
Teaching is not a one size fits all kind of job. It is very close to being the exact opposite of that, actually.
If you walk into a classroom today, you will find students with a variety of needs and abilities as well as different personalities, values, and belief systems.
Each one of them learns best under certain conditions. It is the teacher's job to figure out how to best accommodate these conditions in order to achieve the year's learning goals successfully for each student.
It doesn't end there. Teachers are also catering to student social, emotional, and an entire menu of non-academic needs.
The point: The are too many moving parts in classrooms for any one system to work for all.
We need to stop dictating how teachers should be teaching. Period.
We can't just walk in and say that teachers need to use more technology, or use a scripted curriculum, or teach for the test, or any other specific way. Specific is never going to work for an entire classroom.
Empower them instead.
What teachers actually need a toolbox full of effective tools and strategies, and then we need to give them the freedom to blend these ways however they see fit and most effective for their current students' needs.
Ok, they could also benefit from access to a community of teachers so they can collaborate and bounce ideas off of each other.
In the end, teachers need to teach. Let's not burden them with all these blanket solutions. Instead, offer them relevant, applicable tools that they can use as needed to maximize student development and learning.