Middle School Parents

The BBQ Pit
61

As a middle school teacher, let me chime in and say I LOVE teaching 7th grade. They are great at that age and I enjoy the hell out of them, even though they are exasperating spazzes sometimes. I am not crying about my job, and though there are a lot of annoying aspects, few of those are kids.

Here’s the thing that gets me: parents who are totally snowed by their kids’ obvious lies. I’ll give an example. When I give a writing assignment, I put the due date on the board, and on our team’s website, and remind them daily when it’s due. A boy (regular ed, no excuses) didn’t have his essay. After 2 days without it, I called his mom to tell her that her son didn’t have his paper, it’s a major grade, etc. First she said, “He said didn’t know when it was due.” I pointed out that couldn’t possibly be true, and why. Despite concrete evidence to the contrary, she said, “My son is a martial artist, and integrity is very important to us. If he said he didn’t know when it was due, then you didn’t tell him.” Since I have tenure, I flat-out told her that her son wasn’t be honest with her. She got very angry, told me “not to go there,” and that she didn’t like me calling her kid a liar (not what I said, but I did imply it).

Then, she bitched me out for not attending the parent conference she had with our team. I was sick home in bed. Not good enough-- I knew when the parent meeting was, I should have dragged myself into work that day! Aha, nice double standard! What the fuck ever, lady. It’s -5/day for late papers, and your kid’s is 2 days late. Fucking deal. BTW, when I talked to the kid about it, he admitted to me he lied to his mother. Shocking.

You’re wrong. The classification process to get a kid an IEP takes many, many man hours of testing, processing, and discussions among many levels of the faculty, with and without parents. I am NOT against kids getting IEPs who need them. I hate to say it, but there are always a few kids who need an IEP desperately, and it can take an entire school year to go through the process of getting them one. I had a kid (14 yo in 7th grade) who was nearly blind transfer in from NYC. He couldn’t read because the shitty school district he was in before ours didn’t recognize his sight loss during his formative years of skill acquisition. Took a whole fucking year to get him into special ed, and meantime the kid was failing his classes. Really demoralizing for everyone, and tragic, because he was damn smart. It’s really fucked up, but there is a queue for that testing, and it’s time and energy I hate to see wasted on a kid who doesn’t need it.

OTOH, there were several kids last year who did not need the special ed services they were getting, but they got them because the parents insisted and freaked out and threatened law suits. They were wasting the district’s money and infantilizing their kids, who IMO were doing fine (A’s and B’s) without the mods. Once a kid has A’s and B’s in all his classes, they try to declassify them, which means they still get the testing mods but did not have a resource room scheduled. That resource room space is precious (supposed to be <12 students by law, but there aren’t enough teachers, so…); some kids really need that extra support. Your kid has fucking straight A’s, but you insist he needs RR instead of a study hall. That is a waste of resources, seriously. Let the kid who is failing everything have that space, PLEASE.

62

Is there any chance there’s less behavioral problems in these honors classes? Less behavior problems mean the teacher is going to be spending more time teaching, and the kids learning, than dealing with problem students. While I usually do not, I, for once, actually agree with the parents in these situations. I’d also rather have my kid in a class where the students are more intent on learning.

So what’s the problem? Give the poor kid a chance! If he can’t cut it, send him back down to the regular class. If there’s lots of kids wanting a chance, make another Honors Algebra class.

63

There are supposed to be qualifications for getting in-- gets A’s and B’s, does all homework, is prepared for class, tests well. If you aren’t qualified, then the class isn’t for you, because you won’t maintain your B or above average, and you will make it harder for the rest of the class (ie., the kids who are qualified to be there) to move at the pace most appropriate for them. It also demoralizes kids when they do badly in the advanced class but could be doing A’s or B’s in the regular class.

A lot of why some parents push for their kids to be in the accelerated class is status. It’s concerned slacker, not ambitious, low status, if your kid isn’t in all the accelerated classes, regardless of the kid’s ability or desire to be in the class. If your kid really can’t do the work, why force him to be in the class, against teacher rec and possibly also the kid’s desires? Let your kid be on his own level, and maybe enjoy school.

As for “Make another Honors class”… do you know how much that costs? And the process for getting another teacher? Really, it’s not just ::snap::, another Honors teacher to meet the unreasonable demands of parents who are not accurately assessing their kids’ abilities, just wanting the better class because they are “better people.”

64

So they fail and you send them back to regular classes where the material is more their speed and level of difficulty.

I think kids may be inspired by such a system. A system where they’re not allowed to rest on their laurels and will actually have to make an effort to keep up. As someone that’s been in both, the atmosphere in an honors class is very different. People come in to learn and pay attention, asking questions. In regular classrooms some kids can’t even be bothered to take their headphones off. Teacher doesn’t make them because there’s really no point, they’re not paying attention anyway and this way at least they’re not bothering anybody else.

My high school my senior year even considered making at least one honors class a requirement for graduation. It was quickly scrapped, but they did ask us what we thought about it.

Ummmmm…“Hey Judy, instead of your ‘Basic grammer for soon to be criminals’ class, would you have a problem teaching an Honors English class this semester?” Am I missing anything? Thirty more students in an Honors class are thirty less in a normal class so you don’t need to hire anybody new. I can’t imagine a teacher with any meaningful experience would have a problem drawing up a new, more aggressive lesson plan. If anything I think teachers would be JUMPING at the chance.

65

This discussion has been very interesting for me. I went to private schools in elementary then public from then on. I went to the “bad” middle school, their art class, as an example, used rubber cement and ink to do tie-dye if the parents couldn’t buy the $2.00 t-shirt. The “good” middle school did macrame projects, screen printing, ceramics… Same district. Radically different experience. At the good school, I was put in a remedial math course, no matter how much we argued that they weren’t placing me correctly, based on my elementary school progress.

Right now, I am fighting for my 2 year old daughter to get speech therapy. I stumbled upon a program that is designed for infants/toddlers to get them the help early before they “enter the system.” I see coddled, spoiled, entitled children every day. and I work in a place where no one under 18 is admitted. (Yes, I am the boss of you)

Remind me in 4 years of the struggles I will have to face not only with the schools, but with the other parents.

I’ll echo the person upthread as far as middle school. I may have been a huge pain in the ass at that age, but the teachers that stood out at that age, stand out now. It is an amazing time to influence a child and I dare say, Mr. Moretta will go down in my history as the single most influential instructor I’ve ever had. Not for just his ability to teach, but to understand us, to work with us and to engage us. The harpy that taught civics? Yeah, she can rot. But him? Absolutely amazing. I was 12/13 then, and am 39 now and I still recall the feeling of him being proud of me or the class. It was manna from heaven.

66

OK, I am not a teacher, but when I was a senior in high school, the school board/administration was trying to cut the high school honors program from the budget entirely. (In the same school year, they approved $20,000+ for new stadium lights/bleachers for the football field. But I digress.) I was part of a committee of pissed-off students and parents who were in opposition.

These are a few of the costs that the school board listed as too high to maintain:

– Purchasing new books and course materials every year.
– Field trips. One year of the honors program was based on seeing what local artists/exceptionals had contributed, so we visited a lot of workshops, authors, theatres, etc. I can safely say that meeting Ben Logan was one of the highlights of my life.
– Teacher training. The teachers who taught Honors went to workshops/conferences that offered courses for teaching the exceptional child.

There was also something about paying for the college credits of high schoolers when they outstripped the curriculum provided at the school, but I don’t think that’s an issue in middle school. And, technically, under Wisconsin law, college courses taken in high school aren’t part of a honors program provided by the school.

I could easily see this being too much of a financial obstacle for some districts. On top of that, some schools look at the fuss raised when kids don’t make it into honors courses, the National Honors Society, etc. and just decide to discontinue those courses/programs. Phwew, there’s goes that financial drain and those potential lawsuits.

I’m not sure about other states, but advanced courses are required for exceptional students in Wisconsin. (Here’s the rather scanty webpage on the requirements.) Unfortunately, they often aren’t provided because, well, exceptional students require exceptional education. If you start moving “average” kids into honors classes, what does that do? Either the average kids fall behind and fail, or the classes get dumbed down* to their level. Where does that leave the actual honors students? Unfortunately, there’s this idea that smart kids will do just fine in mainstream curriculum – it will just be easier for them.

In a perfect world, courses for exceptional students/TAG kids/“geniuses” would be part of the special education program and would be just as well-funded. Unfortunately again, there aren’t very many politicians who are willing to take up the banner for smart kids – nobody really cares except their parents.

And, of course, in your scenario, who’s going to take over the basic grammar for soon-to-be criminals class? Is Judy just going to add an additional class to her schedule and lose prep time? Or is some other teacher expected to take one for the team and start teaching remedial kids? Are you just going to shunt them to some other class? Is the school prepared to offer another honors course? Is Judy familiar with teaching strategies for exceptional students? Does the state have special requirements she has to fulfill before she can teach something called “honors”?

It goes way beyond just asking a teacher to teach an honors class. It sounds so simple – “Well, just make one!” – but you just can’t go creating honors/TAG programs willy-nilly.

[sub]*It’s OK to be average. Most people are. But it’s also a little disingenous to go on believing that any child can succeed in a well-structured TAG program. Average kids won’t.[/sub]

ETA: And, because I’m feeling like a complete bitch right now, it’s motherfucking grammar. There’s no goddamn “e”.

67

I picture this dude with a pencil behind his ear, a legal pad in one hand and measuring tape in the other, wearing an intrigued look on his face and a $5 suit that looks like it came straight off of a 1970s CBS News set, nodding enthusiastically while listening to bemused/befuddled granddaughters rattle off numbers.

I hear you, but dude, honestly, it took two glasses of water, a cup of meat tenderizer and half a bottle of Pepto-Bismol to digest that sentence.

Part of that is on the field of psychiatry, which convinced much of my generation’s parents that we had ADD and the way to make sure we succeeded was to, um, get us hooked on amphetamines from age 8 onward. Of course, when we landed in California I had an IEP with a special counselor who got inches from my face (and apparently never brushed her damn teeth!) and told me how we were going to bend my teachers’ collective will to get me as much test-taking time as possible and waste a whole bunch of my time sitting in meetings listening to grown-ups spew bullshit about my progress. And, accused me of being a racist when I had trouble staying on track with a black math teacher’s homework assignments. Yeah, obviously it’s because she’s black, not becuase she, gee, doesn’t give clear deadlines, doesn’t check the homework, doesn’t teach any concepts until after they’re due in the HW, etc. :rolleyes: But I digress.

The point is, when I had academic issues as a wee little one, my parents saw a psychologist who urged them to keep me off of prescriptions, while our trusted pediatrician told them they just had to get me on drugs or else I was doomed to ever-lovin’ failure. They picked the pediatrician’s advice, and now I’m a recovering speed freak with a superhuman SAT score, about 3 college semesters of 100% wasted time and tuition mixed in with a couple decent community college grades, and I’m a year away from transfering back to a four-year university in this, the year that all of my old classmates are graduating with bachelors’ degrees. It’s hard to forgive my parents for that, but some parents legitimately believe that the IEP/special accommodations route is really what’s best for their child.

68

I notice that this has digressed into an IEP discussion. I only had to go down the path of IEP once for my oldest daughter. It was during a discussion where I was told that my daughter needed to adapt her learning ability to the way that the teacher was teaching. When I pointed out that a good teacher recognizes that there are multiple ways that kids learn and attempts to reach them, I was told that was not possible in a school of that size. So I countered with, “Gee, it seems that my daughter is an **INDIVIDUAL **with an **EDUCATION **need that requires a **PLAN **in this circumstance.” Amazingly, the school decided that a different teacher may be just the solution that was in order at that point. Funny, that was what I said to start with…

69

No one wants kids to FAIL, esp. if the kid is in the wrong placement. And that’s not even really the issue. Usually the kid is not going to fail, he’s going to get C’s, maybe a D. He is going to drag down the level of the class for the kids who are making the required A or B, and then, guess what? It’s not fucking ACCELERATED anymore. Your selfish need to have your unqualified kid in the advanced math class is going to harm the education of others, and probably demoralize your kid. Just let him be in the math class that suits his level.

First of all, the “Ummmmm” is really condescending and annoying. There have been Pit threads devoted to hating it.

Second, these leveling discussions tend to be about math only. There are no Honors English classes in my middle school.

Third, I don’t know why you think there would be 30 kids like this. It’s usually 5-10 parents who bitch up a storm and want their kid in accelerated math. Enough to fuck up the acceleration of everyone else in the class, making a class that’s too large and too slow to do anyone any good, but not enough to form another whole class. You’d go from a nice, small class of 15 go-getter students to a class of 25 mixed ability students, and the entire purpose of the class goes out the window. The misplaced kid gets his C’s and is miserable, but do you think that will convince the parents that the kid needs to move back down to regular math? Nope. It’s really ridiculous.

70

OK, here’s my random IEP-related story. One day, as I was working through some Calculus problems while eating lunch in the Gifted room (this was during my senior year of HS), I shouted out, to no one in particular, “There is a hole in my head where this stuff should be!” Our Gifted teacher dug through her file cabinet and pulled out all my testing records. She walked over to me and said, “You know, these test scores would seem to indicate you are right. With the gap between your subscores you could easily be categorized as twice-exceptional.”

She was horrified that no one had pointed this out to me or my family in thirteen years. I just felt a sense of relief because there was an explanation for the reason why I struggled with the work. Technically, I should have had an IEP. I’m glad I didn’t, though I do wonder how it would have changed things. I mean, it’s not that I can’t do math–when I was given a diagnostic test to see if I could take Algebra in the eighth grade even though I had only taken arithmetic in the seventh, I got a perfect score, and, dammit, I passed a frickin’ Advanced Placement test in Calculus. The problem is that the visual and spatial methods often used to teach algebra and calculus don’t work for me. I don’t think the school district would have been able to craft an IEP that effectively addressed that issue (giving me more time to try and move imaginary things around in my head that I couldn’t effectively visualize if I sat there for 10,000 years would not do anyone any good), so, at some level, I’m glad I was left to my own devices.

By the way, OP, do know that the truly vile and irritating and meddling parents have a comeuppance ahead of them that is far crueler than anything you or your wife could devise. You see, I get these kids when they start college, and man oh man, you would not believe the things they will say to someone who seems willing to listen. There are a lot of parents who had better pray that Johnny or Susie take an ethics class and that the lessons about duty stick, or else they face a cold and lonely old age. OP, these kids are embarrassed by their parents and have very little respect for them. Some of them will tell their parents to take a hike once they hit 18, the less bold will wait until they get a job after college and then they’ll move 1,000 miles away from their parents’ reach. I promise you, OP, the selfish and grandstanding parents, the ones who want their kids to be in Honors not to glory the child but to glory themselves, the meddlers, the coddlers–they are laying seeds that will one day be sown to their detriment.

71

8th grade teacher here -

I find this discussion fascinating, and I appreciate the varying perspectives, though I hardly know where to begin to comment.

I have to disagree with the general spirit of the OP. The biggest problem in education today is that parents just don’t care, or that if they do care they believe it is the responsibility of the public school system to educate their child. A child’s education is the responsibility of their parents, and at around fifteen years of age it becomes partially the responsibility of the child as well. We can do very little for a child whose parents aren’t involved.

At our parent night last month I had 8 sets of parents show up (out of 89). Three worked for the school district. Of the remaining five only two asked me about my qualifications, my education, what I would cover in class, or any other question that would have been expected in such a meeting. It is no coincidence that the three parents (one couple, one single mom) who did have an in-depth discussion with me have my two most advanced students this year so far.

So I would love to see parents who are doing everything they can to get their kids into the best schools, the best classes, the best programs, etc. In my district most don’t seem to care at all. I’d bet the majority of my students’ parents have no idea what material we are working on in my class right now. It’s crazy.

The other comment I have concerns honors classes. My school has none, ostensibly because the school is too small, but in reality because it would interfere with football and basketball practice. I have 24 studnets who are recognized as GT, and who in my experience so far deserve such recognition. Yet, again to accommodate athletics, they are not grouped into GT classes, they are mixed in with everyone else. Mainstreamed special ed, ESL, and IEP students are also all mixed in with no regard for learning ability. I’m left teaching classes in which a quarter of my students are bored out of their minds because I have to teach to the lowest common denominator to comply with special ed laws. So I can forgive parents who want to push their kids into honors classes where they are available. As long as the parents understand that honors students are expected to work, and that taking honors courses may make it more difficult to maintain an “A” average I have no problem with moving up the students with parents who care enough to fight for their children’s education.

72

Rubystreak, I’m so glad you’re in the trenches. The middle school years were my least favorite, but they would have been a lot worse if it hadn’t been for the few dedicated teachers I had. I’m happy to discover that there’s someone out there who loves that age group.

Someone should do an experiment. Have two classes with the same caliber of teacher and the same level of material, but label one class as “math” and the other as “math for special smart and adorable kids”. For both classes, throw in students who are at the same intellectual/academic level. Determine how fast it takes the parents of the regular math kids to throw a fit and demand their kids be moved to the honors class. It will expose the parents who are into status from the ones who just want their kids to get a good education.

Because while I can’t agree 100% with the OP, I do think that for many parents, it’s not about stimulating or challenging their kids, although that’s what they say. It’s about making them special and setting them apart from the riff-raff. It’s about having your precious ones labeled as “smart”. No one wants an average kid.

In middle school, I was in both honors and regular classes. The kids in those classes varied, but the behavioral problems were the same. If anything, the honors kids got away with murder because their parents would play the “he’s just a bored genius” card when they were called to the carpet. Also the honors kids could hide their obnoxiousness with charm–something that comes with being valued and esteemed. Yes, being in honors in middle school paves the way for AP in high school (which sucks for the late-bloomers who don’t blossom until ninth or tenth grades). But if a school is good enough, it’s not like being in an “above average” class is going to sentence you to the vocational track when you get to high school.

The problem with fighting parents is that their efforts only work if everyone else stays quiet. If everyone thinks their Jimmy and Suzy belongs in super-duper honors instead of “regular” honors, then you water down the meaning of super-duper honors. Someone has to be kept out, but no one wants their kid to be standing on the bad side of the cut off. I understand how sad it might make both kid and parent to be cut off (believe me, I was that kid who always stood on the cusp of “giftedness”–good enough to win awards and praises from my teachers, but never quite good enough to get full acceptance into the gifted program). Sometimes you just have to be satisfied with what’s available and make the best of it.

If parents are involved enough, they can make sure their kids are challenged enough outside of school. Education doesn’t stop after 3:00. And kids shouldn’t be getting their self-esteem from the classes printed on their schedules anyway.

73

Parent of an 8th grader checking in:

I received a letter Thursday stating next quarter she is required to take a remedial math class as her elective as she barely passed the state mandatory test for 7th grade. Note she did not fail. She passed.

Last spring school was hell for her. Her primary male influence (Grandpa) passed in January. She was shattered. Her grades tanked. By the end of the year she managed to pull the D’s and a few F’s back up to mostly B’s. Math she went from an F to an A- thanks to an understanding teacher who did not autmatically baseline her grade to a C for late work. She did very well on every test, except the mandatory state one.

So I called the school to see if she could “test out”, explaining the circumstance and noting how she brought her grades back up from the cellar.

Nope. It’s required. Since she scored so low she has to take the class. BUT SHE PASSED. Bummer.

THIS kind of stuff aggravates me. I fully understand my daughter’s weaknesses. I know what she can and cannot do. I know her teachers - I may not e-mail them often, but I am there for every function and do contact them if something is going on. That she is being forced to take a class to “help” her for test she passed? Bullshit.

I don’t want to be one of those parents who are always in the office. The Kid is of the opinion “Easy class, leave it be”. Why should I?

74

Actually I wouldn’t mind this at all. I love to have kids separated into “Has Parents Who Care” classes and “Has Parents Who Don’t Give a Shit” classes. It’d be better for everyone.

You should insist that she test out or be taken out - don’t just give up.

I feel for you. I teach a remedial course (that replaces electives) for students who failed last year’s state-mandated standardized test. I’m able to recommend that students be taken out and put back in electives if they are advanced enough. I’ve done this for 4 students so far, three out-of-state transfers who were placed in the class because they didn’t take our state’s test last year (stupid, I know), and one who’s father was killed in Iraq last spring which totally screwed him up temporarily. All 4 had to take a full version of a released standardized test on my recommendation, if they passed they were allowed out of the class. Your school’s inflexibility is inexcusable.

75

Actually, no it wouldn’t. Because there are terrific kids who manage to have “parents who don’t care”, and they should be given just as much chance to shine as the kids with parents who care. Kids shouldn’t be catered to based on their parents. They should be catered to based on their abilities and potential, nothing else.

76

My experience is that there is a nearly one-to-one ratio between those two groups.

77

My problem is that there’s the perception problem. When people think they can dick over a kid because they aren’t likely to have an “angry” parent, that’s bad.

I was bussed to schools. Many of the kids in remedial classes were bussed. Now, it’s true that many of those kids were in fact remedial, for whatever reason. But I know for a fact that some of those kids were NOT remedial. They had been placed there because the good classes were filled up with kids with “parents who care”. Or, to my suspicious mind, kids who were perceived as having “parents who care”, based on income and race. The schools I attended catered to these parents, because they didn’t want their school to be overrun with minority poor kids, and white kids were already fleeing the school system. Meanwhile, the cut offs for all the smart-kid programs tended to lie right on the kids with parents who were more trusting of the school system or those who weren’t especially rich or priviledged, in addition to parents who just didn’t care.

I think it’s easy to categorize parents into two neat groups–one bad and one good. But in actually, you’ve got parents who are obnoxious, status-hungry bastards, who will sue the pants off the school for the most minor of “injustices”. Then you’ve got parents who geniunely care about challenging their kids and want their smarty pants offspring to be treated as such. Next you’ve got parents who care about their kids getting a good education, but don’t know what all this entails. They think “basic English” is just as good as “above-average English” which is just as good as “honors English”. They think if a kid is happy and coming home with mostly “As” and “Bs”, that means the kid is learning. If the kid goes to Yale, great. But if they end up going to state school or voc ed, that’s just as great. Unsophisticated, yes. Unambitious, true. But not uncaring. And then, you’ve got the bad parents who don’t give a shit. The reality is that unless you sit down with the parents, you have no idea which kid belongs to which kind of parents. Hell, my parents were far from dysfunctional, but they didn’t go to PTA meetings, and the only reason why they’d go to Open House was because my orchestra would perform and I’d need a ride home (well, not 100% true, but they did stop going when I got to high school and I stopped needing rides). But they cared when it counted.

No, kids should be evaluated based on what they bring to the table, not what their parents do or might do. When I was in middle school, someone looked at my address and my race (both printed on my schedule) and decided I probably didn’t have a parent who cared, so I was shafted into a mediocre program. I have no doubt this happens to thousands of kids every school year, but no one ever comes to their rescue. And it’s not fair.

78

But why should you punish the children for the mistakes of their parents? This way, you’re pretty much crippling them before they get out of the starting gate.

79

What a bunch of bullshit. Some of my favorite students, and biggest success stories, have been kids whose parents weren’t involved in their education. In some cases, the parent was in jail, or dead, or had 5 other kids to take care of. They needed more TLC from me and the other teachers, but they really appreciate the extra attention. You can really make a difference with a kid like that. Kids with over-protective uber-parents don’t need me as much, which is great on one level, but I’m there to help every kid, not just teach to kids who would learn just fine regardless.

MissTake, the school is probably worried about their test scores. There is a lot of pressure to make sure every kid passes-- No Child Left Behind says they all HAVE to. I’m sure your kid will, but the school doesn’t know that. Maybe if she gets an A in the class the first quarter, you can go to the principal and point to that grade, saying something like, “I think my daughter is taking up a seat in a remedial class that would be put to better use by a kid who is failing. Please use that resource for someone else. My kid can be in the regular class.” It would probably work if you have the leverage of an A grade to show.

80

Really. Not to mention, it just perpetuates the problem. Punish the kid unlucky enough to come from a bad family, and then that kid grows into a bad parent who couldn’t give two shits about school. And no wonder.