May 23, 2008
· Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged elementary school, hate, Kindergarten, latchkey kids, notes, third grade
Hate is such a strong word, stirs up emotion, applied to so many things in life. How much of what you say you hate, do you really hate? Your clothes, hair, food, what about people? What’s sad is that I hear the ‘h’ word constantly. More often than not it is applied to students hating students, or teachers. What’s worse is when I hear the words spoken ‘my teacher hates me’. My heart aches. As a teacher, could you ever HATE a child? Even if it isn’t true that said teacher hates said child…what could you be doing that puts that message out there to that student?! Where is the love in the schools that need it most? Some students certainly don’t get it at home. I have even found out that some students aren’t living with their moms (dads are rarely in the picture), they are living with older siblings. While in the kindergarten class today the teacher and I noticed a large burn on a little boys hand. When the teacher asked what happened he told us that he was making himself noodles for dinner and burned his hand. A five year old in charge of feeding and cooking for himself!! Unbelievable! According to his cousin who is in 7th grade, him and his siblings, ages 3, 5, 5, 7, 7, and 8, are left home alone to fend for themselves!
A third grade girl got in trouble by her teacher for talking and disrupting while they were supposed to be taking a test. The student then wrote a note to a classmate which the teacher saw and confiscated. It read ‘I hate my teacher. She sucks dicks for dimes.’ The teacher got the girl suspended and then brought her to the office where she had the student read her letter to her mother over the phone. Of course the student felt awful and wouldn’t say the bad stuff to her mom. I am amazed that a third grader even knows this kind of language, and I wonder if she even knows what it means.
May 14, 2008
· Filed under Uncategorized · Tagged behavior, elementary school, fighting, Kindergarten, out of control, students, Substitute, teaching
What do you get when you put 25 five and six year olds in a room with a teacher they don’t care to listen to?
The day starts as the students file in and sit in their seats ready to learn. For the first hour and a half we all learn together and are listening and participating. It seems after lunch is when everything always falls apart. Kindergarten is the only grade that gets an occasional recess, but at recess there is constant pushing and fighting that there are always at least four students out against the wall. We come back in the classroom to a student flicking people off and yelling cuss words. As I try and remove her from the situation she goes limp and kicks while she cries for being in trouble (so much for the “don’t touch students” due to fear of lawsuits). The class is now chaos and no one will listen or sit in their seats, some jumping over tables and chairs and one student throwing books. It takes about 5 minutes to restore ‘order’ and most of the students get into their seats, two decide to fight over a pencil, a real tug of war. One gives up and pushes the other as she turns to walk away, the other student then takes the won pencil and stabs (and I don’t use that word often to describe actions) the other girl in the back!
After the students are removed, partial order is restored. One student even walks up to me and says “I feel bad for her, she got hurt really bad. Jesus doesn’t want us to treat people that way, we are supposed to be nice to everyone.” This from one of the boys who is constantly in trouble! (Maybe there is hope!) Empathy is something I rarely see in these children.
I then have a student from a 4th grade classroom come in and ask me if she can help in the class. When I ask why she isn’t in her own classroom, she informs me that her class also has a substitute and they are acting crazy.
I announce my last resort for any type of order for the last 2 hours of school…I will bring in treats for those students who cause no problems for the rest of the day, and/or those who have been behaving throughout the day. I had most of the class on my side for the rest of the day, and as promised I did bring them treats the next day (rule #1 of promises to any child is that you MUST follow through, you have to build up their trust in you, just as they have to do the same with you!).
The kids are then lined up outside the room to await their parents/grandparents/sibling/ or cousin to come and pick them up to go home. I retire to the classroom, to cleanup the destruction, and leave my note to the teacher in the hopes they will follow through with discipline the next day!
Hate is such a strong word, stirs up emotion, applied to so many things in life. How much of what you say you hate, do you really hate? Your clothes, hair, food, what about people? What’s sad is that I hear the ‘h’ word constantly. More often than not it is applied to students hating students, or teachers. What’s worse is when I hear the words spoken ‘my teacher hates me’. My heart aches. As a teacher, could you ever HATE a child? Even if it isn’t true that said teacher hates said child…what could you be doing that puts that message out there to that student?! Where is the love in the schools that need it most? Some students certainly don’t get it at home. I have even found out that some students aren’t living with their moms (dads are rarely in the picture), they are living with older siblings. While in the kindergarten class today the teacher and I noticed a large burn on a little boys hand. When the teacher asked what happened he told us that he was making himself noodles for dinner and burned his hand. A five year old in charge of feeding and cooking for himself!! Unbelievable! According to his cousin who is in 7th grade, him and his siblings, ages 3, 5, 5, 7, 7, and 8, are left home alone to fend for themselves! 
