Don’t you love parents who think “their” child is the “smartest” kid in the world?

If you are one of these parents, I’m sorry.  I know, EVERY parent, thinks their kid is special……….. and every kid is, in their own way.

First off, let me say that while their child IS wonderful, she’s no standout academically in my class.  She’s been a bit of a behavior problem of late.  I would be one of the first to admit that both the under- challenged, and the over-their-head challenged can both be behavior problems (and some of the middle kids as well).   And I have some of each this year.  So much so, that I have really had to tighten up my discipline plan this year (as in, I actually have had to implement a mechanical progressive discipline process, something I have been more relaxed about in the past).  I have a three card system, which consists of a warning, two stages of yellow and one stage of red.  The warning carries no consequences, the first yellow is a timeout, the second yellow is loss of play time at recess, and the red is a call or note home.   Each day students take home a Monopoly money size green, yellow or red card.  I’ve printed out most infraction types on the cards and only need to check one or more boxes on the card.  They need to get the yellow and red ones signed and returned.

Samantha’s problem is that she is easily distracted, has a kindergartener’s natural exuberance at being around a bunch of other kids, and is impulsive.  Nothing bad there really.  But she does take the occasional yellow card home.  Which from the way she gets almost hysterical when it happens, you would think they beat her, (hopefully that’s not the case) but I do know that they do take a yellow or red card very seriously when she gets them.  I have hinted, that while I want the child to think it’s very serious, that perhaps they might not attach quite so much significance to the  occasional yellow card when she gets it. 

Yesterday, mom brought me a note from the doctor,  she knew class was starting, and didn’t want to take my time……. but did anyway……..

The note is written on a doctor’s prescription pad and reads,  “Please discuss with mom testing Samantha for advanced I.Q. since she has advanced knowledge for 5 yrs old in face of behavioral difficulty.”  I’m not even sure that’s grammatical…. but who am I to be picky, the doctor pulls down more income than me I’m sure. 

Yeah, I have some kids this year who are learning well and doing well on various assessments as they are given.  But I do NOT have any kids reading Magic Tree House books in the first trimester like I did last year.  This years crop of kids is AVERAGE, and she is in the upper half of the class in that respect.  But she doesn’t stand  out.  I have very few who can consistently decode CVC words.  She isn’t one of them.

I find it interesting that parents rationalize their children’s behaviors back to being the teacher’s fault.  She is apparently bored, or not being challenged and that’s why she is getting in trouble.  If she is SO smart, maybe she could figure out how to stay out of trouble……………..

Parent Conference Progress Update

Friday when I should have sent home  parent-teacher conference confirmations, I remembered AFTER the last child had left.  So Monday mornings conference wasn’t confirmed, and one of my Tuesday morning confirmations didn’t get home on Monday, because the child was absent on Monday. Other than that, it has gone pretty well.  If I don’t count those two, out of 15 scheduled conferences, I had 11 of them.  Not bad.

Tomorrow, there isn’t any school for the students.  I have 11 conferences scheduled during the day tomorrow.  I’ll try to  get the rest of them made up or finished on Thursday or Friday.  So far they are going really well.   It’s been nice to be able to talk to so many of the parents and tell them just how great their children are, and how well they are doing.  Putting together the report cards and the material for the conferences made me realize that my class really was doing better than I had previously thought.  There is this small core of about 5 kids who are really struggling, but the rest of them actually are doing pretty well.

It’s Parent Conference Time!!!!

Yeah, yeah, it’s overrated.  The parents you don’t need to talk to are the ones who always show up.  Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to talk to them, to be able to tell them how wonderful their children are.  And they need to hear it from the teacher once in a while.  They are the ones who will sign their kids up for extra free tutoring, because they can.  Not because their child NEEDS it.  They are involved, they read to their kids, they interact with their kids.  Generally GOOD parents, and GOOD kids.

Then there are the rest of them.  Some of them love their kids, want the best for their kids, but don’t have the skills or the time to do it.  We are a Title One school and as such a lot of our families don’t have a lot of material things and if the parents are working, they are generally working a lot.  Parent/Teacher conferences can help these parents, if they have the time.

The frustrating ones are the ones who probably never should have had kids in the first place.  The kids are street smart, sometimes REALLY street smart, but have no clue about book smart.  No one has ever read a book to these kids, they have no number sense, they have no fine motor skills.  They have been raising themselves since they were toddlers.  They’ve watched movies and video of things that I have NEVER seen, and never will,  These parents don’t show up, don’t return calls, don’t help with homework,  don’t sign their kids up for tutoring  (and their kids NEED tutoring).  They don’t understand what their part is in the whole education of their children.   They often had a less than stellar experience in school themselves.   They have a hazy idea of what their responsibilities are as parents.  And yet they have these kids, and we are supposed to teach them.

By the end of the week, I will have talked to so many parents I won’t remember what I’ve said to who.  Sometimes that happens during the conversation.  “Have we talked about this already?”  Some of them will have been highly enjoyable discussions about great kids.  Some I will come away from dissatisfied,  nothing will be resolved, and nothing will change.  And with some I will have had little to no discussion at all.

I came to teaching later in life. I was about 40.  I’ve been doing it fo 20 years now.  My first 4 years were kindergarten, two half day sessions of about 30 kids each.  We still have about 30 in a class, but now at least it’s a full day class and only one class.  So many of these kids I wish I could take home, clean them up, feed them, read to them, take care of them.  I think to myself, they would be so much better off.  But the funny thing is, most of them LOVE their parents, those less than perfect people who brought them into the world and sort of take care of them.  For most, if given the choice, they would stay with who they love.  Would they like those flawed parents to be better?  Sure,  they don’t want to see daddy beat up mommy, but they love them.

How strange is that?  I just have to believe that some of what I can do as a teacher will make a difference.  Read this.  It’s a great post about making a difference as a teacher.