Jane Thompson Olson
Year 25 of teaching and I had hit a brick wall. I no longer found any joy in being in the classroom with twenty-five boys and girls, aged nine and ten. I had mentioned this to my principal at the year-round school where I was teaching 5th grade. Much to my surprise, the principal called me into her office about a job that she thought I should apply for. This was in early January and by the end of the month, I had a new job and, happily, was no longer teaching 5th grade.
My new assignment was to work on a five-teacher team called the
Instructional Resource Team or IRT. We were sent to “low performing” schools to work with teachers, specialists, and administrators to help improve the quality of teaching and the school climate. The job was with Wake County district in Raleigh, North Carolina, and was the superintendent’s idea on how to help raise the standardized test scores for low-performing schools. We reported directly to him. He decided what schools we would visit and shared his concerns about each one. The team consisted of three elementary teachers covering all grades, a reading specialist, a math teacher and a high school history teacher.
Our team worked nine weeks at each designated school. We spent our days visiting classrooms: observing, model teaching, team teaching, working with small student groups, and providing help for individual teachers. Often we were met with apprehension by the faculty, but once they realized we were there to help and not “report,” we had requests to come and help teachers as they tried new teaching methods.
Yes, there are “bad” teachers out there, and our goal was to encourage them to involve their students more actively in learning. (No more teachers doing all of the talking while the students sat passively in those all too familiar rows of desks.) When I observed students leading discussions and actively working in groups on projects and assignments while the teacher offered suggestions and guidance, I knew I had made the right decision to leave my own classroom. The job did require longer hours and months working, but in exchange I felt validated as a teacher. I had opportunities to observe A+ teaching, and I saw students and teachers get excited about school. This job was in the second largest school district in North Carolina, so we were busy!!
This IRT job was so much fun and came when I was really down on teaching. My principal truly rescued me. Coincidentally, I had the worst class of 5th graders that year and felt no remorse when I left them in the middle of the year. I was once again excited to be an educator and thrived with this opportunity to work with teachers and students. I was even given my very own business card.
When the superintendent retired, the team was disbanded. I had retired the year before. I like to think that the IRT was successful for everyone involved. It sure saved me from wanting to walk away from my job as a 5th grade teacher!
I taught in a private school for very little pay but a great deal of freedom. One of my fond memories of 5th grade was when they were studying Sumerian history. I looked up the art history and found engaging images of funeral figures, which I encouraged children to copy in clay. I asked the children to make an anachronistic detail on their figure so that it would be understood as a 20th century art object. One of the figures had red sneakers showing under his robe. Others were smoking, or wearing watches. Some also changed the hair style. It was great fun seeing the student trying to carefully copy the artifacts and then decide how to alter the image so it was contemporary art. My school had permanent special resource teachers who were valuable for bringing special ideas to the teaching. Those teachers help keep teaching alive.