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Teacher Appreciation Week: Providing Teachers with Innovative Tools

Posted by Lior Weinstein on Wednesday, May 8th, 2013

It all starts with teaching. Teachers are the foundation of our country. Not only do they help our young people learn basic skills and life lessons, but they also teach adults to learn new skills. This is Teacher Appreciation Week. A good teacher is priceless, but they aren’t paid nearly enough and they often aren’t given the tools that they need to do their job.

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Benjamin Franklin said, “Genius without education is like silver in the mine.” We all have fond memories of teachers who mentored us and instilled a love of learning inside of us. Teachers have a huge impact on how we learn to see the world, they help build strong minds and encourage us to take chances and push ourselves to try new things.

As we witnessed in the tragedy of Sandy Hook, teachers are willing to give their lives for our children. This week, students are giving homemade greeting cards and little gifts of thanks to their teachers. The men and women of this fine profession deserve kudos every day for what they do.

Many of us complain about the state of education in our country, but it is not the teachers’ fault. There is a lack of government funding which leads to programs being cut, fewer teachers hired, outdated equipment and a lack of supplies. Children all over the world have a right to an education, unfortunately this isn’t always the case.

If you are an adult going to college or university, you understand how expensive it is to get an education.

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Education is evolving. Teachers are using more digital resources to teach their students. Today’s student, from kindergarten up, already know more about technology and the Internet than many of their parents.

Eventually, there will be no more heavy textbooks to lug around because learning will all be through e-books or websites.

E-learning is already a popular means for young people and adults to learn or even get a degree through distance education programs offered by many colleges and universities. While you may not be face to face with a teacher while learning online, you still have a teacher guiding you. E-learning sites have teachers who put the programs together and are there to answer questions. Some courses offer live webinars taught by teachers, or provide a portal, email or Skype to talk to your teacher.

Teachers will rise to the challenge of this new form of teaching because that is what they do. They adapt, and they teach us how to do the same thing.

We do pretty much everything else online, why not learn? E-learning also provides a means for those who can’t attend a physical school, whether it is because of a physical disability, distance or some other reason.

As the new paradigm in teaching evolves, we will all need to start learning new tools. Most of us know Excel. If you don’t, there are teachers who will show you how it works.

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Even a child can make a spreadsheet, and they should learn how to do this while they are young, because it will not only help them in the business world, it can help a student with their homework schedule and research planning for school projects. If teachers are provided with a PDF to Excel converter, it gives them an advantage in planning their lessons. They can take PDF files and convert them to spreadsheets that they can utilize in their lesson plans.

We celebrate teachers this week and all that they do for the future of our country.