Teach for America teacher explains how sucky their training is

[Hannah Bell]

Last week, by way of a video posted through something called the Teachers Talk Back Project, I met a former Teach For America intern teacher by the name of John Bilby. He spoke of his relationship with his (non-TFA) mentor, David Greene. I asked the two of them if they would share some of their experiences with us.

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John: ...My immediate TFA supervisor had taught for two years; the program's "big gun" had taught for 5. My principal had taught for 4, the AP had taught for 3. Between all of them, they still come up twenty-four years short of you (experienced teacher Dave).

Dave, I remember when you first came in to observe me and everything was, to put it nicely, a mess: I was doing some confusing lesson on God knows what that I had picked up from my grad school class, I never varied the tone of my voice and the only way I knew to get people's attention was to count down from 5 or clap my hands. I also had posters covering every inch of available wall space and I didn't use my whiteboard, an absurdly labor-intensive and un-academic TFA "trick" where you write everything on chart paper and then "reveal" it as class goes on (it has the byproduct of completely stifling any class conversation). You sat me down and told me that it was, politely, "not too good;" more importantly, you gave me ways to fix it, number one being to have a personality in the classroom, which actually WENT AGAINST what I had been told, which was to be neutral in all things.

TFA would also give us access to "teacher-proof" materials, when in fact it would be some thoughtlessly scripted lesson with all the right buzzwords that would be over in ten minutes and leave you with an hour and a half of chaos. You mentioned the "prescribed and proscribing" scripts that TFA hands out - how do you think we can do these things better? I think more preparation with experienced teachers is key, but that means time and money, two things in short supply. What can new TFA teachers and mentors do now?

David: John, Those are two questions. TFA teachers are hard pressed to do much unless they can wean themselves off of the prescribed formulas and look for proscribed alternatives. That is not likely to happen for two reasons. TFA puts a lot of pressure on you to do it their way. They also give you the big TFA teat to suckle. They give TFA teachers the "safe" way to prepare, so TFA becomes like an enabling parent. As a result, only the strong and more independent type of TFA teacher will separate themselves from this without help. And that is more likely to happen with a mentor who knows about and successfully uses proscribed alternative methods.

http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2011/02/bilby_greene_tough_lessons_fro.html

[Pholus]

1. But I thought ANYONE could just walk in the classroom and share their life experiences....

"It's hard to teach well" doesn't correlate with the meme that the only real problem is hard to remove bad teachers.

[Fumesucker]

2. Good point..

This whole thing smacks of consultantism run amok.

[Reader Rabbit]

3. Praise to Bilby for having the guts to speak out.

I wonder if Michelle Rhee got a similar evaluation from a veteran teacher when she was doing her TFA stint, and she resented being told her teaching was "not too good." It sure would explain her current pathological desire to stick it to veteran teachers.