Week "9"

What have people said that's interesting?

“...the three children had one another for comfort and support over the course of their miserable lives. And while this did not make them feel entirely safe, or entirely happy, it made them feel appreciative.”

-Lemony Snicket

          Last class in Teacher Cadet we ranted a bit about how it's a teacher's job to spot a child who is suffering of going through abuse, whether socially, emotionally, or physically. And as the quote above suggests, reaching out to help and protect these children may not always make their world turn inside out from misery into eternal happiness and wonder, but what it can do is show them they have someone. Maybe a child you approach will resist. Maybe a friend you confront will lie. They'll still know that there's someone who sees and wants to care and help, and that's one more positive thing than they had before, isn't it? While it may not take away the abuse, or may make them upset that you're prying, it will make them know you're there.

What's happening in education?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2012/nov/29/bogus-teacher-forged-qualifications-jailed

          Steven Morris, writer at The Gaurdian online news, spoke yesterday of a teacher that was arrested and put in jail for eighteen months due to faking her teaching qualifications. The judge who condemned her said that her "entirely self-centered approach to this has blighted the careers of everyone [she] taught." Morris added that, in her defense, she had a troubled childhood in Africa and only faked the information for social gain, not financial gain. I still have to agree with the judge, though, that it was approached selfishly. Her fraud took her to teaching positions in advanced biology classes and even scoring the exams for said classes nationally. Her attorney, Lee Bremridge, later commented that it was ironic the fake teacher was clever enough to forge information that she could have achieved the same status legitimately. Honestly, it's great to want to help children, even if your priority is somewhat to help yourself, but there comes a point in an airplane crash where if you put the oxygen mask on your child before yourself, you become a passed out, 120+ weight in their way instead of a strong adult there to help them. This teacher fits there, to me, barely crossing the line from help to hinderence. 

And what have I learned this weak?

          Again, it's been a packed week. Our class has been focusing on barriers still, social, physical, emotional, and so forth. It reminded me a lot of my first year in school when my social life was stunted by what people called a 'sheltered' lifestyle. I forced myself into a lot of miscommunication situations just by not having the pop-culture definitions of certain words, and once it got around to some that I was homeschooled, all my 'differences' were blamed on that. A girl in a group I worked in thought my love of old music and figurines, unconventional as it apparently was, came from my homeschooling. A boy that sat behind me in one class thought my disdain towards profanity was chalked up to homeschooling. A girl in another class accused me of basically being racist, unfriendly, and discriminatory because a friend of hers who was homeschooled had such traits. So all this was brought back to mind and just yesterday a boy in a disruptive class was talking loudly (as usual) and mentioned a friend of his that saved up his money to by a minivan, which, in this classmates opinion, was the stupidest car he could have bought. And he decided to pointedly mention "Why? Because he's a homeschooler!" I'm not sure where these stereotypes and misconceptions come from. . . but I'm glad the occasional violent accusation and ditching by friends due to misunderstandings is all I have to go through. The situations we've talked about have kids going through much worse. And I'll mention here at the end that teachers were in almost every above situation backing me up against the unintentional ''bullies.'' Go teachers!