Bill O'Reilly's revved up about recent NAEP scores, and he thinks that poor education is related to poor discipline in classrooms:
The reason so many American students can't read very well is twofold: first, many parents do not encourage reading, and allow their kids unfettered access to TV, computers and crude music. And second, discipline in many public schools is woeful. Students simply are not held accountable for behavior and academic performance.
Consider the following as a microcosm of what's going on. In the small town of Mt. Pleasant, Mich., a 16-year-old high school junior named Alexander Smith stood up in the cafeteria of his public school and called the principal, Betty Kirby, a "skank" and a "tramp."
Smith was suspended for 10 days. Enter the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which sued on Smith's behalf. The ACLU said his speech was a "parody," and therefore protected. A federal judge agreed and struck down Michigan's verbal assault law. While the judge did rule that the school had a right to discipline Smith, it could not do so simply on his abusive statements alone.
This kind of nonsense is happening all over the USA. The ACLU, which I believe is the most dangerous organization in America, is on the prowl...
Think about it. How can teachers possibly keep order in large schools when students know there are few consequences to outrageous behavior? Anything said can be described as "satire" or a "parody." In Houston, a survey of public school teachers finds 70 percent of them have been the targets of profane language by students. That's an awful lot of parody.
Interestingly, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch has a story which reports the same lack of respect, and the resulting effect on educational quality:
Roxann Breidegam had been teaching at Cahokia High School for three days when a student in her class got angry at not being called upon. He stood up, looked Breidegam straight in the eyes, called her a derogatory name and demanded, "You going to answer my question?"...
Whether it's talking back to a teacher, failing to say please, chomping on chips during class or remaining seated for the national anthem - students today are ruder, sassier and harder to handle, teachers and school officials say.
The American public seems to agree. A study last year by Public Agenda found that 79 percent of Americans think that the lack of respect and courtesy should be regarded as a serious national problem. Six out of every 10 believe it is getting worse.
Some administrators are taking a proactive approach, by asking teachers to "give step-by-step lessons" in basic manners related to greetings, conversation, and apologies. Some teachers worry that these lessons are "condescending," as though kids who learn manners at home are going to take offense when those lessons are repeated in the classroom. If the above occurrences are anything to go by, the possibility of offending students with perfect manners is the last thing teachers should be worried about.
Other schools have responded more subtly by weaving character education into day-to-day lessons. Many schools feature posters with positive messages like "respect one another." In Edwardsville and other districts, some schools emphasize a particular quality every month, such as "kindness" or "responsibility," that are stressed in school assemblies.
Educators say those measures help, but it's still tough to make up for what used to be taught at home. According to many school administrators, the difference in students' classroom behavior can often be attributed to parents.
"The dramatic shift is parents' expectations for their kids," said Ed Harris, principal at Cahokia High. "It used to be that the parent and the school were in cahoots to make sure the student was doing the right thing. Now, the parent often sides with the kid.
"I've had parents fuss about a student having an hour-and-a-half detention," he said. "It's not popular for there to be real consequences anymore."
That's appalling. I feel sorry for any teacher who doesn't feel free to discipline or punish a kid who uses ugly language in class, especially language that is directed towards another human being. How can a teacher be expected to teach under those circumstances?
I remember in my high school, certain "tough" teachers were always assigned to certain classes and certain bus routes (yep, our teachers often drove the buses). It was assumed that certain kids would be harder to handle than others, but it was also assumed that someone should teach those kids how to behave, and if that meant the most imposing male teacher with the deepest voice and the strictest discipline got the worst kids every year, so be it. Classroom discipline and respect for the teacher were not optional.
Posted by kswygert at December 1, 2003 02:52 PM