I Hope This Is Not What My Future Holds
I’ve mentioned before that I didn’t get in trouble at school. I was obedient, respectful and I knew that teachers and administrators had the most authority. So, if my respectful and obedient actions holds true, I will turn into what is deemed a “helicopter parent”.
Definition of Helicopter Parent: Parent(s) that hover over their children, scooping them up before they can make a mistake.
What is the end result? Children who become adults and cannot cope with failure. Does any of this start to ring true for you? Sara Bennett and Nancy Kalish put into words the very things I’ve tried to say many times. I’m just a bit wordy (you know, like I talk too much). They accomplished putting into words so many of my thoughts, it is odd.
TCAH quotes a parent as saying, “We made our daughter do the homework even though we didn’t believe in it because we were obedient parents, which I really regret, and because I was worried about what would happen to her.”
Sound familiar? Don’t we all do this to some degree in one facet of our child’s life or another? But, the homework issues don’t have to go that far.
Another parent was quoted as saying, “Homework seems to have supplanted teaching. Whatever the teacher hasn’t finished becomes homework”
What does that mean? That means that the parents are expected to take up the slack. And, if this is the case, I’d rather homeschool any day so I could work on my time frame as opposed to allowing someone to half-way do their part and want me to pick up the pieces in a hour or two in the evenings…all at the expense of the child.
October 1st, 2008 at 10:50 am
…I’ll say it again: Homeschooling is a great option [smile].
~Luke
October 1st, 2008 at 3:30 pm
This series of posts on homework is the kind of questioning I went through when deciding what to do about school for our kids. For me, it was the first step into what would be a deep dive into the many “have-tos” of school that didn’t make sense.
So many of the things we associate with school - homework, grades, age-segregation, strict schedules, sitting in rows, etc, are cultural habits. They don’t have meaning in and of themselves, except to continue to support what has already been, or to support the system.
Good luck with dealing with this. I give you huge kudos for sticking with it after all you’ve gone through.