So as you all may or may not know I work in various school districts as part of my job function, working on the computer networks. I am around teachers every day, teachers that are responsible for helping to shape and mold the young minds of our children. Teachers that are supposed to be able to be on the cutting edge of events and technology, in order to effectively ensure that our children grow up with the toolset required for them not only to function in society once they leave the school system process, but also to ensure that said toolset will allow them to excel and contribute to the world in which we live. The base knowledge that a child has once he/she leaves the school system should be on par, not behind what they will find in todays world. I just wanted to make this point, as today I received an all star of a help desk call. A high school teacher called me saying that her e-mail would not send because there was an open dialog box. The dialog box resided right on her screen, right in front of her. The solution which, maybe I am crazy would be to click the “OK” button (the only button in the dialog box) which would effectively close the dialog box allowing her to send her e-mail. Now I may very well be crazy, and I understand that not everyone has a natural inclination towards technology or computers.. But is it too much to ask that teachers responsible for my children’s education be able to READ AND FOLLOW SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS????? Every day I am plexed with teachers that are unwilling to learn new things themselves, afraid of technology, afraid of teaching with, or about it. And these are the people again responsible for our children’s education. I am afraid that our society is one that is shaping our future leaders for failure. Local state and federal government agencies making every law they possibly can to “protect our children”, which really serves more to instill fear in parents for disciplining their children than anything else. Parents are afraid to even yell at their children now a days in fear that CPS will be banging on the door accusing said parents of neglect or abuse. KIDS ARE BAD SOMETIMES, and need to be made to understand that what they did was bad and that there are consequences for such actions. I am by no means saying people should have the right to beat their children but COME ON….... I personally believe as a parent, that kids should be disciplined when they do something bad. They should be raised to understand the difference between good and bad, and be held responsible for their actions. Again maybe I am crazy. What right do I have wanting my own children to grow up responsible and with a sence of good and bad, right from wrong, and an inclination towards not swaying to the dark side because they understand that wrongful actions will in fact invoke consequences, that may be less favorable than doing the right thing in the first place. And again what right do I have to expect that today’s teachers stop whining about having to learn new things themselves in order to effectively teach our children about these new things and genuinely prepare them for the world that really awaits them. And to clarify I would also like to state that I by no means am I accusing every teacher out there of being like this, There are alot of teachers that do get excited to learn new things, in order to teach them, or teach with them, But there seems to be alot more teachers that just all out refuse to change the way they have been teaching for the last 15 years. Their inability which is really just lack of motivation, from anyone, to want to push ahead and grow themselves really frustrates me. Ok enough of this rant..I just had to really vent after I received my last help request from a teacher to help getting the VCR in her class to work….... the solution…... Rewind The Tape

I agree that it’s difficult to get teachers to read/listen and comprehend. The thing is, teachers are used to giving instruction all day. They lack practice at listening and comprehending. That’s a skill that we all need to use or lose.

It is interesting that the teachers and administrators I work with are eager and excited to use technology, but then they are Adult Education not K-12.
—A web developer

Keep up the rants, Mike and Rich – those are the best parts of the show. 48%!

I wonder if that person with 10 years of computer experience was a Mac user.

(I’m a Mac user myself so I can make fun… )

It saddens me to see this and how our students are not challenged. My son who is in first grade is utterly bored in his class, and this class is supposed to be an advanced class compared to the regular ones. The teacher doesn’t even use the computers other than for AR and STAR. No challenge for the kids on anything even with the technology available to them. My son already knows how to use a computer (and on running Ubuntu at that) and is able to go where he wants (I’ve already had certain discussions with him about the double-edged sword that is the Internet).

But as Mike and Rich mentioned, there are those few that do take advantage of the technology and use it to truly enrich the kids’ knowledge and learning. At the two elementary schools that I maintain, only one of the schools has people like this and they still equal to less than the number of fingers on my hand. These districts need to understand that just throwing technology at the schools is not going to solve the problem. They need to effectively train faculty on the available online resources and teach them how to truly challenge their students.

I guess it shouldn’t surprise me so much at our district since our school board was the one that decided Rudy Crew would be the best solution for our district. It’s obvious that the change here needs to be from the top down.

By the way, it’s not just teachers that don’t know what a right-click is. I’m the only IT guy for over 300 users at a law firm and I run across this little gem every few months.

What’s more stunning is when I get this from someone who’s been using computers for 10+ years. “Right-Click??? I never know you could do that”.