Search Results for: blog are you a teachers worst nightmare

Paying for Your Child’s Bad Behavior in School

What kind of punishment would really hit you where it hurts in regards to paying for your child’s bad behavior in school? British government officials say parents of poorly behaved students are no longer deterred by moves to shame the family name as punishment to get their kids to act properly, so they’ve decided to hit moms and dads where it really hurts—-in their wallets. According to reports, parents in the United Kingdom – whose kids attend state schools – will now be required to sign a contract that promises their children will behave while at school. The government’s new … Continue reading →

Would You Allow Your Child to Live in a Co-ed Dorm Room?

Given that I spent my entire freshman year at the University of Wisconsin-Madison holed up in a girls-only dorm affectionately (though, not accurately) known as the “Virgin Vault,” my answer to the question posed in the title of this blog would be a resounding: “HELL NO!” But that’s just me. After all, there’s still a good chance that my precious daughter could end up in a convent, which would make it a moot issue. Regardless of my opinion, the subject of teens living together in the same room at college is as real as it gets for parents of students … Continue reading →

Unexpected School: A Student’s Worst Nightmare

I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that Wal-Mart has already started stocking its back-to-school supplies. So long beach towels and sun chairs. The area, where just last week, I picked up a mini cooler for my daughter’s summer soccer camp is now filled with pencils, pens, paper and shiny new scissors. The new arrangement was met by more than just a few sighs from the parent-shoppers I passed. If Wal-Mart’s back-to-school displays are disconcerting for them, imagine how it must feel for students and parents in Southern California. Thanks to a clerical error, kids at Dickson Elementary in Chino and … Continue reading →

How NOT to Help Your Kid Get Into College

Here’s some news that will help ease the guilt of all you parents who desperately want to give your children a leg up on the stiff competition that faces them on their journey to institutes of higher education. So you occasionally help out with your student’s science projects or you maybe drafted a few of his research papers and had him pass it off as his own. Not good. But, definitely not as bad as what Caroline Maria McNeal did to help increase her daughter’s chance of getting into the college of her choice. The overzealous (see: desperate) mom, who … Continue reading →

Driver’s Education—Who Was Your Teacher?

I’ll never forget my driver’s ed teacher. My grandma had the patience of a saint. Seriously. My then 72-year-old grandmother is the person I credit with teaching me how to drive a car. Well, her and Mr. Malingus, my high school driver’s ed teacher. He’s the one my parents paid to teach me how to handle our family’s Toyota on the road, but it was my beloved grandma who really helped me pass my road test. In Hawaii (where I was born and raised), you are allowed to obtain a driver’s license at age 15. (Less than a year after … Continue reading →

How Much Do You Help With Homework?

School’s out for the summer, which means kids are getting a break from mountains of homework. Only in some households, students aren’t the only ones excited about the homework reprieve—-parents are cheering too, especially the ones who regularly cross the line between parental involvement and parental takeover. Be honest; how many times have you completed your child’s homework assignment (to spare yourself from hearing him whine, complain and belly-ache), rather than simply provide assistance to your frustrated child and let him finish the project by himself? A recent study shows that a “disturbing” amount of parents admit to being “overly … Continue reading →

Do You Punish Your Kids for Bad Grades?

If you are the Generals from Chesapeake, Virginia, your kid not only gets punished for coming home with a bad report card, but his punishment makes front-page news. It’s hard not to end up in the paper when you have your 15-year-old standing near a busy intersection wearing a chest-to-trunk poster board displaying his bad grades for hours on end. According to reports, Trenton O’Neal’s parents were fed up with their teen’s lack of effort in school and decided to publicly humiliate him. “He hadn’t been trying at all,” the boy’s dad, Rev. Donald General Jr., pastor of Perfecting Saints … Continue reading →

Are You a Teacher’s Worst Nightmare?

In Japan, they’re called “monster parents,” and now teachers there have a new way of dealing with them. You might know a few monster parents yourself. They’re hard not to notice. Typically, they are the moms and dads who are constantly complaining and making unreasonable demands on schools and teachers. Most of them are overbearing, pushy, and some of them go as far as threatening educators. But, instead of fighting back with their fists, teachers in Japan are taking a new training course to learn how to deal with these pushy parents without resorting to physical violence. Japan’s Ministry of … Continue reading →

School Food Fight Leads to Jail Time

When you pack your child’s lunch in the morning the last place you consider it will end up is on the wall of the school cafeteria. Unfortunately, that’s exactly where dozens of lunch items stuck after a huge food fight broke out earlier this month at a Chicago middle school. In the end, tuna sandwiches, which were made into torpedoes and apples used as attack weapons, were spattered all over the cafeteria at the Calumet middle-school campus of Perspectives Charter Schools, in the Gresham neighborhood on the South Side. Even more disconcerting was the fact that police were called in … Continue reading →

Sexual Innuendo Gets Teacher Fired

I don’t know about you, but when I look at the state of Florida on a map, the last thing I see is a phallic symbol. Of course, I haven’t seen science teacher Ryan Haraughty’s recent depiction of the “Sunshine State.” If I did, I might have a better understanding of why Shawnee Mission school district administrators gave Haraughty the boot a couple of weeks ago. According, to the former Mission Valley Middle School teacher his firing was instigated by a drawing and comment he made about the state of Florida. The Kansas teacher says as part of a lesson … Continue reading →