Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Years ago a parent blamed me because her 4th grade daughter was not one of the "popular kids" in her classroom.
This was in an American school overseas. This particular family was from Bethesda.
Being in my early 20's I was first confused at this allegation. We then had to meet in the principal's office. I learned that the student did not appreciate me speaking French with the francophone kids during lunch. The mom continued to say that all the boys liked one of the French girls. She also said had I not been playing favorites, her daughter would have been popular with the boys too.
I looked at her and flatly told her that instead of blaming me, she should put her overweight kid on a diet.
Needless to say my principal was quite upset with me. The mom pulled the girl out of the school (there was only one 4th grade class) and went back to Bethesda.
The one thing I learned from this bizarre incident was to make sure not to show any kind of favoritism to any student.
DAMN that's not cool. Was this story supposed to make you look like a not terrible person?
Should she have said that? Of course not. Did she say it in front of the kid? No.
Should the grown adult parent have called a meeting to whine repeatedly about how it's the teacher's fault that her kid is not "one of the popular girls?" Of course not. How asinine and pathetic on the part of the mother.
Yeah I'm not going to fully believe the story of anyone who says these kinds of things. If she's this shitty in her OWN retelling of the story, I'm perfectly willing to believe that she was behaving badly IRL.
NP, the problem I see is that she is admitting that she was showing favoritism to particular students, and its bizarre that she needed this experience to learn to not do that. It still sounds like, the lesson for her was to not get caught while doing so. I am sure the parent overreacted but OP sounds like a crappy teacher.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Years ago a parent blamed me because her 4th grade daughter was not one of the "popular kids" in her classroom.
This was in an American school overseas. This particular family was from Bethesda.
Being in my early 20's I was first confused at this allegation. We then had to meet in the principal's office. I learned that the student did not appreciate me speaking French with the francophone kids during lunch. The mom continued to say that all the boys liked one of the French girls. She also said had I not been playing favorites, her daughter would have been popular with the boys too.
I looked at her and flatly told her that instead of blaming me, she should put her overweight kid on a diet.
Needless to say my principal was quite upset with me. The mom pulled the girl out of the school (there was only one 4th grade class) and went back to Bethesda.
The one thing I learned from this bizarre incident was to make sure not to show any kind of favoritism to any student.
DAMN that's not cool. Was this story supposed to make you look like a not terrible person?
Should she have said that? Of course not. Did she say it in front of the kid? No.
Should the grown adult parent have called a meeting to whine repeatedly about how it's the teacher's fault that her kid is not "one of the popular girls?" Of course not. How asinine and pathetic on the part of the mother.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Been there. Don't wast time. Have him moved to another class IMMEDIATELY
For those who had their child moved to another class, how did you go about this? I have tried communicating with my son's teacher (he had her last year too) about the things that concern me and she is dismissive, condescending, and unresponsive. In 1.5 years I have only expressed my unhappiness with three major issues, one of which was an untreated injury that happened on her watch. I haven't gone barking to her about the small stuff and I have never gone above her head to the administration. She did something recently that was just over the top and once again blew me off. Now I am thinking of taking it up the chain, though I am nervous about this. (Honestly, I am unhappy with school for other reasons, too, but that's for another thread.) How do you request a new teacher mid-year? How was this received?
I've always been pretty directed to the point. Email the principal saying that you're requesting a new teacher and list off the reasons why.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I am a lawyer. If my clients don't like my services, they can fire me and hire a new lawyer. They don't have to discuss it with me. They can call me or send me a note or just go hire someone else and the new lawyer can contact me. When my child is having a bad year in school because her teacher has 0 classroom control skills or repeatedly tells students to "shut up" or ridicules them openly in class or forgets to keep a record grades and gives kids zeroes instead of admitting that she lost a stack of tests, I can't fire that teacher and go find a new one. My kid is stuck for a school year. There are LOADS of bad lawyers. LOADS of them. Statistically, there are probably fewer bad teachers than there are bad lawyers, but lawyers are much easier to get rid off and they don't have as high an impact on kids.
It's a lot easier to switch teachers than you think. I have a senior in high school and we've done it approximately three times during her 12 years. I'm not about to sacrifice her education and put her with lousy teacher. Parents do have options.
Trophy-participation parent detected. Keeping your child in a bubble wrap instead of dealing and learning to deal with adversity. College should be fun!
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I am a lawyer. If my clients don't like my services, they can fire me and hire a new lawyer. They don't have to discuss it with me. They can call me or send me a note or just go hire someone else and the new lawyer can contact me. When my child is having a bad year in school because her teacher has 0 classroom control skills or repeatedly tells students to "shut up" or ridicules them openly in class or forgets to keep a record grades and gives kids zeroes instead of admitting that she lost a stack of tests, I can't fire that teacher and go find a new one. My kid is stuck for a school year. There are LOADS of bad lawyers. LOADS of them. Statistically, there are probably fewer bad teachers than there are bad lawyers, but lawyers are much easier to get rid off and they don't have as high an impact on kids.
It's a lot easier to switch teachers than you think. I have a senior in high school and we've done it approximately three times during her 12 years. I'm not about to sacrifice her education and put her with lousy teacher. Parents do have options.
Anonymous wrote:As kids gets softer, teachers seem meaner. I don't mean that teachers should be mean but what many kids today consider mean is over the top. With kids believe they should never experience any negative emotion, never be held responsible, be allowed to set their own expectations, and be treated as though they are special - the world around them seems mean. We see that on here - normal child behavior is called bullying, anything that is said that isn't inspiring is mean. if someone disagrees, they are mean. If they say anything that isn't nice, even if it is true it is mean and bullying. Not inviting every child to a birthday party is mean. etc..
The definition of mean has changed a great deal over time. In the past children were expected to be respectful and to see teachers as authority figures who were allowed to set expectations for them. That is now gone.
Adversity build resilience. Now adversity is a bad word, and resilience is vanishing. Kids are growing up to be a 'nation of wimps', with ever increasing mental health problems in early adulthood because they can't handle the pressure or expectations of life. They think the world around them is mean and unfair and they crumble.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Been there. Don't wast time. Have him moved to another class IMMEDIATELY
For those who had their child moved to another class, how did you go about this? I have tried communicating with my son's teacher (he had her last year too) about the things that concern me and she is dismissive, condescending, and unresponsive. In 1.5 years I have only expressed my unhappiness with three major issues, one of which was an untreated injury that happened on her watch. I haven't gone barking to her about the small stuff and I have never gone above her head to the administration. She did something recently that was just over the top and once again blew me off. Now I am thinking of taking it up the chain, though I am nervous about this. (Honestly, I am unhappy with school for other reasons, too, but that's for another thread.) How do you request a new teacher mid-year? How was this received?
Anonymous wrote:My children had some teachers who loved them and some, not so much. Teachers are people, too.
Anonymous wrote:I am a lawyer. If my clients don't like my services, they can fire me and hire a new lawyer. They don't have to discuss it with me. They can call me or send me a note or just go hire someone else and the new lawyer can contact me. When my child is having a bad year in school because her teacher has 0 classroom control skills or repeatedly tells students to "shut up" or ridicules them openly in class or forgets to keep a record grades and gives kids zeroes instead of admitting that she lost a stack of tests, I can't fire that teacher and go find a new one. My kid is stuck for a school year. There are LOADS of bad lawyers. LOADS of them. Statistically, there are probably fewer bad teachers than there are bad lawyers, but lawyers are much easier to get rid off and they don't have as high an impact on kids.
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:I had a teacher I didn't like at a private. She had a preferences for girls (I have a boy), often treating the boys poorly. Ha! She just had a baby boy.
HA! Now that's funny!
The sad reality though is that I'm seeing more and more female educators who dislike boys. I'm not sure what their problem is with boys. Maybe because they have poor relationships with their fathers, were teased by boys, rejected by boys in high or in college. It's like they have penis envy or something. I find teachers like this scary and destructive. Thousands of boys get misdiagnosed and labeled with problems that they don't even have due to male hating staff at their school. I honestly believe that there is a growing push to emasculate and to psychologically castrate boys in many schools.
Amen.
Anonymous wrote:Please spell out what makes a teacher awful. --a teacher who wants to know
Anonymous wrote:Anonymous wrote:Years ago a parent blamed me because her 4th grade daughter was not one of the "popular kids" in her classroom.
This was in an American school overseas. This particular family was from Bethesda.
Being in my early 20's I was first confused at this allegation. We then had to meet in the principal's office. I learned that the student did not appreciate me speaking French with the francophone kids during lunch. The mom continued to say that all the boys liked one of the French girls. She also said had I not been playing favorites, her daughter would have been popular with the boys too.
I looked at her and flatly told her that instead of blaming me, she should put her overweight kid on a diet.
Needless to say my principal was quite upset with me. The mom pulled the girl out of the school (there was only one 4th grade class) and went back to Bethesda.
The one thing I learned from this bizarre incident was to make sure not to show any kind of favoritism to any student.
DAMN that's not cool. Was this story supposed to make you look like a not terrible person?
Anonymous wrote:Do you ever look at your child and then head for the mirror?
probably not, eh?
Anonymous wrote:Years ago a parent blamed me because her 4th grade daughter was not one of the "popular kids" in her classroom.
This was in an American school overseas. This particular family was from Bethesda.
Being in my early 20's I was first confused at this allegation. We then had to meet in the principal's office. I learned that the student did not appreciate me speaking French with the francophone kids during lunch. The mom continued to say that all the boys liked one of the French girls. She also said had I not been playing favorites, her daughter would have been popular with the boys too.
I looked at her and flatly told her that instead of blaming me, she should put her overweight kid on a diet.
Needless to say my principal was quite upset with me. The mom pulled the girl out of the school (there was only one 4th grade class) and went back to Bethesda.
The one thing I learned from this bizarre incident was to make sure not to show any kind of favoritism to any student.