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Bright 2nd grader & school truancy / part-time home-school?



 
 
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  #211  
Old October 31st 03, 08:34 PM
lizzard woman
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Default Family-friendly employers


"Robyn Kozierok" wrote in message
...
(snip)

A family-friendly employer is a wonderful thing! I made it a priority
when job hunting and am forever grateful!


I suspect there are few employers more family friendly than the US Federal
Government though this may vary a bit from Agency to Agency.


--
sharon, momma to savannah and willow (11/11/94)


  #212  
Old October 31st 03, 08:40 PM
Jenrose
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Default Bright 2nd grader & school truancy / part-time home-school?


"Joni Rathbun" wrote in message
...

On Fri, 31 Oct 2003, Circe wrote:


Well, I agree that the disruption is unfortunate, but I also think it

was
the teacher's *choice* to delay the material until all the students were

in
class. The teacher presumably knew what the material was. The teacher
presumably could have given the material to the parents of the students

who
were going to be out and had them impart it to their children. We're not
talking about calculus here, are we? We're talking about curriculum for
third graders, and I'm sure most parents in affluent schools are

perfectly
capable of homeschooling third-grade material for a few days.



I'm in the middle on all of this. Flexibility must exist on both
sides. Both sides are damned if they do and damned if they don't.
And we all have examples of responsible behavior and abuses of
the system, etc., etc., etc.

I think it's the attitude toward what is being taught and
how it's being taught that bothers me -- a little.

In nearly 20 years of teaching, I've never used a textbook
or generated a mass of worksheets to be used. Much of what I've
done has been process-based. For example, when we did a multi-
class social studies unit on community and government with
second graders, we visited all the city government offices,
developed our own community, our own government and community
infrastructure, court system, etc. Each student played an integral part
in our community and government. Their counterparts
in the city came to the school on a regular basis to work
directly with them. And what we planned for next week was highly
dependent upon what happened this week... Not the same thing
as working your way from chapter one to chapter two in a
textbook.

That sort of thing is not easily packaged in a hand-out
that can be sent home with parents to duplicate.


And that's one reason why I rarely take my daughter out of school for
anything but illness (and I just flat out won't send her to school with a
fever--I hate it when parents do...) Because her teachers *don't* use a
canned curriculum and it's really interesting and involved and my kid
*wants* to be there. But our teachers are flexible enough that they have
never *once* blinked or seemed like they minded in the least when I *did*
take my daughter out early for an afternoon or to extend a weekend for a
trip. It's rare... maybe once a year that I take her out for a full day,
twice a year that I get her out of school early for something. If her work
consisted of worksheets and textbook reading (her classes don't have any
textbooks, as far as I know...) as the majority of her education, we
wouldn't bother with school at all, period.

Jenrose


  #213  
Old October 31st 03, 09:11 PM
Ericka Kammerer
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Default Bright 2nd grader & school truancy / part-time home-school?

Circe wrote:


Well, I agree that the disruption is unfortunate, but I also think it was
the teacher's *choice* to delay the material until all the students were in
class. The teacher presumably knew what the material was. The teacher
presumably could have given the material to the parents of the students who
were going to be out and had them impart it to their children. We're not
talking about calculus here, are we? We're talking about curriculum for
third graders, and I'm sure most parents in affluent schools are perfectly
capable of homeschooling third-grade material for a few days.



Actually, it was more orientation information--
class rules and policies, how to do various class and
school specific stuff, assessments that would have been
difficult to make up, etc. So it wasn't something
the child could make up or the parent could teach,
but it was something quite important to the child's ability
to navigate the class successfully. The teacher *could*
have decided to let those kids sink or swim, but it
would have made life very difficult for the students
who missed it, not to mention it would have created
a headache for the teacher who would have either had
to write everything down to send it home, or would have
had to take time away from other students to convey
the information. And the assessments would have had
to be done outside of normal school hours or would have
required taking class time away from the other students.


IOW, you're blaming parents for a decision that was really made by the
teacher. If you were sure that every single absence was the result of an
illness or truly justifiable reason, the delay would have been just as
disruptive.



Absolutely--but we think differently of
absences for different reasons! If someone calls

you to back out of an engagement, you feel very

differently depending on whether they have to go
to a relative's funeral or whether they "have" to
go to someone else's party.

Best wishes,
Ericka


  #214  
Old October 31st 03, 10:37 PM
Donna Metler
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Default Bright 2nd grader & school truancy / part-time home-school?


"Joni Rathbun" wrote in message
...

On Fri, 31 Oct 2003, Belphoebe wrote:


"Ericka Kammerer" wrote in message
...

I've never heard of you doing anything that I thought
was inappropriate. However, while I agree with the idea that
people should be flexible on both sides, I also think attendance
is a serious thing. I've pretty much had it up to *here* with
people who don't place any value on the time of other people
than themselves (not saying you're in that camp at all). I
do see a bit of a pattern among many people--people who can't
be bothered to show up when they say they will at a party,
college students who skip classes (and who almost invariably
expect you to recount your lecture for them)


I teach at the college level, and have also been thinking about this
phenomenon as I've read this thread. I've always been very careful to

put
my attendance policy on my course outline and to explain it on the first

day
of class. Students get a certain number of "free" absences during the
semester, and once that number has been exceeded, their course grade is
lowered a certain amount for each "extra" absence. Students do not need

to
show me doctor's notes or other documentation to prove that they had a
legitimate reason to miss class. And bringing such documentation does

not
"excuse" their absences, so I urge students to save their absences for

true
emergencies.

Students always nod and say they understand all this when I explain it.

But
then I'll always have students who try to get me to make an exception.
"Dear Professor: I will miss class the Friday before and the Monday

after
spring break, because my flight leaves early and returns late. Please
excuse my absence, and let me know if we're doing anything important on
those days. Thanks for understanding." It's not unusual for more than

half
my students to miss class right before and right after a break.

I had a student who missed all of her "free" absences, and then was

absent
on a peer-review day (for a writing class). Missing a peer-review day
carried extra penalties--losing points on the final paper. When the

student
returned for the next class session, she told me that her parents had
"kidnapped" her to take her home to celebrate her birthday.


What is taught and how it is taught makes a difference. Sadly, many
of my college courses were such that you COULD skip and still do
very well -- especially at the 100/200 level. It was really a bit
of a shock for me back when. I'd have been happy to meet an instructor
like you tho after my experiences with the other courses, you might
have had to do some convincing Your students today have probably
had similar experiences.

That said, all my years in college, I only had one professor
present an attendance policy. He allowed NO absenses for any
reason. He promised to grade down one grade for each day missed.
As luck would have it, I had a required art course that required
a field trip which would cause me to miss that professor's course
one day. I tried to make arrangements. I got a professor from
Course B to talk to the professor from Course A. But I still
got the B.

I didn't think it was fair or appropriate and protested
to the powers higher up. My B was changed to an A.

I had a professor who said this-no absenses are excused for any reason, and
anything missed due to an absense cannot be made up. (I had four classes
with this particular person, over my last two years of college)

The day of his midterm, I went to student health that morning, because I was
feeling just plain lousy and my stomach hurt. The student health doctor
looked at me, and told the nurse to drive me to the hospital. (appendicitis)
However, when I got there, I wouldn't sign the intake papers, because I HAD
to take this guys test (I had a pretty high fever). Finally, she called
Prof. Bigshot, and let him know that he had a very ill student who wouldn't
sign in to the hospital, because of his test policy. He came over to the
hospital to tell me himself that I was excused from the test, and could make
it up later. He also made arrangements with all my other professors for me
to make up their exams when I got out of the hospital.


His syllabus the next year read that "Absenses will be excused ONLY under
extreme circumstances, which will be determined on a case-by-case basis"-
and when he went over this, he explained that being in the hospital counted
as "extreme circumstances".



  #215  
Old November 1st 03, 06:10 PM
Vicki
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Default Bright 2nd grader & school truancy / part-time home-school?

"Jenrose" wrote in message
s.com...

BTW... you can see a summary of our program at
http://schools.4j.lane.edu/family/index.html

The site just went live today.


It looks like a wonderful program. Nice web site too!
Vicki


  #216  
Old November 1st 03, 10:07 PM
Belphoebe
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Default Bright 2nd grader & school truancy / part-time home-school?


"Joni Rathbun" wrote in message
...

I'd have been happy to meet an instructor
like you tho after my experiences with the other courses, you might
have had to do some convincing Your students today have probably
had similar experiences.


Having read your other post regarding your own teaching, I can say I wish
I'd had a teacher like you in grade school--your approach sounds wonderful.


I could understand the frustration you expressed in that post, since I've
always done quite a bit of group work in my courses, and missing class makes
a difference not only for the student who missed, but for those in his/her
group.

That said, all my years in college, I only had one professor
present an attendance policy. He allowed NO absenses for any
reason. He promised to grade down one grade for each day missed.
As luck would have it, I had a required art course that required
a field trip which would cause me to miss that professor's course
one day. I tried to make arrangements. I got a professor from
Course B to talk to the professor from Course A. But I still
got the B.

I didn't think it was fair or appropriate and protested
to the powers higher up. My B was changed to an A.


I've always understood that emergencies do happen, so I'd never insist on a
zero-absence policy.

--
Belphoebe



 




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