Family Matters

Posts Tagged ‘K-12 Education’

In the past, people thought that teens’ behavior during the teenage years was directly connected to physical changes they start to experience at the age of 12, which makes them feel strange with their body changes and confuses them. Today, the approach is that adolescence is a more gradual process that starts with the first time children want to try doing things on their own, sometime as early as the age of 3.

If teenagers seem confused to you, it is mainly because they have reached a point in their life when they need to define who they are, what they think, what they like or hate, what their beliefs are and what they wants to be later on in life. These thoughts are tough. I know many adults who have not reached that self-definition yet, so this is not easy for a 12-year-old to do, although they are expected to have some clue about it.

Around the age of 10, beliefs that were part of children’s identity are shattered and they need to put the pieces together to survive emotionally. Kids with high emotional intelligence can do that, but most cannot, so they have to ask for help from those who unintentionally create the problem – their parents or their teachers.

This series will give you a sneak peek into teens’ confused brain and help you understand why it is so hard do be a teenager. I still remember my adolescence, I am raising my second teen, the third one is reaching puberty soon and I have worked with lots of teenagers in the last 25 years, so this list is quite reliable.

This week, I had the opportunity to discuss school horrors with 3 of my clients. One of them was a 45-year-old man who could not handle school because he had to “toughen up” at the age of 4 when his father left home. Another one was a 13-year-old girl who was about to start 8th Grade with a 3rd Grade reading abilities and was convinced she was stupid. The third one was a 48-year-old woman who was told all her life she was stupid, never succeeded in her schooling and thought it was an obstacle to finding a job. All three of them described school as a period of horror when they were scared to be there and when teaching was about pumping information without considering their life’s circumstances – teaching out of context.

During coaching, I usually share some of my personal experience with my clients, so it was very natural for me to share one of my horror stories from school. Unfortunately, I have had too many. When I tell them, I re-live them in my mind and have clear memories of them. I remember the names, the places, the settings and the feelings I have had. I shared these stories because I wanted my clients to consider that in spite the horrors of our childhood, we can all make it. In spite of our parents not protecting us, we can make it. In spite of our teachers not teaching us with the right context in mind, we can be very successful. And happy.

All of them just looked at me quietly for a while. One of them started crying (and it was not the 13-year-old). Another one said, “Ronit, you are making this up”. The third one said, “It’s impossible! You look like you’ve been successful all your life”. Then, all of them left their sessions believing they can make it too.

Gal said I should write it down so more people will be inspired, more parents will be involved in their kids’ schooling and more teachers will teach within their students’ context, so here I am sharing with you my first horror story from school.

As a parent, a life coach, a business consultant and a former corporate employee and manager, I have become increasingly concerned about morals. Until recently, I read or heard about people doing things that seem obviously wrong to do, and wondered how they could bring themselves to do them.

Now, I believe I know some of the reasons. Better yet, perhaps these reasons can lead us all towards a solution.

Almost invariably, you turn on the news or read the papers and find out about somebody who was caught scheming, embezzling or downright cheating. These people seem to have no regard for other people’s wellbeing, possessions or money. Sometimes, people are killed over what seems like a minor conflict, because the killer values something else – their wallet, their leather jacket or their girlfriend – over their life.

In response to Ronit’s posts on bullying, many readers have shared stories of workplace bullies who abuse their position, physical size or some weakness of their co-workers in ways that hurt them and ruins morale and productivity. Do these people follow a different value system to the rest of us? Given the rise of bullying, probably not.

So what is going on in the world? Has everybody gone mad? Is there nobody who still does the right things?

In his great book, Predictably Irrational, Dan Ariely presents a conflict between two modes of living: the “social norm” and the “market norm”.

Most of the new information kids receive at school comes from reading. Even if that information is on the computer, they still need to read it. So if there is something you need to do well as a parent, it is to make sure your kids read well, that they understand what they read and that they read in order to find and use information.

Kids are not born with reading skills, but they still need them to build their knowledge and understanding. We develop these skills in them by reading for fun or by reading to get information.

Although I believe that reading for fun is very important and can help increase your vocabulary and understanding, I think it is limited, because kids cannot check on their own if they understood the stories or not. Many books have layers of understanding and the young reader cannot tell which layer he or she is reading at and what they might be missing.

School is pretty much the only place where we can check kids’ understanding and help them develop their reading skills and teachers are qualified to tell which level of reading and which reading skill is expected at each age, but as a parent, there are things you can teach your kids at home that will help them greatly with their reading development.

I am not a great fan of playing computer games, because I believe it takes children away from social interaction and from creativity. I must admit that when I was a student, I worked at the Special Education Library designing similar card games and board games and dreaming of creating something like a computer game to make things easy for me.

Computer games are not a dirty word if they support the development of the player. When a child plays a puzzle on the table, their cognitive skills are stretched as much as when they play a puzzle on the computer.

I remember preparing hundreds of pages that ask the kids to circle the “odd one out”. Now, they can play many computer games that are way more colorful and varied that reuse the same “cards” for the children to choose from. I was limited by the number of stamps and my drawing ability and used lots of paper to allow each child to have enough pages to experience and learn. Now, any simple computer game can give the kids endless opportunities to find the odd one out, with great graphics, sounds and animation.

When we moved to Australia, I was shocked to discover that many people were sick. At school, it was hard to find a day when all kids were there. At Gal’s work, out of 7 people working in the office, 2 or 3 were missing every day, because they were sick.

At first, I thought Australians were just sick more often than others in the world, but after a short time, I came to the conclusion they were taking a day off when they were tired, sneezed too much, had some errands to run or just needed a day off.

As a parent, that freaked me out. I could take myself one or two years into the future and imagine my own children substitute “Mom, I want some time off” with “Mom, I’m sick”. I believe that if you say you are sick enough times, you will convince your body that you are and then you will actually feel sick. Gal and I put a lot of effort and thinking into raising healthy kids and the thought of them being “sick” every time they needed to rest made me feel sick ;P

I fully understand that people need some a break from time to time and the regular days off on weekends and public holidays are good, but they do not always come at the right time or provide enough relief. It makes sense to me that kids do not plan to need time off exactly on those days, so it is just natural that they want time off on a school day.

The problem with “being sick” is that you cannot really enjoy the day and rejuvenate, which defeats the purpose of taking a day off. Taking these needs into consideration, I came up with a solution that has been working for me for over 12 years.

If you have a school-aged child, even in Prep (or whatever you call the year before First Grade), you probably already know all about Literacy and Numeracy. Education systems seem to be so focused on teaching kids to read, write and work with numbers they cut Music classes, Art teaching positions and other “non-essential” subjects and put enormous pressure on children with standardized literacy and numeracy tests.

In Australia, there is now something called NAPLAN – National Assessment Program for Literacy and Numeracy, officially described like this: “Every year, all students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9 are assessed on the same days using national tests in Reading, Writing, Language Conventions (Spelling, Grammar and Punctuation) and Numeracy”.

This means that absolutely NOTHING else matters to most of the teachers and parents of students in Years 3, 5, 7 and 9. After having quite a bit of fun in Prep and Years 1 and 2, the poor kids in Year 3 are taught things by the book, tested every week, deprived of play time, music, art, sport and extracurricular activities and subjected to constant pressure to perform. State Education ministers go nuts from it, so Department of Education executives go nuts from it, so principals go nuts from it, so teachers go nuts from it, so students go nuts from it.

The same thing happens all over again 2, 4 and 6 years later.

And that is really bad.

Because learning should be fun and because all that stress actually blocks learning.

From time to time, 10-year-old Noff makes me so proud I just have to write about it. This girl inspires me so much I want other parents and kids to be inspired too. To me, these are the things that make the world a better place. This time, Noff showed how to be a good friend.

Noff’s school has a special unit for children with various disabilities. These kids spend much of their time in “normal” classrooms and go to the special unit for additional support, specific exercise and maybe a little bit to get out of classroom competition.

At the same time, the school includes these special students in every extracurricular activity – choirs, school plays, instrumentals bands and even dance troupes. We are amazed and moved to tears watching the little brave souls get up on stage with walking frames or in electric wheelchairs during concerts and performances and pour their heart out, their faces beaming with joy.

Some time ago, I picked Noff up from school and she said that one of the special education teachers had approached her and a few other girls for a secret mission. She said, “She wanted us to help one of the girls without telling anyone about it. She said the girl needed someone to help her get from the special unit to class and back and someone else to protect her in the playground from bullies”.

“Wow”, I said, “Are you proud she picked you?”

“Yeah!” she beamed at me, “And straight away, I asked her if it was Kelly [not her real name] and she looked surprised, but I know it’s hard for her to walk all the way to the special unit and back with all her stuff and I know some kids are picking on her”.

Matt was a troublemaker. He disturbed the class, made lots of noises and fought with the other kids in class. It was unbearable. His teacher tried different methods to stop this behavior, but nothing helped, so he invited Matt’s presents for a talk.

Matt’s parents came to see the teacher and he told them about his failed attempts to calm him down and keep the order in class.

“I’ve tried everything I could and exhausted my options”, said the teacher and asked Matt’s parents about his behavior at home.

Matt’s dad said, “We’ve tried everything ourselves. We punish him, we bribe him, but nothing helps”.

“Have you tried diagnosing him?” asked the teacher.

“I don’t believe in diagnosing. It won’t help. It’s not practical,” said Matt’s mom.

“Well, how about giving him Ritalin?” suggested the teacher, “It will calm him down”.

“Where do we get Ritalin?” Matt’s dad asked.

“Oh, don’t worry, I’ll arrange this for you. Matt will take one tablet every day before he comes to school and everything will be OK”, said the teacher.

“Well, that won’t work”, said Matt’s mom, “Our mornings are very hectic. My husband leaves home early and I rush the kids to school. Who’s going to make sure he takes his tablet?”

“OK, then I can help you with this”, said the teacher, “I will give him the tablet myself when he gets to school”.

Today, my son Tsoof had his graduation ceremony and finished Year 12. Wow, it was fast! It did not only feel fast, but it was, because he only celebrated his 16th birthday last month.

In the past three weeks, he has had many awards night, celebrations, final concerts and farewell parties. During those events, Tsoof received many awards for excellence, for leadership, for showmanship, for his contribution to his school, his friends and his community and we felt honored and blessed for his talents, his kindness and his love for what he does.

You seen this in the movies: the parent of the star performing on stage is sits in the crowd, looks around and tells everyone that sits next to them in excitement, “This is my son” Well, this is how we felt at every event. Tsoof is so talented and so famous we introduce ourselves as “Tsoof’s mom/dad/sister” and we were very proud.

At the end-of-year Performing Arts evening, as the winner of the prestigious title “Performing Artist of the Year”, Tsoof opened the night and said, “Good evening. My name is Tsoof. I am a school captain, Vocal Harmony and Wind Symphony captain, a member of the Senior Percussion Ensemble (Mac-cussion), Show Choir and Big Band. Thank you for coming this evening”.

Gal, Eden, Noff and I sat the whole night proud as peacocks for being associated with him.

That was his last performance with all his ensembles, where he said goodbye to those who had contributed greatly to growing his talents, enthusiasm and passion for music – his music teachers. Three of them had been his musical mentors and had taught him for eight years, through both primary and high school.

I want to thank them too.