Cultural comparisons are most acute during first meetings or
the first days of a visit. By the third day of their placement, the reflections
of the Canadian teachers did not contain the same detailed comparisons as they
did the first day, or upon initial impressions.
A higher level of sustained work focus did stand out. In
Ontario, it was not uncommon for the teachers to switch activities every 10-15
minutes once their students began to lose focus and interest. Calls from the
office, announcements, students coming in and out of the classroom were
frequent interruptions. You might even argue that from the time children enter
school, the school system is training
children to disconnect after a short ten minutes; that the frequent disruptions
to the class during the school day prevents students from concentrating on
anything at all for a sustained period of time.
In Scotland, these announcements and office inquiries were
limited to the morning’s ‘registration’, or homeroom attendance, by a different
teacher. The office handles students arriving late or leaving early without
disrupting the class. The only genuine emergency, or cause to disrupt the
class, would be a fire.
Eliminating classroom interruptions does make a difference.
One of the new teachers said, “it’s amazing how long the students are able to
concentrate on their work…the class is constantly at work during independent work.”
Any writer, student of English, artist, creator, or
scientist, knows that you cannot begin and finish a piece of work in ten
minutes. Single art pieces may take one to three years in the making, for
example. We would all learn something from this work model – “leave me alone;
I’m working!”
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