TED Community » Amy Peach

More About Me

I'm passionate about

Education. As a history teacher, I observed centuries of wars, poverty, and unspeakable destruction. The few breaks in that cycle can be attributed to compassion resulting from education.

An idea worth spreading

The previously impermeable walls separating K-12 and higher education are starting to diminish. Teaching future educators about the immense joy and significant challenges to working with children in an environment entirely separate from those students is an antiquated notion. I look forward to the day when pre-service teachers are given the benefit of day to day training with practicing teachers as well as brief sabbaticals with the researchers and innovators who look beyond the everyday practice. It is with the steady influence of both that they can truly develop the pedagogical, technical, and spiritual skills necessary to thrive as a teacher in this rapidly evolving field. In addition, allowing these teachers to determine for themselves the best path to their own enlightenment through self-created demonstrations of their knowledge can create a generation of teachers capable of truly changing the world through its children.

Talk to me about

Absolutely anything. Although education and technology are my passions, I've found immense joy in simply learning. I am always surprised at how new knowledge applies to unexpected situations.

People don't know that I'm good at

Learning. Many are surprised to know that, although I work in technology, my skills are entirely self-taught. I've made creative use of the seemingly infinite resources the digital age has provided.

My TED Story

A colleague introduced me to TED when we met to work on a grant for ipads in classroom use. She was demonstrating the app. While I should have been impressed with the technology, it was the talk titles that really got my attention. When I returned to my office, I found Mark Bezos's story as a volunteer firefighter and I've been an addict ever since. I work with a wide variety of souls every day and the various topics on TED have informed those interactions in the most unexpected ways. I share many of the technology-based talks with the faculty I currently train, but have found the everyday insights of amazing individuals like Mark extremely useful in my encounters with almost everyone.

Comments

• TEDCred score: +5.10 TEDCred reflects your contribution to the TED community.

• A reply on Talk: Geoffrey Canada: Our failing schools. Enough is enough!

  3 days ago: Hi there, neighbor! I've had student teachers in SLPS over the years and I would definitely have to agree. There is so much political infighting in my beloved city that the only people suffering are those kiddos who deserve better. As usual, the problem is with the adults...not the kids.

• A reply on Talk: Geoffrey Canada: Our failing schools. Enough is enough!

  3 days ago: Me too!

• A reply on Talk: Rita Pierson: Every kid needs a champion

  May 3 2013: I think your sentiment is a very common one and deserves attention here, Sharon. As an educator and a parent, I've seen the situation you describe from both angles. Ultimately, our teachers are prepared to conduct lessons, manage common classroom behavior, and assess/report on learning. What I would like to see in the future for teacher prep programs is more insight into how to communicate more effectively with the many stakeholders in our kids' lives.
  
  For example, I can spend my school year helping Jackson learn Geography, but I also have to talk regularly to his counselor, his parents/guardians, anyone who can help me understand what he needs. If we all talk to each other, we can find more effective solutions to any problems he's experiencing.
  
  Ultimately I think we spend a lot of time glorifying or demonizing teachers when, if we just remembered that they are people first, much of the miscommunication you describe might be avoided. This goes for teachers communicating with parents too. Rita actually touched on that in her talk as well - attempt to understand before being understood. It's just that in the early, harried hours before first period, it's easy to lose sight of that at times. Something important for me to remember myself :)
• +3

  A comment on Talk: Rita Pierson: Every kid needs a champion

  May 3 2013: "We're educators. We're born to make a difference." I guess I have another quote to put on my wall :)
• +2

  A comment on Talk: Rita Pierson: Every kid needs a champion

  May 3 2013: Oh, WOW! This woman is absolutely my hero!! Building self confidence and academic excellence simultaneously is no easy task, but it can be done. Way to go, Ms. Pierson!!! You're an inspiration to teachers everywhere.
• +1

  A reply on Conversation: What can we do to change education?

  Apr 26 2013: I think you're both right about SOME people who struggled in school. I have seen friends and colleagues become embittered by the experience and absolutely determined to go in the opposite direction (for my high school friends it involved joining the peace corps, for my college friends it usually meant work in corporate America).
  
  I would add just one more deviation, though. Struggle in our current system can also make people determined to change it. I wasn't a terrible student in school, but homework definitely interested me less than friends. I can clearly remember a biology teacher in 9th grade telling me I probably forgot my homework in my locker because I was too busy chatting with the other cheerleaders about the dance on Saturday (it was a Friday and I was wearing a uniform at the time).
  
  While the sexist remark did bother me, (and I made it clear to my counselor that it did), I didn't follow the path you describe. Rather, I went to college. Became engrossed in Victorian America and Sonny's Blues through my History an English programs. Applied that content knowledge to my M.Ed. Taught public, private, online, and urban high school students. Completed my Ph.D.
  
  Now I work with people in every field of education imaginable and spend my days convincing them that our current system just doesn't serve students in the way it could and should. I don't remember my biology teacher with bitterness, but rather one (of many) signs that it was my job to advocate for students like myself.
  
  And despite all the things that are still a struggle for our students, I think those efforts have paid off in small ways that will be apparent down the road. My kids are in elementary school, so I sincerely hope so anyway :)

• A reply on Conversation: When do you keep pushing and when is it time to give up?

  Jan 16 2013: SO true, Don. I often think of the motive behind a request or statement. Quite often what they're asking for isn't the original request at all.

• A reply on Conversation: When do you keep pushing and when is it time to give up?

  Jan 16 2013: I absolutely agree, Kate. The only time I have a problem with someone's opinion when it is vastly different from my own is when it impacts policy in some way that I know is extremely detrimental. I like Fritzie's idea of influence and how that might be applicable in situations like that.

• A reply on Conversation: When do you keep pushing and when is it time to give up?

  Jan 16 2013: Pat, I'm busy today but now you're going to suck me right into these talks, aren't you? :)

• A reply on Conversation: When do you keep pushing and when is it time to give up?

  Jan 16 2013: ...an agonizing thought!