C4T-#3

The blog I was assigned to was SpeEdChange, the owner of the blog is Ira David Sokol. The idea of this blog is "the future of Education for all different students in democratic societies." This first blog I chose to read about was about Unions. This teacher, Ira really gave a great explanation of what exactly a Union is. People are in Unions a lot more than they think are. Unions are what give people advantages today such as; livable wages, vacation time, lunch breaks, sick time, and working hour rages. Ira's mother actually helped start the "American Federation for Teachers" in her district back in the 1960's. It helped create tenure, jobrights, lunch time, and planning time. This union gave teachers a voice and helped lead to highly successful educational innovations. This blog was very informative on the Unions, I actually didn't know that teachers were formed by a Union and to do this day, I am assuming are still a Union because of our benefits. It's amazes me when people do things to help other people that actually end up changing history. I commented on his blog stating how impressed and awesome it was that his mother actually helped start that Union in their area. His mother helped to make sure that teachers got the benefits and were respected as teachers.
The next blog I commented on was called Pedagogy 101, it was a poem and I would like to share it on here.

Suited (I thought) and tied,

earnest as the day was very long,
I taught them when to be still,
why they needed to listen,
where Columbus was born,
how to answer textbook questions
and what the similarity was
between my decrees and their grades.
Sitting at bolted desks
while flies rambled on tall windows
they taught me when to shut my mouth,
why I needed to hear,
where they were coming from,
how to question textbook answers,
and what the difference is
between schooling and education.

If I read right, the first part of the poem is talking about the struggles of teaching the students and the second half is the struggle of listening to the teacher. This poem really gets to the point, because students are just expected to sit back and be quiet and listen to the teachers all day long. Students always wonder, why do I have to know all this, especially stuff that happened over 500 hundred years ago. The teacher actually learns from the students in the second part of them poem, it's kinda reversed. I really enjoyed this poem, I have it saved to my computer to go back and read because it relates to some of the other classes I have taken dealing with students and teachers relationship in the classroom!