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Welcome to familywisdom.com, a website dedicated to informing and inspiring couples and families. Each week you will find a new article, story or essay about parenting, marriage or life. Suggestions for articles and questions to Ellen Terich are welcome. You can contact her at e.terich1@verizon.net |
HELLO SCHOOL! 2004-10-19 When I woke up this morning I heard the faint sound of raindrops on my backyard patio. A Fall shower is rare here in Southern California so at first I thought the dripping sound was coming from my coffee pot, but a quick peek out the back window told me otherwise. As sometimes happens to me, when a sound or a smell triggers a long forgotten memory, I thought back to my early years, when the cool and damp Fall weather of the Midwest signaled the beginning of the school year. All of a sudden I was back in that first grade classroom, shared with fifty other students, excited, energized and eager to learn. Here in America, we hail January 1st as the time of new beginnings, resolutions and fresh starts, but I have always thought of the start of the school year as a time of new beginnings. It's when I got new books and new pencils, a shiny new book bag and a couple of new school uniforms. But it was also the time I got to learn about new things, develop new skills and make new friends. If only we could instill that spirit of discovery in all of our children, so that they would see school as a great adventure and not as drudgery, imprisonment and failure. I've often thought of how we might make school more interesting and exciting for those students who don't do as well and my thoughts take me back to some of the better teachers I have known as well as some of the most creative parents. One teacher who inspired me was a third grade teacher who started the school year by teaching the children that they were a big family and they all must take care of each other. She went to great pains to instill values like cooperation, kindness, and compassion in her students. Those who finished an assignment early learned to offer assistance to those who struggled. No one felt left out or left behind. I don't know what the final test scores were in that classroom, but I know the children weren't a behavior problem, and they all felt included and important. We hear a lot today about students who are behavior problems in the classroom and how they are either diagnosed with Attention Deficit Disorder, or they are "bored." Attention Deficit Disorder is the name we give to a set of problems with paying attention and/or hyperactivity. It can be a serious concern for parents and teachers who grow weary of dealing with a child who is bouncing off the walls. We don't know yet why some children act this way, whether it is a true biological problem or simply a response to something in the environment, but the nuns who taught me had simple remedies for both hyperactivity and boredom. The kids who were highly active were given loads of responsibility and were often sent on errands to other classrooms or the office to work off their restlessness. The highly intelligent kids who complained of boredom were assigned a job tutoring those students who were struggling. A mother I once knew started every school year the same way with her three children. She asked them to set four goals for themselves: a social goal, a physical goal, a learning goal, and a spiritual goal. A social goal might be to make three new friends or join an organization like Boy Scouts. A physical goal might be to learn how to jump rope or join a sports team. A learning goal might be to improve one's reading ability or math grade, and a spiritual goal might be to do one kind thing every day for someone at school. Each month she would sit down with her kids and have them evaluate and/or refine their goals to help them follow through and to give them encouragement. Even parents who don't ask their children to set yearly goals might help motivate their children to enjoy school by having a dinner conversation each night about what they learned that day. Too many parents will ask the dreaded question "What did you do in school today?" as their children walk through the door. We all know the standard answer: "Nothing." A more productive plan might be to warn the children that each night at the dinner table (this is one good reason to have dinner together each night) the children will be asked to talk about one thing they learned at school. This could range from something they learned in the classroom to something they found out on the playground or school bus. Children then get in the habit of being on the lookout for something to say at the dinner table. This reinforces learning and makes them into teachers of their parents who, hopefully, will express great astonishment and interest in their children's new discoveries. They also begin to see school as a place of learning, not a place of drudgery. A final thought I've had for years is that the amount of homework teachers give should be minimal, at least in the early grades. Children spend many hours at school each day. To give them hours of homework in addition to that can make many children hate school. When young children get home they need to run and play, not sit at the kitchen table arguing with their parents over their homework. Of course, I'm not an elementary school teacher and I don't know all the pressures they are under to assign homework, but I would hope most of the formal learning could occur in the classroom so that time at home could be family time, something far too many children are deprived of because of working parents and hours of homework. School has always been such a joy to me that I continue to spend time in an environment of learning, teaching graduate students in psychology. At the start of each class I tell my students that I hope we all accomplish three goals: learn, teach, and have fun. That's my wish for all students, young and old, this and every school year: that they learn from the teacher as well as each other, that they teach and help each other, and that they have a lot of fun in the process. |