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My wife and I are recently retired teachers. I taught elementary science in Title 1 schools. My wife taught PE and keyboarding in Title 1 schools.
A teacher has to put in time to hone their craft. You can spend that time making your classroom more inviting and exciting(proactive) or you can put that time into discipline and distractions(reactive). Either way the teacher WILL have to put in the time, they just have to decide what is more important to them.
At my last school I applied for and got grants from Walmart and other sponsors. I started a before school makerspace club. I bought a 3D printer that the kids could use, we started coding sessions, and I got several robots. Our competition robotics team went from worst to first in our district. In science class we had the daily hurricane report. The kids really wanted to know what was going on in the world and how it may affect them. If their were no hurricanes to track we had the daily earthquake report. There are seismic tremors all over the earth everyday. If I were still in the class we would be talking about the covid situation. Those kids wanted to come to class each day. We earned academic awards for science from the state. These were underperforming students that have no hope, they have no vision. They had no reason to want to be at school until I gave them a reason. I have repeatedly told and shown the admin that they do not have an academic problem they have a value problem. The students do not value what the schools are selling.
My wife did similar stuff in PE, make it fun or interesting so they want to be in class.
I can only speak from my experience. I cannot speak to your school situation.
Maybe you could be that spark. Maybe you could connect teachers with resources that would make their positions better. Maybe you could provide direction for admins and school boards. I have seen former teachers develop character education programs and do presentations for schools. The schools have to provide the character ed and they do pay for it. You could develop the program and train 2-3 teams to make the presentations. If they are doing your presentations then you get a cut of their fee and add more teams. Schools also pay for teacher training, mainly in the fall. You could develop a teacher training program and contract with the schools.
Good luck in your quest.
Multiple edits due to typos - fat fingers.
A teacher has to put in time to hone their craft. You can spend that time making your classroom more inviting and exciting(proactive) or you can put that time into discipline and distractions(reactive). Either way the teacher WILL have to put in the time, they just have to decide what is more important to them.
At my last school I applied for and got grants from Walmart and other sponsors. I started a before school makerspace club. I bought a 3D printer that the kids could use, we started coding sessions, and I got several robots. Our competition robotics team went from worst to first in our district. In science class we had the daily hurricane report. The kids really wanted to know what was going on in the world and how it may affect them. If their were no hurricanes to track we had the daily earthquake report. There are seismic tremors all over the earth everyday. If I were still in the class we would be talking about the covid situation. Those kids wanted to come to class each day. We earned academic awards for science from the state. These were underperforming students that have no hope, they have no vision. They had no reason to want to be at school until I gave them a reason. I have repeatedly told and shown the admin that they do not have an academic problem they have a value problem. The students do not value what the schools are selling.
My wife did similar stuff in PE, make it fun or interesting so they want to be in class.
I can only speak from my experience. I cannot speak to your school situation.
Maybe you could be that spark. Maybe you could connect teachers with resources that would make their positions better. Maybe you could provide direction for admins and school boards. I have seen former teachers develop character education programs and do presentations for schools. The schools have to provide the character ed and they do pay for it. You could develop the program and train 2-3 teams to make the presentations. If they are doing your presentations then you get a cut of their fee and add more teams. Schools also pay for teacher training, mainly in the fall. You could develop a teacher training program and contract with the schools.
Good luck in your quest.
Multiple edits due to typos - fat fingers.
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