This time I hadn’t been making up conversations in my mind of how to approach the teachers. I didn’t have this feeling of anxiety before even going to school. No pain in my stomach as a sign of being reluctant. I just went as if I had an appointment. Today and yesterday we had parent-meetings at school, which is basically an overload of waiting in line and listening to teachers talking in circles and only a few who are capable of making a distinction between students and not replaying the same judgements over and over again to all parents.
The kids were still at school for extra lessons, my son J. was waiting downstairs where the porter sits and my daughter A. went up with us. This way we could stand in line for three different teachers at the same time and A. filled in the place of the one that had to go inside the classroom. Very effective and this way we were ready in almost no time. Normally I do not go and talk with the teachers alone, I was always afraid I was missing out on something or totally not understanding the message. I’m over it, I found out that they rarely have really something to say, so why making a fuss over something like this. I understood what they said and was able to respond, maybe not in beautiful sentences, but the message got across.
All these years when a teacher told something about my child that was really no reality, I got mad and mean. Mad in my back chat and mean in my words. Did this help so far? Nope. So no valid strategy and time for another one. One teacher said that my son J. while doing a paper, had written his name and all the questions but no answers and handed it to this teacher. So I asked the teacher what J. his motives were, since I hadn’t seen J. that day at home and had not spoken to him yet. The teacher said he didn’t know why the paper was empty and J. didn’t fill in anything. I said this is to me weird behavior how come you as a teacher do not know J.’s motives for not responding to the questions? He said he simply didn’t know. I told him that I would find out why. When I spoke to J. he said he had answered the questions, but he hadn’t written much, simply because he didn’t recall it. In other words, he has to study more.
Then another teacher spoke about my daughter A. on how she had to score better on his subject and that he saw her grades go up and down. So I asked him if he knew why this happened and he said he didn’t have a clue. He had found out that A. was doing well in class, but within tests and homework she wasn’t able to perform. I said, maybe she isn’t able to apply the information. So I asked him how we were going to fix this problem since she is doing her exam this year. He said: she can come to me before or after class and ask questions if she wants.
So this was a cool new experience since I normally, when teachers were telling crap, immediately went into my back chat and became less open to hear what they were saying. The fact that most teachers and students have different truths, isn’t giving me the liberty to get mean and rude. Also this time I asked what we were going to do about certain problems to keep all of us within our responsibility. I just approached it in the moment and if a teacher wants to lie, he has to deal with the consequences himself. I cannot make him change his mind and I cannot take this personal. Defending my children as I always did is only making teachers angry. Then when they see my child they are reminded of me and they see my child in a negative way. Because going to these meetings is only to put positivity to the name of my child and show them that we care as parents. Never something constructives happend
within this kind of conversations. The current education system is simply not a place where they think about what’s best for all. We all know it, but don’t want to do anything about it. It simply is as it is.
While waiting in line some interesting things occurred. People were talking about the teachers and how they didn’t care anymore. How teachers were no longer teaching out of passion and no longer explaining till the student understood the materials. So I said that most teachers were seeing teaching as a job and not as a passion. It’s simply a way to make a living, so all about money. People agreed. Then one dad said that it was better in the old days and that things had changed. I said, we also changed, we do not educate our children the way we were educated. So the result is another type of child/student and another type of teacher. One not necessarily better or worse than the other. Then another dad said: but in the end we educate our children the same way as our parents. And yes that’s pre-programming and following your download.