Sunday, January 15, 2006

The Most Important Lesson I Ever Learned

Colleges of Education are currently under attack from the "reform" groups who claim they are nothing but liberal indoctrination camps. I went through two excellent teacher training programs at LSU and the University of South Florida. I had literally hundreds of hours in the classroom by the time I graduated and knew how to run a classroom

However, the most important lesson I learned came in grad school. I had a little old retired professory (I'm sad to say I can't remember her name) who had done studies on reading disabilities and had found that 95% of all 1st graders who had trouble reading had some kind of vision problem. Of the remaining 5%, 80% had hearing problems.

Our final exam featured this question:

What's the 1st thing you do with a child with reading difficuties?


YOU GET THEIR VISION AND HEARING CHECKED!

Please share the other important lessons you learned.

3 comments:

Dan Edwards said...

A good reminder for all teachers.
My second grade teacher sent my parents a note suggesting they get my eyes checked.....something to do with almost sticking my nose on the chalkboard to see what was on it.....

Many of my junior high students have vision problems that are not being delt with or corrected by parents.... Maybe someday they will see and find out about that great big wonderful world out there.

Mike in Texas said...

Polski,

Over the last 10 years or so I've actually had to take at least 3 children to their eye appts and to pick up their glasses, all paid for by the Lion's Club. Their parents were too lazy to even take them to get free glasses and eyecare.

"Ms. Cornelius" said...

I call kids on their squinting. If they don't bring their glasses into the classroom or wear their contacts, I call their parents. I have had to hotline one family who would not get their kids their free glasses from the Lions. It's neglect.

And my 3rd grade teacher caught my vision problems.