Maybe I'm just old school

So, my son's teacher replies via email:
" I don't think I was nearly as firm as I could have been in this situation."

What? The child was handing in work from his writing portfolio and he was missing one piece of paper which happened to already be placed in his school memory box b/c this Mom was proud of this particular writing piece and didn't realize that it needed to be returned to school.

LACK of communication.

After telling me that she tried to tone down her firmness with my son b/c "we both know" he is sensitive, she doesn't once express any concern that the kid returned to his desk crying and that she never checked on him.

I find out today that he privately asked to speak with the guidance counselor. Um, yeah. I think you were firm enough.

It's been a weird year. Where is the compassion for the student? The year began in this manner with a very strange encounter that our son had with his teacher that led to a rather heated discussion between us parents, the teacher and the principal. Now...it's ending on this sour note. There have been little issues all year with her teaching style but nothing that warranted calling the Principal or asking for another meeting.

Until this past Friday. And now, she's making it sound like a horrible offense that my child was missing one piece of paper. One piece of paper that Mom and Dad showed off to our son's grandparents and then proudly put in his memory box.

A piece of paper that she says "the fact of the matter is that he lost something that he is responsible for". Um, yeah. No. His parents failed to return it to school.

Now, I could see this severe uproar if missing papers and such were a constant part of my son's school career. But. Um. No.

I'm not in to conspiracies much but I'm gonna think again that the low scores that we put on that anything-but-anonymous survey just might have acted as some catalyst. I don't know. I'm just sayin'. Maybe.

Nicolas came out of school today and he's okay. But he's not his jovial, happy go lucky self. And shouldn't the last week of school be a little bit more, well, exciting? Maybe I'm just old school.

Comments

[traci curth]

Oh. No. She. Didn't.

Wow. That is just amazing and incredibly irresponsible of that teacher. I have to ask....is this particular teacher younger or older? (or put another way: is she relatively new at this or is she a veteran teacher?).

On the upside...at least your son is not going to be in her class anymore and hopefully he can move on and not think back on this.

[Kristen]

Ok, Kim. I beamed you the land and see pn Twitter but after reading this I see you are going to need more. Here's 1st class airfare ;) and chauffeured transportation. Hang in there!

[Kim]

New teacher. Willing to give her the benefit of the doubt on many things. Compassion is a wonderful thing. Just wish she felt the same!

[Kim]

There. Feel better now. Must be that special virtual trip that Kristen packaged together for me. Thanks for helping me through my challenging mom moments.

[Allison @ Slice of Heaven]

My mom and dad have almost 80 years combined teaching experience and I just read these posts to her. My mom was horrified and stated that the most unfortunate effect this has is that "the teacher might have just killed his enthusiasm for learning and that is unacceptable!!!"

I am so sorry for this happening. I do hope these last few days get better and the year ends on a good note!