I thought I knew what discipline meant. The Latin root is disciplina which encompasses education, training and order. Tufts says that disciplina is instruction, tuition, teaching, training, and education and I’d always known discipline to be a benign word, positive even as it relates to children and education. Unfortunately I was wrong. You see, when I look it up at Webster’s the first definition is that discipline and punishment are synonymous and that “instruction” as a synonym to discipline is now obsolete. Academia needs to either reclaim the obsolete use of …
Tough Love With More Love Than I’ve Ever Given
6th grade is hard. There are lockers and multiple classrooms and teachers who expect you to take care of yourself. Alexander didn’t turn in three pieces of homework this week and he’d completed all of them. He’d simply lost them somewhere in the locker or in transition. When I dug into his binders with him I noticed graded homework assignments that were less than stellar not because he didn’t understand but because he didn’t take his time and do good work. My kids are smart, they were just sort of …
Girl Power
I’ve spent the last two days connecting with amazing women. Every bone in my body aches, I’m tired of smiling and even more tired of talking. I just want to listen. I’m off to a party hosted by DECA, I’m pretty sure everyone there will just want to talk about themselves. Today that is a good thing, I don’t have any words left so it’s best that I’m surrounded by people who need to talk. The kids are done with the work part of school, there is no more homework …
Motherhood and Sinking Feelings
Jane has too much on her plate. This morning she had no skirts, they’re all in her locker at school. She’s forgotten to bring them home. I know that she has four. I’ve bought four for her within the last month. Math was full of tears, and science brought on sobbing. I can’t help her with this. She just has to work harder, and probably get rid of the weekday sports. I also have to shut off all telephones and computers and make the evenings 100% about the kids and …
Just One Of the 738 Reasons I Love My Kids’ School
It’s back to school night tonight and K-3 doesn’t have homework. Alexander is thrilled, and I don’t blame him. Jane was telling me she loves her fifth Grade teacher because she, “deals in reality”. Reality means that you can check your math with a calculator (they exist in the real world), many tests will be open book (resources exist in the real world), and the fifth grade has homework tonight, because the reality of it is that kids don’t attend back to school night. Yeah baby. We’ve got a teacher …
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