On Being a Mom
Even though I had an advanced education in Biology, most of my teaching career was comprised of teaching French. I suppose this had something to do with me being bilingual because this was also around the time Prime Minister Pierre Elliot Trudeau declared Canada a bilingual country so every school was scrambling to make students speak both official languages.
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In Loco Parentis
I have now told two of my favourite stories about having contests with parents as a teacher. I must admit I can only think of two more episodes where I found myself on the wrong end of parental anger.
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A Life Lesson Learned – Part 2
Last week I set the stage for a showdown between myself and the chairman of the Board of Trustees for the school at which I worked. During the last class of the day, the chairman’s frustrated son had showed a clear lack of decorum when facing a failing grade on his exam. He was removed from my class and his dad showed up minutes after dismissal.
This dad was clearly upset that his son had been kicked out of my class and he wanted an explanation. The student had accompanied his dad, I presume to watch his dad take me to the cleaners, so to speak. His posture demonstrated that he was expecting something akin to a Roman gladiator taking on a worthy opponent.
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A Life Lesson Learned – Part 1
I was happy to have a full-time job after a few years of trying to support my family as a supply teacher, even though my new job was an hour’s drive away. I had been offered the job mid-year, as the students had driven the teacher I was replacing nuts. I knew it was a bad scene, but I was not afraid of students and I needed more secure employment.
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Preaching in Class!
I am likely bragging a bit, but in all my years in the classroom, it was rare to find myself in confrontations with parents. This claim is supported by the fact that I still remember the few I had.
One parent with a grievance did not contact me, nor did he contact the principal. He went directly to the Superintendent who demanded a meeting with the principal, the parent and me the following week. According to the principal, I had been accused of preaching. When I explained to the principal that I had told a disgruntled student his mark was directly related to his effort and that he had simply reaped what he had sown, the principal pounded his desk, exclaiming that was not preaching but common sense.
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One More Reading Story
We often get phone calls from desperate parents wanting to escape a school system that is simply not working for them or their children. This problem can easily be explained with a single word: standards. Likely the biggest reason for failure in the school system is the erroneous belief that standard expectations can be applied to all children, none of whom are standard or average.
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More Reading Stories
We had the privilege of working with a family composed of both natural and adopted children. It was a very interesting experience to see the unique family dynamics. While discussing the educational program of the older children, a tiny girl barely a half meter tall came carrying a Bible that could have outweighed her. Her parents informed me that she had learned to read. We naturally assumed this to be a joke, as the girl was only three and a half years old. We were dumbfounded when the girl opened the Bible and articulately read passages from both the Old and New Testaments without tripping over complicated names. This episode of reading lives on as the youngest individual to be fully literate in our experience.
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Building a Library
Last week I told the story of the late-blooming boy who demonstrated no interest in learning academic subjects, particularly reading, until much older than the “industry standard” of reading by age six. Once puberty hit and this young fellow began reading, he quickly excelled and became a power reader.
His dad was a successful investment specialist. He had an agreement with his son that he would purchase any book the son wanted (parental reason prevailing), on condition that it would be read cover to cover. The dad then purchased a bookcase that would only house books after they had been fully read and the contents discussed with dad to ensure the son was understanding what he was reading.
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Learning to Read
He was certainly an energetic boy. As he zoomed past his mother and me, I realized this fellow now registered for home education through us was not ready for formal education.
I asked his mother if she thought he was ready and her answer somewhat baffled me. She did not think the lad was ready but she was convinced she should proceed with “schooling” anyway. When I asked her to explain, she said the authorities expected a child to start formal training by age six.
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Don’t Judge
Every family has its quirks and its outstanding features; its strengths and weaknesses; how it shows up in public and its secrets. Every family is weird in some way. Most children want something different from the family in which they grew up regardless of whether their family was good, bad or ugly.
My dad was a World War Two veteran. The things he was exposed to as a teenaged volunteer marred him for life. His marriage was less than stellar, partially because of his issues and partially because of my mother’s. In retrospect, I believe my father suffered from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Nobody considered just how violently damaged the WW II vets were at the time. As a consequence of his psychological damage, my father was distant even when he was at home. So even though I believe my father loved me, my maternal grandfather played a big role in my upbringing.