Usually when a student is failing, the teacher seems to be the person automatically put to blame. Their teaching methods and/or abilities to reiterate information to students are put into question. It is unlikely that the student has to take responsibility for not understanding the material. I read a case study about a boy named Michael who, seemingly places the blame on his teacher because he felt as though the teacher isn’t teaching the subject very well, as opposed to Michael not being able to understand the material he is taught.
Michael was at fault because he didn’t put enough effort into his education, and rather blamed his teacher for his failures. However, instead of sitting in the classroom week by week knowingly failing without saying anything, he got his parents involved. From my middle school experience, I watched as many of my peers knowingly failed, and didn’t care enough to change that. There’s a difference between wanting to pass the class and wanting to understand the work that is given. Personally, I believe you have to start with wanting to exceed before you can focus on the material. Michael was well aware that him not understanding anything was the root of his problem and took the correct steps in wanting to further get help.
Ms. Tucker, his tutor plays an essential role throughout this case study, because she is the reason Michael in turn succeeds in the class. She works with him individually to build his confidence in his mathematical abilities. His judgment of his teacher made the subject so uninteresting to him that he resulted in failing. Ms. Tucker balanced out Michael inability to work and the strategies he could use to better help him. After working with the tutor, Michael was able to see where and how he was going wrong and in what ways he could improve. He had now become more involved in the class in terms of listening, taking notes, and studying aside from the class.
In my opinion, the teacher wasn’t given a chance to better Michael’s learning experience. His parents automatically sought out a tutor when simple communication between parents and teachers could’ve expressed Michael’s lack of interest in the class. I don’t believe there is enough information to determine whether the teacher did everything in his power, however he wasn’t even made aware of the issue Michael was having. Based on the information in the case study, I believe Michael just needed a one on one interaction with a teacher so he could better understand the material. Maybe being in a classroom setting with multiple other students made it difficult to for him to want to learn.
The classroom is the place where students should want to participate and get involved. Being in the eighth grade is when students are really social and would rather talk to their friends rather than listen to the teacher’s lesson. Teacher should use this against students for example making activities to get them to work together and as a team figure the problem out. Teachers should pair students of different levels together so instead of grouping with your friends and one person always giving the correct answer, they will feed off of one another and come to a consensus together.
