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You are generalizing that all students in the U.S. would respond in a certain way and would not react positively to changes. You are also saying that since we look at students a certain way, we cannot change how we look at them (and treat them), which is not only circular logic, but your typical defeatist mindset.
Obviously this is not a fact, it is your opinion -- which is quite a presumptuous opinion, seeing that you are speaking for millions of students everywhere. I'm willing to bet that most students, and many teachers and parents completely disagree with you.
Even if some classes have students "off task" near the end of the class (despite that public school policy is generally against that, and admins will come down on that sort of thing if they see it) -- that doesn't mean they don't need more time in between classes. It would actually be more of an argument to make it "official" instead of a thing that "sometimes" happens behind closed doors.
I stand by what I said. 15 minute passing time is unnecessary. How do I know? Because you can walk from one end of my school to the other and back again with time to spare in 5 minutes. 15 minutes of passing time would also create discipline issues as that's too much time for our kids to be unsupervised. They find enough trouble with a teacher in front of the room.
This isn't Japan where students need time after class to ask questions and get clarification from the teacher. Our kids don't care about education like that and they don't take the initiative. We coddle them from the time they are born. As a result, we have to treat them like children at 15 because they don't know how to act like almost adults.
Nobody says that we should completely swap out our model with another one. Instead, intelligent people have been suggesting that we can take many successful pieces of a model from others, and adapt them to improve our own system. The goal, as I have repeated tens of times to you and others on this forum, is not to take the Finnish model of education and reproduce it here in entirety. You and many others continually make this point that we cannot "do what others do," but you are attacking a strawman this whole time. The real point is that when we have a problem, we must be willing to look at what others do, and try out new things that appear to make sense -- ESPECIALLY when these other methods make more sense according to research in the sciences and humanities. The first step for you is to get over this belief that what we do in schools cannot affect students differently if "society" doesnt change first. The reality is that if we do not even give students a chance to be responsible, they will continue to live down to our expectations that they cannot control themselves. If we continue to fear the rare parent who would yell at us for not treating their teenager like a 2 year old, then we will continue to have a whole SYSTEM that is based on fear and anachronisms.
The "fact" is that everyone who studies philosophy of education and/or developmental psychology KNOWS that our schools are not healthy places, and FAR from being optimal for learning. While our "society" may be different from ones in other countries, it is extremely foolish for people to say that we shouldn't change (or even TRY to change) our school policies that clearly do not make sense from a HUMANISTIC point of view -- that is, no matter what nationality of kids you put in our schools, there would still be problems with our policies. We cannot wait for the whole populace to change before updating our outdated model -- we must be brave and take a first step -- allowing mistakes, discussion, and growth.
The alternative? You will have kids desperately excusing themselves from class for the rest of your career. Enjoy.
I am pointing out that our kids aren't like their kids.
Nope, I won't have kids desperately excusing themselves from my class. I have a one pass per week policy. Period. They decide when it's important enough to use their one pass. I will have umpteen kids using their pass tomorrow because it's Friday but that's better than a revolving door every day. I'm seeing far fewer kids asking now that I say no. Suddenly they remember that the bathrooms are on the way to my room.
If they're already getting their social time, why do you think we need to give them more? Do you realize how much time you're talking about adding to the school day? Increasing passing time by 10 minutes means adding 70 minutes to the school day and for what? So kids can socialize? That's what after school is for. I see no practical use for increasing the length of passing time for high school or middle school. I see all kinds of potential problems when kids have too much unstructured time on their hands. Also, I really don't want my day made 70 minutes longer and I don't think the kids do either. The school day is long enough.
I would be ok with adding one more minute to passing time and going to a school wide no pass policy. If 5 isn't enough, a 20% increase ought to do the job. Of course that results in a weird bell schedule that will have the kids asking all day long "What time does this class end?". That minute cannot be taken out of instructional time without losing state funding.
Out of curiosity, how many years have you taught and what ages do you teach?
Last edited by Ivorytickler; 12-04-2014 at 07:16 PM..
Students also pick and choose what class to go to the bathroom from. Hmmmm wonder what criteria they use to decide which instruction to miss.
The ones who write passes. The most frequent reason kids give for needing to go during my class is that the previous teacher doesn't give passes. I'm finding if you give passes, they will abuse it. I'm really starting to understand why some teachers simply don't give them ever.
I also think it's an avoidant behavior. I see far more bathroom pass issues in my geometry class than my chemistry class. Many of the students I have issues with are struggling with the material. I think they just want to walk away from it. Interestingly, I have more restrictions on passees in chemistry. I don't let kids out of the room if I'm lecturing or if it's during lab time (in event of an emergency I need to know where every student is). In the beginning of the year, they'd ask and I'd tell them to wait. Now they don't ask.
Students also pick and choose what class to go to the bathroom from. Hmmmm wonder what criteria they use to decide which instruction to miss.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Ivorytickler
The ones who write passes. The most frequent reason kids give for needing to go during my class is that the previous teacher doesn't give passes. I'm finding if you give passes, they will abuse it. I'm really starting to understand why some teachers simply don't give them ever.
I also think it's an avoidant behavior. I see far more bathroom pass issues in my geometry class than my chemistry class. Many of the students I have issues with are struggling with the material. I think they just want to walk away from it. Interestingly, I have more restrictions on passees in chemistry. I don't let kids out of the room if I'm lecturing or if it's during lab time (in event of an emergency I need to know where every student is). In the beginning of the year, they'd ask and I'd tell them to wait. Now they don't ask.
It is interesting that when I subbed for art & graphic design a few days ago, not even one student asked to use the bathroom during class the entire day. It was especially unusual since that teacher had an overload teaching schedule (six classes rather than five HS classes).
Except for that experience, I don't think that I ever subbed for a HS teacher where not even one student asked to use the bathroom all day. Although, when I taught family living (cooking and sewing classes) only a few students needed to use the bathroom each day.
Both were elective classes.
During academic classes sometimes I have numerous students ask to leave each period.
My knowledge of the US high school system is limited to what I've read over the years here on C-D, but it appears that many US high schools don't have a recess/break during the day other than 20-30 minutes for lunch. Perhaps that is part of the pee problem?
Australian high schools (which start at age 12 - no middle schools) generally have a 15-20 minute break around 11am, plus at least 40 minutes for lunch, around 1pm give or take. So, basically, they have plenty of opportunity to use the bathroom about every two hours.
Would a mid-morning break and an extra few minutes for lunch help to resolve the issue of kids leaving class to pee? Seems to me it would certainly make it easier for teachers to say no.
My knowledge of the US high school system is limited to what I've read over the years here on C-D, but it appears that many US high schools don't have a recess/break during the day other than 20-30 minutes for lunch. Perhaps that is part of the pee problem?
Australian high schools (which start at age 12 - no middle schools) generally have a 15-20 minute break around 11am, plus at least 40 minutes for lunch, around 1pm give or take. So, basically, they have plenty of opportunity to use the bathroom about every two hours.
Would a mid-morning break and an extra few minutes for lunch help to resolve the issue of kids leaving class to pee? Seems to me it would certainly make it easier for teachers to say no.
I doubt it. The class where I had the most requests is the class right after lunch. When you count the two 5 minute passing times with lunch, they have 40 minutes. I have asked students why they didn't go at lunch time and been told that they were busy talking to their friends. I don't think it would help. I think they'd just socialize more.
One issue today is kids crave human contact. They are attached by an umbilical cord to their phones and computers. They do most of their socializing outside of school with a piece of technology. Their only real human contact outside of parents and siblings is in school. I think if we had a solar flare take out the power grid so they couldn't use their phones for a year we'd see less need for bathroom passes. I think they have so little human interaction that they have a hard time giving up the little they have. They'd rather cross their legs and socialize during lunch and then plead "EMERGENCY" to the teacher when class starts. Class they couldn't care less about.
It is interesting that when I subbed for art & graphic design a few days ago, not even one student asked to use the bathroom during class the entire day. It was especially unusual since that teacher had an overload teaching schedule (six classes rather than five HS classes).
Except for that experience, I don't think that I ever subbed for a HS teacher where not even one student asked to use the bathroom all day. Although, when I taught family living (cooking and sewing classes) only a few students needed to use the bathroom each day.
Both were elective classes.
During academic classes sometimes I have numerous students ask to leave each period.
This has a lot to do with it. If they're somewhere they want to be they go only when they need to go. If they're somewhere where they don't want to be, they'll take any excuse to get out of the room.
My knowledge of the US high school system is limited to what I've read over the years here on C-D, but it appears that many US high schools don't have a recess/break during the day other than 20-30 minutes for lunch. Perhaps that is part of the pee problem?
Australian high schools (which start at age 12 - no middle schools) generally have a 15-20 minute break around 11am, plus at least 40 minutes for lunch, around 1pm give or take. So, basically, they have plenty of opportunity to use the bathroom about every two hours.
Would a mid-morning break and an extra few minutes for lunch help to resolve the issue of kids leaving class to pee? Seems to me it would certainly make it easier for teachers to say no.
The problem in America, as far as I can tell, is that students are expected to be supervised at a level that does not exist universally. Do schools in Australia have problems with students having sex, taking drugs, or gambling during those times? How big of a problem is fighting when students have free time?
Our school doesn't even allow teachers to leave their students at lunch. I'm bending the rules by going to the restroom and heating up my lunch after I seat my students at the table. We are supposed to allow 22 minutes, but I try to allow each student to finish eating. Then we take a brief break when we get back to the room. (We don't have a designated lunch period. We break during class when we are called to the cafeteria. It's not normal for the US.) We used to stop to use the restroom as a group, but that took too long, and the restroom we used was nasty too much of the time. So instead, I send students one by one. until the class is over. In the last block of the day, there are many students who claim that they were not allowed to use the restroom after lunch. I think that's bogus--both teachers denying restroom usage and students lying about it.
The problem in America, as far as I can tell, is that students are expected to be supervised at a level that does not exist universally. Do schools in Australia have problems with students having sex, taking drugs, or gambling during those times? How big of a problem is fighting when students have free time?
Our school doesn't even allow teachers to leave their students at lunch. I'm bending the rules by going to the restroom and heating up my lunch after I seat my students at the table. We are supposed to allow 22 minutes, but I try to allow each student to finish eating. Then we take a brief break when we get back to the room. (We don't have a designated lunch period. We break during class when we are called to the cafeteria. It's not normal for the US.) We used to stop to use the restroom as a group, but that took too long, and the restroom we used was nasty too much of the time. So instead, I send students one by one. until the class is over. In the last block of the day, there are many students who claim that they were not allowed to use the restroom after lunch. I think that's bogus--both teachers denying restroom usage and students lying about it.
People outside of education don't get the level of responsibility the school bears for student behavior. If a student were to be hurt during a 15 minute passing time, the school would be liable. In other countries, older students are responsible for their own behavior. Not here. Here a 14 year old can gun down his classmates and be set free at 18 with his record expunged because it's someone else's fault.
People outside of education don't get the level of responsibility the school bears for student behavior. If a student were to be hurt during a 15 minute passing time, the school would be liable. In other countries, older students are responsible for their own behavior. Not here. Here a 14 year old can gun down his classmates and be set free at 18 with his record expunged because it's someone else's fault.
Considering that many of our students are legal adults, this level of supervision is ludicrous.
Considering that many of our students are legal adults, this level of supervision is ludicrous.
I agree. Even 16 year olds should be held accountable for their own actions. They can drive and hold down jobs but we still have to baby sit them like they are 5. This is especially laughable when the student is over 18.
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The most frequent reason kids give for needing to go during my class is that the previous teacher doesn't give passes. I'm finding if you give passes, they will abuse it. I'm really starting to understand why some teachers simply don't give them ever.
