Educator, Learner

At the start of teacher appreciation week, I feel selfish. “I’m a teacher and I deserve to be recognized. Yes, I’ll take a PTA lunch. Thank you for the cards and candy. I’m awesome.” Then I remember that I’m only a teacher because of the people around me. How much more meaningful would this week… more

We learn by emulating or imitating. To begin our frog dissections this week, I demonstrated proper cutting procedures on a frog. Students watched and then imitated my cuts. Soon, they were off on their own with a new skill under their belt. “Mr. Bennett, to get through the muscle, I made a pinch cut again”… more

I cannot believe the year is ending in just over two weeks. We are down to 13 days here in Evansville, and the crunch is definitely starting. This week, we are enjoying the End of Course Assessments, courtesy of the Indiana DOE. Then, we will spend the last eight days of school doing frog dissections… more

I have not written for almost two weeks now. Half of the reason is because of writer’s block, another half because school is crazy, and a third half because of some family issues that came up unexpectedly. I opened up my blog a few times with intention to write, but I could not get anything… more

Unfortunately, we are entrenched in an age of education that wants to be “pretty.” Students are all reaching “mastery” in every subject and they all move at the same pace through every class every year. Like all utopian societies, this is not attainable. True learning is ugly (to outsiders), and we need to embrace that… more

Final exams and standardized testing are right around the corner for us. My students have the obligation to sit in a large room and take multiple choice questions that (supposedly) tell us (them?) how much they have learned this year about biology. Naturally, the discussion about study guides comes up more and more frequently from… more