So a friend of mine is complaining about her sons teacher on facebook. This isn't the first time. She says that her son is bored because he isn't challenged and because of this he acts up. Today she complained about the following: Watching Polar Bear Express and making gingerbread houses. Because of this she thinks the adults aren't taking school seriously so neither should her son. She hates that he has nearly 2 weeks off from school etc. Her exact quote was "If the adults at school aren't taking each school day seriously why the hell should he. I'm tired of grounding him for acting up when he's bored. They will either have to learn how to challenge him, or deal with him themselves." It just irks me because I feel like it isn't the whole picture and it feels like she's trivializing the work teachers do. I know I shouldn't take it personally but I was curious to hear your reactions on her statement.
She sounds like the type of parent who can't be pleased. No matter how hard the teacher works--she'll always find a reason to complain.
Sounds like a parent that refuses to take responsibility for her own child. And any mother that complains about having their child around for two weeks probably doesn't enjoy the kid's behavior either.
I have a student with a parent like that right now. "Oh, he's too advanced for your class. He's not being challenged enough. He is constantly bored." This is the same student who makes "meow"ing noises during silent reading, barely turns in homework, turns in three sentences and tries to pass it off as a paragraph, constantly talks to peers during instruction and was recently absent for two weeks due to "vacation". I'm sorry but, if a student is not even doing the bare minimum of work expected, I can't accept that the student isn't "being challenged". If the work comes easy to you, I would think that you would show that by actually doing the work. I know this is kind of off topic to what you posted, but the main message is that I think parents use the "gifted" excuse to cover a lot of misbehavior in the classroom. That way, it's the teacher's fault and not the student's. Do I believe there are some students who do "act up" because they need a more challenging curriculum? Yes. But I don't believe those students come into our classrooms as often as there are parents claiming their children aren't being challenged.
I agree exactly - she says he's gifted but his behavior is horrible. I am not sure that it means he isn't challenged enough. Seems like an excuse
This makes me sad. My grade 5 and 6 students spent some time today decorating gingerbread cookies (we made it one "rotation" during math this morning). One of my grade 6 boys, whose birthday was today, told me that he had never decorated a gingerbread man before and that doing it at school today made it the "best birthday ever". As he was leaving today, he leaned into my arm in a sort of hug and told me that he'd miss me over the break. He learned some valuable lessons today during our pre-holiday activities; he learned that it's important to take time to enjoy the little things, to try something new, to enjoy each other's company and to laugh together.
Honestly, my reaction would be unsubscribing from her updates on Facebook. She's free to vent, but I'd definitely feel the same way you do and I wouldn't want to see it.
Sounds like she needs to homeschool him. Then the only person she could blame for his boredom is HERSELF.
a gifted kid wouldn't be bored,,,he'd be writing a new ending to the story, making connections between book and film, writing or creating projects to show what he understands. This mom is bored. And bitter, and banal..
I would ignore her facebook comments. If she mentioned something to me specifically, I would encourage her to talk with her son's teacher.
Doubtless it's this parents preconceptions and attitude about teachers that seeps into the child and causes him to be a troublemaker. After all if his parents don't respect his teachers why should he? (to take the words of the parent) This parent should get used to picking up her son from suspensions in school quite soon.
I suspect this parent would have a complaint no matter what happened in her child's class. Although, I guess I might just feel like that because I did gingerbread houses with my class too.
I'm so tired of the few pain in the neck parents! They are as bad as their kids. If only we could have more interaction with the many fantastic parents and kids instead of having to spend our time and energy on those who make our lives miserable...I don't even know some of my good kids' parents because they never have a reason to meet with me. What a shame! Just like their bratty kids, they are bratty adults.
I had one of those last year! He was "gifted" but also on an IEP for behavior so I had him on my caseload. Parents excused all of his behavior based on the fact that he was "bored." The child turned in pretty much no work and was failing every subject. He literally did NOTHING in class. There was no indication that he was actually gifted school-wise (parents had gotten a diagnosis from a private company) and the teacher was always saying that if the child wanted advanced work, he needed to show that he understood the "normal" work first (even if that meant just doing the "hardest 5" problems like the gifted specialist was always saying). The parents were honestly harder to deal with than the kid. I would defriend this person, or at the very least hide her status updates from my newsfeed. I would be tempted to argue right back with her, so for me it would be best to just not even see what she was posting!
You can tell the parent you can always find more work for him to do that is challenging if he is caught up in class and has nothing else to do. I'm planning on teaching middle school math after college and if a parent complains to me that their kid is behaving poorly because our work isn't challenging enough for them I'm pulling out the College Algebra and Calculus worksheets.
Facebook is becoming the new "ballpark" that lasts all year. (Around here the ball park is where all the moms gather to complain about school.) Usually one posts something and the rest hop on board.
