Front Row Seats

Angel Rodriguez
English 1A
                                                                               
 
" I got us front row seats to see the teacher". That maybe every educators dream - that and a pay raise. Education has many problems and we need to experiment in order to find it's solutions.  Technology has been constantly evolving, while education has been merely the same since my great grandma was in school. Students are not engaged when they are  being taught irrelevant, boring and useless information. Students feel uncomfortable in class which impairs learning. School institutions inculcate the idea that without education we cannot achieve success and if we can't achieve success we cannot achieve happiness. Students are obliged to follow a curriculum in order to graduate. The education system is robbing us of our voice , and if we no longer have a voice we can easily be overpowered.  
          Technology has been advancing way faster than we can teach it. As we know, technology has been evolving at an incredibly fast pace; I remember like it was just 40 years ago, when I bought my first brick phone, and I remember Christmas like it was just 2 months ago, when I spent half a pay check on my kids iPhone - ok I don't have kids but you get the point. 40 years ago some rich guy spent nearly $4,000 dollars on a cell phone, when he could have only waited 40 years to buy a smartphone for $60 - Doesn't he feel silly. Education has not changed much over the course of history. My mom sat in the same class I did with the same teacher, teaching the same way and the same things. Teachers have to teach a certain way through a curriculum that the county gives them. The people that made the first car, the first airplane, the first cellphone, did not have any principles that they could use as guidance. What did they do? They had to experiment, in order to get the results they wanted. Teachers have to do the same, in order to get students to learn by heart and not memorization, which is what most education is based on. Students study a night before for a test and basically all the information they studied is forgotten. It's like a sponge in a bucket full of water, it will only retain so much water after it has been removed from the bucket. Educators need to find a way to keep the sponge submerged in the bucket.
          In addition, education needs a change. I found it interesting that the people in the audience ages 25 and up wore a wrist watch even though it was unnecessary, given that the only function it has, is in all cellular devices. In my opinion the people that wore watches, wore them just because they're used to doing it. I believe some things in the educational system are the same. Teachers have not changed their educating methods because they're just used to educating in a certain manner. The teaching methods in the school's I've attended, if not all but most, are the same. Students are expected to learn from copying down notes and filling out worksheets. All of the learning was based on repetition for the sake that it would stick to your head; some of the information sticks with you but most of it fades away, which makes sense because of the lack of practice. What I find interesting is, how is it that we remember certain things easily and other things we have to dig deep in to our memory? What did the teacher do differently? What did the student  do differently? I don't believe that the way teaching is done today has to be completely changed, it simply has to be updated-and it probably has to be a huge update, from teaching 1.0 to teaching 5.0. I remember a teacher was telling my class " I'm a math teacher but sometimes I'm a language arts teacher too" or something around those lines. He was explaining the origin of the prefixes on the names of some geometric shapes- which are in Latin and Greek. I didn't put much thought into what he said until now. I think that part of education is also a bit "out of date", that part being categorization. We expect to  solely learn math in math, English in English, history in history, so on and so forth. However, as i go back and reflect on it, I do remember learning various subjects in one class.
          Furthermore, Experiment with your classes, perhaps trying something differently with each one because not all classes are the same. Try implementing class discussions into your lesson plan. I believe we all have something to say and we'd like to be heard. Try making students comfortable as possible in order to have them express their thoughts and opinions more freely. By doing so you get the student more engaged because he feels important and he feels like he's a part of the class and not just that he's taking the class. The whole point of school is to prepare students for a job but they aren't given classes on how to actually get a job. For example they don't teach how to make a resume, how to make a first good impression on someone (for an interview).-Connections to me life- Classes are uninteresting because they aren't relevant to their lives. For instance you quizzed in history about " which countries did napoleon conquer/colonize?" when in your life will this be necessary? A trivia game is the only thing I could think of-It's pointless. It's unnecessary information that does not connect to us except for the point that we have to pass it to get credits to graduate. Students should be taught interesting and relevant things during the first days of school. Like in the beginning of an essay the first day of school should start with "the hook". Captivate the attention of students during the first days of school and they'll be eager to find out how it ends - "the conclusion".  
          Therefore, students may not be engaged because the lessons are irrelevant to their lives. If this perseveres, students will lose the notion to learn and will not pay attention at all. A solution to this out of my own experience, is to make connections between lessons and the students; for example, you can talk about the cold war as if it were two girls that gave each other the silent treatment and they're telling mean and nasty things about each other in order to get support from other people-Not the best example, but something like that. Making connections is like reviewing something you already know. For example, watching a play: the story is the same but there will be different people playing the characters; so all there is to it, is learning vocabulary.
          A classroom should be like your bedroom , you should feel comfortable in it. It should be a non-judgmental place, where students can express themselves freely. In the past I've had teachers snap at me, which I understand, because it can be tiring to tolerate me- back then at least, but sometimes I would ask questions and people would laugh-thinking it was a joke; however I was genuinely interested in knowing the answer. So then I felt stupid and got mad at the teacher- I didn't say anything or do anything, but that's all I was thinking about and I would lose focus on the rest of the lecture. There's many situations like that. Another example that is pretty common, is when a student has a question but never asks it because classmates might think it's stupid and/or might laugh at him. If we don't give students this sense of comfort, it'll keep them from developing their ideas and beliefs. A great way to get students to feel free to express themselves is by having discussions on class subjects and of course teaching them again what their kindergarten teachers had once taught them -- and hopefully their parents as well: Respect, a very important value. This is key to the learning atmosphere!
          School and society have planted the idea on us that without an education we won't live a happy life. This idea alone has made me feel very confused. If students grow up with this idea as am I they will end up the same way, confused without knowing what to do. I believe we do know what to do; however, we are discouraged because whatever we want to do: a) doesn't pay well ,
b) others don't respect it, c) takes to long to get the degree. As you may know, a lot of criteria and expectations to meet. When really it all comes down to what makes you happy. If this belief of ours keeps getting passed on, we might not have someone saying "do you want that with ketchup?". Not the most glamorous thing in the world if you ask me, but we all see things differently; and that should be the belief that should be passed on. All work is equally respectable and serves a purpose in society. We all depend on one another.
          Furthermore, the fact that school is obligatory puts more stress on our shoulders. Making something obligatory makes us question it, challenge it, disobey it. From my experience, sometimes we need a little push. But if you chain someone they don't have a choice; freewill is lost. And again the confusion arises again, weather or not we should keep going to school. Some students might even lose their willingness to learn because they have gotten beat up over the years that they have to attend school. Then, when that magic number 18 pops up, they drop out or decide to discontinue studying. If we feel obligated to do something then it's probably not for us. Things should come out naturally.
         





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