An earlier post today was about the “charter school bubble,” but the link didn’t work. That happens sometimes with links.
Fortunately, reader Jack Covey supplied a story that appeared in the Village Voice that contains a picture of students making mouth bubbles and details about the charter school that teaches proper mouth bubble action. When a STUDENTS makes a mouth bubble, he or she can’t talk. That’s the point. Silence.
Open the the link and you will never again wonder what a charter school mouth bubble is.
Diane Ravitch's blog 
Discipline is genuinely controversial though. People feel really strongly about it on “both sides”. There’s a whole group of parents in our schools who think disruptive kids genuinely harm their children, and then there’s an equally passionate bunch who think it’s too strict. I feel like attempting to reach some middle ground is worthwhile and if we think “public schools” should be genuinely “public” then the debate itself is part of that “public good”. Everyone has to compromise to some extent, and that’s not a bad thing to learn.
There has to be something sensible between a boot camp and a free for all. The basic idea is to be thoughtful and respectful of others, right? That’s the goal of behavior rules? So if bubbles don’t get you there then you’re off track? That’s what I would think, anyway.
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Well stated.
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It seems to me that the reason a lot of upper middle class people abhor tough discipline is that they know their own kids don’t need it. Why? I suspect there’s been an invisible breeding going on in the home. Kids learn unwritten rules, like don’t yell and scream in public places, and it becomes second nature. But not all kids get this breeding, and schools reap the consequences. Student A requires one reminder to be quiet; student B will never be quiet until you threaten him with a detention. Sometimes even that doesn’t work.
Here’s an example of this kind of breeding from my own life: I distinctly remember my mom telling me, around age four or five, it was WRONG to litter. The result is that I will never litter. It’s so ingrained. A large percentage of students at my school litter. It stuns me. It seems obvious to me that they never got the lesson my mom gave me. So the school personnel must reckon with the results of this failure: our poor custodian trudges around campus every day picking up thousands of pieces of litter. Likewise, in classrooms, teachers beg, plead, cajole and threaten countless times each day just to get certain kids to stop talking over them; i.e. coping with parents’ failure to instill the principle of respect for adults/teachers. The majority are not the problem. The untrained minority (and I don’t mean ethnic minority: many are white) are. (By the way, I don’t think “training” ought to be necessarily pejorative. We potty train.) It seems that Success Academy is trying to do a boot camp/crash course in the type of breeding that happens slowly and subtly in upper class homes.
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I think that when we draw such lines of distinction between people in suburbs and people in cities, we may not be taking into account the ongoing legacy of racism in our country. I do not think one should ever say that a group of people is stupid (looking at you, Arne Duncan) or another group needs more rule and law enforcement (looking at you, Donald Trump). Ponderosa, I am concerned about the direction in which this line of thought leads.
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I don’t know. I do know that the parents who want a lot of rules are not the better-off parents, generally. My son’s school is about half low income.
I see both sides. It does harm quieter or more compliant kids if there’s a lot of disorder because it’s distracting. Those parents also worry about loud or disruptive kids being a “bad influence” on their own children. They want them removed, which of course is too extreme. On the other hand, some of the parents say their kids really struggle with a lot of nitpicky rules- especially boys. It’s often boys.
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I have a student who spits on the classroom floor, throws food in class, can sit still but won’t, takes after his (albeit hardworking) dad who encourages him to hate school and teachers, and I could easily make a Got to Go List and put the boy on it. I don’t. I won’t. I am going to teach him to read. I’ve had parents of other students demand his removal. The answer is no. His classmates are going to help me teach him to read. They will have to work hard to overcome obstacles. They will learn more, not less for their efforts. We will ALL be the better for it. All of us.
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I tend to agree with you, but I think there are other ways to characterize it than an issue with two sides. Teachers have more choices than order or disorder. By building community, supporting students’ emotional learning and focusing on culturally responsive pedagogy and management we can create really dynamic learning environments without continuing to follow behaviorist and systems model discipline plans. It’s not like the only alternative is a free for all and I don’t think it’s a question of balance.
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I don’t see where we are addressing the elephant in the room:
Public schools that use these kind of discipline techniques have to figure out how to work with the kids for whom the “mouth bubbles” technique doesn’t work.
Success Academy simply drums them out of their school. Witness how kids come and leave even the first few days of school, and the ones whose parents WANTED that kind of technique but aren’t up to snuff get put on got to go lists over the next few years. Those parents didn’t object to mouth bubbles — but Success Academy sure objected to their children being in their school anyway.
It is one thing to have this if you KEEP all your students. The dirty little secret that the press ignores is that the top performing charter school — the one offering the most luxuries and extras to its kids — is ALSO one of the charter schools that loses the most students
That’s right — those mediocre charters struggling with almost no donations or extras seem to keep far more of their students than Success Academy.
But you rarely hear that because the apologists in the media — led by co-opted reporters such as Beth Fertig at WNYC — ONLY compare Success Academy to public schools that are struggling. If there was a ranking of only charter schools by attrition rates of the kids who win their Kindergarten lottery through 4th grade, Success Academy would have one of the highest attrition rates of any charter school.
That’s right — in the charter world, the schools that parents pull their children from the most frequently are often the highest performing ones. Getting those parents to pull their kids is not a bug, it is a prime feature of top performing charters.
It is just the opposite with top performing public schools where attrition rates are low, not obscenely high.
It doesn’t matter what fancy name you give to your educational system. If you are allowed to drum out the kids for whom that system doesn’t work, you should be classified as a failure instead of being admired for your ruthlessness in doing whatever necessary to five year old children to promote your own agenda.
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Actually there’s two such pictures book-ending this story — one at the beginning and one at the end.
Once again:
http://www.villagevoice.com/news/class-struggles-at-a-bronx-charter-school-6430026
The writer, Steve Thrasher, seems underwhelmed by some of what he witnessed during his multi-day visit to Eva-Land, but at other times comes off as approving:
(I’ll ask, for the ka-jillionth time, how would Campbell Brown or her husband Dan Senor react if the teachers and administrators at Heschel — the rich kids private school where their two son attend — tried to impose this “North Korean-like” (Thrasher’s word) sh#% on their own children? I imagine they’d be displeased.
“What Eva does as SUCCESS ACADEMY is great for OTHER PEOPLE’s KIDS, but don’t you even THINK of pulling that on my kids!”
Campbell sits on SUCCESS ACADEMY Board of Directors, and has given countless speeches, and written countless articles praising SUCCESS ACADEMY.)
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
VILLAGE VOICE’s Steve Thrasher: (Excerpts)
“The newly opened charter school is part of a network run by Eva Moskowitz, a woman who inspires a remarkable loathing from New York’s teachers’ union and other advocates of traditional public education. Employing non-union instructors, Bronx Success exists not only to educate kids, but to show that it can do so better than traditional public schools, like the one it shares a building with, P.S.30
“The Voice was there the day Bronx Success opened its doors for business in August. For now, it has only kindergartners and first-graders.
“And miraculously, they know how to keep their mouths shut.
“The sheer efficiency with which the students, teachers, and parents present themselves and govern nearly every gesture and utterance is so striking that the thought ‘North Korean–like’ kept coming to mind during multiple Voice visits over a four-month period to Bronx Success.
“From day one, students are indoctrinated with drills: how to clear their trays and deposit trash at the cafeteria; how to stand in line and walk up stairs; how to track adults with their eyes when they walk and when they talk.
“And to really make it sink in, movements are matched with rhymes.
” “Hands on top!’
” … adults ring out, and children instinctively know to respond,
” ‘That means stop!.
” … as they put their hands on their heads. Sitting with their hands in their laps is “magic five.” Spend just a few hours there, and soon you’ll be responding like a trained poodle: Months later, there hasn’t been any let-up from the day of the school’s opening, and the rhyming and gesturing is as hard-wired in the children as a soldier’s salute.
“Every staff member takes part; every one of them refers to their five- and six-year-old students as ‘scholars.’ Each class, meanwhile, takes on the identity of the alma mater of its teacher. So one group of kindergartners is known as the ‘2027’ scholars of ‘the University of Michigan,’ referring to the year they will graduate from colle ge if they go to the school that educated their instructor. A group of first-graders is known as the ‘2026 scholars of NYU.’
“On a rainy day in August, the principal, Michele Caracappa—a reservedly energetic white woman who appeared in the divisive education documentary WAITING FOR SUPERMAN—wears a business suit one might mistake for that of a media executive. She is bending to greet each kindergartner, reading their names off the tags around their necks and shaking hands.
“Her attention to each and every child is not just a first-day ritual. Principals in the Success Network group of schools are required to shake the hand of every student, every day. That’s some 186 handshakes a day, and just one of numerous drills that staff members, children, and parents learn with military precision at all seven of the Success Academies. When a parent picks up a child at the end of the day, he or she is required to shake the teacher’s hand. Every time.
” ‘Welcome, scholars!’ Caracappa addresses the student body. ‘We are so excited to have you here. We have been waiting so long for you, and have been working so long for your arrival.’ Her speech is going over the heads of some youngsters, who squirm in their little uniforms. The girls wear matching skirts, and the boys polo shirts. (The kindergarten boys are spared the indignity of a clip-on tie for another year.)
“On this first day of school, not all goes according to the very detailed, down-to-the-minute plan. Quivering lips sometimes give out to cries for mommy. (A typical response from the staff: ‘You’re a big kid, now, and you’ve got to learn to do for yourself.’) One child wets his pants. Another little boy goes to the bathroom after much pleading, only to have a complete and utter meltdown inside, crying hysterically.
” … ”
“So why is a woman (Eva Moskowitz) who spends all her time educating poor children of color so hated, especially when she puts her own kids where her mouth is?
“For one reason, her Success Academies are blamed for cannibalizing. The more Bronx Success grows, the more its ‘co-location’ neighbor Wilton will have to shrink—putting Wilton’s staff and parents on the defensive as their school is pushed toward irrelevance and possible extinction.
“For a charter to grow, the other school in its building must die (or, reformers hope, rise to the challenge). The battle for space alone can make enemies out of entire school communities. That movie is playing out right now on the Upper West Side, where Moskowitz is attempting to open her first charter in an affluent white community, against great opposition.
“Why, contend charter school critics, pit kindergartners against each other? Why should Wilton kids see that Bronx Success has better bathrooms, a longer school day, and more resources in the same building?
” … ”
“It’s not for every family. One child, a kindergarten boy, showed up almost late the first day of school, back in August. While the Voice was observing, he was almost always the slowest child to respond to discipline routines, dawdling when other kids were in ‘magic five’ or had already gotten their ‘hands on top.’
“During our visit in January, he was pulled out of the school by his family, who enrolled him in P.S.30 in the same building. It’s precisely this type of thing—families who can’t cut the routine and leave—that gives charters a huge advantage over traditional public schools, which have to serve everyone.
“But it’s precisely this kind of discipline that a lot of Bronx Success families desire.
“Those small scenes of tenderness stand out in a school with North Korean–like military precision. Students line up and keep quiet by holding ‘air bubbles’ in their mouths, their cheeks puffed out, moving through the hallway from classroom to classroom in utter silence. They must hold the handrail by the correct hand going up and down the stairs. If any students make too much noise, the entire class (or even the entire school) may be made to do a drill again, until it’s perfect.”
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One more thing: the article mentions — and Eva’s defenders often do as well — that her children attend SUCCESS ACADEMY.
Well, when you read the Glassdoor reviews of former teachers and/or administrators who worked at SUCCESS ACADEMY, one of the common threads running through all of them is how everyone is in absolute terror and in fear of displeasing Eva, and striving to please her:
http://www.schoolsmatter.info/2014/08/citizen-jacks-compendium-of-teacher.html
Given that, do you really think her kids get the same treatment from these same teachers/administrators as the average student does, that Eva’s kids are going to, figuratively speaking, get their feet held to the fire in the same way?
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The author was making Eva’s point for her. All that “North Korean” style discipline is necessary because after all, what is the alternative? The dreaded public school.
It’s a little after 11 a.m., and inside the auditorium at Sojourner Truth Elementary School (P.S.149) on Lenox Avenue, chaos has begun to take over.
The Little Mermaid is showing on a video projector, and dozens of children are running around screaming, out of control. Teachers seem unable to do anything about it, and also don’t seem very put out.
“It’s not even lunchtime, and they’re watching a movie,” Eva Moskowitz says with completely unconcealed contempt. “It’s quite sad, really.”
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Michelle,
I thoroughly reject that false dichotomy that the author describes — and which Eva and her ilk incessantly promulgate — where it’s either …
… Eva’s North Korea-ish, military-style, dog-obedience-training-style discipline and methods …
OR
… school chaos, kids running and screaming, baby-sitting with Disney movies … etc.
Really? Like there’s no other alternative to those two choices?
I speak from experience, as I teach the same demographic. All you have to do is substitute …
L.A.’s low-income Mexican/Central American & African-American
for
NYC’s low-income Puerto Rican/Caribbean & African-American.
No teacher or administrator with whom I’ve worked over the last two decades would ever park kids in front of Disney movies, tolerate kids screaming and running, with “teachers … unable to do anything about it, and (who) also don’t seem very put out.”
A solid staff of unionized teachers, backed by a competent administrator can provide a productive, disciplined learning environment — both in the individual classrooms, and the school as a whole… and they can achieve this without subjecting children to “North Korean-like” rituals and demeaning practices that are described in this article.
Out in Los Angeles, Monica Ratliff was elected to the LAUSD school board in large part because her school, San Pedro Street, had its low-income, minority students — who are demographically on a par with those attending the Success Academy school profiled in the article — excelling on every metric, in ways comparable to kids from more upscale White and Asian neighborhoods. The administrators and staff at San Pedro (and hundreds of other LAUSD schools) pull this off … again … without resorting to the nonsense “mouth bubbles” and all that military-style, dog-obedience training methodology so beloved by Mistress Eva.
So please don’t buy into this bogus “either / or” argument. It’s pernicious, and it’s racist. It basically states that white and Asian kids, due to their genetic and/or cultural superiority, can get “Sesame Street” schools, but those genetically and culturally inferior black and brown kids must get Pink Floyd’s THE WALL:
“If you don’t eat your meat, you can’t have any pudding…”
(from 02:10 on)
or must get taught by abusers such as Charlotte Dial (who has since been placed in charge of training Success Academy teachers … oy vey!):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rj2bQvqZ1yA
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“Steve Thrasher, seems underwhelmed by some of what he witnessed during his multi-day visit to Eva-Land, but at other times comes off as approving.” Well, yes, I think anyone would. There are good things about the methods of SAs: for example, students who are easily distracted — as I was in kindergarten — have a right to learn in peace!
OTOH, students trained simply to be quiet and just absorb are unlikely to succeed in classrooms later on when they are expected to voice their critical thoughts.
Nothing is perfect.
The biggest problem I see is that the education a child gets in this country is dependent on who his/her parents are. What about the talented child whose parent doesn’t “shake hands with the teacher”?? In other words, that parent who doesn’t (or cannot due to working, say, 3 minimum-wage jobs just to survive) make any sort of effort to get his/her kid into a SA (or whatever) and keep him/her there? We need a way to assure that that talented child can rise to the top regardless of parental situations, and that isn’t happening. FYI, I have always taught in public schools in NH — rural NH since 1990 — and this is what I am seeing.
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In a way, I understand the comparison to the “North Korean” like precision…..but probably another, non-communist nation might be more apt……China? SIngapore?
I just looked up some of the disciplinary rules used in the Singapore..no gum chewing…the use of caning… http://www.goabroad.com/articles/study-abroad/singapore-laws-to-know-before-you-go
There’s probably many of you out there who know a lot more about this topic than me.
I just have to wonder….in a era when capitalism seems ascendant worldwide, what specific version of it will come to dominate…the Chinese version, for example, or what we’ve had in the U.S.for, say, the last 30 years? Especially if the U.S. faces some other major terrorist attack?
Strangely enough, Trump says he wants to “Make America Great Again” but could he be taking us towards an authoritarian version of capitalism that is actually unprecedented in our country’s history? Russia-lite?
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John, what do you think is more dangerous to democracy: an authoritarian school that solidly teaches history, philosophy, literature, ethics –i.e. the tools to abhor and fight authoritarian government –or a democratic school with a scattershot approach to tackling these subjects? I think it’s the latter. I think we put too much faith in the idea that empowering students vis a vis the teacher will create citizens who will abhor an authoritarian president. Current circumstances seem to prove my point.
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But why those two choices, ponderosa? Isn’t that a false dochotomy? How many “democratic schools” as you put it have a “scattershot” approach to teaching philosophy and literature? And, can an “authoritarian school” truly teach democracy? What’s the ethical lesson then in such an authoritarian school….do as I say not as I do?
The public school system has done well by our democracy for generations. Why the hurry to abandon it? I’m concerned not only with the DIRECTION our nation is taking but the VELOCITY of that change in course. Like Diane wrote in her comments earlier in the day on the Common Core.(and I paraphrase)….why the rush? Who is benefiting from all these drastic and fast paced changes? Economic data seems to indicate that it is NOT the working and middle classes in this nation.
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P.S. “Current circumstances” indicate that millions more Americans did NOT opt for the Trumpian option. (i.e. the popular vote.) Who knows what the next presidential election will bring 4 years from now. I can’t even begin to think in that direction. I’m still recovering from Nov. 8.
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John, it is small comfort that a bare majority voted for Clinton –that still means a staggering number voted for Orange Hitler. I am not at all arguing against public schools; I’m arguing for public schools empowered to check misbehaviors efficiently so that critical learning can occur. John, do you think the founders of our democracy went to schools with light discipline? Or grew up in non-patriarchal homes? Why is it so hard to conceive of young humans going through a PHASE of submission to benevolent authority in order to prepare for a later phase of being a proud, free democratic citizen? Must a caterpillar practice flying in order to become a butterfly? I actually believe that empowered adult authority over children is necessary to check some of kids’ natural impulses that steer them away from the best paths. It seems to me our allergy to adult authority in this country is pathological.
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When our country was founded most people hardly went to school for that long, I think.
Also….Anyone who spent some time in my classroom would see that I’m not “light” on creating an orderly classroom that values respect. But I doubt anyone would call me an authoritarian. I learned from a lot of truly great teachers…real individuals…it’s not just me. It is possible. Maybe my comment farther below to Susan’s post would further illustrate my views about authority? I am proud to be a creature of the 1960s and 70s. LOL.
Of course, it really depends on the child. I’ve seen students who thrive after going into the U.S. Marines. I’ve seen kids who would be crushed. From what I’ve read on this blog, Eva Moskowitz does not the respect the ability of teachers to do what is right for each individual student. She just doesn’t respect teachers. Her authoritarian vision applies to students, adults….anyone who is below her in power and privilege. We should not have to submit to what I’m sure she would see as her “benevolent authority”.
Thanks for talking. I need to let my daughter use this computer to do her homework. And, I have to get up quite early.in the morning.
I suspect we are actually not that far apart in viewpoints if we had time to sit down and discuss this issue more. Take care.
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Definitely the latter. Well-put, ponderosa.
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I refer readers of this blog to a posting of yesterday entitled “Why Allie Gross Changed Her Mind.”
Link: https://dianeravitch.net/2016/12/20/why-allie-gross-changed-her-mind/
A line that jumped out at me then and which I mentioned in the thread to that posting—
“A further flaw with the marketplace solution is the premium it places on the superficial”—
Came to mind while reading the piece linked to in this posting.
Of course, “superficial” may not be applicable to $ucce$$ Academy if the intent is to make people (from as early an age as possible) accept authoritarian non-democratic practices as normal or to train the same people how to conduct themselves in prison.
Just sayin’…
😏
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Kids in our school are told bubble and pebble to walk through the hall ways quietly. I didn’t know anything about it (as I don’t walk kids through the halls) but the K-4 elementary teachers started saying it to our students about 2 years ago to keep them quiet in the halls. I think it means ‘pretend there are bubbles in your mouth and pebbles in your hands’ to keep their mouths quite and their hands to themselves. We’re a small pubic school and it’s never meant in a mean or punishing way…just as a quick reminder but the kids do have the look of the kids in the picture when they do it.
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I do not wish to get involved with the issues underlying the discipline model here, or the value of its success.
Just saying….
I can only react as a teacher who taught over 32 seven year old kids — in more than one Bronx school in the NINETIES… BEFORE phones, and the internet, and during a time when a teacher’s voice had some authority with parents.
I can only imagine HOW IMPOSSIBLE it is to ADVANCE LEARNING if there are moe than 2 or 3 kids who just have not at age 7, developed any listening skills, AND whose behavior has never been modified at home or in preschool and earlier learning experiences.
It seems extreme, but I have to admit, when children have CLEAR EXPECTATIONS then learning can occur. Clear expectations are the FIRST of the Pew research principles of Learning.
Perhaps, one can disagree with the methodology, and the one size fits all routine that gets kids to do what is required, but there is NO quiet reading time, (at least not when I was teaching) if there are move than a few ‘outliers’ who are determined to do their thing, and no parent or administration t appeal to for help[.
I was a very successful teacher, with clear expectations and the REWARDS for achieving expected outcomes, UPPERMOST in my practice, WHICH IS WHAT, the Harvard Pew research teams noticed in my room, but i ‘gotta tell ya’… I have been derailed in may schools by just a few out-of-control children, and no one to appeal to for help.
It seems to work for some teachers in that environment, but it would be overkill in other situations.
Just saying….
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I never taught elementary school, Susan. Couldn’t…wouldn’t. I have REAL respect for teachers who can do that.
But I do teach high school students. And, I can say that the hundreds of young adults I’ve worked with are much better students than the kids, the friends, I went to high school with back in the 1970s. (My school was in a relatively well off suburb that nonetheless resembled the school in the film “Dazed and Confused.”.)
Kids today deserve much better than the crappy situation our country is leaving them…..$20 trillion in national debt, crushing student loans and a president-elect who already makes Warren Harding look like a candidate for Mount Rushmore..
A good number of those hippies and slackers etc…..etc….who graduated in the 60s, 70s, 80s and 90s went on to build the high tech society we live in today.
I’m particularly interested in the conflict between generations, including how it was manifested in this recent election.
The kids I work with give me hope each and every day.
Eva Moskowitz, David Coleman, Arne Duncan, Donald Trump…..all those old farts…..it’s like one big depression bomb.
Thank God for Diane Ravitch and Bernie Sanders!
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“I’m particularly interested in the conflict between generations. . . ”
I find the concept of “generations” to be quite lacking in onto-epistemological (foundational conceptual) basis. How does one take a flow and divvy it up into separate categories/units? Generation implies a beginning and an end to a certain cohort but the continuum of life/years defies that there is a rationo-logical definable groups. Just as the term “the 60s” is a misnomer (for a multitude of reasons I think all the 60s began around 65 and end in 75) so are the terms for generation. When growing up was I a part of the “Pepsi Generation” or the “Me Generation” or the “Baby Boomer Generation”? (the first two of which were current at the time and the last only started to be named after the actual period of the 50s & 60s)?
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True, Duane, though when I talk to people much younger than me (or older, too) I am clearly aware of generational divides, however those distinctions occur. The students in my class, my own children at home, regularly remind me of this reality -especially when pull out my old man flip phone. (Which I love.)
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Gotta free up the computer for my wonderful daughter, Susan. Doing her homework a la the 21st century. Always like to read you on here.
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Facism only works for a short while. Remember HISTORY?
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The single, most important reason why parents choose a charter school is to provide a clean, safe, and orderly learning environment for their child – an escape from the daily chaos and routine disruptions that plague many “struggling” inner city schools. They will gladly accept mouth bubbles, eye tracking, posture policing, scripted lessons, and limited learning opportunities in lieu of a public school which has failed to control the misbehaviors of a small but very destructive minority of students.
Until schools that reflect the dysfunction of their communities and families can be brought under control, the charter school as safe haven for children will always be a strong attraction for concerned parents trapped in struggling neighborhoods.
Love for their kids trumps all else. Therein lies the brilliance of Eva Moskowitz. The test scores are just proof positive that chaos and disorder have been defeated.
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“The test scores are just proof positive that chaos and disorder have been defeated.”
Where’s the emoji for “tongue in cheek”?
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Interesting post and comments. As carry444 states above, bubble mouths (and other disciplinary tactics) are not just prominent in charters, but also public schools. Years working as a Speech/Language Pathologist since the ’70’s, in public schools in both PA and MI, have shown me very similar training techniques starting from kindergarten through high school. PBIS, with their punch cards and plastic toys every 2 weeks, is another “supposedly” effective way of controlling behavior. In my observation, it’s humiliating, and it doesn’t even really work.
Maybe I’ll take one of those charter school jobs I’ve been offered. I will see for myself if charter schools are really and truly an “escape from the daily chaos and routine disruptions” that plague so many inner city schools. I’m looking at 3 in Detroit now.
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If you do indeed take one of those three jobs, please let us know what you observe…
Whatever it is. The good. The bad. The ugly.
😏
P.S. Hint for Kommon Koresters: movie reference above. Not on any CCSS test-to-punish.
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No offense, but as a Speech/language pathologist you would rarely get to experience the group dynamics that produce the daily chaos and routine disruptions that plague inner city classrooms. In my experience, counsellors, psychologists, and administrators have very little understanding of how the behaviors of three or more defiant or combative students can make teaching and learning nearly impossible. That student who seems reasonably well behaved in your office can take on an entirely different (deviant) persona in front of 20+ friends and peers.
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A very important point.
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Not really a good point. Since RTI (Response To Intervention) has incorporated into the educational system, most therapists are required to work with individual or small groups WITHIN the classrooms. No more one-on-one or small groups in the speech office. That includes OTs and PTs also. I end up spending more time in the classroom trying to implement students’ IEP goals (that are required to align with Common Core State Standards) over in a corner, and then even more time in an office where I do all the paperwork!
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Rage: critical point.
Amazing—NOT!—how easily many of those not in the classroom will allow themselves to be misled because, well, think of all the “extra” work and effort it would take to deal with real people and real problems and real solutions.
Much easier for many admins & others to place the burden of responsibility and blame on those that are too often stripped of any real authority to do anything about seriously disruptive students.* (*Teachers & classroom aides)
That said, I experienced situations where admins and school psychologists and teachers and classroom aides were on the same page and—Holy Genuine Learning & Teaching, Batman!—made molehills out of mountains and actually accomplished some good.
Good thread, this.
😏
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It is an interesting thread, as Krazy TA noted.
Rage: your comment above, “Until schools that reflect the dysfunction of their communities and families can be brought under control…”
Of course, isn’t the root problem the dysfunction of those communities? Why should kids who happen to be born into those very tough situations be forced to act like mini-robots? It’s hard imagine Bill Gates, for example, putting up with this sort of thing for his kids. Or, being required to shake the teacher’s hand when he picks up his own little “scholars”. (From the Village Voice piece about Eva’s charterized school: “When a parent picks up a child at the end of the day, he or she is required to shake the teacher’s hand. Every time.”)
I just looked at the website for the Lakeside School….isn’t that where Gates went? Do his own children go there?
Here’s how a study hall is described by a student there: “Study hall is fun because I have a lot of friends in my study hall. If I really have a lot of homework and know I won’t have time for it later, then it’s crunch time. But a lot of times it’s just relaxed – you can work on homework but you can also chat with friends.”
– Dain D. ’22 https://www.lakesideschool.org/student-experience/school-day
Note: Daine must be a 7th grader. How many people on here have been assigned to spend long swaths of time watching a seventh grade study hall?
My guess is if we transported one of the kindergarteners from Eva’s boot camp and let them go to school at Lakeside, by 7th grade the student would probably be hanging out in study hall, reading, learning, chatting.
The thread reminds me of the great movie, “Trading Places”. One of my favorite scenes…the rich guy played by Dan Aykroyd is reduced to stealing salmon and eating it on a city bus, dressed as Santa: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykqq6ZSyFGU
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As Rahm Emanuel famously stated,
“I don’t have to put my family in a homeless shelter in order to implement policies that help them with safe and warm places to live.”
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PBIS? Don’t you mean BPISS?
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Ancillary and support staff or counsellors often walk in late, leave early, take days off without needing a replacement (sub). If you don’t have a key to the room it is never the same experience and responsibility for classroom management. You are also viewed very differently by kids. Teachers in the trenches, 6 periods a day, 180 days a year experience the group dynamics I refer to – and are wholly responsible for maintaining order.
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I’ve often noticed that sub list phenomena. Good point.
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RageAgainstTheTestocracy:
You are right. There is a total lack of awareness and empathy for teachers in classrooms, especially those who are working with at risk youth. Even classroom visitors don’t have the insight into what is really happening with kids in school.
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“You are right. There is a total lack of awareness and empathy for teachers in classrooms”
The corrollary is even more troublesome:
“There is a total lack of awareness and understanding of (especially at-risk) students in classrooms.” by virtually all outsiders, including but not limited to, consultants, advocates, social workers, counsellors, administrators, parents, guest speakers, visitors, politicians, reformers, professors, sales people, police, and citizens. All the people who know better, because they don’t teach.
This is the root cause of all the really bad classroom related activities, policies, and products created and pushed by outsiders
who just don’t get anything important about life in the trenches and what its like cope with up to100+ different youngsters (and their issues) a day – day after day after day after . . .
I think there are many veteran teachers that are fed up with the meddling and sick and tired of the micro-management, and more than frustrated with the infinite ways that outsiders have devised to waste our very precious time and siphon off our limited funds.
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Amen, Rage.
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Adults cannot go into school bathrooms in NY?? That must lead to a total Lord of the Flies situation! I cannot believe this is accurate. So much drug dealing, bullying, and all sorts of nefarious stuff can take place in BRs. Can anyone here from NY clarify? Do they mean just opposite-gender teachers or what?
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Did anyone notice the date of this article? February, 2011–almost 6 years ago.
I know the link was put up for us to see what a “mouth bubble” looks like, but I’m wondering about the content of the article insofar as its date (i.e., it’s old). From the post itself, seems like “mouth bubbles” are still used, but have to question the content.
Does Eva still send her kids to Success? Discipline problem children aren’t advised out (parents continue to be “invited in” & “the school works w/them {parent/child} to keep them in, as explained in the article)? Occupational therapists work there w/special needs students?
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