Feb 1, 2010

Faculty Meeting Pet Peeves

3 come to mind at the moment:

1. Old school veterans who absolutely have to preface anything they say w/ "You know, I've been teaching for 15, 20, 25+ years, and... [insert comment here]"
-You're a wily vet and I respect that. But do you really have to say it every time?
-[Or maybe I'm just jealous cus my 2.5 pales in comparison to theirs.]

2. Presenters w/ text-heavy or animation-heavy powerpoint slides.
-Today's professional development crew presented slide after slide that looked a lil' something like:

-Quick message for you: Just b/c you're using powerpoint does not make your presentation more effective and professional. Your audience is silenced not b/c we are enthused over your amazing new methods but rather b/c we are bored to death.
-I heart this comedian for speaking some truth.

3. The phrase "research-based."
-Not only that, said powerpoint users appended the word "research-based" to virtually every sentence. "And, you know, all of this is research-based!" Congratulations on whatever research article you read, but we educators don't get automatic edu-turned-ons just cus you're droppin' that word.

... Sorry, but had to get that out...

3 comments:

Kaycee said...

I agree, I agree, I agree. It's so frustrating to go to those kinds of meetings!

That and the "the pendulum will swing back" comment on how they did "this" 10-15 years ago and it will switch to something else they have already seen soon.

Ms. Luzader said...

Totally agree on those ridiculous buzz words including "research - based" oh gag me!

Glenn Wiebe said...

Amen to the PPT comments! We spend so much time creating presos that are incredibly ineffective. Faculty meetings need to be more about teacher - to - teacher conversations about classroom practice and less about listening to admin types.

Thanks for sharing.

glennw