SUBSTITUTE TEACHER TALES: PARENTS

What a difference the experience was from one parent to another.

 

This morning a child's mother and father dropped in to check on their son's progress. They were both very pleasant, and delighted by the contents of their son's folder. Their expectations weren't exactly high, and they thanked me for helping him.

 

This afternoon in an IEP meeting, a concerned father spoke passionately on behalf of his painfully shy daughter. There was an attempt to label her, and place her in special education. 

I was glad I'd created individual folders for the students, so that I could show everyone attending the meeting what his daughter had been doing for the past 2 weeks. 

He wasn't surprised at all. It’s what he’d been pleading all along.  

She can do the work. 

She is bright. 

Her classroom behavior is exemplary. She will succeed. He was right. What she does at home has been replicated in school. Why did everyone assume she had special needs just because she was quiet, shy, and well behaved?

I made it to 3:15. 

I told the children who walk home, or are picked up by their parents or siblings, to gather their things and line up. 

I told the students who participate in after-care to stay in their seats and be respectful of the educational aide. 

I walked the "walkers" to the front door. Several of them left with family members. There were a few children still with me when the rain started to fall a little harder. I told them we would go back to the classroom, and wait until whomever was picking them up arrived.

Before I even got to the classroom door, I heard the commotion and knew "Stay in your seats" went in one ear, out the other, and they hadn't paid any mind to the educational aide. 

As I opened the door and entered, I heard a scream then wailing. 

One little girl had left her seat at one end of the room, and was across the room swinging between desks. I guess she missed a swing, because the result was a bump on her head and a bloodied mouth. 

She came to me crying, and I got her things and tried to comfort her as I escorted her to the nurse. The school nurse had the situation under control, and notified the child's parent, so I went back to the classroom.

Not long after that, I heard my name and the educational aide's name being called over the PA system. 

As I approached the office, the principal warned me there was an angry parent waiting for an explanation.

I'm a mother. I've experienced the falls and accidents. I understand the fear and frustration when a child gets hurt. What I don't understand is an irate parent who refuses to acknowledge that their child neither listens to instructions, shows respect, nor follows directions, and is thereby responsible for any mishaps that occur. 

In no way could the parent reason that had her child only remained in her seat as she was told, the accident wouldn't have happened. Her anger was directed squarely at me.

The parent was in rare form. Perhaps the parent gets some kind of power trip out of yelling at adults, and hurling accusations and insults, but I was determined that I would not be on the receiving end of her rant. I shouldn't have had to defend myself. I wasn't the one swinging between desks. My standing up and preparing to leave only made the parent madder. (I have got to remember that argumentative people hate it when you walk away from them.) 

I had no intention to sit there. She mentioned my "attitude". 

I definitely had one. It was the attitude of a person who knows that nothing you say will matter, there would be no reasoning, and so, the meeting was pointless. 

I wonder if people really think you're supposed to sit peacefully while they verbally attack you? 

I wonder if they expect you to just sit docilely and allow them to take pot shots at you? 

My parting words were, "The person you should be talking to this way is your child". 

That just made her even madder. She yelled something as I left the inner office, and I could still hear her as I left the outer office. 

I wonder if she remembered that her child was sitting there watching it all.

I'd spent hours, not only with her child, but with others who are challenged when it comes to following simple directions, and mastering first grade objectives. 

It was the end of the day. The parent should have saved her speech for her child. 

Perhaps it is the child who needs to be reminded what school is all about; what she needs to do, when, where and how--not the adults whom the child notoriously disrespects each and every day.

A parent is a child's first teacher. The parent's nastiness only made me less inclined to be sympathetic to anyone except her child. 

She is the one who will suffer. 

She is the one who is learning that her actions don't have consequences. She's learning that blame is to be placed everywhere except where it belongs. 

People know their children. Unfortunately, they have decided that when it comes to discipline, none is needed, or they admit they don't know what to do. 

So many parents are single-handedly ruining their children by failing to parent, and making enemies out of the very people who, if allowed, could be of the greatest assistance--teachers.

 

If one's child is frequently disrespectful, what does a parent expect school staff to do? Put up with it? Celebrate it? 

One of the things the parent mentioned was that she'd like to be notified every time her child misbehaves in the classroom. I submit that the educational aide and I would be writing referral notices and talking on the phone with her all day, every day. That's just not feasible or reasonable. It would be fine if there were only 10 children in the class--not 27. Exactly when would we have time for instructing the other 26 students? 

It never occurred to her to visit the school more often so that she could observe her child in action. I didn't need parenting or reprimanding. Her child did.

The parent concluded that I don't belong in a classroom, should be fired, and she also admonished me to keep my hands off of her child. That was a bit of a shock, as it implied I had harmed her child. It made me wonder if this parent is a litigious person looking for someone to convert into a cash cow. ( Good luck if anyone seeks to get substantial amounts of money from me. ) 

Why are so many parents looking for someone to sue? Why is that the go-to? I didn't exactly think that guiding a hurt child, by placing my hand on her upper back as we walked, would constitute abuse or corporal punishment. What is this culture of parents going to schools and threatening to "have your job"? 

I submit that there aren't enough parents who visit their children's schools regularly enough to even know what their child's teacher's job entails. If they did, they would know that it's not such a glamorous thing to have, and some teachers would gladly relinquish the job and some of the children to the first taker. 

PTA meetings look like teacher get-togethers.

I also submit that after one day spent in the classroom, many parents would be less inclined to see their child's teacher as someone to be berated, mistrusted, and reviled. Maybe they'd even want to help. 

It would be nice to be in a classroom full of children who are all well-mannered, respectful, smart, prepared, and armed with instructions on how to behave properly. Perhaps that school exists somewhere in a perfect world.

I suppose it would have been nice if someone had warned me that this parent has had run-ins with the office staff, other teachers, and was once even banned from the school. Why people are appeased in their wrongdoing is beyond me. I'm not interested in merely humoring someone. People should be honest and up front. If you don't like your child's teacher, the school, or the curriculum, let it be because the fault lies with them all, but if the fault lies with one's own parenting, one needs to be honest and stop trying to lay blame everywhere else.

It's sad when people reject help, lash out at those whose aim is to be of assistance, don't see the good, and train their children to become detrimental to their own educational futures.

 

Maybe I made a mistake by asking the parent if her daughter rolled her eyes at her, or talked back to her while at home. The parent's "yes" answer told me all I needed to know. Whatever a child is allowed to get away with at home, in the mind of the child, is acceptable everywhere else and with everyone else. If mommy thinks it's cute, why shouldn't the teacher?

I hate to admit it, but all the way home, and even as I type, I've been considering not going back. Someone even suggested I have a glass of wine. Now why should I have to become a drinker? 

Who needs the stress? Who gets up in the morning to go and help little children learn to read, and write, and reason, and looks forward to dealing with madness? Who bothers to get up armed with lessons and materials, only to be insulted at the end of the day by a total stranger? 

"Why not go somewhere where your efforts will be appreciated and welcomed?", I said to myself. Then, I answered my own question. "That was only one parent whose obvious issues have nothing to do with you. There's something else going on that you know nothing about. You can't let one person erase the progress that has been made. Whether she knows it or not, you are helping her child, and the child is the one who matters most. You should be used to it by now. 

There's always a giant. There's always a bully. There's always a nasty, hateful, strife-loving spirit. That spirit seeks you out and wants you to run. 

You should have anticipated it. 

Walking away is not an option. 

Not this time".

The children are a product of their parents and environment, and they shouldn't be penalized. 

The children's regular teacher may not be coming back. They've already been left once. They shouldn't be left again. I don't want to abandon them so close to the end of the year. I reminded myself that I chose to go to the school. I could have chosen to go anywhere else in the city.

It pains me to hear people's frustration. It pains me to see how woefully behind the children are academically, while it seems that school systems around the country are focusing on everything except children. 

I hate to think that children are being set up to fail. 

Why are there 27 children in the class? 

What happened to "Children First"? 

Why do disruptive students experience such ineffective consequences?  

Why can't some of them write their names or count, or spell, or compute? 

Why do they fight one another daily? 

Why are they so defiant? 

Why are they not phased in the least by threats of missed privileges? 

Why is a trip to the principal's office, or a phone call to the home, something that they literally laugh off?

Why should I be afraid when all I want to do is teach?

What I experienced this afternoon, though nothing new, lets me know why it is so difficult to get good people to remain in the classroom. It's not always the unruly students. Sometimes it's their unruly parents who make the whole idea of helping children seem like a very, very bad idea.