Quote:
Originally Posted by moneill
When was the last time you were in a classroom?
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I can't speak for the other poster, but I can say he's on the right track.
We have, in fact, resorted to drugging our children to make them "fit in." My own personal experience this school year was having my daughter's teacher, in the very first parent/teacher conference we had, tell me in no uncertain terms that I needed to get my daughter diagnosed and medicated for ADD. No prior conversation involving my daughter's behavior, no indication that she had any sort of problem other than that she intensely disliked the way that they were teaching math (Common Core lessons are idiotic). The fact that she was perfectly capable of finding the correct answer was ignored because she wasn't doing it the "proper" way, which added 8 steps to a simple math problem. We just needed to get her on medication because the teacher didn't like her behavior.
A recent Harvard study found that we are over diagnosing ADD/ADHD by a factor of 6. Expected levels of diagnosis are 5% of children, while actual levels of diagnosis are 33%. We are giving drugs to children that don't need it in order to make them "behave" in class.
Bullying is also a huge issue, with the behavior being ignored or excused until it becomes a major problem.
My 13-year-old was being bullied by a girl in one of her classes. This girl was throwing things at her, calling her names, telling her that she was going to kick her @#$. All in front of a teacher who supposedly didn't see anything, even when my daughter went to him immediately after the incident. After multiple attempts to get the situation straightened out with the adults, I gave my daughter permission to retaliate. The next time the girl threatened her, my daughter slugged her. Not hard, and not even effectively, but it sure got the attention of the adults in the room. My daughter was threatened with suspension or expulsion over defending herself from a bully. After a long conversation with the Dean of Students, we cleared that up with minimal punishment for my daughter (1/2 day ISS) and much harsher punishment for the bully (3 days OSS). But it never should have come to that point if the teachers and administrators had been doing their job.
Out of all of my children's friends, there is one other "original" family in the group. Most of their classmates come from broken homes that have little discipline and/or supervision because the parent with the kids is working too many hours to make ends meet. There are a few that aren't allowed at our house because they refuse to follow simple rules, and for the ones that do stay over the parents are amazed at how well they behave when they go home - at least for a few hours.
Parents are expecting way too much out of teachers, Hollywood, and video games. None of them made the decision to have your children, and it isn't their responsibility to raise them. It is your responsibility to raise your kids, and too many are failing that responsibility.
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