
Just as our world is changing so too are our classrooms. Gone are the days when a teacher can stand in front of twenty students and talk at them for fifty minutes. Schools are being asked to do just as much, if not more, with less. Challenging schools to do better is not a bad thing. Making standardized test scores the end all bench marks, is. And turning education into a competitive corporate dog eat dog world doesn’t end well. At least not for the lesser half (and let’s be honest when I say lesser half I mean 60+% of the population). We’ve got to change this trend. Our founding fathers told the mother country we wanted to have this country stand on life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. The pursuit of happiness starts with an education. There is too much knowledge at our finger tips anymore for us not to bring it into the classrooms. The technology boom of the internet has helped make our standard core subjects come to life. There are so many media outlets for students to learn, create, and share with that the 21st century classrooms have changed from a teacher centered set up to a student centered class. I hear it said “teachers are becoming more like classroom managers as appose to classroom dictators like they had been.” And so we as teachers will work with the new tools of the 21st century and help the next generation find their way.
Teach
verb (used with object)
1. to impart knowledge of or skill in; give instruction in: She teaches mathematics.
2. to impart knowledge or skill to; give instruction to: He teaches a large class.
Please note that even with the latest and greatest technological gadgets without someone to help give instructions on how to use them or what to use them for, we do not learn. You can’t get to higher education or even higher level critical thinking without learning basic knowledge and understanding. But even beyond the obvious, let me make a simple truth I stand by; people need people. I believe that it is imperative to human health, both mentally and physically to have social interaction. Teachers do so much more than teach skills. A teacher provides advice on both educational and personal matters; they monitor and mediate peer interaction, and teach life skills such as conflict resolution. Technological devices are great tools or aids but there is no need for any of them if there isn’t anyone to share them with. I know our educational system is changing with technology as it should, but if we think we can take personal/human connection out of it, our education will not be preparing our students for the world they live in.
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