What I Wish I Had Learned in College

Teacher preparation programs need to prepare students for all aspects of the teaching profession, not just the teaching part. Below are some things I wish I had learned more about during my undergraduate years.

1. Communicating with Parents: You can love working with kids but teachers spend a lot of time communicating with adults, too. Teachers-to-be need to learn how to deal with conflicts with parents.
2. Being Professional: Sure, all of my professors told me to "be professional" but I think teachers-to-be need to be explicitly taught what that means.
3. Politics: I wish I had known how much politics was involved in teaching! Not only normal "office politics" but also government politics, union politics, and campaigning for school levies.
4. Special Education: General education teachers absolutely should have a least one class that teaches about the special education world, in particular how laws and IEPs pertain to them. ALL general education teachers have students with IEPs in their classes and districts can get into big trouble if their teachers don't follow the letter of the law regarding special education.
5. Reading and Writing: This is a topic for multiple blog entries, but the short version is that English teachers are trained in literature and composition, not teaching reading. ALL teachers need to be taught how to teach reading and writing within their content area.

Finally, no college course is more valuable than time in the classroom with teachers and students. I learned more during my student teaching and first year of teaching than I learned in four years of college. 

It is especially helpful to spend a significant amount of time with several teachers and types of schools and classrooms. Teaching can be wildly different depending on the school. Pre-service teachers need to see some ideal schools and some schools that might scare them away from teaching.