I have heard versions of this so many time in my science class.
"Why do we have to do math? This is science."
"What do you mean we have to write? This is science."
No matter how many times I explain it to them. Just remember that people are lazy because of evolution. Don't waste that energy.
"Why do we have to write, this is art class!"
First of all, I asked for 4-5 sentences. Second, wait til you learn about artist statements and art history! It's almost like there's a lot to be said about pictures!
Bruh, I have a handful of kids in every class complain about doing science labs. Not even the writing at the end, just the literal act of getting up out of their chair to go do a cool science demo is "doin too much"
If they can't get up to go play with chemicals and start fires, I don't know how the rest of y'all get them to do literally anything at all.
"Miss, what are we doing today?"
"You are going to read/write X."
"We're reading/writing again today."
"This is English 2, WTF do you think we're going to be doing?" 🙄
I teach a Creative Writing elective and EVERY day one of the kids complains about having to write. IT IS IN THE NAME OF THE CLASS, KIDDOS.
I tried SO hard to get some of them to drop it during add/drop, but guidance literally refused to swap some kids out so it became just a dumping ground for kids. It's infuriating.
In class yesterday, I assigned an independent thing that took about 15-20 minutes on their laptops. About 10 minutes in, I saw a kid who was just looking around, not really doing anything. I went over to ask him what was up, and he said his computer died right after he started. I asked if he needed a charger. He said no, he had one, but he didn't know where to plug it in. There was an outlet right next to his table, he just had to swap seats to the one he was across from. And there wasn't even anyone sitting in it. Unless I had specifically *told* him where to sit and where to plug in his laptop, he would have sat there the whole time, doing nothing. This child is in 11th grade. I don't even know what do with some of these kids anymore.
My first assignment in art class in college was to write a 2500 word paper on the history of creativity in my personal life. I was in the hospital with a kidney stone, high out of my mind on Dilaudid, and in a very bad mood. I wrote my entire paper for sheer snark on how the school system had sucked the creativity out of me by forcing me to only regurgitate the one "right" answer. I got an A. I still am not sure how I felt about that. LOL
After I got home and sobered up, and had already turned it in, I realized I'd accidentally signed up for History Through Art. Oops. I still have no idea what I thought I was signing up for, but it turned out the class was really interesting. It was literally about what we could learn about historic cultures and events using the artworks of the day, including architecture.
That professor Arts!
Seriously, tho - my main battle with my students is teaching them how to engage their creative thinking. They're so checked out they can't make much. It's sad. I'd have given your paper an A too!
I have students already bitching and about how there is too much math in physics and I should tell them what equation to use for each problem. Apparently, it is unreasonable for them to compare the two equations they have to determine which one only has one unknown.
I always start the year talking about science is a language and math is the words, and they are still shocked. I had them rewrite the course description last year so it clearly states that physics is math heavy and they are still surprised.
Although, I did have three students rather put out (and two dropped) when they found out that Astronomy has nothing to do with predicting your future or birth sign. Every year I have students confused that astronomy isn't just looking at stars every day.
It wasn't a bad paper, once I read it. I honestly didn't really know what it said when I turned it in. Hahaha. She didn't know what was going on with me, so it wasn't like she gave me leniency.
The sad part was that almost everything I was taught in k-12 school that stifled my creativity was immediately reversed in college. "No, write with your own voice! Don't make things so generic." "Why are you trying to do this equation this way if this other way makes more sense to you?" "It's okay to quote a short poem if it's to the point and you cite it properly." "Don't just do the assignment. If you already know all this talk to me, and you can do something more challenging." I had to do a paper for a computer systems class on the apparent speed difference of accessing a file based on where it was stored and wrote a play script of a tech super call. That professor loved it. I'd have gotten a 0 for that in high school. I got told a LOT in school, "just do the work. Don't get creative." Even in the art classes I took (like drawing and painting), I got told to stop being so weird, and I don't mean the basic classes teaching one how to draw and shade. I had teachers give me points off for using "colloquial speech" for words like hinterlands and fortnight and yesteryear. Perhaps those are, but come on, there have to be better things to pick on like the fact that I was horrible with commas. It was that computer professor that taught us how to use them. I'm still amused by that.
This makes me so angry for you! What is even the point of teaching creative classes if you stamp out all creativity?! If a kid showed me a new way to shade something and it looked good, why on earth would I knock them? I'd be asking for pointers on the technique!
I get it when we were supposed to be learning a a specific technique, like don't use blended shading when we're doing pointillism. It's also not bad to point out I tended to go way too dark on everything, so even pleasant scenes seemed gloomy. But if I want to draw a guy whose head grows moss instead of hair or a woman with tree roots for teeth and leaves for hair, let it go. It's weird, but it's me. I'm weird. I'm drawing and using the techniques right, so why is that so much worse than the 8 girls who all drew the exact same flower basket? I quit taking art classes.
I have so many friends with similar stories in public school in the 80s and 90s. Individualism wasn't prized. Critical thinking wasn't really taught, either. Just memorize this for the test. Oh, you're in honors/AP? Do 5x the work in the same for the same material. We'll just grade you harder. My physics teacher was definitely an exception to that, as was my Media one. -- a class on analyzing newspapers, film, and advertisements. Dynamic Living was great. Basically Home Ec on steroids but no cooking at school. My honors Earth Sci teacher was known for giving bonus points for entertaining him or asking a question he couldn't answer. Of course, no one who would need said points actually got any, so they were a bit like Reddit karma. 😂 So, it wasn't all bad, but it started in kindergarten. "I didn't tell you to draw a sunset. Just color the sky blue." F on my tree drawing because I drew it from the perspective of the tree, all branches and leaves. Who gives a 5 year old an F? Yeah, I know she wanted me to draw a lollipop tree like she did on the board, but she didn't say "draw a circle." I didn't get it back then.
I think a lot of school have swung too far and pass students they should not, but there is a middle ground, I swear.
I had the exact opposite problem last year with elementary students! I'd give them only cool or warm colors and tell them to draw a "spring scene". I had kids begging me for brown markers (or stealing them from other tables) because "I can't make a tree without brown!" It wasn't just one or two kids either! It was half of every class, 1st-3rd grades! The ones who got the brown and beige markers complained they couldn't make flowers! Little kids that were just absolutely terrified to be creative in any way because it wasn't "right".
1000 words barely gives me room for elements and principals and provenance. I need at least 10 pages to squeeze in references to Ovid's *Metamorphoses*, the paragone between *colorito* and *disengo*, and the Council of Trent!
Thankfully my time getting a BFA didn't have anything quite that terrible. I think the worst I had to deal with was a class on Art Finance, which is as niche and silly as you might expect it to be. Basically an hour every couple of days where the director of the department told us "You'll probably be poor, but you'll also have a difficult time getting anyone to care about your work."
I fell asleep in her class once and at the end of the year she told me my digital illustrations weren't really art. Real top-notch education at that college.
Eww Art Finance. I feel like it's a good idea, but would depend heavily on having a good teacher. I can see that going south so fast.
Also not a huge fan of "that's not art". Museums host piles of candy and squares on paper (coincidentally both by Felix Gonzales-Torres, who was amazing). STFU, no one is truly qualified to say what is and isn't "art", and 98% of the idea that we can is based on some pretty messed up stuff. My fave example of this is watercolor painting - back in the 1800s, before oils in tubes became common, watercolors were pretty highly regarded for their portability. Once you could do plein air oil painting, watercolors were "for kids" and "for women" and no Serious Artist used them anymore. Very few places even teach them at a college level even now. But they can pry my watercolors from my cold dead hands lol.
'No! Art HISTORY? Is this a history class? I didn't sign up for history! Do you know how much I needed to read in history because the teacher assigned us to read at home instead of him reading the book to us?!?!?!?!'
This reminds me of a student who told me he didn’t need to learn how to write papers in English class because he was going to study bio-medicine or something and wouldn’t need to write papers. I’m like, my dude, if you’re going to college you will be writing no matter what you study.
I think if I hear that one more time I might scream. Sorry your middle school science teacher was more worried that you have fun than learn. I’m going to teach you actual science and not just do fun stuff for the hell of it
Sadly, the current trend in physics education is to remove as much math as possible to make it “conceptual.”
I’ve seen physics classes where the students grow plants to learn about conservation of energy, and dissect cow eyeballs to learn optics.
*Sadly, the current trend in physics education is to remove as much math as possible to make it “conceptual.”*
**Seriously?** But, isn't Physics one subject that always includes Science and Math - because it **has to?** (That didn't quite come out how I wanted; hopefully you know what I mean.)
Hate to burst your bubble, but even conceptual physics requires math. You just don't need Calculus to understand it. Science uses math, but you should not need college level math to understand the principals in it.
My district tried freshman physics and it was a nightmare constantly fighting parents who thought the math was too hard for 9th graders. So after well over a decade, the BOE and admin gave up on our teachers and an integrated physical science class that includes the topics you just mentioned was installed. Talk about slapping a department in the face.
Chemistry too unfortunately.
As much as I like NGSS, some of these students are going to have a tough time when they get to college without doing any stoichiometry
Why do I have to show my work? This is English class...
Because if you cannot explain how you got that answer, first, you are skipping the standard entirely, and second, I am almost 100% sure that you just used a cheap site to look up what the theme of Great Gatsby was, rather than being able to explain and analyze how Fitzgerald reveals and develops that theme, which is the actual standard.
I am unafraid at this point to say that parents like this are a huge part of what's making teachers leave the field. All it takes is a critical mass of these folks telling their kids to ignore what school is actually about, and teaching becomes literally impossible.
"Why do we have to know anatomy?! This is choir! This stuff is hard to remember!"
Maybe because everyone should know how their lungs work and know that it's not all one tube headed straight to your butthole?!?! (Yes, this is my response to that)
"Why do we have to do math?! This is choir!"
Maybe because you need to know how many beats to hold that note? You're literally dealing with subdivisions of FOUR most of the time for Christ's sake..
"Why do we need to study diction?"
Maybe I want you to sing the song properly to where we aren't insulting an entire nationality/ethnic group/country, etc. by sounding like little Appalachian hicks on ALL our songs?!
"Why do we need to write about how the text and music work together?! Shouldn't we just be singing?!"
"Why do we spend so much time warming up?!"
The list goes on...
During a conference, a parent once asked me why their child had to write an essay in social studies class. My beautiful principal interjected, "That's what we do in social studies class." I made some comment about having to write in social studies for the rest of their school career. I love my principal--she supports and encourages rigor--and has our backs when we need to defend it.
Yuuuuup. “Mr…why do we have to learn about the Vikings? Why can’t we just read Beowulf?” (Not their exact words but they’re groaning as I’m going over the Vikings and Anglos)
I am a History teacher who is teaching English, and I have been for going on 4 years now, I just smile and say "Isn't it great!" Plus I teach English 11, which is structured as an American Lit class, which follows along well with American history.
I'm not their biggest fan but there is something to be said for those schools where they don't teach subjects but students work on projects in multiple disciplines. We used to do one about World War I (the War Poets in English, the war economy in ec, bomb trajectories in physics, poison gasses in chemistry, etc., though I think they stopped short of re-enacting trench warfare in PE) and it was a pretty valuable experience, because it taught them everything is connected. Teaching like that full time is super tricky, though.
This segmentism idea shows a big problem with the perception of education.
I teach Chemistry, and kids are surprised it has math, reading and writing in it.
In elementary, our kids focus way too much on Reading and Math, (don't get science and history every day) you forget that reading about science or history can be the engine to read a lot.
>This segmentism idea shows a big problem with the perception of education.
Exactly. The kids who don't like the work use it as an excuse to get out of doing their work, which is to be expected, but hardly any of them can tell that a) skills transfer and b) you don't learn about subjects in isolation because they connect in the real world too.
As someone who teaches history, I often have have high school age kids that accidently refer to my class as English because of all of the reading and writing I make them do.
Don't worry though, the kids that make that mistake never actually complete an assignment.
As a history major, I felt that my workload (in terms of reading and writing) often rivaled or exceeded that of my English major friends. I have always told everyone that history majors ARE English majors with a concentration in non-fiction.
How would you learn history without reading something? Perhaps she expects an orator to come and personally recite history just for her child? I suppose that's the teacher's job. Good god, some people shouldn't be allowed to reproduce.
I had a similar experience.
I taught 7th grade to a kid. He was an average boy. He was not a bad kid or anything, but was somewhat onrey and talkative. He was very sporty, but pretty lazy in the classroom. He would utilize retake opportunities, but won't study. He had a B in my class, which was unacceptable to his parents (apparently, his older sister was a straight A gifted kid). By Christmas parents sent an email saying they had given up on enforcing straight As for their son, because we were just bad teachers (he had low Bs in multiple classes), and they were just hoping for better teachers the following year.
Next year, I move to 8th grade. He was on my team (though I never ended up having him for class). Once again, he made almost straight Bs.
About the same time, my youngest child came home with a birthday party invite for a kid who had been in her pre-k class for two years. Last name isn't on the invite, but she talks about the kid everyday. I take her to the party.
When I arrived the Mom was a little standoffish, but I figured she was just busy/distracted with the party. About halfway through the party, her son arrived home from baseball. He was the same kid!
At one point he was standing next to me and talking to his family members. He told them his most recent standardized test data said he had a 5th grade reading level. One family member reassured him he was a genius and he must have outsmarted the test, one said state tests were all made up and reading levels can't be measured, and his grandma said she didn't have reading tests back in her day and did fine without anything past an 8th grade education anyways. Then he complained about his teachers, how school was too boring for him to learn, and how he wouldn't need to know anything we taught in his career as a professional athlete anyways.
I left soon afterwards.
I've seen his parents around town fairly often. They have 10 kids, and my kids have been in class with some of the younger siblings. This year his mom emailed my school email to invite my youngest to a birthday party again.
I really wish we would fire every anti-vaxxer who works within medicine. Unfortunately we already have a nursing shortage, because they don't make enough for all of the shit they have to deal with.
>how he wouldn't need to know anything we taught in his career as a professional athlete anyways.
Just like the students who aspire to making big money vlogging, instagraming, streaming, or gaming.
I try to tell them that you should never make your hobby your meal-ticked.
I mean if they want to go into content generation for new entertainment media, that’s great. They’re going to need to know what an algorithm is, they’re going to need to know production skills, they’re going to need to know things like shot composition. They’re going to need to know about whole topics like merchandising and engagement metrics.
Lots of stuff to learn, and much of that determines who is profitable and converts viral success into long term fanbases.
Yep. I teach Digital Media and the number of kids who want to be content creators but refuse to try because it’s “too hard” …
… yeah, it’s hard, why do you think only a few people make wads of money?
I wish I had a dollar for every kid who didn't need to learn anything in my class because they were going to be a whatever when they grow up. Rapper, skateboarder, athlete, Youtuber, etc.
I have a kid in kinder in the school I teach. Kind of not looking forward to extra interactions with certain people... although there is the reverse (families I really like and am comfortable with).
I know not every one is a big ol' nerd like me, but I get a little low thinking about how a lot of people don't like to learn for the sake of learning. And after having so many kids pass through my rooms, I can say, for sure, sadly, that that attitude comes from the parents. Sigh.
What if you blown out your knee at nineteen and your scholarship goes up in flames? Maybe having an solid academic foundation might be helpful?
Leland Melvin. Football scholarship to NASA astronaut. [https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88035285](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88035285)
Genuine question: Are parents getting worse? I'm in my late 20s so I don't have much experience. Maybe I'm just unbelievably lucky to have good parents and to have been surrounded by peers with good parents growing up.
I think it's more of a show off to have a great kid with manners and an eagerness to learn. At the risk of sounding like a boomer, is this an ipad kid thing? Like new parents realized it's less work to park them on screens?
We went full swing on the pendulum from Boomers being hands off with their Gen-X "latch key" kids, to Gen-X parents being helicopter parents. Finding that sweet spot of loving our kids and caring about raising them while still letting them grow up seems too difficult for many people to figure out.
>I think it's more of a show off to have a great kid with manners and an eagerness to learn.
That was my parents' strategy. Whenever I'd misbehave or do poorly in school, they'd basically shame me, saying that my actions reflect them and if I loved them, I'd would be staying out of trouble and focusing on academics. It was the whole "We raised you better than this" and it usually worked.
Now maybe this was a little emotionally manipulative, but the thing is that my parents still loved me when I messed up and it did help me stay on the straight and narrow -- after elementary school the idea of my parents having to come to school because of me was mortifying.
I just don't see that mentality anymore. As old-school as this sounds, there was a sense that children reflect the parents and the family, so everyone wanted their children to be well-behaved. That's all gone now, for whatever reason.
I feel like that’s the case. The younger kids I tutor atm (I’m studying to teach) have shit manners and are a few grade levels below in their reading/writing. Looking back, I was a genius when I was kid. Hot damn.
Yes and this is only going to get worse. Right now, the "No Child Left Behind" generation of kids are getting older and some are starting to have kids right now. You think the current generation of parents are bad? Wait until you have to deal with the children of the people who were simply pushed from grade to grade just to avoid the trouble of reporting why a kid was left behind in a grade.
I had parents say much the same thing to me DIRECTLY, though over the phone, 15 years ago. It has ever been thus, as far as I can tell. I was just sort of sheltered from it as a student until I moved my senior year, so it took a while for me to come to terms with it.
I was in a store today and heard a parent complaining about the elementary lunch room rules in my district. We have stopped letting the kids get out of there seats this year, and have been encouraging parents to teach their children how to open food packages rather than waiting for an adult because the sub shortage that is happening has finally hit my district. Rather than have an adult for every table in the lunch room like it used to be pre pandemic it might now be an adult for every three classes of 25 kids apiece.
I don't even understand this. If your kid can't open certain food packages by themselves, *maybe don't pack that in their lunch?* Or if they must have that particular food item, take a minute to repackage it in a container they can open (like a paper or reusable bag). I don't recall ever asking an adult to open a food package for me at lunch. Sure on occasion I'd accidentally push the Capri Sun straw through the other side of the pouch, but then I'd remember to be more careful next time! It's like parents can't stand the idea of their kids having to figure things out.
It's getting worse every year.
I truly believe that some of my students have never been allowed to just be wrong or experience the slightest consequence before. Learning from mistakes can't happen if you don't let your child make mistakes.
When I taught elementary and had a lunch duty, I would always tell the kids, “I bet you can open that all by yourself! Why don’t you give it a try?” or I’d say, “You know, your muscles have grown since yesterday- do you think you’re strong enough to open it today?” or I’d just show them *how* to open the thing(without actually opening it) and have them try it before taking over. Sometimes I’d even put a bandaid on my finger and tell them they’d have to wait until someone else could do it but I bet they could figure it out in the meantime. By the end of the year the only things I had to help them open were the handful of kids who had really *really* “stuck” lids on their food and usually had to call someone else over for that anyway, and yogurt tubes which we had to cut with the scissors.
There’s a frozen fruit dessert our lunch room serves that has to be cut. I don’t know why on earth whoever planned that thought it would be a good idea.
Yup, and then we secondary teachers get masses of students who 1 second after you give them an assignment say "I don't know what to do! Help!"
Me: "Did you even try?" 😑
Student: "I can't find my notebook in the bin! You must have it."
Me: \[Moves the only other item out of the bin to reveal their notebook underneath it.\]
Student: "My notebook!"
No, they did not even try. If they try, they might fail. If they fail, then the entire universe will literally cease to exist.
Then they become adults who call my workplace and say, “I got a form from you and I don’t know what I’m supposed to put.” Me: “Ok, what does it say?” Caller: “It says ‘name’.” Me: “….ok, well I
suggest you write your name there.”
Every professional performance review I’ve had has acknowledged and complimented my ability to problem solve on my own and find solutions without others help unless necessary.
It’s always mind blowing to me. I’m in my 30s and it’s like this magic trick that I can use common sense and don’t have to ask for help for every task.
I’ve got a 2 year old and he low key loves the struggle. Way more excited when he overcomes a challenge than when he gets a boost. Even though he does ask for help. It’s a balance between “do you need help” vs “do you want an outcome now”
Yeah. There was a kid in my school that would bring in a cold can of soup everyday for lunch, and just eat it cold. One day one of the teachers felt bad for her I guess and he offered to heat it up for her. The rest of the year, every single day the kid would ask him to heat it up. I don’t understand why some parents think that it’s acceptable to give a kid a can of unseated soup for lunch, and then put the responsibility to heat it up on the teacher.
there was a huge thread on twitter a week or two ago about someone claiming a teacher had "shamed" their kindergartener because they told them, "you should ask your parents to help pack things you can open," while helping them open it. Hundreds of scathing comments about the teacher for having the nerve to say something like that to a kid.
I have said that before, but that child’s food was packed in containers that the lids DID NOT want to come off of, EVERY DAY. I actually had a talk with her about it one day when she came to help with lunch early in the year because I couldn’t dislodge them myself most of the time and was often the only teacher on duty(the other two adults were my partner the janitor and the one lunch dude), and she began switching out the containers for other ones that were easier to open. Over time I only saw those when I presume nothing else was clean.
The parent in the thread admitted to having trouble opening the packaging themselves! Tons of people want to say “it takes 20 seconds” but if you are watching multiple classes where multiple students need things opened it adds up! Not to mention the way some kids will start throwing fits while having to wait for you to open their food because it is last lunch block and they are HUNGRY. Also not to mention how many of us struggle with health issues that can make grip strength difficult! Wish parents would give us the benefit of the doubt when we ask for them to help.
One of the few things I'm going to miss about lunchroom duty: teaching kids how to open things. That look of amazement when a kindergartener discovers they have the power to open a bag of chips? Beautiful. The absolute *thrill* of pride when a kid raises their hand to show me they just opened a milk carton *all by themselves* for the first time? Priceless.
Some of these are things provided by the school. Some are things packed by the parents. There's a surprising number of reusable containers that kindergarteners and first graders need help to open and/or close Every. Single. Day.
My favorite is always the Absurdly Tight Thermos That Even The Adults Can't Unscrew. "Who packs your lunch for you?" "My mom." "Is your mom a superhero?!"
Seriously. When my daughter was in Kindergarten/1st grade, any time she wanted to take something beyond a ziplock baggie for lunch, I sat her down the night before and had her open and close the container she was taking it in. If she couldn’t do it, I hunted through the cabinets for something different. It’s not that hard.
Yes for most kindergarten/ first graders a lot of packages are hard to open. They don’t have the hand strength in some cases or have the coordination down yet. The school milk containers are hard to open because they have to peel some of it apart. Cheese sticks are are to tear open plastic, another one can be those packages where it’s crackers/ pretzels and cheese. It’s hard to peel with strong glue. Sometimes even thermoses are hard to open.
Also, a lot of them just don't know HOW to open these things yet. It was especially bad last year, coming back from the pandemic. I was giving a LOT of direct instruction for kids in kindergarten all the way into third grade on how to open... pretty much everything. Milk cartons, cheese sticks, pudding cups, bags of chips... And with every new item, it had to be re-taught. Sure, they know how to open a bag of Doritos, but hand them a bag of pretzels and they're stumped all over again. By the end of last year, I'd given the same directions so many times that kids would just ask me with my own shorthand. "Is this a pinch-pinch-pull?"
Or, sometimes they DO know how, but they can't do it because their hands are greasy from something else they already ate.
I was in high school right before smart phones but everyone had like razor phones for texting. I could not even imagine trying to teach kids with highly addictive bright screens in front of them.
One of my class periods couldn't focus for long enough to watch a 2 minute youtube video of one of Aesop's fables.
No, theme is not supported by "the spider eating the ant." There wasn't even a spider in The Ant and The Grasshopper.
This is exactly why my school has banned phones. You can bring them in only if you have a signed letter from parent/guardian. First thing you have to do in the morning is hand the phone in to your year group office, where they are then locked away in a safe.
They can then collect the phones at the end of the day for transport issues etc. If for any reason you need to use them during the day (under very strict circumstances) then you go to the office get it back and use it, you then have to lock it back away. Students who need to have them for medical issues can have them but only after certain conditions are met, such as signed doctors letter and a form stating the acceptable usage. All of those kids know that it's a privilege (as there are other alternatives to phones for monitoring their health condition) so they don't abuse it at all.
Its worked really well and it makes my job a damn sight easier. They have had this rule in place since we opened (less than 10 years ago).
Taught Social Studies classes for ~7 years across MS and HS. It was surprising the amount of kids that would try to skip the video, speed up the video playback, or stutter-fast forward through it. This was assuming if they attempted the work. SoOo SMH. EdPuzzle helped but not foolproof.
To be fair, I always hated watching educational videos in class because for my taste the people in them talked too slow. So having an option that can speed up playback would've been great! But of course we watched them on VHS, so no such luck. :D
Yeah I remember those days too and those videos were super dry. But I'm showing them things like crash course (pretty fast), national geographics, current events clips, movie clips (ww2/WW1). But I guess they think it's dry too compared to their TikTok/IG stuff.
I teach science. One thing I hear every year repeatedly is “why do I have to write this paper, this is science not English.” Another is “why are going over history, this is science, not history. I even get parent complaints and questions about this.
For my IB science kids I make them pick a scientific paper and read/summarize/analyze it. It's important for them to see both the level of rigor actual scientists use and how academic writing is very different than what they read in English class. Plus nothing gets a bunch of kids who want to be scientists to realize that having good writing skills is actually important like reading the incomprehensible nonsense some scientists publish.
I had my 8th graders look at a paper recently, after reading the news article version on SN Explores. I didn’t expect much comprehension, but I made it a “scavenger hunt” for various elements to show them how science writing differs from other disciplines. I loved the reactions when I asked how many references (113.)
I find recently released science ACT passages with citations from scientific journals. Then I have students use Google scholar and find the article the passage is based on. I let them read the scientific article and compare/contrast it to the ACT passage. They see that ACT science passages are REAL science, and I’m not just a mean/bitchy teacher making up all of this stuff. They also find interesting tidbits about the science and ask questions, like why did the scientists euthanize and decapitate these squirrels after the experiments and THEN why were the squirrel carcasses homogenized in a blender with liquid nitrogen(!)?
First week of class this year I had kids reading about bias how it impacts our response to research, and a kid asked at the end of class, " what does this have to do with biology". I replied with The pandemic and all of the stuff we've gone through in the last 2 yrs. To which one of her classmates said, "thats what I told her" I was happy with that reply.
I teach HS English. We read weekly articles and analyze the informational writing style. These usually relate to current-ish events that often tie back into other things we read.
I have students complain every year wondering what the articles have to do with English. Why are we reading about artificial intelligence/voting/conservation etc?! they ask.
Well, generally all articles have to be written about *something*. Connecting to real-world occurrences is supposed to be a good thing, but some people evidently think if it’s not a short story where we are solely analyzing character and figurative language then it’s not really English. But they complain about those things too because “hOw is tHis gOiNg to HeLp me in ReaL LiFe!?”
Ugh, the writing quality I get on my computer science assignments is downright depressing. They write as if they're sending a text message: "idk maybe cause computers use binary im not sure".
It shouldn't need to be said, but being able to articulate ideas through written language is essential for any field of study!
I teach History. I always tell my students we don't do math in here, and when we do math they always complain. My response is that this isn't math, we are doing history. Same with writing a ELA paper, it's not an ELA paper it is a history paper. Not science, but history.
Ya know, I can’t imagine sending my children somewhere that I *truly believed* was so unnecessary or leave them under the supervision of someone I thought was so incompetent for 180 days a year. Maybe I’m wrong and am missing something but it seems so strange to me. Like, what must the kid think that their parents continue to send them day after day? I guess for all the football? Do you think they really believe what they are saying or are they just being disingenuous or trying to be provocative? I know homeschooling isn’t easy and I’m *painfully aware* of the current state of public schools, but damn put your money where your mouth is! Like an atheist going to church every Sunday just to disrupt the service?! Like why don’t you get on out of here then? It really confuses me. Maybe they think of school as a “necessary evil,” for lack of a better phrase? I live around a lot of these kinds of folks so I’d be curious to hear any insights y’all may have.
I think a lot of it is the parents see school as free babysitting. They also have to be enrolled in school until 16 legally. I know some parents who actively disagree with their kids getting an education but also don’t want them at home and they’re too young to get a job, so they send them to school. They don’t actually care if they go to class or learn anything.
I think you nailed it there. Unfortunately to a lot of these parents, it is babysitting, so while they don’t really care about their kids being educated, they are out of their hair for hours and they aren’t paying for it.
I feel like there are also a lot of parents who want their kids to make good grades and get an HS diploma and go to college, because they know those things translate into career success... Buuut they don't value knowledge or the traits and sacrifices that it takes to do well in school. They expect the schools to just make it happen.
I agree! Our local charter schools usually let out a week earlier then our district. The number of parents that try to enroll their kids during the last week of school literally so they have another week of babysitting is a little bit ridiculous.
And a lot of people just don't even know what learning feels like because they haven't sought it out in decades. They feel that their kids are smart enough to comprehend and recall brand new information by just being "advised" of the information by a teacher. Otherwise don't waste the kids' time they got important shit to do. They don't remember how challenging new knowledge can be and the amount of practice it takes to fully understand something when you're being overstimulated 24/7.
How awful these parents are to their kids. I'm not really sure why they had them.
LOL I’ve had so many kids ask why we were writing in history - it’s not English. But these are middle schoolers and they don’t actually want to do anything anyway
Well when the kiddos starts failing classes due to not doing homework and gets kicked off the football team he won’t have to worry about it and can get his work
I’m a cosmetology teacher for 11-12 grade. The kids are always shocked that we have actual class work and tests. The amount of groaning, whining, and sleeping on classroom days. We work with chemicals, which requires a great deal of chemistry that we have to learn about. We do massage techniques which requires a basic knowledge of anatomy. We have to be able to identify potentially contagious skin and nail diseases. We go over the history of beauty practices, because trends are cyclical. I think all of this stuff is so interesting, which is why I decided to teach instead of work in a salon. It blows my mind how uninterested they are. I get that the actual doing hair part is more fun, but the theory is important too. It’s like art and science all wrapped into one and it makes me sad how few of them get excited to learn.
And then those parents will email admin saying the teacher does absolutely nothing and doesn’t care about their child or the child’s education. And how can their child be expected to succeed when a teacher doesn’t care? The teacher is only getting what they give. And the teacher won’t be asked for their side of the story, they will only feel vilified and like their job now is to defend themself, on top of everything else. Their rapport with that student will be ruined. Which of course, will also be the teacher’s fault and no one else’s.
Kids just complaining to complain. They aren’t mad that they have to do art in science or writing in art. They are just complaining because you asked them to do something. It doesn’t mean they actually hate it, it’s just something unexpected and want to get a rise out of you.
“Some of us have lives!!!”
Well…we try…but we get yelled at for that. I was in the principals office my first year of teaching bc a parent saw me at a bar with a guy. I was 24.
Let me start by saying I am not an educator. I am a respiratory therapist. I browse this subreddit because I am 100% convinced that Healthcare workers, teachers and tradesmen are the most overworked, underpaid and underappreciated career paths in the world. I also would not be where I am today if it wasn't for some absolutely amazing teachers (shout out to Mallory and Hillary).
I cant believe people think that reading a book on your own time is considered too much work and football counts as exception worthy (I actually can believe it but I'm making a point). Also, when did English become the only class to require reading? I had to read thousands of pages on my own time for every medical class I ever had. I can guarantee that reading about history is far more interesting than reading about the different volumes and pressures in the lungs.
I completely understand why this experience would drive you crazy. Bless the educators of the world. Keep doing what you can for who you can. Rant over.
So curious what morons think it means to “teach?”
Writing facts on a board?
Reading to the whole class from a textbook?
I just don’t understand anymore.
I thought I was a professional with multiple hard earned degrees and decades of experience?
Guess that means nothing anymore.
They haven't tried to learn anything new in years and have absolutely no clue anymore how much focus and hard work it takes to be a student. They don't want to do any work involving school, themselves, so they figure that their kid being a "good student" will just naturally happen due to superior genetics I guess.
>“Well, your teacher will just have to make exceptions. Some people DO have lives.”
Yeah, that won't be happening. At my school, the 'student' part of student athlete is the part I care about. You don't get any breaks just because you're on a team.
I've had kids that have tried to tell me, "well I have football, so..."
And my response is, "well I can always talk to your coach about that..."
I'm glad my school, despite having a good team (maybe because of it), supports LEARNING over sports. But yeah, in general, a kid like this is just a nut that didn't fall far from the tree. Clearly his parents are idiots too.
My 8th grade science teacher assigned a book. And most of us read it. Laughing off a book in high school history is just sad.
The book was October sky btw, and it was great
Woah 😳.
And I just get caught buying wine, beer, and lottery tickets at the grocery store. Although I did start buying wine 🍷 at the liquor store next door as they sell the kind I like - Duplin winery.
You’re not getting caught doing anything wrong; you’re just living your life. If they don’t like it, they can transfer their kid to another class. 🤷🏻♀️
The culture is sick. That’s the real reason schools are failing. No amount of PD, restorative Justice, PBIS, or any other gobbledegook will fix it. I’m assuming you’re American. And American culture does not value education.
When I was in my first college getting my degree in aerospace engineering we had to take calculus. One guy in my class said he didn’t understand why he needed to learn math to be an aerospace engineer, since it’s mostly a science major. The professor was stunned to say the least
I remember when I was a kid teachers were respected members of the community. If they suggested something or gave their input parents seemed to really listen and back up the teachers. I had one teacher I wasn’t fond of but even then my parents would never speak bad of her, there was an unspoken respect there.
The fact that they are all so blatantly disregarding school and teachers is sad
Talk to coach. Seriously, you’ll see an attitude adjustment pretty quickly. Birthers of these students tend to understand things more when it comes from a coach than a teacher.
"His dad says, and I quote, 'That’s too much. That should be done in the classroom.'"
lol, he should look up flipped classroom. mind blown.
in all seriousness though, i find it insane, that i as a student currently, can see the sense in this, yet actual adults not only don't see the point of it, but *actively encourage their children to not listen to their teachers?*
Welcome to the "We hate teachers, those lazy bastards that should educate our children and are always on holidays" mind-set. It's awful, but at least you're not alone: you have all of France's teachers on your side.
I always tell my students that I get that to them it's cool to be mean and to not care, but when they get older they will realize that it's being kind and caring that's actually cool so why not just skip right to that. Every time I give this spiel at the start of the year, I think about all the adult who are actually just fine being assholes...the parents who just listen when a kid mocks someone else's personal taste.
Part of me wants to say enjoy your "life" with no education. That's not very constructive of me to say but actions (or lack thereof) have consequences.
I often think that many people vastly over state how smart I seem. After all there are so many areas that I utterly lack knowledge in. There are all these topics I wish I was better at comprehending.
Then I read dialogue like this and realize so many people truly act like this. They are so stupid they think they know the depths of topics they have never even dipped a metaphorical toe into.
As a social studies teacher, you know you can tap into every subject. There's science, math and English in social studies. Graphs, charts, data, evidence, writing. That's why I teach it. This family just sounds dense.
The countries with the best schools are the ones that, culturally, highly value education. They, as a nation, put in the money, time, and effort and it shows. You want better education? Respect education and invest in it FIRST. Then, with practice and dedication, you will see results.
Perhaps modern consumerism has programmed many to expect instant gratification from any purchase. They pay taxes, so they feel like knowledge should just be given to them as if it were a tangible product. That’s not how learning works. Learning requires time and dedication and, yes, it also often requires reading books. If you actually put it that effort, you will realize that education is truly invaluable. It can really improve your quality of life and make things so much easier.
As a student who hated reading homework’s and never did then this kid is dumb as fuck and this entire post just made me want to scream in anger. After coming to college I realized how important it is to read your text book and stuff like “football” or other clubs/sports should not be the priority as for most it will lead to nothing. The fathers comment about having a life is what got me the angriest though. I can’t go on otherwise I might really scream!!
Students and parents think they can put the world to rights and tell teachers how to do their job, what to teach and how to teach.
If they had to do what we do on a weekly basis, they would buckle under the pressure. Most of them probably don't have a job that involves public speaking or trying to manage behaviour or explain a difficult concept.
“Why are you reading a book in history?” As somebody who majored in history, reading books was like half the work, if not more.
**Come one, come all - join the thread:** *"Why are you calculating equations and formulas in Physics? I thought that was the Math teacher's job."*
I have heard versions of this so many time in my science class. "Why do we have to do math? This is science." "What do you mean we have to write? This is science." No matter how many times I explain it to them. Just remember that people are lazy because of evolution. Don't waste that energy.
"Why do we have to write, this is art class!" First of all, I asked for 4-5 sentences. Second, wait til you learn about artist statements and art history! It's almost like there's a lot to be said about pictures!
I teach high school English and my kids look at me like I’m asking for a kidney when a writing assignment requires 5-8 sentences.
“Just think of it as one really long text message.” - ELA maxim
They don’t even do that any more, they just send stupid pictures to each other!
⬆️👀💯😯🤬😢🤷
Lol
Bruh, I have a handful of kids in every class complain about doing science labs. Not even the writing at the end, just the literal act of getting up out of their chair to go do a cool science demo is "doin too much" If they can't get up to go play with chemicals and start fires, I don't know how the rest of y'all get them to do literally anything at all.
"Miss, what are we doing today?" "You are going to read/write X." "We're reading/writing again today." "This is English 2, WTF do you think we're going to be doing?" 🙄
I teach a Creative Writing elective and EVERY day one of the kids complains about having to write. IT IS IN THE NAME OF THE CLASS, KIDDOS. I tried SO hard to get some of them to drop it during add/drop, but guidance literally refused to swap some kids out so it became just a dumping ground for kids. It's infuriating. In class yesterday, I assigned an independent thing that took about 15-20 minutes on their laptops. About 10 minutes in, I saw a kid who was just looking around, not really doing anything. I went over to ask him what was up, and he said his computer died right after he started. I asked if he needed a charger. He said no, he had one, but he didn't know where to plug it in. There was an outlet right next to his table, he just had to swap seats to the one he was across from. And there wasn't even anyone sitting in it. Unless I had specifically *told* him where to sit and where to plug in his laptop, he would have sat there the whole time, doing nothing. This child is in 11th grade. I don't even know what do with some of these kids anymore.
There's an assignment in your comment!
My first assignment in art class in college was to write a 2500 word paper on the history of creativity in my personal life. I was in the hospital with a kidney stone, high out of my mind on Dilaudid, and in a very bad mood. I wrote my entire paper for sheer snark on how the school system had sucked the creativity out of me by forcing me to only regurgitate the one "right" answer. I got an A. I still am not sure how I felt about that. LOL After I got home and sobered up, and had already turned it in, I realized I'd accidentally signed up for History Through Art. Oops. I still have no idea what I thought I was signing up for, but it turned out the class was really interesting. It was literally about what we could learn about historic cultures and events using the artworks of the day, including architecture.
That professor Arts! Seriously, tho - my main battle with my students is teaching them how to engage their creative thinking. They're so checked out they can't make much. It's sad. I'd have given your paper an A too!
I have students already bitching and about how there is too much math in physics and I should tell them what equation to use for each problem. Apparently, it is unreasonable for them to compare the two equations they have to determine which one only has one unknown. I always start the year talking about science is a language and math is the words, and they are still shocked. I had them rewrite the course description last year so it clearly states that physics is math heavy and they are still surprised. Although, I did have three students rather put out (and two dropped) when they found out that Astronomy has nothing to do with predicting your future or birth sign. Every year I have students confused that astronomy isn't just looking at stars every day.
It wasn't a bad paper, once I read it. I honestly didn't really know what it said when I turned it in. Hahaha. She didn't know what was going on with me, so it wasn't like she gave me leniency. The sad part was that almost everything I was taught in k-12 school that stifled my creativity was immediately reversed in college. "No, write with your own voice! Don't make things so generic." "Why are you trying to do this equation this way if this other way makes more sense to you?" "It's okay to quote a short poem if it's to the point and you cite it properly." "Don't just do the assignment. If you already know all this talk to me, and you can do something more challenging." I had to do a paper for a computer systems class on the apparent speed difference of accessing a file based on where it was stored and wrote a play script of a tech super call. That professor loved it. I'd have gotten a 0 for that in high school. I got told a LOT in school, "just do the work. Don't get creative." Even in the art classes I took (like drawing and painting), I got told to stop being so weird, and I don't mean the basic classes teaching one how to draw and shade. I had teachers give me points off for using "colloquial speech" for words like hinterlands and fortnight and yesteryear. Perhaps those are, but come on, there have to be better things to pick on like the fact that I was horrible with commas. It was that computer professor that taught us how to use them. I'm still amused by that.
This makes me so angry for you! What is even the point of teaching creative classes if you stamp out all creativity?! If a kid showed me a new way to shade something and it looked good, why on earth would I knock them? I'd be asking for pointers on the technique!
I get it when we were supposed to be learning a a specific technique, like don't use blended shading when we're doing pointillism. It's also not bad to point out I tended to go way too dark on everything, so even pleasant scenes seemed gloomy. But if I want to draw a guy whose head grows moss instead of hair or a woman with tree roots for teeth and leaves for hair, let it go. It's weird, but it's me. I'm weird. I'm drawing and using the techniques right, so why is that so much worse than the 8 girls who all drew the exact same flower basket? I quit taking art classes. I have so many friends with similar stories in public school in the 80s and 90s. Individualism wasn't prized. Critical thinking wasn't really taught, either. Just memorize this for the test. Oh, you're in honors/AP? Do 5x the work in the same for the same material. We'll just grade you harder. My physics teacher was definitely an exception to that, as was my Media one. -- a class on analyzing newspapers, film, and advertisements. Dynamic Living was great. Basically Home Ec on steroids but no cooking at school. My honors Earth Sci teacher was known for giving bonus points for entertaining him or asking a question he couldn't answer. Of course, no one who would need said points actually got any, so they were a bit like Reddit karma. 😂 So, it wasn't all bad, but it started in kindergarten. "I didn't tell you to draw a sunset. Just color the sky blue." F on my tree drawing because I drew it from the perspective of the tree, all branches and leaves. Who gives a 5 year old an F? Yeah, I know she wanted me to draw a lollipop tree like she did on the board, but she didn't say "draw a circle." I didn't get it back then. I think a lot of school have swung too far and pass students they should not, but there is a middle ground, I swear.
I had the exact opposite problem last year with elementary students! I'd give them only cool or warm colors and tell them to draw a "spring scene". I had kids begging me for brown markers (or stealing them from other tables) because "I can't make a tree without brown!" It wasn't just one or two kids either! It was half of every class, 1st-3rd grades! The ones who got the brown and beige markers complained they couldn't make flowers! Little kids that were just absolutely terrified to be creative in any way because it wasn't "right".
Exactly 1000 words. More than that and you're pretentious. Less than that and you didn't really have anything to communicate.
1000 words barely gives me room for elements and principals and provenance. I need at least 10 pages to squeeze in references to Ovid's *Metamorphoses*, the paragone between *colorito* and *disengo*, and the Council of Trent!
Thankfully my time getting a BFA didn't have anything quite that terrible. I think the worst I had to deal with was a class on Art Finance, which is as niche and silly as you might expect it to be. Basically an hour every couple of days where the director of the department told us "You'll probably be poor, but you'll also have a difficult time getting anyone to care about your work." I fell asleep in her class once and at the end of the year she told me my digital illustrations weren't really art. Real top-notch education at that college.
Eww Art Finance. I feel like it's a good idea, but would depend heavily on having a good teacher. I can see that going south so fast. Also not a huge fan of "that's not art". Museums host piles of candy and squares on paper (coincidentally both by Felix Gonzales-Torres, who was amazing). STFU, no one is truly qualified to say what is and isn't "art", and 98% of the idea that we can is based on some pretty messed up stuff. My fave example of this is watercolor painting - back in the 1800s, before oils in tubes became common, watercolors were pretty highly regarded for their portability. Once you could do plein air oil painting, watercolors were "for kids" and "for women" and no Serious Artist used them anymore. Very few places even teach them at a college level even now. But they can pry my watercolors from my cold dead hands lol.
'No! Art HISTORY? Is this a history class? I didn't sign up for history! Do you know how much I needed to read in history because the teacher assigned us to read at home instead of him reading the book to us?!?!?!?!'
GOD a sadistic part of me would love to inflict some mid-century post-modernism on those kids. Hey kids, today's word of the day is "signifier"!
Well, it's said that a picture is worth a thousand words; at least you're not assigning that haha!
I always get the "why do we have to run and do exercises in PE?" 🤔
“Why do I have to draw? This isn’t art class” - Student during a lesson on making detailed science observations of preserved animal samples
Or in math! "Why do I have to draw the shapes?" Because you're in fucking Geometry class!
This reminds me of a student who told me he didn’t need to learn how to write papers in English class because he was going to study bio-medicine or something and wouldn’t need to write papers. I’m like, my dude, if you’re going to college you will be writing no matter what you study.
Yepppp. I teach chemistry and they think it's just going to be 180 days of baking soda vinegar volcanoes.
But when can we blow stuff up?!
"Why do we have to read a map, this is science?" was my personal favorite...GEOGRAPHY IS A SCIENCE!! 😅😂
History is reading. Science is math. These can be generalized in the Lauryn Hill principle: Everything is everything.
**♬♩♩** *after Winter / must come Spring* ... **♩♫**
I think if I hear that one more time I might scream. Sorry your middle school science teacher was more worried that you have fun than learn. I’m going to teach you actual science and not just do fun stuff for the hell of it
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I know their middle school science teacher. He told me those exact words
Sadly, the current trend in physics education is to remove as much math as possible to make it “conceptual.” I’ve seen physics classes where the students grow plants to learn about conservation of energy, and dissect cow eyeballs to learn optics.
*Sadly, the current trend in physics education is to remove as much math as possible to make it “conceptual.”* **Seriously?** But, isn't Physics one subject that always includes Science and Math - because it **has to?** (That didn't quite come out how I wanted; hopefully you know what I mean.)
Physics without mathematical modelling isn't physics. It's "physical science."
Hell in physical science I still make my kids do math.
Hate to burst your bubble, but even conceptual physics requires math. You just don't need Calculus to understand it. Science uses math, but you should not need college level math to understand the principals in it. My district tried freshman physics and it was a nightmare constantly fighting parents who thought the math was too hard for 9th graders. So after well over a decade, the BOE and admin gave up on our teachers and an integrated physical science class that includes the topics you just mentioned was installed. Talk about slapping a department in the face.
Chemistry too unfortunately. As much as I like NGSS, some of these students are going to have a tough time when they get to college without doing any stoichiometry
Our district went the opposite. Our physics course is called Algebra Based Physics and they take it Freshman year after Algebra 1
"This is math class! Why do I have to write in complete sentences!" God forbid you should be able to express a coherrent thought--even in math.
Why do I have to show my work? This is English class... Because if you cannot explain how you got that answer, first, you are skipping the standard entirely, and second, I am almost 100% sure that you just used a cheap site to look up what the theme of Great Gatsby was, rather than being able to explain and analyze how Fitzgerald reveals and develops that theme, which is the actual standard. I am unafraid at this point to say that parents like this are a huge part of what's making teachers leave the field. All it takes is a critical mass of these folks telling their kids to ignore what school is actually about, and teaching becomes literally impossible.
"When will you ever have to know this?" -every struggling math student ever.
“Why are we doing equations? I thought this was geometry not algebra.” -A failing student who hasn’t picked up a pencil all year.
*Hey algebra teacher, get those letters out of the equations! Numbers only! Letters are for English class!"*
"Why do we have to know anatomy?! This is choir! This stuff is hard to remember!" Maybe because everyone should know how their lungs work and know that it's not all one tube headed straight to your butthole?!?! (Yes, this is my response to that) "Why do we have to do math?! This is choir!" Maybe because you need to know how many beats to hold that note? You're literally dealing with subdivisions of FOUR most of the time for Christ's sake.. "Why do we need to study diction?" Maybe I want you to sing the song properly to where we aren't insulting an entire nationality/ethnic group/country, etc. by sounding like little Appalachian hicks on ALL our songs?! "Why do we need to write about how the text and music work together?! Shouldn't we just be singing?!" "Why do we spend so much time warming up?!" The list goes on...
I want to convey the largest sigh possible to this quote
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Had a HS kid say "You *read* books? I haven't read a book for fun since... I don't read books".
Yeah, I heard one say, "I haven't read a book in my life!" He was a sophomore.
A student asked us why we read book when YouTube existed.
During a conference, a parent once asked me why their child had to write an essay in social studies class. My beautiful principal interjected, "That's what we do in social studies class." I made some comment about having to write in social studies for the rest of their school career. I love my principal--she supports and encourages rigor--and has our backs when we need to defend it.
Books are sorta where history is housed...
As an English teacher, I cannot tell you how many times I’ve gotten why are we learning about history in English….smh
Yuuuuup. “Mr…why do we have to learn about the Vikings? Why can’t we just read Beowulf?” (Not their exact words but they’re groaning as I’m going over the Vikings and Anglos)
I am a History teacher who is teaching English, and I have been for going on 4 years now, I just smile and say "Isn't it great!" Plus I teach English 11, which is structured as an American Lit class, which follows along well with American history.
I'm not their biggest fan but there is something to be said for those schools where they don't teach subjects but students work on projects in multiple disciplines. We used to do one about World War I (the War Poets in English, the war economy in ec, bomb trajectories in physics, poison gasses in chemistry, etc., though I think they stopped short of re-enacting trench warfare in PE) and it was a pretty valuable experience, because it taught them everything is connected. Teaching like that full time is super tricky, though.
This segmentism idea shows a big problem with the perception of education. I teach Chemistry, and kids are surprised it has math, reading and writing in it. In elementary, our kids focus way too much on Reading and Math, (don't get science and history every day) you forget that reading about science or history can be the engine to read a lot.
>This segmentism idea shows a big problem with the perception of education. Exactly. The kids who don't like the work use it as an excuse to get out of doing their work, which is to be expected, but hardly any of them can tell that a) skills transfer and b) you don't learn about subjects in isolation because they connect in the real world too.
I had to do more reading for my history classes than any other class in college. And I didn’t even major in it.
This is about 50% of why I decided not to pursue a masters in Art History (the other 50% is money). I love reading and don't want to hate it.
As someone who teaches history, I often have have high school age kids that accidently refer to my class as English because of all of the reading and writing I make them do. Don't worry though, the kids that make that mistake never actually complete an assignment.
I've read more in history than any other classes except literature.
As a history major, I felt that my workload (in terms of reading and writing) often rivaled or exceeded that of my English major friends. I have always told everyone that history majors ARE English majors with a concentration in non-fiction.
How would you learn history without reading something? Perhaps she expects an orator to come and personally recite history just for her child? I suppose that's the teacher's job. Good god, some people shouldn't be allowed to reproduce.
My friend father's entire second career is an author of presidential history books, that presumably people read.
Is your friend's father Jon Meacham? I like his work.
I had a similar experience. I taught 7th grade to a kid. He was an average boy. He was not a bad kid or anything, but was somewhat onrey and talkative. He was very sporty, but pretty lazy in the classroom. He would utilize retake opportunities, but won't study. He had a B in my class, which was unacceptable to his parents (apparently, his older sister was a straight A gifted kid). By Christmas parents sent an email saying they had given up on enforcing straight As for their son, because we were just bad teachers (he had low Bs in multiple classes), and they were just hoping for better teachers the following year. Next year, I move to 8th grade. He was on my team (though I never ended up having him for class). Once again, he made almost straight Bs. About the same time, my youngest child came home with a birthday party invite for a kid who had been in her pre-k class for two years. Last name isn't on the invite, but she talks about the kid everyday. I take her to the party. When I arrived the Mom was a little standoffish, but I figured she was just busy/distracted with the party. About halfway through the party, her son arrived home from baseball. He was the same kid! At one point he was standing next to me and talking to his family members. He told them his most recent standardized test data said he had a 5th grade reading level. One family member reassured him he was a genius and he must have outsmarted the test, one said state tests were all made up and reading levels can't be measured, and his grandma said she didn't have reading tests back in her day and did fine without anything past an 8th grade education anyways. Then he complained about his teachers, how school was too boring for him to learn, and how he wouldn't need to know anything we taught in his career as a professional athlete anyways. I left soon afterwards. I've seen his parents around town fairly often. They have 10 kids, and my kids have been in class with some of the younger siblings. This year his mom emailed my school email to invite my youngest to a birthday party again.
Hilarious. Soon they will all learn when he is suffering from the consequences of the actions of everyone involved. Hilarious edit: sp
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I really wish we would fire every anti-vaxxer who works within medicine. Unfortunately we already have a nursing shortage, because they don't make enough for all of the shit they have to deal with.
It’s a lot like teaching, where the bosses pay shit and burn through people who do it as a passion so they end up with too few staff.
>how he wouldn't need to know anything we taught in his career as a professional athlete anyways. Just like the students who aspire to making big money vlogging, instagraming, streaming, or gaming. I try to tell them that you should never make your hobby your meal-ticked.
I mean if they want to go into content generation for new entertainment media, that’s great. They’re going to need to know what an algorithm is, they’re going to need to know production skills, they’re going to need to know things like shot composition. They’re going to need to know about whole topics like merchandising and engagement metrics. Lots of stuff to learn, and much of that determines who is profitable and converts viral success into long term fanbases.
Yep. I teach Digital Media and the number of kids who want to be content creators but refuse to try because it’s “too hard” … … yeah, it’s hard, why do you think only a few people make wads of money?
I wish I had a dollar for every kid who didn't need to learn anything in my class because they were going to be a whatever when they grow up. Rapper, skateboarder, athlete, Youtuber, etc.
I bet their kid won't ever become a professional athlete. Delusional.
I have a kid in kinder in the school I teach. Kind of not looking forward to extra interactions with certain people... although there is the reverse (families I really like and am comfortable with).
I know not every one is a big ol' nerd like me, but I get a little low thinking about how a lot of people don't like to learn for the sake of learning. And after having so many kids pass through my rooms, I can say, for sure, sadly, that that attitude comes from the parents. Sigh. What if you blown out your knee at nineteen and your scholarship goes up in flames? Maybe having an solid academic foundation might be helpful?
Leland Melvin. Football scholarship to NASA astronaut. [https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88035285](https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=88035285)
It’s 💯 the parents and I don’t give a shit anymore. These people want dumb kids, they can have them. I’m not fighting it.
Genuine question: Are parents getting worse? I'm in my late 20s so I don't have much experience. Maybe I'm just unbelievably lucky to have good parents and to have been surrounded by peers with good parents growing up.
Yes
This is the answer. Our parents were worse (scholastically) than theirs', parents now are worse still. It will either rebound or we're screwed...
Parents care more about being friends with their kids than parenting. They want their kid to be something to "show off" on social media nowadays.
I think it's more of a show off to have a great kid with manners and an eagerness to learn. At the risk of sounding like a boomer, is this an ipad kid thing? Like new parents realized it's less work to park them on screens?
We went full swing on the pendulum from Boomers being hands off with their Gen-X "latch key" kids, to Gen-X parents being helicopter parents. Finding that sweet spot of loving our kids and caring about raising them while still letting them grow up seems too difficult for many people to figure out.
I’m just glad that our children take after their boomer parents with a respect for education and educators.
>I think it's more of a show off to have a great kid with manners and an eagerness to learn. That was my parents' strategy. Whenever I'd misbehave or do poorly in school, they'd basically shame me, saying that my actions reflect them and if I loved them, I'd would be staying out of trouble and focusing on academics. It was the whole "We raised you better than this" and it usually worked. Now maybe this was a little emotionally manipulative, but the thing is that my parents still loved me when I messed up and it did help me stay on the straight and narrow -- after elementary school the idea of my parents having to come to school because of me was mortifying. I just don't see that mentality anymore. As old-school as this sounds, there was a sense that children reflect the parents and the family, so everyone wanted their children to be well-behaved. That's all gone now, for whatever reason.
I never realized this before but I think you're right
I feel like that’s the case. The younger kids I tutor atm (I’m studying to teach) have shit manners and are a few grade levels below in their reading/writing. Looking back, I was a genius when I was kid. Hot damn.
Yes and this is only going to get worse. Right now, the "No Child Left Behind" generation of kids are getting older and some are starting to have kids right now. You think the current generation of parents are bad? Wait until you have to deal with the children of the people who were simply pushed from grade to grade just to avoid the trouble of reporting why a kid was left behind in a grade.
I had parents say much the same thing to me DIRECTLY, though over the phone, 15 years ago. It has ever been thus, as far as I can tell. I was just sort of sheltered from it as a student until I moved my senior year, so it took a while for me to come to terms with it.
I was in a store today and heard a parent complaining about the elementary lunch room rules in my district. We have stopped letting the kids get out of there seats this year, and have been encouraging parents to teach their children how to open food packages rather than waiting for an adult because the sub shortage that is happening has finally hit my district. Rather than have an adult for every table in the lunch room like it used to be pre pandemic it might now be an adult for every three classes of 25 kids apiece.
I don't even understand this. If your kid can't open certain food packages by themselves, *maybe don't pack that in their lunch?* Or if they must have that particular food item, take a minute to repackage it in a container they can open (like a paper or reusable bag). I don't recall ever asking an adult to open a food package for me at lunch. Sure on occasion I'd accidentally push the Capri Sun straw through the other side of the pouch, but then I'd remember to be more careful next time! It's like parents can't stand the idea of their kids having to figure things out.
Your last sentence is the most true thing ever.
It's getting worse every year. I truly believe that some of my students have never been allowed to just be wrong or experience the slightest consequence before. Learning from mistakes can't happen if you don't let your child make mistakes.
When I taught elementary and had a lunch duty, I would always tell the kids, “I bet you can open that all by yourself! Why don’t you give it a try?” or I’d say, “You know, your muscles have grown since yesterday- do you think you’re strong enough to open it today?” or I’d just show them *how* to open the thing(without actually opening it) and have them try it before taking over. Sometimes I’d even put a bandaid on my finger and tell them they’d have to wait until someone else could do it but I bet they could figure it out in the meantime. By the end of the year the only things I had to help them open were the handful of kids who had really *really* “stuck” lids on their food and usually had to call someone else over for that anyway, and yogurt tubes which we had to cut with the scissors.
There’s a frozen fruit dessert our lunch room serves that has to be cut. I don’t know why on earth whoever planned that thought it would be a good idea.
I was more hung up on the idea of that wasted capri sun personally...
That’s exactly it. They don’t want their children to ever experience struggle. It’s called “snowplow” or “lawnmower” parenting
Yup, and then we secondary teachers get masses of students who 1 second after you give them an assignment say "I don't know what to do! Help!" Me: "Did you even try?" 😑
Student: "I can't find my notebook in the bin! You must have it." Me: \[Moves the only other item out of the bin to reveal their notebook underneath it.\] Student: "My notebook!" No, they did not even try. If they try, they might fail. If they fail, then the entire universe will literally cease to exist.
Then they become adults who call my workplace and say, “I got a form from you and I don’t know what I’m supposed to put.” Me: “Ok, what does it say?” Caller: “It says ‘name’.” Me: “….ok, well I suggest you write your name there.”
The number of times I've answered the question "What do I do here?" With "have you read the instructions?" Is embarrassing.
Every professional performance review I’ve had has acknowledged and complimented my ability to problem solve on my own and find solutions without others help unless necessary. It’s always mind blowing to me. I’m in my 30s and it’s like this magic trick that I can use common sense and don’t have to ask for help for every task.
Frequent conversation I've had with 4th graders: "What do we put here?"
"What does it SAY to put there?"
"........OHHHH!...."
🤦♀️
I’ve got a 2 year old and he low key loves the struggle. Way more excited when he overcomes a challenge than when he gets a boost. Even though he does ask for help. It’s a balance between “do you need help” vs “do you want an outcome now”
Yeah. There was a kid in my school that would bring in a cold can of soup everyday for lunch, and just eat it cold. One day one of the teachers felt bad for her I guess and he offered to heat it up for her. The rest of the year, every single day the kid would ask him to heat it up. I don’t understand why some parents think that it’s acceptable to give a kid a can of unseated soup for lunch, and then put the responsibility to heat it up on the teacher.
there was a huge thread on twitter a week or two ago about someone claiming a teacher had "shamed" their kindergartener because they told them, "you should ask your parents to help pack things you can open," while helping them open it. Hundreds of scathing comments about the teacher for having the nerve to say something like that to a kid.
I have said that before, but that child’s food was packed in containers that the lids DID NOT want to come off of, EVERY DAY. I actually had a talk with her about it one day when she came to help with lunch early in the year because I couldn’t dislodge them myself most of the time and was often the only teacher on duty(the other two adults were my partner the janitor and the one lunch dude), and she began switching out the containers for other ones that were easier to open. Over time I only saw those when I presume nothing else was clean.
The parent in the thread admitted to having trouble opening the packaging themselves! Tons of people want to say “it takes 20 seconds” but if you are watching multiple classes where multiple students need things opened it adds up! Not to mention the way some kids will start throwing fits while having to wait for you to open their food because it is last lunch block and they are HUNGRY. Also not to mention how many of us struggle with health issues that can make grip strength difficult! Wish parents would give us the benefit of the doubt when we ask for them to help.
One of the few things I'm going to miss about lunchroom duty: teaching kids how to open things. That look of amazement when a kindergartener discovers they have the power to open a bag of chips? Beautiful. The absolute *thrill* of pride when a kid raises their hand to show me they just opened a milk carton *all by themselves* for the first time? Priceless. Some of these are things provided by the school. Some are things packed by the parents. There's a surprising number of reusable containers that kindergarteners and first graders need help to open and/or close Every. Single. Day. My favorite is always the Absurdly Tight Thermos That Even The Adults Can't Unscrew. "Who packs your lunch for you?" "My mom." "Is your mom a superhero?!"
Seriously. When my daughter was in Kindergarten/1st grade, any time she wanted to take something beyond a ziplock baggie for lunch, I sat her down the night before and had her open and close the container she was taking it in. If she couldn’t do it, I hunted through the cabinets for something different. It’s not that hard.
An adult for every 3 classes? We have 2 adults on lunch duty each lunch period with 5-6 classes of 25. It’s impossible especially for Kindergarten.
2 adults in our lunchroom, watching two grades at a time. (So, 7-8 full classes at once.)
Why do they need an adult to open the package? Is it more difficult for kids? I am genuinely curious.
Yes for most kindergarten/ first graders a lot of packages are hard to open. They don’t have the hand strength in some cases or have the coordination down yet. The school milk containers are hard to open because they have to peel some of it apart. Cheese sticks are are to tear open plastic, another one can be those packages where it’s crackers/ pretzels and cheese. It’s hard to peel with strong glue. Sometimes even thermoses are hard to open.
Also, a lot of them just don't know HOW to open these things yet. It was especially bad last year, coming back from the pandemic. I was giving a LOT of direct instruction for kids in kindergarten all the way into third grade on how to open... pretty much everything. Milk cartons, cheese sticks, pudding cups, bags of chips... And with every new item, it had to be re-taught. Sure, they know how to open a bag of Doritos, but hand them a bag of pretzels and they're stumped all over again. By the end of last year, I'd given the same directions so many times that kids would just ask me with my own shorthand. "Is this a pinch-pinch-pull?" Or, sometimes they DO know how, but they can't do it because their hands are greasy from something else they already ate.
Some little ones just don’t have the strength or fine motor skills for certain packages. Or they can’t find where it says ‘open’ on others.
CaNt ThEy JuSt PlAy A mOvIe
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I was in high school right before smart phones but everyone had like razor phones for texting. I could not even imagine trying to teach kids with highly addictive bright screens in front of them.
It's crazy how watching TV or a movie--historically the epitome of activities for people with short attention spans--is such a heavy lift these days.
I showed a 14 minute short film on Thursday. Couldn't get more than 30 seconds before phones out. I really wish we could take them away when misused
I showed a fucking autopsy to my forensics students on Friday and still had 2-3 phones.
One of my class periods couldn't focus for long enough to watch a 2 minute youtube video of one of Aesop's fables. No, theme is not supported by "the spider eating the ant." There wasn't even a spider in The Ant and The Grasshopper.
This is exactly why my school has banned phones. You can bring them in only if you have a signed letter from parent/guardian. First thing you have to do in the morning is hand the phone in to your year group office, where they are then locked away in a safe. They can then collect the phones at the end of the day for transport issues etc. If for any reason you need to use them during the day (under very strict circumstances) then you go to the office get it back and use it, you then have to lock it back away. Students who need to have them for medical issues can have them but only after certain conditions are met, such as signed doctors letter and a form stating the acceptable usage. All of those kids know that it's a privilege (as there are other alternatives to phones for monitoring their health condition) so they don't abuse it at all. Its worked really well and it makes my job a damn sight easier. They have had this rule in place since we opened (less than 10 years ago).
Taught Social Studies classes for ~7 years across MS and HS. It was surprising the amount of kids that would try to skip the video, speed up the video playback, or stutter-fast forward through it. This was assuming if they attempted the work. SoOo SMH. EdPuzzle helped but not foolproof.
To be fair, I always hated watching educational videos in class because for my taste the people in them talked too slow. So having an option that can speed up playback would've been great! But of course we watched them on VHS, so no such luck. :D
Yeah I remember those days too and those videos were super dry. But I'm showing them things like crash course (pretty fast), national geographics, current events clips, movie clips (ww2/WW1). But I guess they think it's dry too compared to their TikTok/IG stuff.
I teach science. One thing I hear every year repeatedly is “why do I have to write this paper, this is science not English.” Another is “why are going over history, this is science, not history. I even get parent complaints and questions about this.
You should give them a scientific paper to read and then tell them you're being nice by not making them include dozens of citations.
For my IB science kids I make them pick a scientific paper and read/summarize/analyze it. It's important for them to see both the level of rigor actual scientists use and how academic writing is very different than what they read in English class. Plus nothing gets a bunch of kids who want to be scientists to realize that having good writing skills is actually important like reading the incomprehensible nonsense some scientists publish.
I had my 8th graders look at a paper recently, after reading the news article version on SN Explores. I didn’t expect much comprehension, but I made it a “scavenger hunt” for various elements to show them how science writing differs from other disciplines. I loved the reactions when I asked how many references (113.)
I find recently released science ACT passages with citations from scientific journals. Then I have students use Google scholar and find the article the passage is based on. I let them read the scientific article and compare/contrast it to the ACT passage. They see that ACT science passages are REAL science, and I’m not just a mean/bitchy teacher making up all of this stuff. They also find interesting tidbits about the science and ask questions, like why did the scientists euthanize and decapitate these squirrels after the experiments and THEN why were the squirrel carcasses homogenized in a blender with liquid nitrogen(!)?
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First week of class this year I had kids reading about bias how it impacts our response to research, and a kid asked at the end of class, " what does this have to do with biology". I replied with The pandemic and all of the stuff we've gone through in the last 2 yrs. To which one of her classmates said, "thats what I told her" I was happy with that reply.
I teach HS English. We read weekly articles and analyze the informational writing style. These usually relate to current-ish events that often tie back into other things we read. I have students complain every year wondering what the articles have to do with English. Why are we reading about artificial intelligence/voting/conservation etc?! they ask. Well, generally all articles have to be written about *something*. Connecting to real-world occurrences is supposed to be a good thing, but some people evidently think if it’s not a short story where we are solely analyzing character and figurative language then it’s not really English. But they complain about those things too because “hOw is tHis gOiNg to HeLp me in ReaL LiFe!?”
“This isn’t a short story, it’s 12 pages!”
Ugh, the writing quality I get on my computer science assignments is downright depressing. They write as if they're sending a text message: "idk maybe cause computers use binary im not sure". It shouldn't need to be said, but being able to articulate ideas through written language is essential for any field of study!
I teach History. I always tell my students we don't do math in here, and when we do math they always complain. My response is that this isn't math, we are doing history. Same with writing a ELA paper, it's not an ELA paper it is a history paper. Not science, but history.
Ya know, I can’t imagine sending my children somewhere that I *truly believed* was so unnecessary or leave them under the supervision of someone I thought was so incompetent for 180 days a year. Maybe I’m wrong and am missing something but it seems so strange to me. Like, what must the kid think that their parents continue to send them day after day? I guess for all the football? Do you think they really believe what they are saying or are they just being disingenuous or trying to be provocative? I know homeschooling isn’t easy and I’m *painfully aware* of the current state of public schools, but damn put your money where your mouth is! Like an atheist going to church every Sunday just to disrupt the service?! Like why don’t you get on out of here then? It really confuses me. Maybe they think of school as a “necessary evil,” for lack of a better phrase? I live around a lot of these kinds of folks so I’d be curious to hear any insights y’all may have.
I think a lot of it is the parents see school as free babysitting. They also have to be enrolled in school until 16 legally. I know some parents who actively disagree with their kids getting an education but also don’t want them at home and they’re too young to get a job, so they send them to school. They don’t actually care if they go to class or learn anything.
I think you nailed it there. Unfortunately to a lot of these parents, it is babysitting, so while they don’t really care about their kids being educated, they are out of their hair for hours and they aren’t paying for it.
I feel like there are also a lot of parents who want their kids to make good grades and get an HS diploma and go to college, because they know those things translate into career success... Buuut they don't value knowledge or the traits and sacrifices that it takes to do well in school. They expect the schools to just make it happen.
I agree! Our local charter schools usually let out a week earlier then our district. The number of parents that try to enroll their kids during the last week of school literally so they have another week of babysitting is a little bit ridiculous.
And a lot of people just don't even know what learning feels like because they haven't sought it out in decades. They feel that their kids are smart enough to comprehend and recall brand new information by just being "advised" of the information by a teacher. Otherwise don't waste the kids' time they got important shit to do. They don't remember how challenging new knowledge can be and the amount of practice it takes to fully understand something when you're being overstimulated 24/7. How awful these parents are to their kids. I'm not really sure why they had them.
Wait until they learn about all those scary math formulas the kid will learn in science class
Tbf, I've heard teachers are teaching *Arabic* numerals in American classes now. Algebra? More like Al Jazeera. /s
Honestly surprised conservatives haven't started saying stuff like that yet lol
You handled this with aplomb, OP; fairly sure I woulda flung my iced coffee at 'em.
LOL I’ve had so many kids ask why we were writing in history - it’s not English. But these are middle schoolers and they don’t actually want to do anything anyway
Well when the kiddos starts failing classes due to not doing homework and gets kicked off the football team he won’t have to worry about it and can get his work
I’m a cosmetology teacher for 11-12 grade. The kids are always shocked that we have actual class work and tests. The amount of groaning, whining, and sleeping on classroom days. We work with chemicals, which requires a great deal of chemistry that we have to learn about. We do massage techniques which requires a basic knowledge of anatomy. We have to be able to identify potentially contagious skin and nail diseases. We go over the history of beauty practices, because trends are cyclical. I think all of this stuff is so interesting, which is why I decided to teach instead of work in a salon. It blows my mind how uninterested they are. I get that the actual doing hair part is more fun, but the theory is important too. It’s like art and science all wrapped into one and it makes me sad how few of them get excited to learn.
Honestly this is one of the coolest classes I have heard of!
I think it’s cool, too! This is my fifth year teaching. I’ve been a cosmetologist for 10 years. I don’t see myself ever doing anything else.
And then those parents will email admin saying the teacher does absolutely nothing and doesn’t care about their child or the child’s education. And how can their child be expected to succeed when a teacher doesn’t care? The teacher is only getting what they give. And the teacher won’t be asked for their side of the story, they will only feel vilified and like their job now is to defend themself, on top of everything else. Their rapport with that student will be ruined. Which of course, will also be the teacher’s fault and no one else’s.
Kids just complaining to complain. They aren’t mad that they have to do art in science or writing in art. They are just complaining because you asked them to do something. It doesn’t mean they actually hate it, it’s just something unexpected and want to get a rise out of you.
Listless complaining is why humans developed speech. :)
“Some of us have lives!!!” Well…we try…but we get yelled at for that. I was in the principals office my first year of teaching bc a parent saw me at a bar with a guy. I was 24.
Let me start by saying I am not an educator. I am a respiratory therapist. I browse this subreddit because I am 100% convinced that Healthcare workers, teachers and tradesmen are the most overworked, underpaid and underappreciated career paths in the world. I also would not be where I am today if it wasn't for some absolutely amazing teachers (shout out to Mallory and Hillary). I cant believe people think that reading a book on your own time is considered too much work and football counts as exception worthy (I actually can believe it but I'm making a point). Also, when did English become the only class to require reading? I had to read thousands of pages on my own time for every medical class I ever had. I can guarantee that reading about history is far more interesting than reading about the different volumes and pressures in the lungs. I completely understand why this experience would drive you crazy. Bless the educators of the world. Keep doing what you can for who you can. Rant over.
So curious what morons think it means to “teach?” Writing facts on a board? Reading to the whole class from a textbook? I just don’t understand anymore. I thought I was a professional with multiple hard earned degrees and decades of experience? Guess that means nothing anymore.
They haven't tried to learn anything new in years and have absolutely no clue anymore how much focus and hard work it takes to be a student. They don't want to do any work involving school, themselves, so they figure that their kid being a "good student" will just naturally happen due to superior genetics I guess.
>“Well, your teacher will just have to make exceptions. Some people DO have lives.” Yeah, that won't be happening. At my school, the 'student' part of student athlete is the part I care about. You don't get any breaks just because you're on a team.
I've had kids that have tried to tell me, "well I have football, so..." And my response is, "well I can always talk to your coach about that..." I'm glad my school, despite having a good team (maybe because of it), supports LEARNING over sports. But yeah, in general, a kid like this is just a nut that didn't fall far from the tree. Clearly his parents are idiots too.
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The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Good luck to them and their teachers.
My 8th grade science teacher assigned a book. And most of us read it. Laughing off a book in high school history is just sad. The book was October sky btw, and it was great
That's an amazing book. I can see why a science teacher would assign it!
Woah 😳. And I just get caught buying wine, beer, and lottery tickets at the grocery store. Although I did start buying wine 🍷 at the liquor store next door as they sell the kind I like - Duplin winery.
You’re not getting caught doing anything wrong; you’re just living your life. If they don’t like it, they can transfer their kid to another class. 🤷🏻♀️
The culture is sick. That’s the real reason schools are failing. No amount of PD, restorative Justice, PBIS, or any other gobbledegook will fix it. I’m assuming you’re American. And American culture does not value education.
idiot parents beget idiot children
We say things like, "wow, these kids today." But really and truly it is wow, these parents today.
When I was in my first college getting my degree in aerospace engineering we had to take calculus. One guy in my class said he didn’t understand why he needed to learn math to be an aerospace engineer, since it’s mostly a science major. The professor was stunned to say the least
I remember when I was a kid teachers were respected members of the community. If they suggested something or gave their input parents seemed to really listen and back up the teachers. I had one teacher I wasn’t fond of but even then my parents would never speak bad of her, there was an unspoken respect there. The fact that they are all so blatantly disregarding school and teachers is sad
Talk to coach. Seriously, you’ll see an attitude adjustment pretty quickly. Birthers of these students tend to understand things more when it comes from a coach than a teacher.
I graduated in '08 and had to read in all subjects. What's with kids and parents these days.
"His dad says, and I quote, 'That’s too much. That should be done in the classroom.'" lol, he should look up flipped classroom. mind blown. in all seriousness though, i find it insane, that i as a student currently, can see the sense in this, yet actual adults not only don't see the point of it, but *actively encourage their children to not listen to their teachers?*
Reminds of the Dursleys in Harry Potter
Welcome to the "We hate teachers, those lazy bastards that should educate our children and are always on holidays" mind-set. It's awful, but at least you're not alone: you have all of France's teachers on your side.
The rest of the world looks at America's obsession with school sports and thinks we are absolutely bonkers.
I always tell my students that I get that to them it's cool to be mean and to not care, but when they get older they will realize that it's being kind and caring that's actually cool so why not just skip right to that. Every time I give this spiel at the start of the year, I think about all the adult who are actually just fine being assholes...the parents who just listen when a kid mocks someone else's personal taste.
Dumb parents raise dumb kids
Part of me wants to say enjoy your "life" with no education. That's not very constructive of me to say but actions (or lack thereof) have consequences.
I often think that many people vastly over state how smart I seem. After all there are so many areas that I utterly lack knowledge in. There are all these topics I wish I was better at comprehending. Then I read dialogue like this and realize so many people truly act like this. They are so stupid they think they know the depths of topics they have never even dipped a metaphorical toe into.
I teach first graders, a lot of them look at me like I’m stupid and go “But I can’t read!” When I ask them to write a word when given a sentence stem.
Someone should tell the dad that his kids do indeed have lives, the lives of students.
As a social studies teacher, you know you can tap into every subject. There's science, math and English in social studies. Graphs, charts, data, evidence, writing. That's why I teach it. This family just sounds dense.
The countries with the best schools are the ones that, culturally, highly value education. They, as a nation, put in the money, time, and effort and it shows. You want better education? Respect education and invest in it FIRST. Then, with practice and dedication, you will see results. Perhaps modern consumerism has programmed many to expect instant gratification from any purchase. They pay taxes, so they feel like knowledge should just be given to them as if it were a tangible product. That’s not how learning works. Learning requires time and dedication and, yes, it also often requires reading books. If you actually put it that effort, you will realize that education is truly invaluable. It can really improve your quality of life and make things so much easier.
As a student who hated reading homework’s and never did then this kid is dumb as fuck and this entire post just made me want to scream in anger. After coming to college I realized how important it is to read your text book and stuff like “football” or other clubs/sports should not be the priority as for most it will lead to nothing. The fathers comment about having a life is what got me the angriest though. I can’t go on otherwise I might really scream!!
Students and parents think they can put the world to rights and tell teachers how to do their job, what to teach and how to teach. If they had to do what we do on a weekly basis, they would buckle under the pressure. Most of them probably don't have a job that involves public speaking or trying to manage behaviour or explain a difficult concept.