Teachers, how is your mental health?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was in the grocery store today and saw multiple kids acting nuts while the adults they were with didn't bat an eye. There is a lot of lazy parenting going on. By the time your kid is in ES, they should know how to behave at a store. These kids were running down the aisles dodging carts and yelling. One kid screamed across a few aisles to get someone's attention. They were all 9 or older. Old enough to have some self-control.

I empathize with teachers this year but you need to cut the parents some slack as well. The ones who have been trying to juggle full time jobs while unexpectedly supervising their children’s virtual learning for the last 1.5 years /dealing with quarantines and alternatingly being demonized for taking their kids to places unnecessarily or for failing to adequately socialize them. Frankly a lot of parents are just burnt out too.

This is where I get confused. The schools were closed and parents were demonized for not being able to drop everything and assist with virtual learning. Then we were told we shouldn’t expect the schools to be daycare. Parents lose it out of frustration and being stressed and overwhelmed. We are told “too bad, so sad. It’s a pandemic.”

Now it’s teachers saying they are stressed and struggling because it’s too hard to handle Brightspace/Google classroom with teaching in person. Testing is too difficult and catching the kids up at the same time. Kids aren’t well behaved and mental health issues from returning to classrooms has been difficult.

As a parent, I’m inclined to shrug and explain that yeah, the pandemic has been overwhelming and stressful. More to do than someone can get done and for not enough money. We received no Grace as parents when we needed it. Only judgment and expectations we could help with virtual learning while working our own jobs so teachers could safely shelter when we could not.

There had to be a price to be paid for the last 18 months and this is it. A difficult transition and struggling kids which are behind.

I assume it will get better. I mean, I read tons of posts about all those kids who thrived in virtual learning and weren’t behind. Where are those kids now?

I am happy to send supportive emails and volunteer at the school for lunchtimes. I have a hard time mustering up empathy for how hard it is to deal with the kids. It was always the expectation.

Many, many of the screaming parents during DL had at least one, if not both, white collar parents who did indeed shelter at home, just like teachers, despite the hilarious number of them on an anonymous message board who claimed, conveniently and anonymously, to be "in person frontline workers."

You can keep your lack of "empathy" or insert it into the orifice of your choosing and if it gets any worse, your kids' teachers can just quit and oh, by the way, there not only aren't competent subs, but not even warm body subs, so when that happens, enjoy!

You realize people working from home were supposed to be working, correct? And were working and helping with DL?
I think the lack of empathy has been on both sides for awhile now. [b]I don’t think many care about competent subs.
In reality, I don’t see a mass exodus of teachers - and yes, I teach. If people didnt quit back in August, I don’t see it happening until we finish this year. I would try something else but Im too close to retirement.

You’re right. They don’t. Last year, ignorant parents were yelling that unemployed Target cashiers and waiters should “teach” their kids — any unqualified warm body, just as long as it was outside of their house.

They scream and scream OMG IT’S ABOUT EDUCATION NOT CHILDCARE any time it’s brought up, but it’s a lie. It’s about having a place to park their kids five days a week that they don’t have to pay for (and no, for the millionth time, the piddly, measley fraction of their property taxes set aside directly for public education doesn’t BEGIN to approximate what 30-35+ hours of weekly childcare would cost).

What's your point? We all know public school doubles as subsidized child car. And that it facilitates many more parents to remain in the workforce, which keeps modern society running.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
You’re right. They don’t. Last year, ignorant parents were yelling that unemployed Target cashiers and waiters should “teach” their kids — any unqualified warm body, just as long as it was outside of their house.

They scream and scream OMG IT’S ABOUT EDUCATION NOT CHILDCARE any time it’s brought up, but it’s a lie. It’s about having a place to park their kids five days a week that they don’t have to pay for (and no, for the millionth time, the piddly, measley fraction of their property taxes set aside directly for public education doesn’t BEGIN to approximate what 30-35+ hours of weekly childcare would cost).

But obviously, based on kids being behind academically and socially, it is about education. Academics and socialization are what schools teach. And now everyone, teachers and parents alike, can see what happens when children don't receive it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
You’re right. They don’t. Last year, ignorant parents were yelling that unemployed Target cashiers and waiters should “teach” their kids — any unqualified warm body, just as long as it was outside of their house.

They scream and scream OMG IT’S ABOUT EDUCATION NOT CHILDCARE any time it’s brought up, but it’s a lie. It’s about having a place to park their kids five days a week that they don’t have to pay for (and no, for the millionth time, the piddly, measley fraction of their property taxes set aside directly for public education doesn’t BEGIN to approximate what 30-35+ hours of weekly childcare would cost).

But obviously, based on kids being behind academically and socially, it is about education. Academics and socialization are what schools teach. And now everyone, teachers and parents alike, can see what happens when children don't receive it.

DCUM kids are behind in part because their parents refused to help them on the grounds that they refused to do teachers’ jobs.