[etni] Re: Oral Testing in another school

  • From: "Adele Raemer and Laurie Levy" <raemer@xxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: "'ETNI'" <etni@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Thu, 27 Mar 2008 07:44:26 +0200

We are supposed to test on our "free"* day.

In our school our pay IS docked, and for the following reasons:
1. Why should WE be paid twice for work on the same day? (We get paid for
testing, right? Albeit, it's not going to make us into millionaires....)
2. In MY school, anyway, when a teacher is not present, the school has to
pay OTHER teachers to substitute those hours! (So instead of paying ME when
I am out testing, the school is paying a colleague.... so why should the
SCHOOL pay me, if I am not teaching?)

Having said that:
1. There are many schools now whose "free days" are Fridays... NOT a day
conducive to testing! 
2. In many schools, English teachers have "free days" on different days of
the week (for a variety of reasons).
3. Schools with a lot of students often have teachers from more than one
school coming to test - hence, the ability to find all testers with the same
"free day" becomes even harder.

Since I participate in the organizing of testing days in my region, I am
painfully aware of how complicated it is to set the  testing roster up. And
for the reasons I mentioned above, teachers are USUALLY sent to test only
once each year, making the "damage" suffered (pay docking) by each teacher
as small as possible. But it IS our obligation - since WE are receiving
testers who come to OUR school - to perform our teacherly duty and go to
test once a year, in another school.

I hope this makes things a bit clearer. 

Personally, while I do NOT enjoy being in the situation of sitting opposite
nervous kids, who don't know me from Adam, feeling I have come to judge
their abilities, I DO try to make it as pleasant as possible (I sometimes
bring music, as well, to calm the nerves) and - for the most part - enjoy
the opportunity to meet, interact, and encourage the lovely youths who pass
the threshold of my testing room door - and would otherwise not have had an
opportunity to interact with.

Make the best of your testing day... remember: your outlook, your demeanor,
your attitude on this day can help make or break a kid. Treat that "power"
with respect!

Adele 

* I write "free" day in quotation marks because I have always resented it
being called that. We are NEVER FREE on that day. We have that day to
prepare lesson plans, devise activities to enhance our textbooks, mark
tests, prepare grades... as well as doing ALL of the chores that we cannot
do during the school day (doctor, taxman, bank, garage, other bureaucratic
nightmares, etc.) OR some of us have other jobs that we do on that day to
make ends meet! Calling it a "free day" is downright cruel, if you ask me! 

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