Bashing Public School Teachers

[rjk]

" Try managing a group of 25 children"

The class sizes in my wifes district actually push 40 students. [[Farmington)

When I went to Catholic grade school in the 70's each classroom had 35 to 40 kids. When my brother went to the same school in the 60's there were 45+ in each classroom.
I came across this recently when I was looking at some of our school photos. Of course the teachers union is going to complain about class size. The smaller the class size means more teachers need to be hired.

[mauser]

When I went to Catholic grade school in the 70's.

unlike your teachers, my wife is not allowed to hit the children to manage that size of class.

50 minute class, 45 children - each needs help - if you learned math at the parochial school, use it now and tell me that this is an effective way to teach.

Oooooooohhhhhh - you want the teacher to stay after hours for free to tutor the overage of children in the class.....for free. Right ?

[bailey]

You know what would end the problem is allowing local communities to increase property taxes for the local schools. I know where I live people would do it...as long as it stayed here and didn't get thrown in the pot. If a city wants to tax themselves more so they can spend 18k per kid to ensure small class sizes and top pay, well then let them.

[lafayette]

Mauser, you're exactly right on every point you make, although I disagree with your asides about the UAW. But that's not the focus of this thread.

Two things are different now and you touch so well on one of them - the right-wing propaganda that has successfully convinced the ignorant American public that public school teachers are lazy, overpaid union members.

The second elephant in the room no one talks about is the parents of today's kids. They are a good part of the reason class sizes are so big and schools are being nickled and dimed [["It's my money! No new taxes!"). Parenting today and its shortfalls are also a big cause of why teaching is so hard today. Parents today are their kid's attorneys there to make sure their child is always happy, always #1, and experiences nothing to hurt his "self-esteem." Since the beginning of time up until today's crop of indulgent parents came along, kids were taught [[correctly) they had to earn self esteem, not be granted it, and that adults are not here to make you feel happy all the time and entertain you. Kids now are taught that that is adult's primary role in their lives. It makes them unteachable because there are no expectations, automatically granted self esteem and no fear of repercussions for doing substandard work or misbehaving in school because A) your parent will always defend any behavior and not back up the school/teacher and B) your teacher's hands are tied by parents and principals from doing anything but granting self esteem, regardless of what the student is doing.

Up until today's generation of parents, a huge part of the reason kids did OK in school was structure, reinforcement and backing up of the SCHOOL'S goals in the classroom by the parents, not telling the child you are perfect in every way and mommy and daddy will always fight those mean teachers if they do anything or say anything you don't like because your self esteem can't be taken away no matter what you do! You're a wonderful child no matter what and you come first, not doing what your teacher expects of you.

What's too often missing in kids who aren't learning can be laid at the feet of their parents, NOT TEACHERS OR THE SCHOOL; parents who don't reinforce what the teachers are trying to do in terms of curriculum [[making sure their homework is done, they have proper rest and nutrition, proper attention spans to sit for more than 30 seconds), self-control in the classroom so students can learn and teachers can teach, and a healthy respect for authority in the classroom. These things can only be done by parents, not teachers. They used to be done automatically by most parents and teachers could expect that they were living up to their end of the education bargain on these issues. It's not done in so many cases now.

Here's what too many teachers get now from most parents: arrogant/advocate parents to deal with and entitled/low-attention span children to try to teach, all created by the parents. But when it's time to blame someone for a poor outcome, the teacher gets 100% of the blame for poor learning when the parent didn't live up to his/her responsibilities that are critical to the success of the education process.

I'm sick and tired of no one looking at the parents and how they don't prepare their children to learn in a classroom setting.

When does the big debate about what's wrong with education ever, ever include today's parents and what they're doing wrong? Almost never. Why? Parenting creates the student mindset that the teacher has to work with in the first place and parents have to back up what the teacher is doing in order for the teacher to succeed. So, why are they left out of the criticism? It gets back to Mauser's correct theory, that "fixing" education is about union busting, plain and simple. If they really wanted to fix it they'd be putting parents under as big a microscope as they put teachers because parents are at least half of the equation of what creates good learning in students.

[firstandten]

Mauser, you're exactly right on every point you make, although I disagree with your asides about the UAW. But that's not the focus of this thread.

Two things are different now and you touch so well on one of them - the right-wing propaganda that has successfully convinced the ignorant American public that public school teachers are lazy, overpaid union members.

The second elephant in the room no one talks about is the parents of today's kids. They are a good part of the reason class sizes are so big and schools are being nickled and dimed [["It's my money! No new taxes!"). Parenting today and its shortfalls are also a big cause of why teaching is so hard today. Parents today are their kid's attorneys there to make sure their child is always happy, always #1, and experiences nothing to hurt his "self-esteem." Since the beginning of time up until today's crop of indulgent parents came along, kids were taught [[correctly) they had to earn self esteem, not be granted it, and that adults are not here to make you feel happy all the time and entertain you. Kids now are taught that that is adult's primary role in their lives. It makes them unteachable because there are no expectations, automatically granted self esteem and no fear of repercussions for doing substandard work or misbehaving in school because A) your parent will always defend any behavior and not back up the school/teacher and B) your teacher's hands are tied by parents and principals from doing anything but granting self esteem, regardless of what the student is doing.

Up until today's generation of parents, a huge part of the reason kids did OK in school was structure, reinforcement and backing up of the SCHOOL'S goals in the classroom by the parents, not telling the child you are perfect in every way and mommy and daddy will always fight those mean teachers if they do anything or say anything you don't like because your self esteem can't be taken away no matter what you do! You're a wonderful child no matter what and you come first, not doing what your teacher expects of you.

What's too often missing in kids who aren't learning can be laid at the feet of their parents, NOT TEACHERS OR THE SCHOOL; parents who don't reinforce what the teachers are trying to do in terms of curriculum [[making sure their homework is done, they have proper rest and nutrition, proper attention spans to sit for more than 30 seconds), self-control in the classroom so students can learn and teachers can teach, and a healthy respect for authority in the classroom. These things can only be done by parents, not teachers. They used to be done automatically by most parents and teachers could expect that they were living up to their end of the education bargain on these issues. It's not done in so many cases now.

Here's what too many teachers get now from most parents: arrogant/advocate parents to deal with and entitled/low-attention span children to try to teach, all created by the parents. But when it's time to blame someone for a poor outcome, the teacher gets 100% of the blame for poor learning when the parent didn't live up to his/her responsibilities that are critical to the success of the education process.

I'm sick and tired of no one looking at the parents and how they don't prepare their children to learn in a classroom setting.

When does the big debate about what's wrong with education ever, ever include today's parents and what they're doing wrong? Almost never. Why? Parenting creates the student mindset that the teacher has to work with in the first place and parents have to back up what the teacher is doing in order for the teacher to succeed. So, why are they left out of the criticism? It gets back to Mauser's correct theory, that "fixing" education is about union busting, plain and simple. If they really wanted to fix it they'd be putting parents under as big a microscope as they put teachers because parents are at least half of the equation of what creates good learning in students.

Great post

I think over time in this forum we have seen a shift in the assigning of blame. When I first came on here, the teachers were getting bashed big time. I think now that people had have a chance to really think about the issue, folks are seeing that parents are a major cause for the failure of kids not getting educated.

When my children were of school age, my expectations were that the teacher could call me at any time for any reason and whatever the issue was it would be addressed promptly. In return I wanted to see my children get their best effort educationally. I only had a few exceptions where that wasn't the case.

[jackie5275]

unlike your teachers, my wife is not allowed to hit the children to manage that size of class.

The teachers in Catholic schools aren't allowed to hit the children either!!!! Hitting kids in Catholic school went out with the nuns. My brothers & I went through Catholic schools in the 70s & 80s. I have colleagues who sent their kids to Catholic schools in the 90s & 00s. There was no hitting of students going on. I send my kid to a Catholic school. There's no hitting of students going on there either now. My brother-in-law teaches at a Catholic school. He's never hit any student. He can't. He'd be fired. Plus, he does all the same things your wife does for about $23K a year. That's dedication.