• 5 of the 7 parents said their children were assinged summer work by their local school district.
• 4 of  those 5 said they felt the schoosl’ assignments were poorly designed.
• 3 of the 5 called the schools’ assignments “not worthwhile”.
• Only 1 of the 7 parents said they planned to have their students do any formal academic work beyond the summer assignments given by their local school district.

Apparently families are not buying into the “use it or lose it” mantra when it comes to academics.

Unfortunately, there is little consequence for taking the summer “off” or not coming into school at your peak form. Most schools spend quite a bit of time shaking the rust off, and all it takes is a small group of unprepared students to hold the whole class back.

Educators we spoke to mentioned concerns about trying to enforce summer work, and several said they were required by their districts to provide an adequate amount of September time for students to complete any required summer work.  Still others say they are told not to grade the quality of the work, only whether it is completed or not.

We wrote earlier about the wasted time at the end of the school year. Here too, we are seeing a chance to improve student understanding and achievement that is not being well utilized.

There has to be a better way.

What were your experiences with summer work?  Please share your thoughts below.

Next year’s class lists are all set, pending the results of state examinations. Barring any surprises, I could tell you who will be in my classroom, who will be in the accelerated pull out, and who has been tagged as a risk to our district’s funding. Not surprisingly, the groupings are the same as they were last year. In fact, we began the process of dividing the student body into groups for the 2011-2012 school year as early as February.

To an extent, this makes sense. Students who perform at a particular level relative to the peers tend to do so month to month and year to year, with little deviation. But, I’ve spent the last two months wondering if that’s a direct result of the expectations we have for them.

The sad truth is that the students who are identified as low achievers in our district, will carry that tag regardless of the grades on their report cards or test scores. High classroom grades are informally perceived as the result of low expectations or soft grading on the part of the teacher. Possibly the student will receive credit for being the best of a sorry lot. But, even if the student were to earn a perfect score on the state test, she won’t be moved into an honors class. She was tagged back in Grade 2, and this will be her label thoughout her schooling. The best she can do is move up to “college prep”.

On the other hand, honors students with the parents who pushed to get them into the gifted program had better watch out. Our guidance team will comb over each of their report cards and test scores, looking for an excuse to drop them into the mainstream track. This strengthens the middle and culls the weak from the advanced class. As it is, 28% of our sixth grade students were in what are considered advanced classes. That’s four sections of Mathematics and five of Language Arts. I guarantee you that there will only be 3 sections of each by the time they reach eighth grade.

Weighing most heavily on my mind this summer are some of the comments made about student placement in our second to last staff meeting. Our lead guidance counselor spoke openly of his resentment of parent pressures on scheduling decisions, effectively saying that the parents should stay out of the process. In this era of rubrics and selection indices, the teachers in my district believe more in a less transparent, more subjective system. We know who the good (and not-so-good) kids are, and from what I hear and see, it looks like we go with our guts over the rubrics more often than we should.

There’s something wrong about hoping your low achievers don’t score too highly on the state test and disrupt the schedules made mid-year. There’s something equally troubling about giving unequal attention to the performance of the student body.

I would call for you all to be more involved in and aware of you children’s placement processes, but I know too well the repercussions you’ll face: increased scrutiny of your chlid’s work and a negative label for your whole family. I’m certainly no saint, and I’ve resented the input of involved parents on more than one occasion, but that’s nothing compared to what I’ve seen go on behind closed doors.

So what’s the answer? Probably to take your lumps and advocate for your child. You just need to ensure that from that point on you and your child follow through. If you ask for extra opportunities, you had best seize them. If you request support, you had best make full use of it. There are countless eyes looking to use you as a means of deflecting all criticism leveled at the process.

Educator x has been teaching related arts classes at a mid-size, suburban middle school since 2002.

• 6 of the 10 teachers said they had stopped recording new grades for their students by May 20
• 8 of the 10 teachers said they had stopped teaching new material by Memorial Day
• When given asked to identify the least academically productive month of the year, 10 of the 10 teachers chose “June”.
• 4 of the 10 teachers included comments in their responses saying they felt the wasted month(s) were justifiable because “it’s too hot to get anything done,” “the kids are shot,” “we covered everything anyway,” or “it’s always that way.”

If an employee spent 10% of his workday browsing the internet instead of working, he would likley be fired. If a store manager shirked her responsibilities every other Friday and let the employees just hang out and play instead of working, she would be fired. Why is our elementary education system allowed to waste 10% of the school year.

Add to this the time spent remediating weaknesses at the start of the next school year and you have to wonder what might be if time were used more efficiently in schools.

We recognize that recognition assemblies, field trips, spelling bees, science fairs, etc., have some educatoinal value; however, it would be difficult for any objective person to look at the difference in productivity during October and June and not question what more could be done.

What were your experiences with what goes on in schools during the final weeks of the year? Please share your thoughts below.

• 8 of the 9 parents said they feel they cannot help their child with their homework
• 0 of the 9 parents said they looked through their child’s math notebooks at least once a week

This troubles us to no end.

If your child is in an Algebra 1, Geometry, or Algebra 2 class, then they should have both a textbook and a set of class notes designed to illustrate how to solve homewok problems. Not to mention that the topics students learn in each of the three courses are progressive and build upon previously learned material, so any child who needs help on Day Q, should have an understanding of days A – P and those resources to help parents understand well enough to make a reasonable attempt at helping with homework. If this is not true, then the issue was allowed to fester too long.

We will run our unScientific study of parent conference comments in the coming weeks, but we will tease that “I can’t help my child with their homework anymore” and “I was never good in [Subject]” topped the list for high school instructors.

We are not suggesting that every adult needs to be at the top of their game in high school mathematics for the rest of their lives; however, they should certainly be able to read the child’s notes and skim the textbook and get the gist of it. Alas, none of the parents we surveyed regularly looked through their child’s math notebooks. As one staffer at J2 Content puts it “A notebook should read like a textbook. Teachers create lesson narratives that students are to either copy verbatim or take notes from. They are creating a resource. If a student cannot open to any page in their notebooks and explain to anyone [especially their parents] what is being illustrated there and describe the concept, then the child is not being an active participant in their education and that issue should be addressed immediately by the parent and teacher.”

What were your experiences with parents helping or being unable to help children with high school mathematics? Please share your thoughts below.

The stress was made even worse by the timing of the move, in the middle of the school year which increased the impact on my children

My kids, as many do, are most comfortable and do their best when our life follows a routine.  Frequent or significant breaks in the routine often impact their ability to succeed in school, and this move was a significnat example. Homework was one the hardest hit areas, especially for  my 9-year-old son. Leading up to the move and after, I saw him leaving homework unfinished (or sometimes was just lost), watched his spelling test grades decline, and witnessed him become increasingly apprehensive about all aspects of school. Despite being a bit older, my daughter was also thrown off of her routine, and this straight-A student suddenly let her algebra grade slip to a C+.

I tried to point out to them that the move itself was a temporary disruption, and that soon we would reestablish our routines. Unfortunately, the quickness of the move can seem like an eternity to a kid.

We only moved 5 miles from our original house, but the move put us on the other sound of the boundary line and  placed us into a new school district. My children were frustrated that such a minor change of location required a change in schools, and they were concerned they did not know anyone in the new district.

Since both of my kids had less than 8 weeks of the school year left, I sought to find a way to allow them to finish the year in their old district. I was able to make that happen, but there was a lot of paperwork and a rigorous approval process we had to go through. The reasons for making it difficult for someone to attend one school district when they reside in another are understandable, but when you combine the anxiety we felt through this process with the stress of moving and you can imagine the family was tense.

Today, the move is nearly complete. The kids are now excited about the new house, and they are adapting to their new surroundings. Their grades are improving and we are reestablishing a routine. Making the teachers aware of the move also helped because it gave the teachers insight on why they might see behavioral shifts during the move.

Going forward, I am confident my kids will be okay. However, if I could go back in time, I’d have for moving during a winter or spring break, or preferably during the summer.

For some reason, my child’s school district has decided that we need 4 opportunities each year (not including make-ups) to buy a photograph of our child in front of a photoshopped patriotic or tropical background.

Honestly, my suspicion is that someone in the district has close ties to the photography studio. I find it hard to believe that these “$18 for two 5×7 photos and 6 wallet-size” are the result of a bid process or that anyone truly believes this many photo ops are necessary. I’m equally suspicious that the school receives a small “finders fee” from each photo package sold. I see no other justification for why these  photo ops are more heavily promoted than school band concerts or back-to-school night. I’d rather have more information about my child’s next science test than to already know the school picture dates for 2012 and 2013.

I admit that I do want to buy the class group photo  (at least until my child was in middle school); however, I also wanted the format to be similar year to year. I buy these photos to record the progression of time and would have preferred Grades 1 – 6 to have been the same size photo, taken from the same approximate angle, on comparable weight photo paper.  Sadly, this is not the case. But hey, what can I expect when I’m only paying $12-15 per photo, right?

The individual “headshots” are another matter. I don’t mind buying one per year (although, again, they are very overpriced). However, I do not appreciate my child being pressured to dress nicely for a second and third “picture day” on which I do not intend to buy the photo. I do not appreciate the letter home telling me (generically) that I may not have realized how much my child has grown and their appearance changed since October December March and that I need to spend $20 or more so that the school-endorsed photographer can save me from my own apathy

How about you send me a letter telling me about how my child is performing academically or behaving? My child brings home five half-completed pieces of artwork each year and somehow gets a B+ in Art. Why not send a letter home explaining why the artwork isn’t complete or even what it was intended to be when it was finished?

I see that another parent has already posted on this site about the burden of fundraising. Many of her points apply here.  I say add school book fairs and picture days to the list of  things that need to be reconsidered. This parent’s bank account can’t take the strain.

[For the record, we will NOT be buying "Package G" today. My child was quite insistent about dressing for school picture day and very upset to learn that we were not going to be making a purchase. As a compromise we took a photo in our living room which I will Photoshop to have some exotic background. I'll print out a couple of 5 x 7 and 8 x 10 photos, maybe some wallet size too... for a total expense of $1.93. Maybe I should look into the school letting me be the photographer for a fifth school picture day.]

You can watch the final 6 minutes of the series finale here.

I actually think it’s a very good message that Lily turns down the chance to go to Paris and live out a dream… because it’s not her dream, it’s Miley’s.

I spent much of the first 45 minutes of the episode telling my daughter how wrong I thought it was for Lily to delay going to college because she couldn’t be with Miley. The early scenes of the episode are episode are full of whining about how the two BFFs are not going to be going to college together.

As a parent, I found this desperation to be together to be one of the things I have dreaded seeing develop in my daughter’s relationships with friends. I’m glad my daughter has someone she considers a best friend, but I expect that relationship to allow her to be her own person. I want to see her care about others but look out for herself at the same time.

“A good friend wouldn’t being saying those things. That’s actually bullying, what she’s doing there” I told my daughter, as Lily moped and repeatedly took shots at Miley for considering a movie deal with Steven Spielberg and Tom Cruise.

“Oh, that’s not right. Lily should do what she wants to do!” I said as Lily decided that if Miley wouldn’t go to college with her then she wasn’t going to go to college either.

What parent doesn’t dread their child making college and career plans based soley on what their high school sweetheart or best friend might do? Not to mention that the Hannah/Miley character is hardly the most stable person for someone to be following.

So, as the episode came to a close (the youtube clip above), we see Lily at the airport, reconsidering her decision. She shows all the strength and self-confidence I would hope to see in my daughter (or son) as she tells Miley that Paris is wonderful… “the problem is it’s your dream…”. Lily’s dream is college, and in a fantastic display of maturity and foresight, she says that no one can know if there might be another movie deal or tour or distraction down the road. Lily wishes Miley well, tells her she loves her, and heads out of the airport to return to college and follow her own dream.

That, to me, would have been the right message to send. Two great friends who grew up together, and love one another like sisters, are ready to go their own way… and that’s okay because both are doing what they really want to do, each is happy for the other, and there’s no reason to think that they won’t end up together down the road – maybe on some reunion show or spin off. At the very least it’s a happy ending.

The folks at Disney must’ve considered it too because this is an alternate ending they included on the DVDs…

However, that’s not the ending they showed on cable. On television (and in the first youtube clip), we are given three minutes more to watch. We see a mopey Miley and a contented Lily each going their own ways, and then ultimately… spoiler alert…. Miley shows up at college ready to be Lily’s roommate.

The studio audience cheers, but this father booed the screen.

The message sent was “if your best friend wont compromise on her dreams, you should compromise on yours.”

Luckily, my daughter doesn’t idolize Hannah Montana , but we still spent a good half-hour talking about what might’ve happened in the finale instead of what we’d seen and whether Hannah really made the right choice.

We talked about whether Hannah would really be happy or if she might always wonder “what if?” We talked about whether Lily might’ve been better off having a chance to make some new friends and not just be in Miley’s shadow. We talked about whether Speilberg and Cruise might’ve said “you know what? Forget her, let’s just get someone else” and never offered Miley a second chance. We talked about whether Miley’s ‘sacrifice’ would make Lilly feel like or Miley expect that Lily had to be the one who gave up her dreams next?

Again, I know this is all fiction on television, but it’s (semi-)realistic fiction. And whether she loves Miley/Hannah or not, she watched the show attentively enough that we had much to talk about afterward about what my daughter would do differently (or the same) if she were in each of those girls’ shoes.

I was reassured and pleased by my daughter’s views on things, but that didn’t lessen my disappointment in Disney and the shows writers for the path they chose to take. As my daughter put it “it’s not like one of the girls was sick or there was some sort of emergency!”

I am happy that my daughter defines best friends as people who care for one another and who will be there when you need them, not as two people who are trying to live the same life.

I do NOT expect television to parent my children, but I do expect Disney to be a source of positive examples – and in this instance I was disappointed in Disney and Hannah Montana.

I’m Jennifer’s mom. I think it’s great the way that Jennifer and your daughter, Olivia, get along so well.

We are in a weird situation, you and me, in that our children are friends, but we hardly know each other. I know very little about you and the way you like to run your household, and you know equally little about me and my way of doing things. Sure, we can discern a few things from how the other’s child behaves, but I know my kid does plenty of things I disagree with. I’m sure the same is true about you and yours.

My daughter hopes and expects that we will become friends. I wouldn’t mind that. Since starting a family most of my social interactions are generated from my husband’s work or my children’s activities. Sometimes my daughter gravitates toward a family that I’m not too comfortable with, but I’m hoping that you and I can maybe grab coffee sometime or get our husbands together and all get together. At least as long as our daughters are friends. If their friendship dissolves, then I suppose it would be come awkward.

Speaking of awkward, there are a few things I would never say to you directly, but I really should.

• Please try not to give my daughter snacks right before a 6 PM pickup from a playdate. Odds are I will be giving her dinner shortly after, and it is both difficult and frustrating to hear that she just ate a bunch of marshmallow treats moments before I arrived.
• Please let me know if your child has invited my daughter over when other friends will be present. My daughter enjoys your daughter’s company a great deal and is sometimes disappointed when what she expects will be one-on-one playtime isn’t. Especially if the other guests are people who she doesn’t care for.
• I respect the rules and freedoms you have in your household, please respect mine. For example, my daughter is NOT on Facebook. I understand that yours has been for years, and you think it is the greatest thing. I am very familiar with how it all works, but our family will make a decision about if and when to make that move on our own. Similarly, please give me the opportunity to say “it’s all right” or “we’d rather she didn’t” when you would like to push the envelope with the kids. It’s great that you have Netflix and access to that funny R-rated comedy that was out last summer. I would like the opportunity to say whether she is allowed to watch the movie, not find out afterward that the decision was made for me.
• I genuinely do appreciate the times you take her to the movies, skating, bowling, and such and you pay for her ticket. I will try to always send her with $20 for admission and or snacks. It is very nice of you to take care of her expenses, and I hope you know we will do the same if we bring your daughter somewhere. I do ask, however, that you discourage her from taking the money that was to go to admission and using it for video games and gift shop junk. That was not the reason I gave her the money, and while it is my responsibility to advise her of that – I would appreciate your support. I also have a line at which I’m not as comfortable with you paying for ticket. A $7 movie is one thing; a $50 ticket to an amusement park is another. I appreciate your generosity but please do not put me in a difficult position if I politely say “no, thank you”.
• Finally, please be prompt with picking up or dropping off your child. If there is a problem, please give a call so that we may adjust our schedules. Our children get along wonderfully, and I do enjoy Olivia as a guest, but we often have other things in our schedule and need a 6:00 pickup to be exactly that.

That came across a bit negatively, and I apologize for that. I do enjoy Olivia and am happy she and Jennifer are friends. I do hope we can become friends independently of our children. I have been through some rough situations with parents of my children’s other friends, and I just felt it might be best to clear the air – albeit passive aggressively.

Yours,

Parent X

“Be sure to sponsor your son/daughter [insert name of child here] in the annual Jog-A-Thon. Top prizes include a free year book and lunch with the principal!”

This latest fundraiser involves the children collecting money for the quantity of laps they travel around the school’s basketball courts in 20 minutes. Basically, if I pledge $1 per lap and my son completed 10 laps, I would have to pay $10 to the cause. (I have to give them creative points for this one as it at least encourages kids to exercise.)

I fully acknowledge that the public school system is strapped for cash. I understand that a school facing budget cuts will usually cut extra-curricular activities such as the student government or chess club. I also know this, too often, is followed by severe cuts to art or music. Fundraisers are championed as a potential solution in order to pay for these programs.

However, anyone who knows me already knows that I have issues with fundraisers.

The fundraiser ‘events’ all seem to start off in the same way: an assembly is called, and whomever is running the fundraiser (usually the PTA), rallies the kids into a sales frenzy by enticing them with prizes for the top sellers. Even though I could purchase most of these ‘top prizes’ at the local discount store, the kids get hooked and they are off to the races, intent on being the top seller so they can bring home the glow in the dark yo-yo before anyone else.

This creates a dilemma for parents, such as myself, whose friends all have children of their own. Thanks to the rule of reciprocity, if my child approaches them about a fundraiser, I can expect a knock at my door from their child the next time around.

Another issue that I have with fundraisers is the sheer quantity of them. Let’s take my son as an example: between non-school activities and the school itself, we are given at least one fundraiser to participate in every month. I can’t help but wonder if my son is simply learning to be a salesperson. Not to say that sales is a bad career path; however, it is not the best fit for every child.) Most importantly, not every family can dish out the cash for this volume of fundraisers.

Children should not be peer pressured by their school system or the PTA to participate in these fundraising ‘events,’ but they are. Similarly, parents should not be put into the uncomfortable situation of having to explain to their child about why they can’t sponsor them (again) for the latest fundraiser, but we sometimes are. There has to be a better way to meet the financial needs of programs than to pressure our children to so frequently sell so many items for which most people have so little use.