parent-teacher

yesterday and today we had parent-teacher conferences. for those of you who have managed to get through an entire life without having participated in these spectacles, i will fill you in a bit first. twice a year (at least here in nyc) public schools set aside time for teachers to meet with parents and visit about how students are doing. my own school sets aside thursday from 6-8:30pm and friday 12:20-2:20. on thursday we have school until 3:10 and because it takes me (and many other teachers) an hour or so to get home and then a whole new hour to get back, i just stick around, go out for dinner, fix up my classroom.

this year i had help. one of my ninth grade boys decided to hang around at school instead of going home and when i realized he was driving folks crazy with his nonstop chatter, i invited him to help me set up my class. he started talking immediately. during class i have to ask him to stop talking about five million times, but outside of class, i like to just let him go. he's reading a book. a great book. early in the year he read a novel about the knights templar and wouldn't shut up until i read it. he was right. it's the kind of book you don't shut up about. but now he's got this new book and i'm beginning to see he likes knights and fantasy and all that, but he has this little kid streak in him, too. and so he walked around the room, taking chairs off tables and setting them upright on the ground, never once pausing in his assessment of this new book. he talked for fifteen minutes about a book. and his face was completely involved in what he was saying. and when his mom came to visit we talked about how he never shuts up in class but then i told him (and his mom) that when i was little i never shut up. and i never slept. his mom asked what my parents did and i said they did everything. they kept up with me. she slumped back in her chair and looked very tired but the kid's eyes got really wide. "you were like me?" he yelled. i nodded. "cool!"

parents arrive between 5:30 and six. they sign in and wait in chairs outside the classrooms and are called in, like at a doctor's office, a family at a time. some folks sign in and then walk off. when they return they are incensed that someone went in before them. things often get heated. grown folks yell at each other about who will get to visit with me first. i pretend this is flattering but really it's mostly ugly and i feel embarrassed for the children they belong to. voices get shrill. parents come in grumbling about having worked all day, somehow forgetting that i've been in this very room since 7:30 am and will leave well after they do. after 8:30, because even though my principal will announce at 8:30 that the building is closing and will be locked in five minutes (information that makes my breathing get short and makes my skin prickle) three sets of parents will be standing at my door and will refuse to leave, saying they've been waiting and i have to talk to them. all three will be parents of children whose names i barely recognize. children who show up to my class once a week and do nothing on those days. the parents will demand to know why their children are failing and will ask what i am doing to help their children. and i will resist the urge to get all snooty and say, "plenty. and what are you doing?"

and there are plenty of parents like that. people who don't really have any interest in the miserable fourteen year old living under their roof, but who come in to try to get me to admit it's my fault this child can't read. i don't. they leave disappointed. i no longer get parents staggerng in drunk or high like i did when i had younger students, but there are always a few wild ones.

one child came storming in with his mother, yelling at me as he walked across the room to the table. his mother sat down and let this continue until i told him he needed to stop yelling at me and sit down. he sat and began again with the yelling. i turned to his mother and asked if he treated her the way he was treating me. she said yes. now, here's a hint. don't admit to things that will make you look like an idiot. don't admit to things that will make you look pathetic. but she did and i figured she was asking for it so i told her the reason he treats me, and in fact all women, as far as i can tell, like dirt is because she allows him to treat her that way. i suggested she get her child under control if she plans on having anyone try to teach him anything because right now he isn't learning anything from me. the child continued to be rude and i continued to point it out each time. we ended the meeting with a handshake and a suggestion that his mom get a spine.

one child came in with a grandmother and mom. it was clear pretty quickly who was in charge. after i explained that the child was working pretty hard and was struggling with comprehending what she read, the grandmother asked what the family could do to help. they want her to improve comprehension and vocabulary. good, i thought. this is nice. they want to be involved. so i said what i know- the only thing that helps kids improve those things. read. read all the time. read and talk about what you read. read good books. read easy books and hard books and books about science. read everything. ask questions about what you read. tell people what you're reading, what you love about it, what you hate. and the grandmother smiled at me the way you smile at a small child who can't understand something you find simple. she leaned in and said, "yes, of course. but what can we do? isn't there some sort of program? some technique?" and there are countless programs designed to improve a person's reading skills and countless more designed to improve vocabulary, but a fourteen year old girl who had a hard time reading because she doesn't read much needs practice more than anything else. so i asked her. what are you reading? and her whole face lit up and she started spilling out this story of a family swirling around in a drama of cancer and poverty and struggle of various sorts. she was gesturing with her hands while she talked. i asked how far she'd read. ten pages. only ten pages and she was already hooked. so i smiled and said, "that's what you do. that. you talk to her about books. read with her. read to her. read the same book and talk about it. read." and and the kid got the point right then but grandma just didn't want to hear it. "don't you think there must be some program, something online she could do?" and i smiled at her and i smiled at the child who was still thinking about this family swirling in drama and i said, "no. i really don't."

a set of parents came in without their son. i prefer having children present so nobody twists anything anyone else says at these things (it is usually parents who are guilty of this, by the way). they lamented their son's grades and were surprised and concerned to find out that he shows up in my last period class about once ever two weeks. i did not intend to tell them that i think their son is a drug dealer. i've learned that parents don't want to hear that, even when it's true. they sort of have to come to the realization on their own. but they began to tell me a saga of endless brief cell phone conversations and mysterious treks outdoors late at night to get "index cards". my brain was itching at that point, positively squirming to tell them and i'm pretty sure my outsides were fidgeting, trying to keep my brain shut up. but then the mom mentioned they thought he might be smoking weed. my mouth slowly opened. the sentence was crawling toward the front of my face when the dad said they'd had the kid tested recently and he'd come up positive. i closed my mouth. breathed in. he tested positive and all she can say is she thinks he might be smoking? dear parents: this is why your kids think you are stupid. it's not your lame taste in music or clothing. it's not that you don't know how to text fast enough. the kid has been slapping signs up all around the house and they couldn't read them, couldn't put them in a stack and add them up. and so i said, slowly, "well, i have to tell you, when you put all that together, the drug use, the short phone calls at odd hours after which he's gone for a while, the cutting class, the sleeping in class, the plummeting grades, the fact that he has some pretty nice stuff for a kid with no cash, you might want to consider that he's selling and not just using". lights going on all over the place. "ohhhh," whispered mom, not as surprised as you'd think. same with the dad. they'd had these thoughts and put them away. hoping. and i'm not telling them this just to shove the kid further into trouble. the problem is he's not such a clever kid and if he's selling, he's selling for someone. and that someone is a real drug dealer. those folks don't so much fool around. this is the sort of kid who will smoke some of what he ought to be selling and will try to short the guy he works for. and if confronted, he'll act with a drug dealer the way he acts when i ask where his homework is. but drug dealers, the real kind, do not just put zeros in grade books. they are in business and quite a few of them carry weapons to help drive home a point with problematic clientele or employees. the parents tell me they are planning to test the child again over the weekend. i wish them luck. i wish the child luck.

but not everything is me feeling like my frustration with a child has just been shifted over to the child's parents. not everything is the big light going on over my head when i meet a parent and see why a kid doesn't think being able to read is a real issue. or why a kid is so obnoxious. one mom came in with her son, a child who is quiet and who seems to think i am smart and funny. do not hold this against him. his peers like the jonas brothers. he smiles as he slides his report card across the table to me. excellent grades. he is a good kid. and i tell her. i say a pile of nice things because i think a good kid who is working really hard ought to hear someone go wild with praise at least once or twice a year. at some point i stop. "but you know all this already," i say. she looks at her son and smiles. "of course i do," she laughs. "but i really like hearing you say it, too."

one of my last visits is from a mom all by herself. her child failed my class because it is hard for him to do most of the things school asks him to do. he is shy and gentle and when i think of him i think baby giraffe. he is the sort of child you instinctively protect. he doesn't ask you to. it's just what happens. he is very much a little boy and is quite shy but recently he's decided to grow up a bit. his spin on this involves grumpiness, which is very grown up. i tell her about his recent attempts at grumpiness, huffing around when i tell the class to get out a sheet of paper, grumbling when i ask them to open their books. somehow, things i would snarl about with other children end up seeming, well, adorable when this child does them. this is because, although you may not recognize it, these behavior changes are signals of progress for this particular child. these things are an indicator that he is struggling right now to gain control of a life he will always have to work to keep together. but his mom knows this and she giggles with her whole body as i tell her and says with a look of absolute passion, "i do just love him so much!"