tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post4444184558065486057..comments2024-03-28T06:53:24.022-05:00Comments on a blog about school: ChoicesChrishttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12919030671050831251noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-40135480237279121072011-08-26T11:09:55.885-05:002011-08-26T11:09:55.885-05:00Chris, I don't know if there is a form of PBIS...Chris, I don't know if there is a form of PBIS in high school or not. I would think that there is.<br /><br />One thing that makes me sad this year is that in both elementary and junior high that there is more attention to behavior than ever before. I went to the back to school night at the junior high. I like to hear them talk about the subjects they teach(which they did)...but I think they must have been encouraged to talk about the SOAR program(some of them did), plus there was a SOAR poster in every classroom I visited. Plus as the night started and we sat in the kids' homerooms we had to listen to a message from the principal over the loudspeaker about the SOAR program.<br /><br />On one hand I think in group settings there does need to be attention to some expectations about behavior...on the other hand it seems as if talking about behavior is almost like a new school subject.KDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07883213697051461818noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-20187773731978222382011-08-23T14:44:32.248-05:002011-08-23T14:44:32.248-05:00KD -- As for PBIS, it is a very infantilizing way ...KD -- As for PBIS, it is a very infantilizing way to treat kids, so it makes sense that the older the kids are, the more bothersome the program seems. It's mind-boggling to me that they use it in junior high -- what self-respecting adolescent would want to please the adults just to get a paper ticket or a prize? Maybe kids really *are* different than when I was young . . .<br /><br />Do they use it in high school, too?Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07559356125770114400noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-72112496405142670522011-08-23T14:38:42.293-05:002011-08-23T14:38:42.293-05:00KD -- On the one hand, I see where you're comi...KD -- On the one hand, I see where you're coming from as far as not trusting the schools to teach ethical reasoning in an unbiased way. Again, I'd rather have no discussion of values at all than the top-down indoctrination with authoritarian values that we currently have.<br /><br />But I disagree that it would be so hard to engage the kids in ethics and philosophy in a way that respects their freedom to reach their own conclusions. It's the kind of teaching that occurs routinely in college humanities classes, and (at least I hope) even in high school classes that touch on controversial topics. Our school's teachers have spent countless hours being trained in how to administer PBIS. Would it really be so hard to get them to approach ethical issues in an exploratory, rather than lecturing, way?<br /><br />I think kids are all naturally interested in questions of right and wrong and what life is for and what makes it meaningful. To completely exclude those topics from school is to miss an important opportunity to engage them in the process of inquiry that should be at the heart of education. And, again, it ends up teaching that those questions aren't really serious or important, compared to the stuff on the multiple choice tests.<br /><br />When schools neglect that opportunity, and instead just lecture the kids to do as they're told, school basically becomes a kind of vacuum, where the things that are most meaningful to people are the things that never get discussed. It used to be that those topics would at least find their way into, say, literature classes, but now even those classes are all about reading comprehension.<br /><br />I sometimes wonder whether the petty cruelties and cliquishness that we associate with schoolchildren aren't basically just a product of the fact that we've made school into such a vacuum of ethics and meaning.Chrishttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07559356125770114400noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-70733705736739166072011-08-23T10:53:12.832-05:002011-08-23T10:53:12.832-05:00I'd say at this point I'm neutral about PB...I'd say at this point I'm neutral about PBIS. I'm okay with it up to a certain point in the elementary schools....I don't care for how it is implemented at the junior high level.<br /><br />The junior high has "SOAR" tickets that are handed out that can be redeemed in various ways. At the level of junior high the ticket system seems silly. Even if one thinks the tickets are a good thing, I'm not sure the program at the junior high level is effective. Any kid who knows how to use a copy machine could make hundreds of SOAR tickets to cheat the system.KDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07883213697051461818noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-37943859130210929782011-08-23T10:44:25.386-05:002011-08-23T10:44:25.386-05:00I'm not sure that I could trust teachers to te...I'm not sure that I could trust teachers to teach ethical reasoning in a nonbiased way.<br /><br />In example number one, would the teachers used scripted scenarios or would the students have an opportunities to talk about ethical dilemmas that are meaningful to them.<br /><br />Would students be informed that they did not have to participate in the discussion, or share information that might make them uncomfortable?KDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07883213697051461818noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-37304286031222030042011-08-23T10:39:25.576-05:002011-08-23T10:39:25.576-05:00Fedup mom, at the last curriculum review the distr...Fedup mom, at the last curriculum review the district made a small show of involving the community when it changed the math curriculum....I think you had to be paying close attention though to know about it.<br /><br />Ultimately though the same individuals that picked out the Investigations/TERC curriculum that was used previously though were heavily involved in choosing Everyday Math at the elementary level.KDhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/07883213697051461818noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8285353362748898720.post-24438729760413882932011-08-20T19:02:52.522-05:002011-08-20T19:02:52.522-05:00When, exactly, did your community choose the math ...When, exactly, did your community choose the math curriculum, or the amount of homework, or how to provide a developmentally appropriate education? Never, that's when. They're called public schools because they're funded with public money, not because the public have any say in how they're run.<br /><br />I'm not saying that's OK, I'm just saying that's how it is.FedUpMomhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00951858601020687242noreply@blogger.com