Why are we forced to share school supplies

[Anonymous]

I don’t mind an occasional sharing, as in “can I borrow your red marker?” But I hate buying my kid nice stuff that ends up in a bucket for everyone at the table. Then at the end of the year the teacher thinks they are doing me a favor sending my kid home with a bag of half used, broken, cheap crayons. Just throw them out. I don’t want a mix of Rose Art crayons with crayola.

[Anonymous]

DD’s teachers have always asked that the kids keep anything that has personal value in their desks, and put the rest into communal piles. Most kids keep binders, pencil cases, that extra special sparkly pencil, etc. They don’t generally care about the rest.

[Anonymous]

Wrong question.

The right question is "why are we forced to buy school supplies"?

Imagine if, at your workplace, every time you needed a new pen, you had to go to the store and buy the pen.

How much money would your organization save buying the pens in bulk? How much time would it save?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
The only thing I wish my DD could have and keep for herself are her left-handed scissors. She has trouble using right-handed scissors and people don’t always think to provide some left-handed scissors.

The beauty of being forced to use right-handed scissors as a lefty is at some point you learn to do that and you no longer need left-handed scissors, which is better because you can always find regular scissors.
Signed, left-handed woman

Not to mention that it helps kids to become more resilient, and learn to adjust to situations rather than expect everyone to meet their specific needs.

Kids scissors are less sharp and much harder to use in the wrong hand than adult scissors. I have no doubt she’ll be able to use right handed adult scissors when she graduates to being allowed actually sharp objects. But dull kids scissors are hard enough to use without having to use the wrong hand to cut with.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Individual supplies is actually less time-consuming. Also, students learn to take better care of their resources and less things for a student having a temper tantrum to readily throw at you.

- signed, teacher who works with first graders.

Maybe you need to work on your classroom management skills if first graders are throwing school supplies at you.

Or maybe parents need to pay attention to their kids so they don't seek negative attention because negative attention is better than no attention at all.

Oh, blame the parents! Some kids throw stuff because the schools can no longer stop them unless they hurt others or themselves. This is the new politically correct world that we live in.

This doesn't even make sense. Anything to whine about "political correctness" though, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Individual supplies is actually less time-consuming. Also, students learn to take better care of their resources and less things for a student having a temper tantrum to readily throw at you.

- signed, teacher who works with first graders.

Maybe you need to work on your classroom management skills if first graders are throwing school supplies at you.

Maybe I should transfer to a UMC school and let other people deal with the poor brown kids who are basically raising themselves while their “parents” use drugs and either ignore them or abuse them. Kids who are throwing things have deeper issues that has nothing to do with classroom management.

The only school at which a child ever threw anything at me was in North Bethesda and it was a white kid from a wealthy family. Please find a different career. You are kinda racist and have poor classroom management skills.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was surprised that the kids used their supplies communally, but my kid didn't care. However, his table-mate, Melanie had her own supplies. So it seemed like the teacher made space for all types of needs.

I too was surprised when I bought the prepackaged supply case and then when I started volunteering I saw that they were communal supplies. That said, I really did not care, there are plenty of supplies to go around for everybody. My child did not need to have her own and I never heard that she was missing anything in particular

Why would that bother somebody? Unless you are auto immune suppressed or have some sort of allergy, you don’t really need to have your own supplies And if you were auto immune suppressed or had an allergy, I am certain the teacher would accommodate that child

Not at our school. They don't accommodate for allergies or medical issues. I got tired of catching every cold from my child who brought them home regularly from kids with parents to selfish token them home. It got much better when supplies stopped being shared as they are never cleaned.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Individual supplies is actually less time-consuming. Also, students learn to take better care of their resources and less things for a student having a temper tantrum to readily throw at you.

- signed, teacher who works with first graders.

Maybe you need to work on your classroom management skills if first graders are throwing school supplies at you.

Maybe I should transfer to a UMC school and let other people deal with the poor brown kids who are basically raising themselves while their “parents” use drugs and either ignore them or abuse them. Kids who are throwing things have deeper issues that has nothing to do with classroom management.

The only school at which a child ever threw anything at me was in North Bethesda and it was a white kid from a wealthy family. Please find a different career. You are kinda racist and have poor classroom management skills.

Not "kinda racist," more like "definitely racist.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does my 1st grader still have to share his school supplies with all he’s “friends”?
Personally I don’t like it. Do you?

Because they are not "his" supplies. Public schools are inadequately funded, probably due to voters like you, so parents are asked to supplement the budget by providing classroom supplies, among other things.

They actually are his supplies. This is not tax funded, this is a directed purchase that I made for my kid. People can get their own supplies for their kids.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does my 1st grader still have to share his school supplies with all he’s “friends”?
Personally I don’t like it. Do you?

Because they are not "his" supplies. Public schools are inadequately funded, probably due to voters like you, so parents are asked to supplement the budget by providing classroom supplies, among other things.

They actually are his supplies. This is not tax funded, this is a directed purchase that I made for my kid. People can get their own supplies for their kids.

Private school for you.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why does my 1st grader still have to share his school supplies with all he’s “friends”?
Personally I don’t like it. Do you?

Because they are not "his" supplies. Public schools are inadequately funded, probably due to voters like you, so parents are asked to supplement the budget by providing classroom supplies, among other things.

They actually are his supplies. This is not tax funded, this is a directed purchase that I made for my kid. People can get their own supplies for their kids.

Change your perspective. They ate CLASSROOM supplies. There, now you have no need to worry as they aren’t his supplies.

[Anonymous]

Cool. From next year, I'll not buy supplies and mooch(share??) classroom supplies.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Cool. From next year, I'll not buy supplies and mooch(share??) classroom supplies.

Not everyone can afford supplies. However, some of us donate a ton of extra so those kids should be given their own supplies vs. the teacher holding them. I am donating for the kids sake.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Wrong question.

The right question is "why are we forced to buy school supplies"?

Imagine if, at your workplace, every time you needed a new pen, you had to go to the store and buy the pen.

How much money would your organization save buying the pens in bulk? How much time would it save?

Np: I do buy my own office supplies for work and am happy to do it because I have no interest in using a cheap Bic pen when I prefer Staedtler or Stabilo (not super expensive, but more costly than basic pens). I also buy my son the nicer versions of school supplies and contribute to the general classroom supplies, so I don’t think it’s stingy to want him to have access to the things he, specifically, chose for himself.

[Anonymous]

I happily donate classroom supplies to be used by everyone.

But when I buy supplies for my kid specifically, I don't want them to be shared with everyone mainly because I will never get it all back. Same concept as pool toys. We bring some, other parents don't, they walk off with them and I'm left buying more things I cannot afford since everyone did not pitch in. I'm not talking about FARMs kids.