What Do You Think?: A Guide for the Teacher in All of Us

By Joseph Olivieri

In the not-so-distant past, schools succeeded in teaching students the lessons they needed to survive. They taught students subject matter and manners. They taught respect and responsibility. They had discipline. They made learning fun. They gave one standardized test, which was not tied to school performance or fundingit was to measure student achievement. Teachers taught a curriculum, not the test. They propelled the United States to the forefront of education. All thisand time for recess!

What Do You Think? will inspire and enhance the following:
Perspective
Compassion
Respect
Attitude
Passion
Joy for the day

Through the eyes of a music teacher with thirty-three years experience, Joseph Olivieri shares stories and ideas so parents, grandparents, legislators, teachers, administrators, or students learn the importance of their roles as teachers in everyday life.

What do you think?

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Jul 17, 2015
• ISBN: 9781504923118

Joseph Olivieri

Joseph Olivieri has a Bachelor’s Degree in Music Education from the University of Northern Colorado and a Master’s Degree in Music Education and Conducting from the University of Colorado Boulder. He has taught students from kindergarten through college and has conducted musicians from the ages of 5 to 85. He retired after thirty years of public school teaching and is currently a teacher and administrator in an independent school. Besides music, he has a passion for restoring neglected cars. He and his wife, Bonnie, live in New Bern, North Carolina.

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© 2015 Joseph Olivieri. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 07/17/2015

ISBN: 978-1-5049-2312-5 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-2314-9 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-5049-2311-8 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2015911390

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models,

and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

Certain stock imagery © Thinkstock.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

CONTENTS

Introduction

1 Who is a teacher?

2 Paper Teachers

3 Protection

4 Territory

5 Perspective

6 C.P.A.

7 C.P.R.

8 Trading Places

9 Convictions

10 Ugly Bimmers

11 Humor

12 Testing…….. Testing………

13 Behold this day…

14 Moving Forward

15 What do you think?

Epilogue

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I would like to acknowledge and thank many people who have been instrumental in helping me with this book. My wife, Bonnie, my best friend, my soul mate, and my sounding board. She is the inspiration and frequent loving motivator to complete this work.

To my dad, who showed me what it is like to be a great father and a great teacher.

To all of the teachers I have had throughout my life. The ones who inspired me to become a teacher because of their love and nurturing. You made me a teacher because of your positive attitude.

To all of the students I have taught in thirty-three years… and counting. I have learned something from each of you.

INTRODUCTION

What do you think? Many people today want to know what to think. They watch 24 hour news channels. They belong to unions or organizations that prescribe adherence to a set of ideals. They lack the perspective, compassion, passion, or courage to stand by their own thoughts and beliefs.

I feel many times parents expect teachers to do the same for their students. They want the teacher to tell them what to think. Frequently I get asked by my students, What do you think? I will share my answer to them at the end of this book.

Teaching is an honorable profession. In "Democracy and Education" John Dewey states the importance of passing knowledge, history, and culture to our future generations. It was primarily the challenge of schools to provide part of this need. He explains this by pointing out the idea if a generation of any given society or culture were to suddenly disappear, there would be no model or example of accepted norms for a younger generation to learn from. This new generation would not have anything except their experiences (or lack thereof) to build their future.

Whether you agree with him or not, John Dewey makes the case for education as a means of preserving our past while preparing the younger generation for their future. In the not so distant past schools succeeded in accomplishing this task. They taught students the lessons they needed to survive. They taught students subject matter and manners. They taught respect and responsibility. They offered art, music, and PE for every student. They gave one standardized test, which was not tied to school performance or funding, it was to measure student achievement. They gave teachers freedom to develop a relevant curriculum. They had strict grading scales, no curves or sliding scales. They had discipline. They did all of this with student achievement and success in mind… not how they measured up to other countries or government imposed norms. All this……… and time for recess! The United States was in the forefront of education in the world. We were leaders throughout the globe in science, technology, and the arts.

So what happened? As you read headlines and countless articles about the state of education today, one can wonder how we lost sight of preparing the next generation for success.

This book is written for teachers, administrators, parents, grandparents, legislators, and students to emphasize the importance of adequately preparing our younger generations to meet the challenges laid before them. Not through the guise of standardized testing, but by means of ethics, morals, personal standards, and educational competition. Not competition with or against someone, but competition with ourself. When you only work to outdo another, you will never truly attain your peak performance. If you set personal standards and goals based on passion and desire to succeed our students will find themselves at the head of their field.

Students ask many questions. Here we will learn to give students the directions to discover the answers for themselves.

I have been a music educator 30 years in public education and 3 in an independent school. I have taught band, orchestra, choir, and general music. My observations are what inspired me to write this book. As you read, please ponder…..

What do you think?

1

WHO IS A TEACHER?

I touch the future; I teach.

Christa McAuliffe

When we think of teachers, many people come to mind. I remember my seventh and eighth grade band director who inspired me to make music education my life’s career. I remember my first grade teacher who dashed my interest in art because a person cannot be bigger than a tree, even though I was looking at a photo of a child in the foreground with a tree in the distance. I think it is called… perspective. I remember my eighth grade English teacher who, through the tumultuous junior high years, would urge me to keep the faith. I remember the teacher who lived next door who would always call me Joey in class………even though I was a junior in high school. I remember my math teachers……kind of. I remember the chemistry teacher (the one everyone feared) who asked how I arrived at the correct answer.

I copied the formula in the book and used the numbers from the experiment was my reply.

As the rest of the class chuckled, he explained that was exactly how we were to do the problem. I felt great! I remember the teacher who said I did not have the talent to be a successful music teacher because I strayed from standard teaching practices. 33 years later, I would beg to differ. I remember the teacher who taught me how long fifth grade could really be. I remember the teacher who showed every student how much she cared for all of us. It was the shortest year of school I had.

And as I think of all of my teachers, the ones who stand out are not because they taught a particular subject, I think of what they taught me.

We all have teachers who, thinking back, we loved and some……not so much. But one thing they had in common. They taught us.

Orchestra was the last class of the day. The room was a large carpeted, tiered rehearsal room with acoustic foam (which looked like mold) sprayed on the back wall. Students would come into class with the frustrations and ordeals of the five previous class periods weighing on them. They looked forward to the chance to pour their heart and soul into their music. They could, even if it was only for an hour, escape the nuisances and challenges of their school life. They would enter the room, deposit their backpacks by my office door, retrieve their instruments from the storage room, find their music, arrange their chair, tune and await the opportunity to make music.

One day in orchestra class I posed the question, Who is a teacher?

Almost every student had the same reply…. You are. All except the cellist seated to my right. The one who always tries to find the angle to every question.

Everyone is he chimed in, expecting to get my best teacher look.

I turned to him, looked him square in the eye and said, Right! I think he was surprised and a tad disappointed his answer did not elicit his expected response, but he soon joined the others in the class by nodding his head in understanding. We proceeded to talk about teachers, good and bad. We talked about lessons learned, whether curricular or life lessons. We talked how we can learn from each other if we pay attention.

My angle-seeking cellist then asked, Why aren’t we playing? Why are we talking about teachers?

What do you think? was my reply

You don’t want to listen to us today.

Nothing could be farther from the truth I replied. I enjoy listening to students make music. Back to the question. What do you think the reason is for talking about teachers?

So we realize we all can learn from each other, and when we pay attention to one another we can achieve even more……… now can we play some music?

I responded, Absolutely! and class began.

Put the word teacher in a search engine and you will get a huge number of images. We all have stereo-typed images of teachers. We think teachers are the persons in front of a group instructing us. We assume they have all the knowledge and can answer all of our questions. The dictionary defines teacher as one who teaches. Based on that simple, but accurate definition, almost everyone in our every day life can be a teacher and that same every day life is our classroom. When you stop to think about it, as you drive down the highway, go to the store, talk on the phone, observe or talk to children, or put yourself in the view of the general public, you are a teacher. Your actions, good or bad teach others lessons about you, themselves, or life in general. They teach proper (or not) responses to a situation. They instill lessons in people’s memories which are more permanent than we may realize.

Let’s look at a real life lesson. You are late leaving for work and need to drop your child off at school on your way. As you speed across town you are pulled over by a policeman. Frustrated, you let out a moan, pull over, and ready all pertinent documents for the officer. The officer, in a professional but pleasant tone of voice, informs you of your speeding violation and asks for license and proof of insurance.

Your reaction to the situation, as well as the policeman’s, will be lessons not only for each other, but for your child as well. Your child will watch you to see how you handle the situation, and that reaction will be your teaching moment. The same is true for the policeman. His demeanor and presentation will define his moment. Whether we think about it or not, eyes are almost constantly on us. As parents we set examples for our children. As teachers we set examples for our students.

When your child asks why were you speeding, and why you got so upset, you have the perfect opportunity to be a teacher. The most effective way to use the moment is with total honesty and sincerity. You take the time to answer their questions and make sure your child understands the lesson they observed.

We face a large number of teachers every day. But do we really listen and learn?

In today’s culture we are visible to the public practically all of the time. Where ever we go, cameras are present watching our ever move. With this exposure to others, we must remember that what we teach speaks volumes about who we are. Our actions and every day deeds, good or bad, are our most prevalent teaching tools. Daily we witness numbers of people who exist in their own private cocoon. They have no regard for the people around them and little regard for themselves. They will not look you