Who's Seen "Waiting for Superman?"

[sparklynails23]

And what did you think of it? I thought it pointed out some problems, but the solutions it talked about were far too simplistic, even as starting points. It also put too much blame on the teacher's union and not enough on the parents.

The one issue they were discussing on The Talk today was about the evils of putting kids with different abilities on different tracks. Why is it so bad to give student who have the innate ability to excel the opportunity to excel? Why should they have to take classes with kids who can't keep up with their pace of learning. Won't that just result in most kids acheiving at the same dumbed-down level? I think tracks are good.

 

[mamacatnv]

I have not seen the movie, although I have seen it referenced here.

I am totally against mainstreaming/inclusion when it comes to the classroom. Group kids by their abilities and teach them to reach the highest they can. Accept that not all will be able to keep up and group them accordingly.

I get really annoyed with all the dogooding bleeding hearts who don't want anyone treated differently than anyone else. The bottom line is not all children are the same. Some are low, some are high and some are in the middle. Some kids have behavioral issues, some have learning issues and some are mentally ******** and will never be able to keep up with their age peers. Why we insist on treating them all equal is beyond me. I don't see how any child benefits from the current system of raising/lowering them all to the same bar. We are getting our butts kicked on a global scale when it comes to educating our children.

I am not a fan of the teachers unions but I think the bigger issue is with administration and societies expectations not teachers in general.

 

[shortbun]

Here's the deal, when a school presents the upgrade to all children, most children learn more. My son went to an elementary where they had a full time G/T teacher and she was fabulous! She spent all day in whole classrooms instead of pulling the identified students out of those classrooms. End result? That little school scored highest on all tests(I hate tests-another thread) and they had fun doing it! No stressed out teachers struggling with lower ability children, no stressed out kids being coached on how to take the test over and over again. No letters home about kids getting rest, eating well and so forth. These kids and their parents loved their school and it was because the principal, the teachers, the G/T teacher collaborated and gave those kids a wonderful education.
Fade to high school. Of 49 students in my son's class, 24 of them are going to the magnate high school that has an IB cirriculum. It's a lottery school and the standarrd at that school is the same academically as the other high schools AP courses. I hate that there is only one of these high schools in our district but it's interesting that almost half my sons elementary class is there from that one elementary-there are 22 elementaries and only 200 in each freshman class at this high school. the senior class is under 150. No one gets in after sophmore year. There are over a thousand applications to each freshman class-only 200 get in. Children are starving for a good education. Every school should be able to provide that. All teachers should be able to provide a boosted academic program. This should start in kindergarten. My husband JUST graduated with a masters in education. He had so few real teaching classes it's disgusting. There was all this theory and no real world classes. Teaching doesn't pay enough to attract those people who could really enrich our student's lives because they are intuitive, intelligent and caring people BUT they have to be able to feed their families and pay their mortgage. My husband is moving into a second career. He owns a business and has people who work for him. He's always wanted to teach. He became so aware as he watched our son go through school that there was a need for teachers that he began taking classes for another degree, one in education. He just did his student teaching in language arts and science at an elementary school. He wants to teach middle school-I am trying to talk him out of it, lol-he says that's where he's needed most. When he teaches, he wants to give enrichment to everyone. I'm going to help him do it, behind the scenes. Our kids deserve people who WANT to teach. The union thing does not matter-one can be in a union and do a great job with the students. Schools would have to rob, cheat and backstab their teachers to make ends meet without unions-I've worked for a school district. We need a new way to fund education and unfortunately, there are teacher who need to go away-a lot of them. Do you realize that when a teacher gets tired of teaching, many of them become guidance counselors or principals? It's ridiculous that this is allowed. I've seen some really burnt out teachers; I drove a school bus for eight years and teachers talk...kids talk too. Every morning my kindergartners and first graders took turns 'reading' to each other on the bus. the second graders were assigned as tutors to help them with words they didn't know. The third and fourth graders did their homework IF it wasn't done and the 5th graders were their tutors or sat quietly in the back of the bus. My last words every day to all my kids was 'do your best!' Sometimes the highschoolers would practice foreign languages or help each other with math. They would help each other edit too. My buses were calm. When a child got on the bus and was having a bad day, they sat behind me. The kids got so they would get on and say, "Ms. R, I need to sit with you today.' They trusted me. Once, even the high school boys came up and sat behind me because I 'invited' one of them and his friends wanted to come too. It was immediately a good day on that bus!
Kids need grownups they trust and grownups who will give them the respect they want and have earned. Somewhere on this board there is a guy who would tell me I am really 'sexy' for having such a long post. lol! I'm passionate about this, can you tell?
I've got seven 15yo boys in my back yard shooting hoops right now; it's the last day of school. I'm going to take them some lemonade and ask about their finals.

Yeah, I've seen the documentary and I've got the book.

 

[DWGal210]

I watched it & wasn't surprised but it still made me sad.

There are many many factors at play. Too many to get into here. But as someone who doesn't even have kids yet - it's SCARY. If the education system is the same when I have kids, I'll most likely homeschool.

What I don't understand is the negative response of some to have charter schools, performance arts schools, etc. I don't get why some are so hesitant to make changes - it's broke & needs fixing. That much is clear. I don't have the answers but it's disheartening that some in the fed & state level aren't making positive changes. It's just a blame game & no action.

 

[mamacatnv]

I watched it & wasn't surprised but it still made me sad.

There are many many factors at play. Too many to get into here. But as someone who doesn't even have kids yet - it's SCARY. If the education system is the same when I have kids, I'll most likely homeschool.

What I don't understand is the negative response of some to have charter schools, performance arts schools, etc. I don't get why some are so hesitant to make changes - it's broke & needs fixing. That much is clear. I don't have the answers but it's disheartening that some in the fed & state level aren't making positive changes. It's just a blame game & no action.

Interesting you say this. My Aunt is a retired educator - she taught Elem and art for 35 years in a District south of me, same state, different district.
I have my DD in a Charter School that has K-5 and 6-12. The Elementary school is only 1 of 2 in our entire district which has approx 55K or so students to achieve "high achieving status" and the middle highschool is the only one out of 12 high schools and I'm not sure how many middle to also achieve the "high achieving status"

My Auntie goes on and on about how the state doesn't like charters, how they won't fund anymore (true) etc. etc. Now, I know that many Charters started with kids/parents that were not doing well in traditional settings and thus have become cesspools of poorly behaved and poorly performing students. Ours was started by people who wanted to offer brite kids more, who wanted to give average and above average kids a chance to excel.

My DD's school does not deal with behavior issues or with kids who don't want to be there. They encourage the kids to excel, to compete against each other etc. I have been called an elitist by a few on this board because I have my kid there. I have been told that my "Princess will not learn tolerance" etc..... Granted, I know that this skews the statistics but I'm okay with that. My DD is just finishing 6th grade and is so far ahead of her peers at our neighborhood public school that we will most likely never return her to the local schools.

I honestly think that some of the adversion to the charters/performing arts etc are jealousy. Some from those whose kids can't cut it, some because while their kids classroom does not have pencils the arts school has stuff that many do not consider to be necessities. I know they have a valid argument to some degree, but I don't know completely what the answer is.
I do know that the bureaucratic BS that goes on plays into it.

Example, at my DD's school when we want a field trip, we (parents) drive the kids. When the pipes burst this winter due to freezing, several parents jumped in to help and repair the problem, when the parking lot is full of snow/ice its us parents out shoveling/plowing etc.
Our school may not have state of the art facilities and the lockers might not match but we do have state of the art technology, small class sizes and kids/parents/educators that all want to be there with the common goal of learning, expanding their horizons and encouraging them to be all they can truly be.