"What's the point of this?"

More and more, I find myself thinking this in my grad classes this summer. Admittedly, this is partly due to fatigue, boredom, frustration, et cetera. The other reason why may be more justifiable.

In these education classes, I've already heard, "Make sure your instructional decisions are beneficial to your students," a million times. Got it, professors. Now, you sure your instructional decisions are beneficial to your students, especially because you teach in a college of education and should know better. 

To be fair, this is not an attack on them. They are all smart people with good-intentions in training teachers. However, some of them are guilty of making us do extraneous/cutesy/redundant/pointless/redundant assignments. How many reflections does each professor need? Why are we not learning or reviewing middle school math content in a content class? Why are we doing math puzzles in a content class? Are five chapters in five different books with the same perspective of the same subject necessary to discuss? While we, the future teachers, are supposed to be thinking about the purpose of homework or notes and why a hands-on might be better than direct instruction, it seems that some professors are sleeping at the wheel and not thinking about their craft. 

"Ms. 'Insane' Teacher? Ms. 'Insane' Teacher"

I have no problem with reflecting upon what we discuss.  Nor do I have a problem with reading a bunch of chapters every night as long as there is some sort of larger point to them all and it is not repetitive! In fact, I welcome the reflections and readings; it forces me to think critically about the decisions I make in the classroom and why I make them. I do have a problem with hypocrisy. If you are going to teach about good teaching, you must practice what you teach.

If only Magic Squares and Sudoku were a part of the curriculum.