The Long Way of Teaching (Reflection#1)

From colonial times to nowadays, teachers' preparation has improved greatly. In fact, most of the teahers in colonial America did not have good preparation because they had gone to a elementary or secondary school only before they decided to teach in front of a class. These teachers were not required to have teaching abilities or great knowledge about the subjects, so the students received a mediocre education. Because teachers were not required to have good preparation, some of them were not reliable. For example, some teachers were fired because they were drunk or had stolen something. Also, some of the teachers were teenagers, and others taught for a year or two and then left schools because teaching was considered a temporary job. It is clear that the majorirty of American teachers at that time were not professionals, and students could not have a satisfactory learning experience at schools. The teachers' preparation in colonial times was the same as it was in medieval times, and it did not change until the nineteenth century with the appearance of normal schools this concept which had a positive in the American education system. These schools provided future teachers with teaching skills trough formal training, and some of these schools became prestigious universities of today. However, teachers' preparation still needed improvements. In the first years of the twentieth century, teachers were not considered professionals, and this was in part due to the fact that their level of preparation was not as high as in other careers like lawyers, and doctors, but this situation changed with time because programs to become teacher turned out to be longer, and harder, and universities amplified the number of teaching programs. In the eighties, there are clear attempts to improve teacher preparation. Some prestigious professors from different universities wrote reports criticizing the level of professionalism exhibited by educators at that time, and they suggested some changes to the education system. For example, a group of deans of Harvard called The Holmes Group wrote a report named Tomorrow's Teachers in 1986, and the same year, the Carnegie Forum released its report titled A Nation Prepared. In the 1990s the creation of the National Board for Professional Teaching Standards (NBPTS) was extremely important. This organization rewards teachers who show great preparation and commitment to students, so it encourages teachers to never stop improving themselves. Nowadays, teachers can obtain their degree and start working in a classroom trough a traditional or an alternative way. The traditional way takes place when future teachers acquire their knowledge by studying and then take their knowledge to practice, and the alternative way happens when teaching students work helping experienced teachers and at the same time they learned through the experience. Probably, the most famous of these alternative programs is Teach for America (TFA) created by a college student in 1990. This organization recruits members to teach in schools with poor resources and schools located in rural areas, and its members are rigurously selected. Then, it is not strange that this program is extensively accepted as one of the best among the alternative programs. However, not everyone has a favorable opinion about TFA. Some people think that recruits of this organization are not well prepared as teachers given the short period they are in the teaching field which is two years, so the students do not receive a good education. These people who do not agree with the program suggest that its members prepare more and stay as teachers a longer period. Teach for America is a controversial program without any doubt. Finally, the education system in the United States has experienced several changes since colonial times, and teachers' preparation has improved along the way, but I think that the education system is still evolving in order to make this countrys teachers more prepared and subsequently the students as well.