i am considering taking a teaching job at a school that has block scheduling. the teachers teach three 90-minute periods each day and have one 90-minute period for a prep. each course is covered in half of a year.
i know that there are a lot of teachers on this board. does anyone have any experience with a teaching schedule like this? what are the pros and cons?
What school?
All in all it's not that bad.
I'd rather teach 3 90 minute class with 90 students than 4 70 minute class with 120 students any day. Or 5 55 minute class with 150 kids a day. The amount of grading and paper work is almost unbearable once you get over a 100 students.
The only bad thing is that after about an hour your students will start to lose interest if all you do is lecture so spice up your lesson plans.
another plus is that you only have to teach these kids for half a year. If they are a pain in the butt class you will be very happy to get rid of them after half a year. However, with anything but block you get the kids all year long. Some classes I don't know if I could survive if I had to teach them the whole year.
There is research that goes both ways in favor and against block scheduling. Personally I think it is better than the alternatives.
Block scheduling is great for some subjects and horrible for some subjects. It is great for science classes with labs and the such, because there is ample time to do the labs. It is horrible for a math class, because you either lecture for 60 minutes or let students do work for 60 minutes. If it is lecture, the students tune out way before the lecture is over. If it is work, the students stop doing anything after about 20 minutes.
Yes, I experienced that type of schedule as a teacher.