The principal just called.
There are two pieces of good news: he agreed that some of Miss T.'s practices are absolutely wrong and informed her of this fact yesterday. The other good news is that for the first time, I felt like he was talking TO me and not AT me. He seems genuinely concerned about this problem and he clearly wants to resolve it. The problem from my perspective is that I'm not sure he realizes its extent.
As an example, I had to remind him about her rigidity and her policy of marking things wrong if the student didn't use her method (even if the answer is correct). I used specific examples like not allowing kids to regroup in subtraction (they can't write anything; they just have to remember) and forcing them to write a row of zeros in a problem like
123
x102Etc. I emphasized that she announced on back to school night that she knows there are different ways of doing math, but in my class you do it my way or get it wrong (i.e. my kid is not making this up). At that point the message seemed to sink in a bit, and he told me that yes, "my way or the highway" is not a sound pedagogical approach. Ya think?
I finally told that when I see this level of rigidity in a profession where flexibility is key, I begin to suspect a lack of knowledge. I was careful to say that I don't know if this is the case with Miss T. (because I don't), but that something is driving the rigidity and lack of knowledge is one plausible explanation. Ouch.
Finally, he said that she admitted she'd given a post-test of the entire fifth grade curriculum six weeks into the year and called it a pre-test. But she said that the problem was that it was "rushed." I countered with "Six weeks into school is ample time to know what's in the curriculum and calling the pre-test "rushed" is not an option at that point.
Ouch again. He had to concede that one.
I'm beginning to feel like a jackhammer, but it seems to be the only way to get through the barrier.
