Wednesday, January 17, 2007
Letter From A Parent
Dear Guidance Guy,
I am a single mother of 3 children. I have a 17-year old daughter, and 13-year old twin boys. I have always had issues with some of the teachers and the way the school does some things. Most of these issues are pretty common I am sure. My latest one is, one of my sons was angry with one of his teachers. Rather than disrespect the teacher or lose his temper, he wrote his feelings down in his notebook. I have instructed him to write his feelings when he is angry rather than do it verbally, when in that kind of stiuation. Anyway, the teacher found this and they suspended him from school for 3 days, out of school.
Now what written was, "Ms. *****, You are an under educated, over paid imbecile."
To me that is pretty innocent. There are so many ways this could have been dealt with. I think this punishment is way too harsh. This seems ridiculous. But I truly feel like they are picking on my boys. I feel like they look for things and create things to to make it hard on them. I have taught my kids to respect authority. I have told them to stand up for what is right. But most of the time, I just tell them to ignore things and just do what you have to do. I am not one for complaining or calling the school.
But I am getting to the point where I really feel like something is wrong here. I would just like to know your thoughts on this.
Thank you,
Rhonda Freeman
*** *** ***
Dear Ms. Freeman,
Interesting situation! A lot of it depends on where the letter was when it was found. If it was held privately in his notebook, and not seen by anyone else, then I would agree the teacher/school is definitely overreacting. Kids do have their thoughts, and some of them need to get them out of their system before they explode! But it does seem kind of unlikely the teacher dug into his private papers to find the note.
If this was given to the teacher, or shared publicly with other kids, then it's another story. If this "memo" went public it would be difficult for the teacher not to take some action. Her respect among the students is being challenged and she has to answer it. The punishment does seem kind of harsh for the note he wrote. I wonder if there's a history between the two of them that involved some other kind of misbehavior. Hard to tell, but I think some detention and a letter of apology would have been appropriate.
I like your advice to your kids. Hopefully your son will see past his anger and take what you teach him seriously.
Thanks for an interesting letter,
The Guidance Guy
I am a single mother of 3 children. I have a 17-year old daughter, and 13-year old twin boys. I have always had issues with some of the teachers and the way the school does some things. Most of these issues are pretty common I am sure. My latest one is, one of my sons was angry with one of his teachers. Rather than disrespect the teacher or lose his temper, he wrote his feelings down in his notebook. I have instructed him to write his feelings when he is angry rather than do it verbally, when in that kind of stiuation. Anyway, the teacher found this and they suspended him from school for 3 days, out of school.
Now what written was, "Ms. *****, You are an under educated, over paid imbecile."
To me that is pretty innocent. There are so many ways this could have been dealt with. I think this punishment is way too harsh. This seems ridiculous. But I truly feel like they are picking on my boys. I feel like they look for things and create things to to make it hard on them. I have taught my kids to respect authority. I have told them to stand up for what is right. But most of the time, I just tell them to ignore things and just do what you have to do. I am not one for complaining or calling the school.
But I am getting to the point where I really feel like something is wrong here. I would just like to know your thoughts on this.
Thank you,
Rhonda Freeman
*** *** ***
Dear Ms. Freeman,
Interesting situation! A lot of it depends on where the letter was when it was found. If it was held privately in his notebook, and not seen by anyone else, then I would agree the teacher/school is definitely overreacting. Kids do have their thoughts, and some of them need to get them out of their system before they explode! But it does seem kind of unlikely the teacher dug into his private papers to find the note.
If this was given to the teacher, or shared publicly with other kids, then it's another story. If this "memo" went public it would be difficult for the teacher not to take some action. Her respect among the students is being challenged and she has to answer it. The punishment does seem kind of harsh for the note he wrote. I wonder if there's a history between the two of them that involved some other kind of misbehavior. Hard to tell, but I think some detention and a letter of apology would have been appropriate.
I like your advice to your kids. Hopefully your son will see past his anger and take what you teach him seriously.
Thanks for an interesting letter,
The Guidance Guy
# posted by Larry Hochman : 1:28 PM
