What of this book business?

So here I am in my new placement and although I think the cooperating teacher is a swell character, I find that his teaching is dry and baron. He teachers from the book , to the test, and lacks passion. Furthermore, his stundents don’t seem to respect him at all. I had heard about teaching from the book as a big no no and a practice done by the dinosaurs, but this man is young..Where did his passion go, or did he have any to begin with? I find myself picking his brain fo knowledge of the content, but not for teaching tips. Anyone seen this sort of thing in their placement?

“ The true teacher defends his pupils against his own personal influence. He inspires self-distrust. He guides their eyes from himself to the spirit that quickens him. He will have no disciple.

— Amos Bronson Alcott

“ I had a terrible education. I attended a school for emotionally disturbed teachers.

— Woody Allen

“ You teach best what you most need to learn.” -

— Richard David Bach

“ Prejudices, it is well known, are most difficult to eradicate from the heart whose soil has never been loosened or fertilized by education; they grow there, firm as weeds among rocks.

— Charlotte Bronte

“ A poor surgeon hurts 1 person at a time. A poor teacher hurts 130.

— Ernest Leroy Boyer

Discipline

I am now working with 7th and 8th graders and am intrigued by the level of discipline that is necessary to accomplish anything in the classroom. I am curious as to if these students are simply accustomed to teachers with little expectations of them? Also, had the students started the year with a teacher who had and enforced their expectations, would they be any different?