Get Schooled

By JustMe

February 1, 2008 10:11 AM | Link to this

I’m sure that there are more….

By jim d

February 1, 2008 10:54 AM | Link to this

Parenting issues #1 on the list?

Sure!, why not? But leave us not forget this short note from the article. Williams, 16, a junior, knows the finality of a funeral. By the time he was 15 he’d buried both his parents.

By Lisa B.

February 1, 2008 11:29 AM | Link to this

My son seems more distracted by peer issues these days than anything else. He’s in the 8th grade, and lives in a home with both parents. He’s healthy, smart, and while not rich, lives in a middle class household. My son is a bit of a “softie,” and wants to “save everyone.” He gives aways too much stuff, tutors classmates, brings home stray kids and forgives nearly anything but intentional cruelty. He is so troubled by the problems his peers experience, and rages about why people are not more kind, resposible, fair, etc. I know that life is not fair, but my son would probably vote to bury “unfairness.” He likes to remind his friends that we could have been born in caves in Afganistan.

By HS Teacher Too

February 1, 2008 11:44 AM | Link to this

I echo JM’s sentiments. jim d, the list wasn’t numbered … be nice! :)

By blueja

February 1, 2008 11:54 AM | Link to this

Lisa B- Your child needs to begin to accept reality and/or you need to see about getting him some anti-depressants.

By Old School

February 1, 2008 12:20 PM | Link to this

“What obstacles do you think prevent some students from succeeding? What can be done to help them bury the past?”

There are those kids who seem to feel they cannot trust any adult; who buy into every trend or fad in an attempt to “fit in”; who are so hungry for affection that they mistake sex for that affection; who just want to be heard by the RIGHT kind of folks; who simply march to a different drummer; and who have simply given up caring.

As a teacher, I can only offer an unjudgmental ear and open heart. This I have done countless times and will continue doing. I am not part of our school’s mentoring program but there are students who come to me for various information or just to talk. I let them know when I think they need a resource other than me for whatever reason and I NEVER share our conversations (except when the law demands it and I tell them what I must do.)

The only way I know to help them bury the past is to start clean each day. That can be tough but sometimes even a fresh start in only one class with one teacher can make a difference.

By Lisa B.

February 1, 2008 1:18 PM | Link to this

Blueja,

I was just trying to make a point that my son, and many other middle grade students in my school, are far more concerned about peers than about academics. I don’t want students to stop caring about one another, but some students are distracted to the point their grades suffer. The middle schooler in my school are continually side-tracked emotionally by so many outside forces. It is a diffecult age for kids. I think my son will be fine. Fortunately, or unfortunately, life has a way of toughening us up.

By me

February 1, 2008 1:34 PM | Link to this

Each year when I start my class I tell the students that my class room is a place to get away from it all and learn. My wife has her own place to be at work, my children grown now are at there places of work, when I had a dog it could not come to the school. The class is where I came to get away from any problems (not that all those things are problems for me) or issues. It is my chance every day to not deal with any negatives. I then ask them to try and do the same and leave all their issues and problems out of the class room and use that hour in my class room to get away from it all. It works really well. Me and the students both do a good job most of the time leaving things out of the class room door and use that hour to have fun /enjoy / have a good time / and learn.

By SET

February 1, 2008 2:07 PM | Link to this

Lisa:

Enroll your son in combat training - a good Karate school, etc. He will get real when 3rd and 4th graders knock him on his rear end.

At 8th grade he is already simmering in poisonous alturism. He believes he should or can control other people and wants other people to do what he thinks they should. He just doesn’t get what growing up in a free society means.

It means people are free to do drugs, refuse to learn, to be criminals, and have and spread untreated diseases, and to have children and pets and mistreat them. And you get to watch.

By 8th grade he should have a sense of identity, of family, clan if you want. He should know that some people are with you and most are not. He should be forming a sense of duty and obligation - to some people and not to strangers. If he doesn’t get a stronger sense of identity than what you describe he will be a lost little boy and I see them all the time. In CA we have cults that can spot such personalities across the street - Berkeley is full of them. Otherwise he can just drift until a stronger personality arrives to tell him what to do.

We prefer that our children become strong, stable, self-sufficient adults who will push our wheelchairs, not personality disordered nervous types.

By catlady

February 1, 2008 2:42 PM | Link to this

In my area, the things that get in students’ way seem to be primarily related to lack of aspiration. IMHO, in my experience and according to the research I have done, lack of student aspiration comes from lack of parental aspirations/espectations on their behalf and lack of a peer group with high expectations/aspirations. Those two things are central to student achievement/aspirations. With other things held equal, those act as a tipping point.

Now, if you think of it, you can think of ways that lack of parental aspirations/expectations play out; for example, lengthy sessions with the Xbox allowed to a student. The same for the expectations/aspirations of their peers.

By jim d

February 1, 2008 6:00 PM | Link to this

WTG Laura!

334 blog entries, so far, in just your first week.

Not bad!

By WFC

February 2, 2008 8:15 AM | Link to this

Here’s the deal:

It’s not rocket science!

By Realist

February 2, 2008 9:07 AM | Link to this

SET- I feel very, very sorry for you. What a sad life you must live if you feel that way. If you cannot recognize that we need alot more kids like Lisa B’s, then hope must be gone from your life. Clannish people that are scared of “others” is one of the biggest problems we face. I hope you eventually recognize our interconnectedness and embrace our common humanity.

By catlady

February 2, 2008 9:39 AM | Link to this

jim d, I can’t believe you added them up for Laura! Just think, if she had used the words “illegal immigrants” or “war in Iraq” or “Hillary” she could have gotten 1000 posts, easy. It is telling to me how relatively few blog here compared to Wooten or the sports blogs.

By Tony

February 2, 2008 12:04 PM | Link to this

After looking over Banneker’s report card data, I commend the teachers for what they have been able to accomplish with the students. Considering the economic and societal factors that have a negative impact on student achievement, it appears they are able to experience relatively modest success over the last few years. Unfortunately, that success is not highlighted in the public eye because of the AYP status of the school.

This school apparently has tremendous obstacles to overcome in order to break through the statistics of the past. Holding a ceremony like this one may help students to recognize some of these obstacles that is within their power to overcome. Poverty alone does not doom a child to eternal failure.

Here are some things to wonder about, though. What if these students as young children had access to better healthcare? What if these students were surrounded by community members that valued learning? What if these students ….? You fill in the blank.

To even the playing field for these students to get the very best education requires more than the things schools can provide. It would be so much better for the schools if government agencies used other avenues to improve the quality of life for the children in areas of high poverty. When students come to school ready to learn, our job becomes easier. This means the students have to have adequate care at home, motivation to learn, and hope for a future. Schools alone can not transform the social ills that hold students back. Neither should we be held accountable for those ills.

By Attn: Clayton Parents

February 2, 2008 12:55 PM | Link to this

Why did the AJC run a story about databases that keep track of teachers who have harmed children, yet continue to ignore the story of Clayton school board member Rod Johnson KNOWINGLY hiring an accused, now indicted, child molester to work in the Clayton school system in a job that had the potential for DIRECT contact with children?

Can’t be because they don’t think the Clayton school board is of interest, as they have run close to a DOZEN stories on them in recent weeks.

Can’t be that it wasn’t a credible story, as the Clayton News Daily saw enough evidence to do its own “special report”. (And, as was noted, everybody on the board except Rod Johnson was willing to comment on the story; what does that tell you?)

Sadly, it looks like the reason the AJC is sitting on the story is Rod Johnson is a political opponent of board members affliated with the Metro Association of Classroom Educators.

What does it say about the AJC editors and their alleged “concern” for the safety of students that they’ll provide cover for a school board member who KNOWINGLY hired an accused child molester to work in the Clayton system, only because that member is an opponent of an organization the AJC has a personal vendetta against?

So much for any kind of credibility when the AJC writes an editorial “for the children”.

By keep thinking

February 2, 2008 5:02 PM | Link to this

Boring topic - this is an ‘easy-thinker-upper’ that horrible Mr. Mobley at Marist would have tossed at us.

By jim d

February 4, 2008 8:14 AM | Link to this

Burying the past?

Indeed voters have an opportunity tomorrow to bury the past practices of one local BOE’s spending millions of dollars a year behind closed doors.

This could be rather entertaining.

By SET

February 4, 2008 7:35 PM | Link to this

Realist… I was in the Los Angeles area during the Rodney King Riots. I’ve lived long enough to have seen a lot of things. The SLA in Berkeley for example. Synnanon in California. I had friends who dealt with the Rahaneesh in OR. The list goes on. CA is an interesting place.

Your personal attacks on other bloggers reveal more than you realize. You should realize that other people have their own perspective on life - we don’t have to agree with each other. Nonetheless when other people are trying to explain the significance of the train whistle you need to get your nose out of the drink and look up from the lawn chair you have set across the tracks.

People who think they have to save other people if they have to kill them to do it are nothing new to me. That kind of thinking starts in childhood. Most of us grow out of it when we realize what living in a “free” society such as this one really means.