Carrie Bartkowiak v. 5.0

These are weird, but neat.
You might take a look at this and say that this fellow needs a hobby, but apparently, he already has one!

Pete Goldlust | Carved Crayons

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Yet another thing, since I’m ranting about this…
The entire first grade had the exact same homework to do every week. I mean down to the letter, no exagerration… it was the same exact xeroxed sheet handed out to every child in every first-grade class. I was shocked to discover this one day when I went to a friend’s house with Kelsey to get his homework assignment, since he’d been sick. (Our family has never been so sick as they have since school started. I can’t even begin to count up the money we’ve spent on doctor’s visits and medication from the bugs the boys were bringing home.) Anyhow, Kelsey’s friend has a younger brother who is also in the first grade. He was sitting at the table doing his homework. I hear him ask for a way to use a certain word in a sentence and my ears perk up… that’s one of Brendon’s homework words for tonight. I asked the boy if he was in Brendon’s class? Nope. I asked to look at the homework sheet… exactly the same copy, down to the letter.

No room for classes that might be moving faster or slower than the others, no room for *kids* that might be moving faster or slower than the others. This is what the first grade will do this week, period. I later asked the teacher about that on the phone and she told me that their homework was completely planned out for the entire year. They received the homework sheets on Monday morning before school started and put them into the baggies.

This, my friends, is what No Child Left Behind has given us.

Now really, I don’t hate this woman. Actually, I think she could be a pretty good teacher if she’d make things a bit clearer to the kids regarding how she expects them to act in class, who exactly she is in terms of “teacher” or “friend”, and kept her personal opinions to herself as to whether a child is “hyper” or not (unless she gets a Master’s in psychology and a nice royalty check from Pfizer). Yes, I do call her a bitch for putting it into my son’s brain that he is “hyper”. See, now he thinks there is something “wrong” with him. He’s repeated the fact that he’s hyper several times since I took him out of school, so obviously she said it to him more than just one time - or she made a very big deal out of it the one time she did say it. It’s planted in there pretty good. For that, yes, she is a bitch - but it’s not a “the way she schooled him” thing, it’s a “the way she personally interacted with him” thing. And it’s one of the things I’ll be focusing on as I help Brendon decompress from school… convincing him that he is not hyper, that he’s just a normal boy, with normal boy energy and the need to… well, just jump on things, pull them apart to see how they work, break bones, need stitches, and generally give their elders early gray hair.

But in all seriousness, I feel really sorry for this woman.
No one becomes a teacher unless they *really* want to be one. You know going into this that it’s going to be long, hard days with rowdy, sometimes misbehaving kids. You know your salary is going to be pathetic compared to people in other careers with the same amount of schooling and experience. You know you’ll be having to put up with parents who won’t hear anything other than their child is a supernatural prodigy, an angel in the classroom, and who simply must have an IQ level that puts Einstein’s to shame. You just don’t go into this career unless you really feel a calling to do it.

Now imagine that you’ve been a teacher for a long time. You’ve seen kids come and go. You’ve refined your methods, learned the best way to deal with “problem” kids, and found ways to teach the material to the children in a way that they’ll really enjoy it and soak it in. You revel in your job. You live for those moments when you see a light bulb go off in a child’s mind and it suddenly “clicks”. You’re creative, you’re spontaneous, you love to help the children learn… you’re a good teacher.

Now imagine that the school suddenly gets an edict that if their kids don’t perform to this arbitrary level, they won’t get funding from the federal government and could possibly be shut down. To address this impending deadline of funding cutoff, the school district closely studies these standardized tests that will be used to determine whether you get funding or not, and the decision is made to spend the entire year making absolutely sure that everything on that test is covered.
So much so, that the school plans out your entire year for you, down to exactly what you’ll be teaching each day, and what homework you’ll be giving out.

Screw your creative spontaneity. Screw your ability to breeze ahead if the whole class is “getting it” and ready to move on. Screw your power to slow down and more thoroughly cover a subject if the class doesn’t seem to be “getting it” or is just *really* interested in the topic and wants to learn more.
Screw the little art center you’ve got in the corner for kids to amuse themselves with when they’re done with their work… that’s gone, out the door, being replaced by a “math center” that will drill the students on calculations that will be on the test.
Screw the fun activities you used to do where the kids would make something for the holiday while blending a little bit of history, reading, or math into it; and they’d have a good time, learn, and have something to proudly show Mommy and Daddy… there’s no room for that in the schedule the school has handed you.

This is what you will teach on Day 25. This is what you will teach on day 26. This will be the homework you will give to your students this week.
Don’t bother making a lesson plan… we’ve got it all planned out for you.

And god forbid you don’t keep up. After all, we’ve got a test to take, and we’re damn sure not going to fail that test. If your students fail that test, it’s your job. So keep up… or else.

I mean, think about it. It must be absolute, utter, complete hell.
Especially when you see a child that really needs some more time with something, or when a couple of your kids really shine and blow through everything you give them. You’re really, honestly supposed to just turn your back on these kids and say “too damn bad”? “Sorry, can’t help you”?

I used to be a supporter of NCLB. Given the state of our schools in general, I felt that holding them accountable was a good thing. I would spend quite a bit of time on different email lists arguing that this was going to make things better in our schools.

Man oh man, was I wrong. And I’ll say it loud and clear for anyone out there who I might have debated against… I am SORRY. I was horribly, horribly wrong. Because I was homeschooling at the time, I just didn’t *see* the real effect this would have. Now I’ve seen it, firsthand.

Not just with my own boys, either. There are more and more parents and grandparents joining our local and state homeschooling lists, and there are just too many of them saying the same thing for it to be made-up or mere coincidence… their child was literally pushed out of school because she/he couldn’t keep up.
These parents were warned that their children needed to keep up. The parents were advised to purchase tutors or take their children to after-school learning centers. The parents were told about the IEP program, told to subject their children to school psychologists… and eventually, the parents were told there was no place for their child at the school.

These parents are still joining the lists, terrified. They never saw themselves homeschooling, and don’t know the first thing about it. They can’t afford tutors, they can’t afford private school. Homeschooling is now their only choice. Unlike those of us who *choose* to homeschool and read up on the subject, agonize (or in some cases, revel) over the decision of what’s best for our child, and take as much time as we need to prepare; these parents are suddenly and unexpectedly being thrust into homeschooling - which, they’ve been told all of their lives by teachers and the media, is BAD. Homeschooling is bad, bad, BAD. Homeschooled kids are shut-ins. They’re unsocialized. They’re just plain weird and can’t integrate into society. Look at all of the weirdos that end up killing their kids and were homeschoolers. Homeschooling is BAD.
Oh, umm, sorry… even though it’s bad, guess you’re gonna have to do it… because we have no room for your child here. Buh-bye now! Have fun! That’s one less negative mark on our test scores!

So the kids are losing out in more ways than one.
The teachers, honestly, have no room to really *teach*. They’re just drilling facts and cramming for the test. So much for even having the chance to enjoy learning just for the love of learning.

The ones that can’t keep up or who don’t “click” on a subject in time get pushed out of the school so that his/her test scores don’t lower the school’s average; and now the unprepared parent has no choice but to jump feet-first into homeschooling.

Don’t get me wrong, I wish all kids were homeschooled, but I am not so naive as to think that every parent is capable of doing it. Not that they aren’t smart enough to help guide their kids through subjects and learn right alongside of them - every parent is smart enough to do that. But some parents just don’t have the time; economy standards being what they are and the need for two (or more) incomes just to keep a roof over the family’s head. Some parents, sadly, are more interested in the corporate ladder than the task of raising their children. Some parents just don’t have the patience (and this is no slight to them, my hubby is one of them) to sit down and work through something with a kid who doesn’t “get it” on the first try. Sure, they can learn, but it’ll be rough going for the first few years, and hell for both them and the child. Then there are the parents who are absolutely certain that only religious fanatics or hippie tree-hugging, pot-smoking weirdos homeschool, and they’re absolutely terrified about it to the point of sheer panic because all they’ve ever heard is negative press. Panic is not a good place to start from when you’re trying to convince a child, and yourself, that you’ll get through this and everything’s going to be okay.

Now these folks from all walks of life are pouring into the homeschooling community.
It’s both good and bad. Good, because once they get there they usually realize pretty quickly that what the media has told them is utter bollocks, and/or that it’s definitely not going to be as hard as they think and will probably end up being the best thing that ever happened to them.
But it’s also bad because these kids and their parents aren’t prepared and will most definitely spend the first year (or more) going through a very rough time trying to readjust or find a method that works for them, and that in itself is going to build up walls, tear the family up, and generally give them a pretty good reason to hate learning all together.

Then there are the kids who really *need* some sort of professional help; perhaps with a severe learning disability. I’ve seen a lot of parents on the homeschooling lists whose children have severe disabilities and they’ve learned to adjust their methods so that it’s not even an issue, or so that the child is steadily making progress… but sometimes there are kids who need outer help. These kids being pushed out of the schools are given a lip-service IEP that is supposed to still help them even though they’re at home. For example, one mother’s child had a speech impediment. The school’s IEP gave that child a 15-minute time slot every two weeks with a school district speech therapist. I’m not kidding… half an hour a MONTH. That’s what our tax dollars are getting these kids who are getting pushed out of the schools. Luckily the mom was able to learn from other homeschooling moms who’d been in the same situation, and developed her own methods of helping her child. What will happen to the parents who don’t? Or to those who turn to a “charter school” and don’t get the benefit of a strong homeschooling community and the experienced homeschoolers who can help them and their kids with suggestions and alternative methods? These parents, and kids, are going to lose out.

Not only that, but there are a lot of teachers joining our homeschooling lists now, too. Teachers who have simply given up fighting the system and quit their jobs. Teachers who used to truly love teaching, and now just can’t stand to be locked into this “teach to the test” mentality. They’ve quit their jobs, pulled their kids out of this crazy institutionalization, and are embracing homeschooling.
These are good teachers that the public school kids are losing. Sure, the teachers’ own children are really winning in the situation, and for that we can give a big cheer. But how long before all of the teachers who really *love* teaching are pushed out of the system, and the kids are just left with people who are only there to handout the schedules and collect their checks? What’s *that* going to do for the kids of this country as a whole?

I’ve always advocated taking the federal government out of the schools and giving that power back to the States, where it belongs. Now, more than ever, I am hoping against hope that this will happen, that the overall reaction to the NCLB and all of the wronged parents, kids, and teachers really can get their voices heard in Congress.

NCLB is bad. It’s intentions were good, but as we all know, the road to Hell is paved with good intentions.

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Well, he didn’t actually go anywhere… except for public school.
Now he’s home with Kelsey.
I guess after you’ve watched your big brother getting homeschooled, and been homeschooled yourself, public school just seems to be too much of a chore.

Actually, it was more than that.
Brendon was happy at first. He was even happy after Kelsey left, and he wanted to stay (against my wishes). But day by day, he grew less enchanted with school.

First, it was all of the homework. Seriously, this kid had a LOT of homework. For a first grader, anything more than an hour of homework an evening was too much… and he had too much.
Secondly, there’s the fact that his teacher can’t even spell homework. I’m not kidding. She actually wrote “homewerk” on one of his papers.
Third, there was the smiling, happy, normally cheerful face of my little boy giving me a hug and kiss in the morning before he went to the bus stop, turning every ten feet or so to blow me a kiss… and then the sullen, angry, confused boy who would come home in his place not wanting anyone to touch him or talk to him, and he just wanted to be alone.
Fourth was the teacher’s disciplinary measures (and I say that *very* loosely) - but more on that later.
The final straw was when he told us all in a huff one evening “I can’t help it! I’m just HYPER!!”
*blink blink* Huh? Where in the world did he learn that? We’ve certainly never used that word around him. To us, he’s just a normal, active, 6yo boy. Well, come to find out, his teacher has been telling him that.
(Friggin Bitch.)
Excuse me, a little tongue slip there. Not.

Finally, he just started to *not* want to go to school. He said all the kids hated him, they lied about him. His teacher would do things like give him a lollipop as a reward for remembering to bring in his homework on Friday… and then sometime during the day, she would take it away from him and he wouldn’t know why.

You see, this teacher does not have a clear set of rules and consequences for breaking those rules in her classrooom. No, what she has is a “good choices” book and a “bad choices” book. If you make a “good” choice, you get put in the good choices book. If you make a “bad” choice, you get put in the bad choices book and the entire class is made aware of it and you get lovely little activities like eating by yourself or working through lunch… or apparently, getting your lollipop (that has no connection whatsoever to what you did, and is a reward for something completely different) taken away.
So what is a “good choice” and what is a “bad choice”?
Your guess is as good as mine.
They’re not written down anywhere. They’re not explained to the kids. There’s no list on the board or on a cute bulletin board giving examples of good choices or bad choices. Nope. There’s just this fuzzy feel-good pseudo-disciplinary uncertain cloud hanging over everyone’s head that at any given moment in time, the teacher might decide that they just made a bad choice and get them ridiculed.

Does this sound like the kind of clear boundaries we need to be giving to active 6-year-olds?
I didn’t think so, either.

Speaking of other unclear boundaries; she called everyone “my friend”. She was not the teacher, she was their “friend”. Now, to a 6-year-old, Barney is their friend. The kid down the street is their friend. The freaking cat is their friend.
And who, exactly, is a friend in terms of authoritativeness? NOBODY.
Your friend doesn’t tell you what to do. You don’t have to listen to your friend. Matter of fact, your parent keeps telling you to listen to your teacher and do what the teacher tells you to do… but this woman keeps insisting that she’s just your friend.
And she expects small kids to respond to this as if she’s an authoritative figure? Puhlease.

There’s also the parent-teacher conference that she scheduled with me last Monday (the 27th). She called me and told me that we needed to discuss Brendon’s behavior in the classroom. That he was consistently making “bad choices” and we needed a parent-teacher conference with Brendon there. (Umm, wouldn’t that be a parent-teacher-child conference? I digress.) She was very insistent that I have Brendon there so that the three of us could discuss his behavior.

It was that night, after Cub Scouts, when Brendon informed us that he was hyper.
That’s when the light bulb went off and it clicked.
That bitch had told my son that he was hyper, and then called me to set up a conference to guilt him into behaving, because obviously her “methods” weren’t working.
Mike and I discussed it… and we both figure she would have mentioned Ritalin during this little conference. Unbeknownst to her, at the risk of her own health. I very clearly envision the day that someone sits across from me at a desk and suggests to me that I consider putting one of my normal, active, typical boys on Ritalin… and I very clearly envision myself launching across the desk to choke the living shit out of them.

Now, let’s get this straight, just to make sure you’ve got the whole picture.
Brendon reads on a 4th-grade level, according to multiple tests I’ve done with him online. This teacher gave him her own assessment the first week of class, and concluded that he was reading on a 3rd-grade level. Fair enough, no biggee. After all, he’s six. He’ll enjoy pretty much anything as long as it isn’t “The fat cat sat on the mat”.

A week or two into school, the first homework sheet comes home. It’s a gallon-size plastic ziplock baggie, and inside of it are two sheets of paper, and two “readers”. These “readers” are glossy little mini-books (6-12 pages or so) that we are supposed to read with our children every night for the entire week. (Can anyone say “Five In A Row”, but without the great storybooks?) One sheet of paper was for us (the parents) to sign each night certifying that yes, we had read the readers together. The other sheet of paper was the homework for the entire week. You did it at home, then brought it in to school on Friday in the baggie.

So I take out these readers - Brendon is very excited to have these little books - and take a look at them.
Guess what?
Yep… the fat cat sat on the mat.
Mark that down as Brendon’s first disappointment. Seriously now, this child was reading stories like “The Night of the Moonjellies” to his little brother before school started, and when he was bored while riding around with Mom and I hitting the yard sales, he’d pick up her latest Dean Koontz novel in the back seat and read it to us. Then suddenly, he goes to school, all excited… and he gets hit with “the fat cat sat on the mat”.

Alright, so maybe that wasn’t so bad. After all, it would take us a whole five minutes to read both of these books, and then we could pull down a book we really liked and read it instead.
I turned to the homework sheet.
“This week, we will be studying the letters Aa, Bb, Cc, Dd, Ee, Gg, Hh in class. Please practice helping your children make the sounds of these letters at home. Please have your child write each letter (in both upper and lower-case) five times each.”
Now we definitely had a problem. Brendon was WELL past the point where he had to learn the sounds the letters made. And no, I did *not* make a typo above… the homework sheet really did skip the letter “Ff”.

So I call up the teacher, and we have a nice little chat about Brendon’s reading level and what she could possibly do to challenge him a bit more. She admitted to giving him her own assessment and that she found him to be on a 3rd-grade reading level. She said that she could send home readers for him that were more on his level. I specifically asked about classroom time… what could Brendon do while the other kids were saying “M says mmmmmmmmmmm”? She said that she could try to give him some busy work, or have him practice his writing.

Well, I was pretty okay with this. I figured he would still probably get bored with all of his classmates learning their letter sounds; but at least she had a plan to give him something to do. And let’s face it, his writing is messy. He’s 6. As I didn’t pressure the boys to write daily previously, I figured he could use the practice.

So the following week she keeps her word and sends home readers that say “Grade Level 3″ on the back. They’re boring and repetitive, but at least they’ve got black and white pictures.
The classroom situation, however, obviously wasn’t working.
Time after time Brendon would come home frustrated and angry because he’d made a “bad choice”. Maybe one time out of five he would know what that “bad choice” was; all of the other times he was completely clueless (hence the anger and frustration).
If you asked me to make a bet on what the problem was, I’d put all of my money on Brendon being bored out of his skull listening to his classmates practice their letter sounds, and he was simply trying to entertain himself.

After all, that’s what kept getting me in trouble in elementary school. *grin*
At least, as far as I know anyway, he didn’t go as far as I did. I would sing to myself, start talking to the kids next to me, I would even just get up and leave the classroom and head for the library to find something interesting to read. My poor teacher had many conferences with my parents and although she loved me to death, she admitted she just couldn’t keep me challenged. She suggested moving me up a grade, but my Dad wouldn’t do it. He’d been moved up a grade or two in school and it had been hell for him; he didn’t want me to go through the same thing. So I kept getting in trouble and kept frustrating my teacher. But at least back then, we didn’t have ADHD… I was simply labelled as bored and unchallenged.

She never once said I was “hyper”. Actually, people didn’t use that word in conjunction with active children until Ritalin was created, and ADD/ADHD was dreamed up to give people a reason to buy Ritalin. But anyhooooo…

Obviously, Brendon was bored, and his attempt at solving this problem was disrupting the class. Fair enough.
But to tell him that he is hyper, and then the same afternoon call me up requesting a conference? Uh-uh.

The next morning Brendon’s alarm never went off. He woke up (fully rested, for once) half an hour after the bus had already left, and I informed him he wouldn’t be going back to school.
Boy, you should’ve seen the hug I got and the smile he was sporting the rest of the day.

Oh, by the way… that parent teacher conference was scheduled to happen this coming Tuesday, the 5th. Guess I won’t be needing to attend that after all.

What do you think? I wanna know! Please leave a comment :)
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