@ktempestbradford even the ones that use computers can only install and manage software via app stores. Pressing install on Steam is the extent of their experience. It’s like going back 20 years to when kids didn’t have any computer experience from home. They only learn it at school.
Today, like many other West Australian teachers, I'm not going to work this morning.
It's interesting that our industrial action is represented in the media as about pay. We're not striking over salary - we're striking because the system is broken.
My son has had no Phys Ed teacher all year. He's had a procession of relief teachers which, for a special needs child, is extremely distressing. He attends an inner city public school, but staffing shortages are statewide.
Speaking of special needs students, I'd like to look after my own without having to skip lunch to ensure their needs are met.
I'd like the Education Department to give me a personal device so I can do my job
(more efficiently). If I want a laptop, I have to lease one.
I'd like an acknowledgement of how teaching has recently become more difficult and demanding, especially during #COVID19, when we kept schools open and tried to keep students safe.
I enforced the mask mandate far more often than a rank-and-file police officer. I've probably been threatened and assaulted more times than many police officers too. And the statewide mobile phone ban? Guess who enforces that every single day.
So many of my colleagues have left teaching: re-trained or resigned due to burnout and stress. Who suffers? The students.
It's not about the pay. We're tired, and we need support. We're underfunded and under-resourced. We need to improve conditions for students. We need to fix the system.
@neenish_tart@FerdiMagellan I think higher pay would attract more people, I don’t know that it would retain them. We have the central, fundamental problem of the emotional workload of dealing with awful behaviour. How can we fix that? Either let us remove badly behaved students, or reduce class sizes to the point where we can manage it.
@neenish_tart@FerdiMagellan the main issue is that private schooling has concentrated the demographics with the most behavioural problems, the trauma, the violence, the poverty into one set of schools, while the students from the families without those issues (statistically, not deterministically) go to private schools. It normalises bad behaviour for those in the public system.
Yeah there were a lot of screwups in the Morrison Government's response, and further reviews are needed, but I honestly don't think a royal commission in to it is the right approach to take. To me that feels way too weaponised & bad faith, like the ceiling batts enquiry. #AusPol#Covid19Aus
@bastardsheep I think we need a review to inform our future preparedness. Would a royal commission do that, or are they always about finger pointing? #auspol
A letter to parents from the SSTUWA
23 April stop work action
Dear parents,
It is likely that your child’s public school may be closed on the morning of Tuesday 23 April 2024. If it is open, it won’t be for lessons as normal. #union#sstuwa#westernAustralia#teachers#teachersStrike#education#parents
This is because the State School Teachers’ Union of Western Australia is holding a stop work action to urge the Department of Education to treat seriously negotiations for a new general agreement covering the salary and working conditions of teachers and principals.
This situation applies to the schools your children are being educated at if you are a parent of one of the 72 per cent of primary students or 66 per cent of secondary pupils who goes to a public school.
We want the public education system fixed. We want it fixed for the benefit of teachers, principals and above all for students. This is the first stop work action teachers have taken in over a decade. That’s how serious the situation has become for our members.
The teaching profession in the public education system is, in the words of the Facing the Facts review chaired by former WA Premier and Federal Minister Dr Carmen Lawrence, “at breaking point and requires immediate steps to improve education and morale.”
The Education Department’s own red tape review said: “Our analysis indicates that the problem goes to the more fundamental question of whether the job of teaching as currently performed and organised is doable or sustainable.”
The SSTUWA’s community research suggests over 80 per cent of WA voters agree that all children deserve a quality education.
We agree too and that requires better salaries and working conditions for teachers and principals.
Well fuck. I wasn’t watching where I was stepping as I swept the roof, fell through a plastic roof panel on the patio. Saved myself on the way down, nothing serious barring a few scrapes and bruises. #lucky#stupid#cleaning#accident
@MorpheusB That was me genius move! I made sure I didn't hit the ground, not immediately. I managed to catch myself on my elbows while my son got a ladder. Sadly, just as he got the ladder in position, the next panel failed and I fell again. Tbh, I'm lucky I came out of it as good as I did!
I did the dumbest little project tonight. I find it amusing that my European colleagues don't realize that their country is basically the size of Indiana.. or Tennessee or some other state that they can't find on a map. So I pulled the data to determine which state is most like which country. My 3 metrics are: population, land mass, and GDP. I have the data cleaned up. So maybe now a simple Shiny app?
@Cmastication also include comparisons to other places. Sure, European countries aren’t that big. Now include African nations, and Asian, even Australian. For example, Texas is less than 1/3 of Western Australia’s land area! Population is a lot lower though.
I don't think (most) people appreciate old technology anymore.
Today I brought my typewriter (a Smith-Corona Silent) to each of my classes to take notes with. Other than my friends, most people just didn't seem to care (or even notice).
And of all teachers, my History teacher asked me to put it away.
Is it just me, or do ppl not appreciate old tech as much as I thought they did?
@krafter In the era of that technology, notes would have been taken by hand. I don’t think anyone would have been taking notes in a lecture on a typewriter. Typewriters were for formalising something to be read by others, rather than for one’s self.
Even now, the evidence suggests handwritten notes are more effective for learning.
Huh, looks like @nextcloud Talk can be (or is working on being) federated between Nextcloud instances. That'd be pretty cool. Instant, video, and audio messaging without relying on someone else's platform would be pretty cool. Its hard choosing a platform that works on desktop, Android, and Apple, and is not trying to monetise my children. #nextcloud#selfhosted
Trying to update firmware on an HP Spectre X360 laptop from linux, but I can't extract a .bin file from the downloadable .exe file. Has something changed in this space? The .exe file extracts only another .exe file! #linux#HP
Ok turns out you can create a usb to boot from, but this has to be done from INSIDE WINDOWS and ON AN HP COMPUTER! Not really helpful! #hp#linux#firmware