Check out this video of teachers flipping out in the classroom. Now, the pinhead in the interview, Mark Eiglarsh, makes the nutty case that teachers yelling at bad behaving kids is “emotional abuse”. Why is it people who apparently have not been a classroom in the last 20 years automatically line up against teachers? I graduated from high school (The Fightin’ Cobras!) in 1994 and so many of the kids were just absolute monsters who simply did not want to be in the classroom. In the ensuing 13 (!) years, it can only have gotten worse. I’m surprised in this country that we don’t have more teachers bringing bodily harm to their charges. Yes, wanton abuse from a teacher should never be tolerated, but the disrespect from pupils towards their teachers is rampant in a culture that too often tells kids that they’re perfect in every way no matter what they do.
As to the use of cell phones in class, I sort of understand the need to have them in emergencies (Columbine comes to mind) but once they’re in the building they must be turned off and not used. And if they are, out they go - no second chances.
In the ensuing 13 (!) years, it can only have gotten worse.
Exactly the kind of solid, backed up by experience or rigid analysis, reporting and analysis we’ve come to expect from you, ODub.
Got to have.
Could only.
Trust me, years (I say years, damn you!) have passed.
I graduated High School in 1978 (the mighty Red Raiders, a little shout out to my homies in ‘Tosa) and I’m going to bet it was just as “bad” then.
So, you want those darn kids to get off your lawn too?
what a world.
I attended DOD schools in high school. Army and Air Force brats didn’t yell at teachers. I did cuss one out just once.
O’Dub,
I hate to admit it but I also agree with O’Rielly. As a teacher I get to see this sort of stuff first hand. Lettuce and mdhatter find this sort of stuff funny, but students have become more emboldened over the years. My generation and this coming generation have less parental participation in the children’s lives. The kids cannot see any consequence to thier actions whatsoever and subsequently feel the need to react in any matter that suits them. My uncle is also a teacher and says that kids will regularly threaten teachers or laugh off any demands for order. Stories like this are important because it highlights how little respect people have for teachers(mdhatter and Lettuce). Parents and communities just keep washing thier hands of any problems off on schools and remain hostile to those who try to do something about the problem.
I also attended a DOD school as a child and this sort of stuff would NEVER fly. Its very simple: threaten a teacher, get in a fight or commit a henious act and your ass and your parents can be shipped out. If you messed up, your parents would be getting the 9th degree from thier commander and could be demoted and redeployed. Getting suspended also meant you had community service. Alas, we may never be able to run schools like that in the civilian world.
The teachers and old ones at Arkham High School (the fighting cephalopods) would never tolerate that kind of disrespect. But then, in a town with so many strange and unsolved disappearances, kids have learned to toe the line as a survival instinct or just plain darwinism.
In 1968, at Byrd High in Shreveport (the yellow jackets) this kind of behavior by the students was unheard of. It is the actions by the students that cause the REaction by the teachers. When will people realize that teachers are human? Teachers are trained to counter abuse by the students, but unrelenting abuse is hard to take without exploding. Could you do it?
WhiteWhale - kids are as in control of the situation as you let them be. Your obvious terror is their instant control. Same as it ever was.
I used to have a substitute teacher who would complain to the principal that we were horrible to him… because we would pass notes and write goofy things on the blackboard. He cried holy murder. It was a study hall.
Don’t be angry with me if you’ve lost some of your own perspective.
As for teachers, I have nothing but respect for those who lead our children, and nothing but disregard for those who slight them. (WhiteWhale and WhiteWhale)
If you are a teacher, might I suggest you’ve lost the taste for it??
It’s just that teachers are one of the front lines against the biology of teenage male dominance.
some hormones are antisocial
it’s a fact, work around it.
I have to agree with White Whale and Oliver on this one, especially the part about parental involvement.
My son and daughter’s teachers both thank my wife all the time because of the communication she has with them (she writes notes in their planners, responds to notes written to her, etc.) They both told her they cannot believe how so many parents are either completely uninterested or just don’t bother.
However, I’ll bet these same parents will be the first to declare, “He’s a good boy” the moment he gets into trouble and that’s where teachers are concerned these days. My niece is a substitute teacher and several times she has had to discipline kids in class, and on a few occasions had to deal with angry parents calling the school wondering they their little angel was getting “picked on” by the teacher.
It is a cultural thing as Oliver says. Discipline (or the lack thereof) plays a large part. I don’t know if it’s social engineering or what, but it seems that a large segment of society has become conditioned to believe that discipline is not really a good thing.
a really large segment of society has also apparently been conditioned to believe that kids were ever much better.
Discipline is taught, teaching is hard, and teachers work for the parents as much as the children.
you tell me when kids were better than they are now.
All kids? or is it still that same 5% of total jerks who have always given teachers a hard time?
I think it is that same 5%, and this conversation has been had before, generation after generation.
I don’t think I’m really arguing that its all or more kids. I think that same 5% is a more malevolent force. When I was in school in the early ’90s we didn’t have the stabbings and shootings that began to happen in the late ’90s. Same kids, but instead of beating up someone they’re stabbing them.
Also, let’s just say that I’m more sympathetic to Mr. Wilson as I get older.
Being the husband of a first year high school teacher, I can attest to the fact that teachers have no recourse for unruly students. Unruly is certainly the nicest way to put it. She has been told to go to hell/cussed at and has another teacher that has been sexually harassed by students and staff.
Administration rarely backs anyone of their teachers up and in the end I fault the parents of these students. She calls the parents (one of the few teachers who does) and makes sure they know what is going on but very little is done.
As far as male hormones are concerned, I hear more about problems with female students than male and have seen a fistfight between 2 females when I visited her school.
It’s almost impossible to teach when you are simply trying to keep kids from abusing each other and the teachers.
All hat being said, she is the true hero in my mind and I respect the hell out of any teacher who can get a student to actually lear what is being taught.
MD, I would say the condition is more the parents than the kids. Kids cause trouble from time to time. That’s life. But far too many parents aren’t ready to believe for some reason that little Johnny is going to be a problem and concludes he is either being singled out for some reason or that the teacher is just wrong.
mdhatter,
You are grossly misjudging my feelings on this subject and my reason for teaching. You are correct in stating that it is the teacher who has control not the student. I practice this everyday. My beef is not with “passing notes” or “writing on the board”; its with kids who would kill and harm teachers. I love going to work everyday and as much disfuntional and non-positive behavior I see, I realize that there is a reason to this behavior. What is discouraging is that you would write this subject off as being much ado about nothing. Further more a dismissive attitude is what really makes it hard to be a teacher. I teach my children about discipline, manners, respect, etc… but without reinforcement lessons can be a drop in the bucket.
In the ensuing 13 (!) years, it can only have gotten worse.
Thank goodness things had either plateaued or even monotonically improved in all those decades before and during your time as a student! Otherwise, the situation would probably be hitting a crisis point right about now.
(Please, won’t somebody think of the children???)
Fast Times At Ridgemont High was written about my grad year. At the start of the school year, the principal mentioned we would be voting for class song “which will NOT be Another Brick In The Wall”.
I guess I went to the wrong high school. I never saw Phoebe Cate’s tits once, although I was in the school play with Michelle Meyrink