Kids or Young Adults?

I found this picture online from the 1940s. High school students. Are they really the same age as our high school kids now? Is it me, or, considering kids today, they a) have prolonged adolescence phases (maybe going into someone's 20s and beyond) and b) mature sexually way too fast. The joke in the teacher's lunch room is that our students are having a lot more sex than we are. Some girls in the high school are now into other girls; basically, they've done everything else, so this is "the next thing" to try.

So we have sexually mature teens who cannot write complete sentences and cannot find the nation of Turkey on a world map. I often think of my grandfather, born in 1917. He only finished the 8th grade, it was the Depression, he went into the CCC and then straight to the army, was in the Pacific during WWII and worked in a machine shop after the war until he retired. For someone who only finished the 8th grade, he seemed to do alright in his day, given the nature of how the US economy was largely based at that time, manufacturing. Even with a one-room schoolhouse, 8th grade education, he could read and write better than a good number of my students today. That generation was unique, as every generation is. But they had to grow up a lot quicker than the rest of us and they most likely married the first person they slept with (can we imagine that?) And then I look out at our kids, could these kids today do what our granparents were doing at 14, 16, or 18? I really don't know. And then of course, tomorrow is Memorial Day, a national holiday, another day off of school. I wonder how many of our students think to acknowledge the significance of Memorial Day, or even know what it really is.

Counting Down The Days...

The last month of the school year is ...X. You can call it what you want. I have mixed feelings of course. Here are just a handful of events going on: the spring musical, honors night, county and state track meets, choir concerts, pizza parties, band concerts, cheerleading tryouts, dance team tryouts, pizza parties (oh, did I already mention that? Well, there are certainly more than one), ice-cream social, open house for middle schoolers, class and club picnics, field trips to amusement parks, day-camps, prom, senior all-night party, graduation. One would think that with graduation, events are over, but not necessarily if seniors graduate before the official last day of school. I hate to admit it, but at this point in the school year, VERY LITTLE learning is actually taking place. Besides the many events, teachers and students alike are burned-out. Students are working on "projects" whatever those may be at this point, something to keep them occupied and appeased. Sticking to a regular schedule is impossible with all of the assemblies, events--not to mention the number of students out each day for field trips and sporting events. Thus all of the empty desks.

Notes from Lunch Duty: Part One

Lunch duty is my least favorite duty (although I'd rather do lunch duty than gym duty for 30 minutes before school starts). My station is near the restrooms in the cafeteria. Another staff member is there (the baseball coach) so at least one of us needs to be near the restrooms at all times. We chat, or take turns "standing guard". Otherwise I walk around and talk to students. And I ALWAYS take note of what the students are eating. It's not good. There are a couple of boys whose lunch everyday consists of 2 orders of french fries, a jumbo Snickers bar and 2 Mt. Dews (one for lunch, one to drink on their way to class!).

I tease them a bit. "Where's your green vegetables? That's not a lunch! What would your grandma say if she saw you eating that?" Or, "I'll give you $5 if you eat a lunch I bring you tomorrow!, How about $10?"

They just laugh at me, but part of me is not kidding. I wonder if thier parents know? The worst part? After eating all that junk, these kids are supposed to go to class and learn...

Cardinal rule of thumb: the class you teach immediately after lunch will be your worst class of the day. Most definitely! There's nothing like a bunch of 15-16 year olds after they've had two plates of french fries, a jumbo Snickers and two Mt. Dews...

Schools, Security and Campus Community

Given the recent shootings at Virginia Tech, we are again confronted with the reality of such incidents. I was in my second year of teaching when Columbine occurred and that was indeed a frightening wake-up call for large suburban schools with "cliquey" student bodies. The high school where I worked at the time was about 1760+ students and growing. There were over 120 adult staff members. Prior to Columbine we had parking lot attendants and hall monitors on walkie-talkies with the assistant principal (for discipline) and after Columbine, all doors to the outside would be locked except for the very front entrance with with a security station. Students could not carry around backpacks or large purses, they could not wear jackets or coats to class. It took three years for the security staff to recognize me as a staff member and there were other teachers whom I barely said hello to in three years. My point is that when our schools get to be so large, we really lose a sense of community; students and staff alike unfortunately do not get the opportunity to become acquainted and develop (respectful) relationships. A friend of mine grew up in a small community in the upper midwest where his graduating class was only a couple dozen students. And that's small, most definitely. But he speaks very highly of his school system that had "a rural school complex" which, according to him, was why his school compensated students with huge tech grants (plenty of computers around), distance learning opportunities for AP courses and Latin, and many specific programs catered to the interests of the students. I think back to my high school graduation (367 students) and I remember kids walking across the stage and whispering to my neighbor, "who's that?". Even for someone like me who was on the yearbook staff, I still didn't recognize names and faces of students in my graduating class. It's too bad in a way. I also attended a Big 10 university and certainly had an excellent educational experience, but aside from a roomate and one other person, I have no contacts with any of the people I went to college with, while friends of mine who went to rather small schools get their alumni newsletter and know just about everyone featured in it from the time they attended. Again, it goes back to the idea of community and as I've gotten older and realized more and more how valuable community is, I wish that perhaps I had entertained the idea of going to a small college, even one without a recognizable name, if anything, to be a part of such a community later on in life. And of course when I got out of college, I quickly realized employers could care less as to where I went to school, but rather could I do the job and do it well and a Bachelor's diploma from a big university may not matter all that much, although some would disagree with me (I have a friend in business/banking and for him, it's all about the institution and diploma). At any rate, I think many out there would agree that community is important and that we need to value community on a number of levels. When I look at schools' mission statements using such language as "all students" or "all learners", I have to point out that when you have a school that is large, you cannot use "all" in a mission statement: it is false advertising. In large schools, we simply cannot accomodate "all" students, yet our schools claim that they do. With smaller schools, at least we could better attempt to accomodate "all" students and that goes for smaller classrooms as well, but that's a whole other issue I won't indulge in at the moment...