A Good Argument for Homeschooling
Sep. 13th, 2004 01:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenite0Yesterday was the first religious education class of the school year. We've got over a dozen middle schoolers in the class. So I was afraid of getting chaos. It wasn't that bad, though. Other than a constant level of background chatter they were reasonably well behaved, and I didn't have to repeat corrections more than once (the other teachers left enforcing discipline to me). The "get acquainted" session two weeks ago was worse, but rearranging the furniture to keep everyone facing the teachers helped a lot.
We started by brainstorming our classroom "covenant". This is a UU practice--we have the kids come up with the rules to live by and write them down so they feel more obligation to follow them. I'm sure that can work fine with any group that wants to have a standard of good behavior. But that didn't describe all of our students. We've got a lot of cut-ups who viewed this as chance to mess with the teachers. After they had their fun for a while we put that aside "to be written up formally" and went on to the next activity.
It's not that these kids are evil or damaged. Brendan's autism drives me nuts at times with his random noises and comic book recitals, but that's something he has a hard time trying to not do. The student who was the biggest problem I know because he's the son of a friend of ours. I had a run-in with him last year when Laura and I were brought in to show Jamie to a sex-ed class. While the girls clustered around the baby the boys faded to the back and started fooling around. In this case, taking out a lighter and a candle and getting a fire going. When I had a chance I went over and just took it from them. No dramatic displays, just taking an action and making it clear that he didn't get to appeal. He got it back afterwards, but the distraction in class stopped.
With that as background I kept on eye on him in the previous session and disappeared the lighter as soon as he pulled it out. He learns quick. Yesterday he and his buds were playing Magic:TG while waiting for class to start. When I told them to put it away they went back in the box and didn't get touched again. Lesson learned. But watching how well he learns drives something home to me. This kid has learned that showing off to the rest of the class by being an obnoxious clown to the teacher and other students is a successful strategy with no chance of punishment. And he's taking full advantage of that knowledge.
As do a lot of the others. One of the teachers is a long time member of the church who's a public school teacher in her day job, so the rest of us were deferring to her as the lead teacher. But I don't think she's taught these grades. When we were wrapping up the snack time to go into the final segment she went up to the whiteboard and I hushed the class. Then she stood there waiting for the last bits of chatter to die out. Which, of course, didn't happen. So the conversations expanded into the vacuum while she stood there not doing anything. Finally one of the other teachers hushed them again and got her started. At this point I figured there was nothing that a student could do to get her to chastise him.
The final segment was the lead-in to our topic for the year--studying the life of Jesus of Nazareth. To get them thinking we asked the kids to brainstorm about what they already knew about him. We got a lot of stuff, much of which would horrify a theologian but not bad for thirteen year olds. Then the problem child I discussed above spoke up. He wanted to make a real point, that Jesus' conception happened when Mary wasn't married. The word he used to express this was "bastard." Then I saw our teacher come down on him, because that is a Bad Word used to Denigrate People. So one of the other students offered "illegitimate" as an alternative, and she said that was better but people were trying to avoid it because that had also acquired negative connotations. Well, yeah--lots of people have a negative attitude about the situation and whatever word you use to describe it will get those negative connotations. But we moved on from the PC vocabulary lesson and went back to our topic. It was a reasonably successful brainstorming session.
The worst part of the class was realizing that one of our better students--smart and well-behaved--was crying. I don't know when it started, probably when I was running an errand out of the room, there were several of those for chairs and supplies. But she was crying and I couldn't figure out a damn thing to do about it. Really makes me feel useless.
So I think the whole thing is a great argument for homeschooling. All the @#$% that was going on was behavior that was trained in school and the kids were acting that way as their routine. I can see two ways out of the trap: one, have the kids be actually interested in the subject being taught. Which will never happen when they're dumped into a room for storage, even if they'd want to know about this under other circumstances. Two, set a standard of behavior and hold them to it. That takes some training for the teachers, but the important part is the back-up that the school AND PARENTS provide for the teachers. Undercutting the teachers is just teaching the kids you can ignore any consequence from disobeying the teacher.
Right now I'm committed to teach the whole school year. I'm going to stick it out unless we give up on the church entirely (i.e., can't handle the political frenzy). But it'll have to be a lot better than this to have me teaching another year.
We started by brainstorming our classroom "covenant". This is a UU practice--we have the kids come up with the rules to live by and write them down so they feel more obligation to follow them. I'm sure that can work fine with any group that wants to have a standard of good behavior. But that didn't describe all of our students. We've got a lot of cut-ups who viewed this as chance to mess with the teachers. After they had their fun for a while we put that aside "to be written up formally" and went on to the next activity.
It's not that these kids are evil or damaged. Brendan's autism drives me nuts at times with his random noises and comic book recitals, but that's something he has a hard time trying to not do. The student who was the biggest problem I know because he's the son of a friend of ours. I had a run-in with him last year when Laura and I were brought in to show Jamie to a sex-ed class. While the girls clustered around the baby the boys faded to the back and started fooling around. In this case, taking out a lighter and a candle and getting a fire going. When I had a chance I went over and just took it from them. No dramatic displays, just taking an action and making it clear that he didn't get to appeal. He got it back afterwards, but the distraction in class stopped.
With that as background I kept on eye on him in the previous session and disappeared the lighter as soon as he pulled it out. He learns quick. Yesterday he and his buds were playing Magic:TG while waiting for class to start. When I told them to put it away they went back in the box and didn't get touched again. Lesson learned. But watching how well he learns drives something home to me. This kid has learned that showing off to the rest of the class by being an obnoxious clown to the teacher and other students is a successful strategy with no chance of punishment. And he's taking full advantage of that knowledge.
As do a lot of the others. One of the teachers is a long time member of the church who's a public school teacher in her day job, so the rest of us were deferring to her as the lead teacher. But I don't think she's taught these grades. When we were wrapping up the snack time to go into the final segment she went up to the whiteboard and I hushed the class. Then she stood there waiting for the last bits of chatter to die out. Which, of course, didn't happen. So the conversations expanded into the vacuum while she stood there not doing anything. Finally one of the other teachers hushed them again and got her started. At this point I figured there was nothing that a student could do to get her to chastise him.
The final segment was the lead-in to our topic for the year--studying the life of Jesus of Nazareth. To get them thinking we asked the kids to brainstorm about what they already knew about him. We got a lot of stuff, much of which would horrify a theologian but not bad for thirteen year olds. Then the problem child I discussed above spoke up. He wanted to make a real point, that Jesus' conception happened when Mary wasn't married. The word he used to express this was "bastard." Then I saw our teacher come down on him, because that is a Bad Word used to Denigrate People. So one of the other students offered "illegitimate" as an alternative, and she said that was better but people were trying to avoid it because that had also acquired negative connotations. Well, yeah--lots of people have a negative attitude about the situation and whatever word you use to describe it will get those negative connotations. But we moved on from the PC vocabulary lesson and went back to our topic. It was a reasonably successful brainstorming session.
The worst part of the class was realizing that one of our better students--smart and well-behaved--was crying. I don't know when it started, probably when I was running an errand out of the room, there were several of those for chairs and supplies. But she was crying and I couldn't figure out a damn thing to do about it. Really makes me feel useless.
So I think the whole thing is a great argument for homeschooling. All the @#$% that was going on was behavior that was trained in school and the kids were acting that way as their routine. I can see two ways out of the trap: one, have the kids be actually interested in the subject being taught. Which will never happen when they're dumped into a room for storage, even if they'd want to know about this under other circumstances. Two, set a standard of behavior and hold them to it. That takes some training for the teachers, but the important part is the back-up that the school AND PARENTS provide for the teachers. Undercutting the teachers is just teaching the kids you can ignore any consequence from disobeying the teacher.
Right now I'm committed to teach the whole school year. I'm going to stick it out unless we give up on the church entirely (i.e., can't handle the political frenzy). But it'll have to be a lot better than this to have me teaching another year.
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no subject
Date: 2004-09-13 12:42 pm (UTC)We've got a lot of cut-ups who viewed this as chance to mess with the teachers.
The best thing to do with these is boot 'em. Before you teach another class, get authorization to kick out kids who do this to you. If you can't get that authorization, don't teach. You won't accomplish anything except your own frustration. If the kids want to be there, fine, they can act like it. If they don't, it's in no one's interests to keep them there--they won't be happy, you won't be happy, and the kids who want to be there won't get to learn anything bc your cut-ups will distract them and you. Ok, it might be in their parents' interests to get the free baby-sitting, but it's called Religious Education, right? The word they're looking for is "daycare," and that's down the hall, sir, ma'am, right this way, let me hold the door for you...
If I could have done this with just a handful of kids when I was teaching, I might still be doing it.
taking out a lighter and a candle and getting a fire going
Kids who light fires for fun are supposed to have other, more serious issues going on. If this is a major form of amusement for him, you might want to talk to his parents. OTOH...um, I lit fires for fun when I was a kid...only in a metal pot that I could put the lid on to put it out (and don't tell my mom)...and I turned out all right, so it may be nothing to worry about.
This kid has learned that showing off to the rest of the class by being an obnoxious clown to the teacher and other students is a successful strategy with no chance of punishment.
See above comment re: booting. It's not a matter of punishment, really, just a matter of establishing what constitutes correct behavior, and not letting him participate unless he exhibits it. If he truly wants to participate, and can curb his behavior (ie, we're not talking ADHD or similar), then he can come back. If not, hey, the door is open...and you can establish a 3 strikes rule in advance if you like.
Then she stood there waiting for the last bits of chatter to die out. Which, of course, didn't happen.
This has worked for me w/ middle schoolers, but in my case I had the leverage that the class was right before their lunch period. They knew I'd let them go 5 minutes early if we got through the lesson, so the more time I spent in silence, waiting for them to settle, the less of those 5 minute they got to enjoy--and five minutes is a lot of time to 13-year-olds. I think it might not be working for your veteran teacher bc the kids instinctively know that RE is not the same kind of formal environment as "real" school.
The word he used to express this was "bastard." Then I saw our teacher come down on him, because that is a Bad Word used to Denigrate People.
In cases like these, I think you're fully justified in digressing from the lesson plan--but since you're working in a teaching team and had the other teacher pulling the discussion towards political correctness, you were at something of a disadvantage. Frankly, I think a discussion of prejudice due to out-of-wedlock birth is a more timely and pertinent discussion to a bunch of middle schoolers than the life history of JC of N. I mean, let's talk about why "bastard" is a "bad word." What's wrong with being born out of wedlock? Etc. Sure, you're off topic, but what will the kids remember a year from now? Actually, this makes another good argument for homeschooling--you don't need an excuse for letting a discussion wander off topic.
Re: Crying student--can't help you there. If you pull her out to ask her what's wrong, you make her obvious to the rest of the class. If you ignore her, you feel like a heel.
my two cents
Date: 2004-09-13 12:55 pm (UTC)This is a UU practice--we have the kids come up with the rules to live by and write them down so they feel more obligation to follow them.
I remember a teacher I had tried this in fourth grade, and there were two problems with it: A)I didn't like the rules the other kids had made, either. It really just alienated me from my peers more. B)I wanted to suggest we study something more interesting. Like you say, if the kids arn't interested in the material, you're in a tough spot. (the one class that seemed to be exempt from this was Math. I don't know why, but everyone paid attention in math, even though the teacher was horrible.)
So one of the other students offered "illegitimate" as an alternative, and she said that was better but people were trying to avoid it because that had also acquired negative connotations.
I always thought the whole point of the Jesus-myth was that hey, here's this guy who was poor, concieved under dubious circumstances, spent his time wandering barefoot in the desert, just generally not a very glorious figure. And He's the most important human being ever to grace the face of the planet. Personally, I might let the kids give Him so negative connotations.
one, have the kids be actually interested in the subject being taught. Which will never happen when they're dumped into a room for storage, even if they'd want to know about this under other circumstances.
That works brillantly, if you can actually find something the kids are interested in. The problem is, how do you get 15 kids interested in the same thing?
I think the bigger issue is, the kids have to respect you.
Covenant as a tool
Date: 2004-09-13 02:36 pm (UTC)I also vividly recall at that age being proud of the fact that we, as a class, managed to run off a (in our view) piss-poor music teacher. (And I grew up to be a professional musician, among other things. Very few musicians have only one occupation! LOL!) 'Tis a difficult age to teach. Our most successful teacher, in retrospect, was the first male teacher we had - eight grade. You have much in common with Mr. George - intelligence, strength, relative quietness (in that he didn't bellow like a bull, like our fathers did).
So what if it's not a perfect class session - model for them an adult to grow into. You will have spent your time well.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-14 10:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-14 10:50 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-14 11:10 am (UTC)I'm debating whether just tossing them into the hall is the best way, or dragging him into the service, having the parents come out, probably interrupting the service in the course of this, and doing the handover in person would be the best way. Pastor may not like that, but I bet it would be embarassing enough to make them avoid repeats. Or it'd get me booted from RE, but I can live with that.
Fire as fire doesn't bother me. As a teenager the big perk of having to mow the lawn was access to the gasoline can. I'd put some in a pot on the patio and light it off. And I still turned out . . . well, like this. Your call on whether it's all right ;-)
no subject
Date: 2004-09-14 07:53 pm (UTC)If you dump him out into the hallway, he'll have the opportunity to tap on your door, make faces in the window, and generally raise havoc in the hall. Definitely remand him to the authority of another adult, preferably his parents, as soon as the infraction occurs. Since you are in a team teaching situation, you can have one teacher stay and keep on with the lesson, while another accompanies your cut-up. It's important that this adult stay as calm as possible--remember, this is not a punishment, it's a way for everyone to get what they appear to want: you get a calm class, and he gets to eschew being in it. This bit of mental judo will throw him off way balance, since he will be expecting punishment, and probably doesn't really want to forego the class.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-14 08:01 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 07:07 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 07:20 am (UTC)Her vision seems to be that we'd go get the parents from the service and make the parents haul the kid out of the class, which seems to me to be a public statement of "the teachers can't control this room". I'd rather bring the kid to the parents so I can immediately end the disruption. OTOH I may be the only teacher confident of being able to put a come-along on one of them.
no subject
Date: 2004-09-15 10:49 am (UTC)