As a former middle school teacher, I have spent hours in the classroom.  Those hours have all been leading the class.  I have taught fourth, fifth, and sixth grade.  I have substituted for seventh and eighth grades.  I love this middle school age group of eleven-to-thirteen.  (As a teacher, I mean.  As a parent, I find working with my own boys much more challenging!)  Read more »

Ever since I was a little girl, I was taught by my parents that school was a place where you could expand your mind and learn about the potential you have within yourself, and become whatever you wanted to be in life. With the passing of time, these ideals have not changed, but have actually expanded further for our kids than anyone could possibly have imagined. 

Unfortunately, so has crime and violence; we hear about it on TV and the radio, read about it in newspapers and magazines. And school shootings have sadly become a regular occurrence.

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Have you read about the Mesquite School District school board decision? As reported in the Dallas news, Taylor Pugh, a four-year old pre-kindergarten boy, was told to braid and pin up his long hair or continue to be separated from his classmates for not following the school dress code. The code prohibits long-haired boys from “disrupting” classrooms.

Taylor, in pre-school, has been hanging out in the library with an aide since November and will continue to remain there until his parents cut his hair — or the board changes the 40-year-old dress code policy.

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A good friend of mine called me the other day to report that her son had told her, “Dad says you should stay out of my business.”  This sixth grade boy was saying these words to his Mom in the school office in front of the school secretary.  The school called because her son was not completing homework, was talking back to teachers, and getting into the occasional fight.

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As a parent of a special needs child, one often does not know where to begin. It all can depend on how old the child is when he or she is diagnosed. If a child is age 3 or older, one of the first things a parent should do is to request his or her child to have an individualized education plan (IEP).

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When our son TJ was nearing the end of 7th grade, he had not yet earned any AR*, or “Accelerated Reading” points.  In an attempt to resolve this before the deadline, we created scheduled reading times and reading quantities (number of pages per day) but he still could not finish his books or pass an AR test.

With the end of the grading period approaching, I decided I would read his AR book to him so I could discuss each chapter with him in hopes that it would help him remember the story better.

One evening as we were discussing a chapter I’d just read to him, I was getting very frustrated because he could not tell me much about the story. I told him, “Just picture it in your head so you don’t have to memorize it all… picture it like a movie in your head.”  He told me he couldn’t do that and my response was, “Of course you can!  You’ve seen lots of movies.  You know how it works.”

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I got a call from my son’s teacher last week. Apparently, he used an inappropriate word and perhaps a hand gesture to accompany it to another child. That child’s parent had called the principal. The principal asked my son Builder’s teacher to handle it. She did. Builder denied it ever happened.

I know better.

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As a parent of two children who have gone through a bullying episode, I can tell you that the emotional, mental and physical stress can be overwhelming for both children and parents. After all, as a parent your natural instincts tell you loud and clear to protect your children against the forces that cause them pain — whether it’s mental, emotional or physical.

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