Old ways of doing things are hard to change. This is true even when they don't make much sense -- or maybe especially when they don't make sense. That certainly explains why, though most people are talking about professionalizing teaching, many supervisors still want to treat teachers like bad kids or day laborers who need to be kept in line.
There's a long history of this kind of thing in education. For example, most other professionals have never had to punch time clocks, but New York City teachers just got rid of theirs a year or so ago. I can remember that we were trying to get rid of time clocks as far back as the 1960's. In fact, time clocks lost a collective bargaining election for the AFT in Milwaukee. The day before the voting, the rival association circulated pictures of New York City teachers lined up to punch the clock with the words, "If you vote for the AFT, this is what you'll get."
New York City school chancellors agreed that time clocks were demeaning. They assured us that they would be glad to throw away the clocks. It was the principals who insisted on keeping them. Without time clocks, the principals said, a lot of teachers would come late or leave early, and some might not even meet their classes. The schools would be in chaos. But we knew what time clocks really represented for many principals was a way of exercising control over teachers.
The lesson plan controversy now going on in the New York City schools is more of the same. There are two issues. Should teachers be routinely required to submit lesson plans to a supervisor? And can supervisors mandate a standard format for these plans?
These requirements were in place when I was teaching in the 1950's -- and long before that. They were only recently eliminated as a result of the latest United Federation of Teachers contract, and this month School Chancellor Fernandez issued a memo clarifying the changes. Now, principals are predicting dire consequences if these requirements disappear.
In fact, the requirements don't have anything to do with instruction, as I know from experience. In my school, a student monitor came around every Friday morning to collect every teacher's plan book with the lesson plans for the following week. The monitor returned the books that afternoon, stamped with the name of the principal. Sometimes we'd get a penciled comment: "Good"; "Nice Work"; "Looks interesting." Of course the principal hadn't read them -- how could he read 25-35 lesson plans for 100 or more teachers? And what would he have found out if he had?
Our lesson plans had to fit into a standard size and format -- two 8 1⁄2 by I I-inch pages were ruled into as many small boxes as there were periods in a week. So the principal would be able to evaluate how neatly we could write in boxes, but he certainly couldn't have gotten much insight into what we had in mind for our classes.
Nobody denies that teachers need to plan their lessons. But what the supervisor ought to be interested in is whether or not a teacher does a good job in class. It shouldn't matter if the lesson plans are in the teacher's head or scribbled down on the back of an envelope or written neatly in boxes. On the other hand, if a teacher is in trouble, a supervisor might want to see a written plan and might want to help the teacher devise a new planning format that suits his particular needs.
One of the big deals about formal plan books, then and now, has been in connection with substitute teachers. Supervisors have always said that it's essential to have a plan book in your drawer so a substitute can walk right in and teach the lesson for the day. But this is silly. Most substitutes don't even try to follow the lesson plan, and most teachers don't want them to anyway. The problem of what a substitute can do with a class is easily solved by leaving a few review lessons in the desk drawer.
The revised rules in New York City do not eliminate lesson plans -- far from it. And supervisors are still free to use them in evaluating a teacher's performance and in helping teachers who need help.
So why do the principals object to these changes? Why is the principals' union talking about filing a challenge?
Whenever there are changes in established institutions, people become alarmed. School administrators are no different in this from middle managers in business or government. And when they see these changes in terms of losing power, people always talk about how the sky is going to fall. But the sky didn't fall when the time clocks were finally taken out of New York City schools, and it will remain in place even though New York City teachers no longer have to jump through the weekly lesson plan hoop.
When changes like the ones in New York City will do is free teachers from the petty indignities that make them feel more like big kids than professionals. Getting rid of the lesson plan ritual might even reduce the cynicism that results when you're forced to do things that no one looks at or cares about -- except as an exercise in control. And with fewer hoops to jump through, teachers and supervisors can concentrate on what ought to be important to both of them -- getting students to learn.