PD Rant

The last two weeks have consisted of a lot of Professional Development.  If I were to make a list of things I hate about being a teacher, the question, "what's my grade?" and PD would be at the top.  Wednesday's PD was a district wide, all day event so the kiddos didn't have school.  The math folk were all placed in one room from 8:00-3:00 with an hour break for lunch.  During the 6 hours we were being developed professionally there was one presenter.

Side note:  Teachers have a bunch of strategies we use to manage behavior and encourage engagement and participation.  The behavior strategies work great for high school kids and the engagement strategies can be great, as long as your kids are interested and want to cooperate.  I know when I was in high school they never worked on me.  I was the shy, quiet girl.  If my teacher told me to think about something then pair up with the person next to me and have a discussion, you better believe I'd think about it, look at my partner, give an awkward grin, then turn away.  Now that I'm an adult (ha) I still am the shy, quiet girl at heart, but I'll do my best to get over that shyness because I know the teacher or presenter has put time into their lesson and I want to show my support.  That's not the way most high school kids think.

Anyway, getting back to PD.  All of these strategies are used on the teachers at every PD.  I go with it because I know what it's like to be standing in front of a group of people who are not willing to participate, but I can only handle it for so long.  The reason I changed my degree in college from Early Childhood Education to Exercise Science was that I couldn't handle being talked to like a child by all my teachers.  Whenever I go to one of these all day PD events I feel the same way.  These strategies are meant for high school students, not adults and professionals!  Rant over.

For reals.