I had a realization the other day.
I was talking with my sub, who was venting about a particularly difficult case. The student has many mental health difficulties, and is on the autism spectrum. The student's mom loves her child very much but can be an, um, aggressive and blunt communicator.
My sub was upset because this student is doing nothing, pretty much refusing to turn in any work. Their grades are slipping. He'd contacted the student's mom with his concerns, and was very frustrated with the response. She basically said she wasn't going to force the student to do anything, that when she talked with the student at home, the explanation was that so far their grades were good enough that the student felt they could just "coast" for a while. The mom was like, "well, the grades are good right now, and maybe they need to see the grades dip. We'll revisit when that happens."
My sub was beside himself. Why would she not care about motivating her child? Why would she let him fail like this? He was gobsmacked by the mom's response when he (the sub) clarified that he spends extra time with all his students to help them succeed, she said: "that's nice, but I only care about my child."
Then he said to me... "As a parent, I just don't understand how she can do this to her child."
Ah.
I explained my thoughts on the situation:
- Natural consequences, a real life if...then, are actually probably the best way to show this student what happens when you just quit the game. It's concrete.
- It is actually pretty impossible to "make" someone do something that they are determined not to do. Sometimes they have to eff around and find out, for themselves.
- What better time to learn the lesson of failing due to inaction than in middle school, when there's no credit? Better now than next year when it goes on a transcript.
- Most parents only care about their own children's success when it comes down to it. She's just being brutally honest and saying it out loud.
- She has known her child the longest. She is the parent. It is not our job to tell her how to parent (unless it is something harmful/illegal). We can disagree, we can offer alternate thoughts, but ultimately you'll drive yourself crazy thinking you can "fix" someone else's parenting, because a) you can't and b) it's not up to you, as a teacher.
Then, I had an epiphany -- maybe one reason why I am somewhat of a "tough parent whisperer" is because I am not a parent myself. I do not have my own frame of reference to put on someone else, for better or for worse. I am not thinking through the lens of what would work (or not) for MY child. I am a fairly neutral player in this game. I mean, I like to think I know what I would have done, if I'd had kids, but I'll never really know what that would have looked like, so I can't speculate TOO much.
Of course, I have opinions, but I feel very strongly that in most situations, abuse aside, parents want what's best for their kids. There are different ways of handling different situations. I can offer facts, such as: We cannot grade what we do not receive. We can give the opportunities, we can extend deadlines to a point, but there is a line where it is what it is. Students get the grade they earn. If they do nothing, they earn...nothing. That's sort of how life works. We can encourage, parents can encourage, but ultimately there is no "making" the child do something they don't want to do. My job, as an educator, is to work with the parent and partner home and school together to help a student be as successful as possible.
I would imagine, as a teacher who IS a parent, that it would be hard not to see through your own lens (at least at first). That it might be harder not to judge based on what you would do in the situation, even though likely your situation is very different from their situation.
It gave me a little bit of a flip side to the dreaded "as a parent..." comments that get thrown around school (and life) all the time -- maybe it's actually an asset to be an educational, developmental expert and NOT a parent.
