Eddie and Educational Terminology

I haven't used much educational terminology since college days, though recently have had cause to have to look at it again. Words like "anticipatory set," "modeled behavior," "closure," and "evaluation instrument" float around educational departments at colleges but aren't commonplace in an actual classroom. How an entire career field can be built around jargon that is not practical on a daily basis is a mystery to me.

I remember being a first year teacher when the realization that "education" was not "teaching" was first driven home to me. I remember thinking, "I've just graduated with a four-year teaching degree full of educational courses, but no one ever told me what to do about Eddie." Eddie was a seventh grade boy in my very first homeroom (of 36 youngsters, believe it or not. My administrator gave a rookie teacher 36 students first period and 36 more 2nd period! He handed me a manual and said teach math!). Eddie was incapable of getting his book, his paper, his notebook, his homework, and his pencil to class all at the same time. And he was usually late. When I would try to talk with him, or admonish him, or tell him he had a detention, he would lace his pudgy little fingers together and shake, and his eyes would well up in tears as his short pudgy body shook right along with the pudgy little fingers. Sometimes he would bring along his Bible to these disciplinary conferences.

Eddie and I somehow made it through the year. Anticipatory sets, closure, and evaluation instruments did me absolutely no good with him. But I did learn a lot about teaching!