Your daily reminder that expecting parents to teach their kids at home is super inequitable

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a black parent, I don't have the luxury of expecting the school to do the heavy lifting in terms of core math and ELA. Maybe little white kids can survive entering K with zero literacy or numeracy skills, but my little black boys wouldn't be taken seriously, nor would I as a responsible parent. Don't talk to be about "equity" when some of you want the "privilege" of sending your kids to school unprepared, notwithstanding the fact that you have the resources to do so.

No, the school shouldn't expect much from parents, but you should expect more from yourselves.

What if the teacher was black? Would that change anything?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I strongly disagree.

What about my husband's WAR REFUGEE parents who came to their host country with nothing, worked hard, and found time to teach their 4 children, all of whom became doctors, bankers or engineers?

We are not wealthy, and until recently didn't have the resources to outsource my son's special needs therapies, executive coaching and tutoring he has needed since he was little. We did 90% of the work ourselves until last year when we put our hard-earned money into great tutors for him, to get him to the next level.

There will always be unfit parents who are not able to parent, absent parents who are not there to help, and all kinds of situations where children are not getting what they need from their families, or lack thereof.

It does NOT mean that the rest of us, rich or poor, should purposefully refrain from helping our children in any way we can.

Schools will provide what governments and society decide they should pay for. It may not be enough for some children. If you, the loving parent, can't make up the difference, nobody will pick up the slack, OP.

OP didn’t say we should refrain from teaching our children at home. She is only implying that it’s an inequitable approach to education for schools to RELY on parents to teach things.

Basically, schools need to step it up!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is directed towards posters who retort “teach them yourselves!” when parents complain that their school doesn’t teach phonics, handwriting, spelling, grammar, multiplication tables, etc.

The *only* thing parents should be responsible for is ensuring their kids are well fed and rested, and mentally and physically ready to learn at school. If there are not enough hours in the school day to do everything, teachers should be sending explicit instructions to the parents about what to do at home (eg please have your child drill these times tables until they’ve memorized them). This is also known as “homework”.

I’m glad this works for you OP. I’ve just never had that mentality. We committed to public school a long time ago (kids are ages 11 and 13 now) but I always expected to supplement a bit. It’s been fine - not a huge burden on me. The new way of teaching math has even been a little fun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It’s actually negligent parenting not to work with your child. Parents have been doing that forever. If you think that a single person working with thirty children can force them to focus for the majority of the school day, you are delusional. You’re the one who hands them an iPad the second they complain they’re bored, and now you expect them to be titillated by the order of operations? It’s not happening.
A good portion of the school day is spent redirecting behavior, writing legal documents, managing the physical classroom, communicating with parents, collecting and analyzing data, and in meetings. If you think that teachers can or should address every academic need, you are in for disappointment. Your own children are the ones who are damaged if you don’t work with them. It is a dereliction of your duty. Period.

Whoever wrote this just chased a bunch of parents to private school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Actually, parents on 100% responsible for their Children’s education. They may choose to outsource some of it by sending their kids to public or private school, religious school, etc. But I would never rely on any school to provide all of the education. Part of being a parent is educating one’s children.

And what about all the parents who can’t? The ones who work multiple jobs or don’t speak English or aren’t educatefthemselves? They’re sh*t out of luck, according to you? What a crappy outlook you have. ALL kids must be educated…and educated so well that kids shouldn’t need to supplement outside of school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:As a black parent, I don't have the luxury of expecting the school to do the heavy lifting in terms of core math and ELA. Maybe little white kids can survive entering K with zero literacy or numeracy skills, but my little black boys wouldn't be taken seriously, nor would I as a responsible parent. Don't talk to be about "equity" when some of you want the "privilege" of sending your kids to school unprepared, notwithstanding the fact that you have the resources to do so.

No, the school shouldn't expect much from parents, but you should expect more from yourselves.

White parents don't have the luxury either. We were told by a black principal how because we supplemented at home/private therapies our child would not get the help at school they needed as they had other families who needed it more. Racism goes both ways. She'd boost up the black kids and ignore the white/hispanic/asian kids. There is no equity. We didn't have the privilege of getting school help and went into heavy debt to get our child the help they needed.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It’s actually negligent parenting not to work with your child. Parents have been doing that forever. If you think that a single person working with thirty children can force them to focus for the majority of the school day, you are delusional. You’re the one who hands them an iPad the second they complain they’re bored, and now you expect them to be titillated by the order of operations? It’s not happening.
A good portion of the school day is spent redirecting behavior, writing legal documents, managing the physical classroom, communicating with parents, collecting and analyzing data, and in meetings. If you think that teachers can or should address every academic need, you are in for disappointment. Your own children are the ones who are damaged if you don’t work with them. It is a dereliction of your duty. Period.

Whoever wrote this just chased a bunch of parents to private school.

And what do you think happens at private school? Teachers just teach and have no other responsibilities? That’s a fantasy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a black parent, I don't have the luxury of expecting the school to do the heavy lifting in terms of core math and ELA. Maybe little white kids can survive entering K with zero literacy or numeracy skills, but my little black boys wouldn't be taken seriously, nor would I as a responsible parent. Don't talk to be about "equity" when some of you want the "privilege" of sending your kids to school unprepared, notwithstanding the fact that you have the resources to do so.

No, the school shouldn't expect much from parents, but you should expect more from yourselves.

White parents don't have the luxury either. We were told by a black principal how because we supplemented at home/private therapies our child would not get the help at school they needed as they had other families who needed it more. Racism goes both ways. She'd boost up the black kids and ignore the white/hispanic/asian kids. There is no equity. We didn't have the privilege of getting school help and went into heavy debt to get our child the help they needed.

I’m the PP. I didn’t blame “racism” and I don’t thing white teachers have it out for my kids. But the reality is that very few black boys are on the level academically and so it’s not surprising that institutions expect little of them, even if they don’t harbor racial animus towards them. It’s that reality, not racism per se, that I have accommodate for — and it’s something we’d have to accommodate for at ANY school, save for a few select privates with a history of educating high performing black boys. Your unfortunate matter might very well be due to the racism of administration in your particular school, but that’s not what I was speaking of. And I hardly doubt that the black principal is doing much to “boost” the black kids, who I bet still perform abysmally. And trust me, it sounds like another school where I wouldn’t send my black sons because the same principal would probably be even more dismissive of our high-SES black family and expect us to accept it out of sense of racial solidarity. This is all way more complex and nuanced that you can appreciate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:As a black parent, I don't have the luxury of expecting the school to do the heavy lifting in terms of core math and ELA. Maybe little white kids can survive entering K with zero literacy or numeracy skills, but my little black boys wouldn't be taken seriously, nor would I as a responsible parent. Don't talk to be about "equity" when some of you want the "privilege" of sending your kids to school unprepared, notwithstanding the fact that you have the resources to do so.

No, the school shouldn't expect much from parents, but you should expect more from yourselves.

What if the teacher was black? Would that change anything?

No - this isn’t about specific teachers, but system-wide low expectations of black kids, even at schools populated by largely black staff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I strongly disagree.

What about my husband's WAR REFUGEE parents who came to their host country with nothing, worked hard, and found time to teach their 4 children, all of whom became doctors, bankers or engineers?

We are not wealthy, and until recently didn't have the resources to outsource my son's special needs therapies, executive coaching and tutoring he has needed since he was little. We did 90% of the work ourselves until last year when we put our hard-earned money into great tutors for him, to get him to the next level.

There will always be unfit parents who are not able to parent, absent parents who are not there to help, and all kinds of situations where children are not getting what they need from their families, or lack thereof.

It does NOT mean that the rest of us, rich or poor, should purposefully refrain from helping our children in any way we can.

Schools will provide what governments and society decide they should pay for. It may not be enough for some children. If you, the loving parent, can't make up the difference, nobody will pick up the slack, OP.

OP didn’t say we should refrain from teaching our children at home. She is only implying that it’s an inequitable approach to education for schools to RELY on parents to teach things.

Basically, schools need to step it up!

OP here. Thank you for saying it much more clearly than I did. I can’t believe this is a controversial statement that people are arguing with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely hilarious how many posters are falling all over themselves to indignantly insist they FULLY APPROVE of sh*tty public education because they’re good mommies who don’t even need it. Good job ladies, here’s your cookie for doing the job your tax dollars should be doing, now please stop yelling angrily at anyone who suggests you should expect more from your public institutions.

I agree, OP. Just one of the many ways public school here is totally broken.

+1

These are the same people in the 7th grade reading thread in Teens who are telling public school parents they are lying about their kids not being assigned books in school. Totally obnoxious and entitled.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely hilarious how many posters are falling all over themselves to indignantly insist they FULLY APPROVE of sh*tty public education because they’re good mommies who don’t even need it. Good job ladies, here’s your cookie for doing the job your tax dollars should be doing, now please stop yelling angrily at anyone who suggests you should expect more from your public institutions.

I agree, OP. Just one of the many ways public school here is totally broken.

+1

These are the same people in the 7th grade reading thread in Teens who are telling public school parents they are lying about their kids not being assigned books in school. Totally obnoxious and entitled.

No. These are the sort of people that would have introduced their kids to canonical literature long before middle school, precisely because they/we understand that public schools don’t make the effort. Why?… because the schools can’t expect much from kids due to deficient supports at home and so they assign only little snippets out of a sense of “equity.” They know most of the kids won’t (or can’t) read an entire novel and they certainly can’t expect anyone in the home to encourage the kid to, much less engage them on the material. We all suffer when some/many families fail to do their part.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Absolutely hilarious how many posters are falling all over themselves to indignantly insist they FULLY APPROVE of sh*tty public education because they’re good mommies who don’t even need it. Good job ladies, here’s your cookie for doing the job your tax dollars should be doing, now please stop yelling angrily at anyone who suggests you should expect more from your public institutions.

I agree, OP. Just one of the many ways public school here is totally broken.

+1

These are the same people in the 7th grade reading thread in Teens who are telling public school parents they are lying about their kids not being assigned books in school. Totally obnoxious and entitled.

No. These are the sort of people that would have introduced their kids to canonical literature long before middle school, precisely because they/we understand that public schools don’t make the effort. Why?… because the schools can’t expect much from kids due to deficient supports at home and so they assign only little snippets out of a sense of “equity.” They know most of the kids won’t (or can’t) read an entire novel and they certainly can’t expect anyone in the home to encourage the kid to, much less engage them on the material. We all suffer when some/many families fail to do their part.

you already got your cookie, you can go away now!

[Anonymous]

I will gladly supplement at home, I’m already doing to for both of my kids. However school is so incredibly long, it takes up the entire day, my kids don’t get home until 4:20 and they have a few after school activities, then we do our extra learning and no time left! School should be 6 hours tops, kindergarten even shorter 4-5 hours a day. I don’t need all the extras they fit into the day, honestly there is so much wasted time in school, incredible.

[Anonymous]

What about expecting students to teach other students? My 6 year old seems to spend his day tutoring his peers in both math and reading. His teacher calls it the buddy system and told me this is an example of differentiation (so teaching the material that he mastered in preschool is how he can "go deeper"). Then at home with me he gets to learn some actual new material and get excited. He is already starting to say he hates school which breaks my heart.