teachers of over thirty years experience

We always here o the things that we need to be prepared for in becoming a teacher. We don’t however, here a lot about what to be prepared for after teaching for thirty years. I really don’t believe that any one can teach us now what to be prepared for in thirty years. For one thing technology will probably be so advanced from anything we can dream of now and also the situations that I may come in contact with may be similar to a situation that someone else has faced but also different. Now one thing that the speaker said that kind of struck a nerve with me was that he said if you aren’t moving to at least a different class every five years your teaching wont really improve. Now this is a bit easier for a teacher in elementary to do because they can go from first grade to kindergarten to third grade and so on. The thing I am thinking about though is that I am going to teach choir for a high school, or at least that’s my goal. Now for me to move every five years would be not smart to do. From my experiences of observing choir teachers, the longer they are in one area the more that can get accomplished with that program. If there is a choir teacher that is there for twenty five years they can take their program and make it visible and also improve the program for that area. A teacher who is specialized in music for instance though can’t just move from choir to band to orchestra. We are trained in the specific field of either band, choir or vocal. For some teachers they may learn better by changing their environment, whether that’s changing a class room or position, every five years but I feel as a music teacher it may be better to just stay in one area and just see what happens.