Trips down memory lane.
Have you ever taken the time to think back along amnesia lane and see who most affected your life? With all the talk about homeschooling, and the latest saying that…
the purpose of public schools is not to teach social skills, and in fact they aren’t good at it…
I began to think about it, and I agree.
It was never my job to socialize some one’s child. I was payed to Show up, teach theatre, direct shows, design shows, build shows, give the class a deeper appreciation of theatre, and go home. That was my job. That’s what I was paid for. And the school was never intended to do anything other than spit out automatons that score high enough grades to get into a middle level college or better.
So back to the memory lane. Eddie. Arguably the best friend of my childhood and tween years. He lived about a mile away, down this dirt…not really a road, more of a cut through. He was a not well off black kid, who lived with his grandmother in a medium sized… shanty. The floor was crazy uneven, and the house had a very unusual smell. I meet him in first grade. I had never meet a person of color before. I probably wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for J.B. Henderson Elem. I didn’t even talk to him at first. By third grade, we were inseparable. I’m sure in back woods Georgia, it was little strange to see this white and black kid riding bikes down the road. Once, I got slapped on the bus in 7th grade by a girl who Eddie “accidentally” felt up. I took the slap, and we laughed our asses off for years about it…bastard.
I learned not to judge, not at church or even at home, but in a small trailer/classroom with 15 other kids and on a school bus that seemed like home at times. I did homework, ate snacks, had many a water fights, and made great friends on that bus route.
And what about the professionals that were paid to do nothing more than pour in information for me to regurgitate on some test. There was Mrs Welling, chemistry teacher…who gave me a Tom Lehrer song book, which I still adore. Mrs. Hand, English teacher, who decided to take some of us to Alabama Shakespeare Festival my senior year. I fell in love with Shakespeare that week. I found out later she forked out money for 2 of the students who went out of her own pocket. Or Mr. Clark, who cast me in a crappy one act “Inside/Out” and started me down this path I call a life. When one of my best friend died my senior year and I failed 3 classes, he let me assistant direct “Wait Until Dark” even though I was ineligible due to grades…it made up my mind about theatre. I could go on, but you get the point.
As a teacher, it was never my job to give advice. It was not my job to stay in touch with my kids at college. It was not my job to write letters of rec years after I left the school. It wasn’t my job to help kids out with other subjects. It wasn’t my job to go to memorial services for the young adults who lost their lives in a school bus accident…the year after I stopped teaching. That’s what you do as a public school teacher. That’s why we do what we do. That’s why, still today, I help any school I can. If you teach and you don’t understand that…then you don’t need to teach.
October 29th, 2007 at 9:42 am
As a teacher, I agree completely. But the point of my post was that the public schools are not the only way to educate a student - including education about social skills. It is possible to provide a better education for a child through other means than public schools. Heck, the “traditional” school format has only been the norm for less than a century in this country, and it still isn’t the norm in some parts of the world. Clearly excellent education can, did, and still does happen for some outside of that format.
As I said at my site, the “traditional” format can be a rewarding, enriching, wonderfully educational experience, but it certainly isn’t automatically these things, nor is it at all clear that public schools are the best way to have these things.
By the way Bryan, I get the impression that you were a great teacher. You care. Thank you for the positive impact that I am sure you had on hundreds of lives.
October 29th, 2007 at 10:17 am
Not only am I proud of you and all you’ve done in the public school system, I’m also proud of our friends who have done the same. It makes me proud to say that 99% of teachers that I know go above and beyond to improve the system they’re in.
It definitely makes me feel better about the future.
October 29th, 2007 at 9:27 pm
“That’s what you do as a public school teacher”
Perhaps some, most certainly not all. And I have to doubt most. Maybe I’ve just been in bad schools, maybe all my teachrs were long since burned out before I had them. But the experiences you are describing did not happen here. I can think of 1 good teacher in my entire 12 years, and it was his first year teaching so he still had stars in his eyes.
Once the bell rings they don’t even know your name anymore. If you can’t afford to go on the class trip, you just don’t go. The only ones who were allowed to participate in anything even after failing classes were the jocks, because if you can run and throw a ball you have deity status here. We have the coaches who teach because they have to to coach so they pick something simple that they can rad straight out the book like math or history, killing any joy in either subject as they drone on like Ben Stein. Or the ones who choose to teach because it mmeant summer vacations and wekends off. And the ones who seem to absolutely hate kids and teach because it gives them a chance to inflict the most power over while being applauded for it.
October 31st, 2007 at 9:08 am
Summer, while I understand the general opinion that public schools are impersonal and uncaring (especially in comparison with home schooling), I just don’t recognize what you are describing.
This is more true for me than for my students. They have their fundraisers for band trips, club trips, and yes class trips. Very little of that comes out of their pocket. And in real life, there are no fundraisers. If you don’t have the money for a trip your peers are going on, you don’t go. I’m not sure how this describes a strike against public schools.
Again, I don’t recognize this in any of the places I’ve lived. It is certainly true for some areas, but our school has several excellent athletes who can’t play due to grades. I think every state has mandates about this, and I don’t know any teachers who bow to pressure from the coaches. If you are going to paint with a broad brush like this, I will have to start asking for direct evidence.
Perpetrating these kinds of stereotypes does not help the homeschooling movement in any way. In fact, it serves to alienate the professional educators who argue so vehemently against the value of what you do. They are great for comedy films and nightcap anecdotes, but they do not reflect the reality of what most public school teachers are about, and I think most of us would resent it… some might even call it a militant position on your part. I hope you will give that some thought.