Yeah, so I got solid B’s on my exam and last quiz (and an A on the first quiz) so I guess I probably won’t like, FAIL grad school or anything.

But man, there are some idiots in that class.  A lot are MAT students, people who got their undergrad in something, and are doing a one year program to become teachers.  There’s lots of debate about whether teachers should get a degree in education, or in a content area, and I’m big on the education angle.  There are some total geniuses when it comes to content, that have zero clue how to work to transfer that knowledge to other people in an understandable way.  It’s also a challenge to be a former teacher and trying to explain really basic shit, like "yes, rubrics should be seen by kids before they start their assessment/project/whatever" because I mean, THAT’S THE WHOLE POINT OF A RUBRIC! To provide clear expectations to students! A rubric isn’t an answer key, ferfuckssake.  And then this guy (who I finally realized reminded me WAY TOO MUCH of my Americorps site partner, old readers remember him, as does Annemarie) when I related rubrics to the backwards planning model, he insisted that such a thing didn’t exist. Oh. my. freaking. god.  Backwards planning is the model that undergrads, student teachers and such are encouraged, if not REQUIRED to use… but apparently they don’t do planning in the MAT program? I was DYING.  I even snapped "Look, I’m not just making this up, I’m just really surprised that you have no idea what it is."

ANYWAY.  This guy had lots of problems with his design, like using the word "most" which is way too subjective, and considering environments to be "land, water, forest, desert."  Those are different! Are we talking biomes? Land in one area is totally different than land in another! ARGH. 

I got mine, though, when I finally just gave up and sat back and let them put together their rubric their way, and the prof called out all the things I had fought to change as being wrong or unclear. DAMN STRAIGHT.  Any of the positive comments he had came directly from my suggestions as well, and then he even used me as an example later in the class as knowing what the hell I’m TALKING ABOUT because I, you know, TAUGHT. And have a degree in TEACHING. Not business or whatever. ARGH. It also sort of pissed me off, because dammit, I was a good teacher! I AM a good teacher!  But I won’t teach again because of well, so many reasons — pay, the assessment system, the fact that I’m smarter than most of the teachers that stick with the profession. . .  it sounds cocky, but it’s true.  And that sucks.