Posted on 10/28/2003 8:25:12 PM PST by willieroe
[Letter:] My son recently started fractions in school. When his teacher assigned homework problems, my son struggled to understand his notes and recall the teacher's explanations. He finally came to me for help.
To encourage him and help him understand that he can get this stuff, I told him, "That's easy!" and taught him some of the shortcuts I use to figure out fractions. I must have done the wrong thing, because he became terribly frustrated and wound up in tears.
Most parents have heard their children complain, "I don't know how to do it!" The natural inclination is to respond, "Let me help." Unfortunately, this can lead parents to cross the line of parenting into teaching. Instead of feeling helped, many children feel alone, intimidated and, finally, humiliated.
When your son asks for help, you need to make a crucial distinction: Is he ready to practice, or does he need more teaching?
It is a parent's job to develop in their children the skill of responsibility - skills that lead to responsible actions. But developing responsibility and teaching can be two different things.
Parents must realize that just because a child has been taught, it does not necessarily follow that the child has yet learned, or taken ownership of knowledge. Some children might have been taught enough that minimal additional guidance will lead them to learning. However, parents who cannot clarify a concept for their child within 10 to 15 minutes should realize that their child needs more teaching.
The parent's job is teaching responsibility, not teaching schoolwork.
What to do
When your child asks for help, sit down in a quiet spot - away from the homework area - and ask for a brief explanation of the problem. If you believe your child is ready for learning but just lacks a little bit to get started, try to fill in the gap. This gentle nudge toward learning should not take more than 10 or 15 minutes.
If your child does not understand the concepts, additional teaching should be done by a teacher and not a parent. Help your child understand what pieces of information are missing, and then phrase it in a specific question for the teacher. Many children will be afraid of taking questions to the teacher, but learning how to ask for information is an important part of the education process. Expect hesitancy and fear, but encourage your child to overcome them. After all, knowing what you don't know is the key to being a knowledgeable person.
Let your child's teacher know that you will be using this method. Initially, the teacher might want you to sign the child's questions to know that you have discussed the problem together.
Do not confuse your roles. Just as we parents must refrain from being at-home teachers, we also must refrain from asking teachers to be substitute parents. When each job is fulfilled in the student-educator-parent learning partnership, the job of learning how to learn becomes easier.
And we parents can enjoy just being parents.
Parents, teachers and students may send their questions to Dr. Yvonne Fournier, 5900 Poplar Ave., Memphis, Tenn. 38119; E-mail yf7thsense@aol.com. Questions can only be answered in future columns.
No, but you clearly state you think some do, and I never said all. Here's what you said: "you then decide in your ultimate Know it all wisdom to cram your way or the highway down their throats to make a point, you are going to just do more harm than good." To me, it does not appear you are too high on parents abilities to teach.
I have stated that few people are good teachers, and I do believe that, I have not in the least limited that assertion to only parents.
And thats where I disagree. Anybody that cares and takes the time can be a good teacher. A licence to teach and being armed with politically correct teaching methods do not neccesarily create a good teacher.
You are creating things in your own mind that are not said, are not implied and are not written. Your precreated bias that all teachers are bad has caused you to frankly read something that isn't being said or typed.
And where exactly did I say "all teachers are bad"? I just question teachers abilities the same way you question parents abilities. You give the benefit of the doubt to the teacher and their methods, I give the benefit of the doubt to parents. I happen to think that methods of teaching, particularly in math, have been dumb down so much that neither teacher or student really understand math. Certainly we both have our biases from our experience.
NO one has questions that you love and care about your children, I don't know what field that is coming out of.
That just comes from my belief that caring is the most important part of being a teacher, not that anyone questioned that.
No one here said you "can't" teach your daughter... you really do need to switch to decaff, none of that has ever been implied by me here, at least not by me.
My caffine intake is just fine, thank you for your concern. But the premise of this article is that parents should NOT teach. Specifically, the author states, "Unfortunately, this can lead parents to cross the line of parenting into teaching." That is an absurd statement writen by some elitist teaching professional who has been exposed to way too much psychobabble.
If you are working on the premise that all teachers are not out to teach, there is nothing anyone can say that is going to make a damn bit of difference to you.
Again I have never said that.
If your goal is simply to play ego chicken with a teacher using your child as a pawn in the middle then hey, more power to you.
Now you are getting more offensive than I care to even respond. I guess now you are questioning my love for my daughter....
I love it.
I believe you are WAY wrong here. The vast majority of children are highly adaptable in problem solving. When you provide them more than one approach to math, for example, then they are equipped with more than one tool for any given problem.
This doesn't mean "my way or the highway". It means my way, or the teacher's way, or your mom's way - whichever works best for the kid.
The problem is that this author IS advocating "my [the teacher's] way or the highway", which you rightly disparage. This method teaches rote, one approach problem solving, plugging data into formulae instead of teaching the underlying concepts.
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