April 7, 2015

Gonzalez, Guadalupe Persuasive

Teaching Their Way

The closer I get to the end of the school year the more time I need to complete the task of
teaching my students before they move on to the next grade level . As I work with my ELL and Special
Ed. students I see huge gaps in their understanding of important subject material that is crucial to next
years learning. I dont feel like I have done justices to these two populations in my classroom this year.
I firmly believe that as we keep working the NCLB way towards all students being placed into the

same mold of achievement we are setting these kids up for failure. Teachers are pressured to
address teaching a certain way and therefore this forces a teacher to leave out curriculum that
should be taught Ravitch 2010).
All students come to school with very different academic backgrounds and family
support this is enough to create a huge gap already. Some of these students lack school readiness
due to lack of parent education or single parent homes with little time spent on proper student
encouragement and reinforcement in the early school years. There is no way to account for that
in the NCLB Act this is a huge downfall of NCLB. This causes students that are slower learners
to need more help catching up or keeping up with lessons. More teacher time needed for them
and less time with the average and gifted students (Stecher &Vernez 2010). A Law that takes
away teacher time from one student to give to another I ask where is the fairness there? How is a
teacher to address the needs of all these different levels of understanding and learning? It seems
to me that even if there was another teacher or aid in the same room to help out the set up is still
not there.

Some of these kids require the use of pictures, a very slow pace and extra time to acquire
and master an objective while the others need a much faster pace and more elaborate assignment
of lessons. Where is the justice in slowing down the very bright and gifted learners? If the fast
pace is kept for the brighter students and gifted learners the other students will get lost or act out
due to the stress it causes them just to try to even keep up orally and not to mention
academically. This is my classroom challenge every day. I have gifted learners, regular ed.
learners, ELLs, and special education learners and no aid to help.
I think part of the problem is that our students needs are not being address correctly and
creatively. Because of the NCLB we are trying to fit all students into one mold, part of that
means all populations to be serviced in the classroom setting. All students are not on the same
level in any subject and to say that they are is a huge lie. All students can learn but not in the
same way or at the same level. I believe that when we accept this reality and address the
classroom set up to benefit the students then our scores will improve dramatically. Each student
population needs to be addressed according to their capabilities and challenge learning to happen
at their speed not the NCLBs speed. The student ratio is also another place where change needs
to happen. A small group of kids per teacher will allow for great lessons to emerge and time to
work enrichment lessons in order to stretch application and practice of objectives.
I believe our school districts need to implement more individualized programs to
address the weak areas of our students and continue to build up those students that already have
strengths. We need to push for better equipped classrooms and programs to better service all the
different needs of our students. One example would be language enrichment classes for our ELL
students that would address vocabulary, writing and comprehension through the use of
technology. Gifted students although they tend to have a strong foundation in the language arts

could also benefit from enrichment classes that would alternate fine arts, math, science and
online programs. For special ed. students more opportunity to work at their pace through
individualized technology programs which they can access on their lab top throughout the day as
they have the class time instead of having to go to a computer lab on only certain days or times.
Students academic needs could also be better met with the help of technology in the classroom.
By that I mean lap tops for each student and students can work at their speed and test as they are
ready to test. To set up these classrooms takes an astronomical amount of money yet thousands
are spent on other things that are not helping to breach the gap of better scores. I know that this
idea of a lap top per student sounds farfetched but in reality this generation we are teaching has
grown up in front of a computer screen so why not look to what works for them. This is what
our focus is supposed to be our students and how to best teach them.
In spite of the great hype made as the NCLB act was being signed and implemented in
2002 it has caused more gaps and weaknesses in our nations public school system as well as in
our students learning. We need to refocus and do the right thing.

References
Ravitch, Diane. (2010). Why I changed My Mind. The Nation, 20-24.
Stecher, Brian., & Vernez, Georgees. (2010). Reauthorizing No Child Left Behind: Facts and
Recommendations. Santa Monica, CA, USA: RAND Corporation, 2010.