"You want kids to come to class? You want them to get excited?"

[mbperrin]

5. Actually, a few facts need to be added.

This is an 18 year old sophomore, two years behind age level, one year because he dropped out, the other year apparently due to failing enough classes. His mother teaches in another district. One would suppose that because he came back, he has some internal motivation. But apparently, he thinks it is someone else's job to provide that for him.

Duncanville High School is a huge school and is rated Academically Acceptable by the state of Texas, which is a lot harder than people might think for a large school with a big minority enrollment and extensive free and reduced lunch students.

The teacher he's picking on is a Ms. Phung, who not only has her school web page up to date, she also has a youTube channel and a Pinterest site for her students to access for help anytime 24/7. She's in her 40s, been teaching a couple of decades, and teaches 5 classes of World History, a 10th grade class with two of those sections being inclusion classes, which means anything from special ed students to those on criminal probation, suspension from another school, 504 students which could include autistic, wheelchair-bound, deaf, or otherwise physically challenged students.

She also teaches an Asian studies class.

So the school has a good rating on state assessments, she obviously teaches multi-modally, he's in a class full of 15 year olds while he's 18, yeah, I'll just write him up as wanting some attention and having picked up some jargon from mom, all to cover up his embarassment at being so far behind where he should be.

I have a MAEd, so anytime a student actually challenges me on methods, I ask them if they have had fillings installed in their teeth or any other dental work, extractions, anything? When they say yes, then I remind them that they were there all along while the dentists worked on them, and so they wouldn't mind extracting or filling their own tooth next time, would they?

Protests. Then I have to point out the obvious: simply being around an educated practitioner does not mean that you can do any part of their job, that you are a consumer, and when consumers go against professional advice, they cut their toes off underneath lawn mowers, they poison themselves by leaving raw chicken on the counter, and they shoot themselves in the foot trying a quick draw.

Ms. Phung will be lucky she doesn't get fired, because teachers are lowest on the totem poles at schools, just a little below the janitorial staff, pretty far under the cafeteria staff, and only a speck to administration and central office personnel.

And that's too bad. Because then they can get a newbie who will need three years just to be able to have confidence that they are calling on children in a non-gendered, non-ethnic sequence, never mind all the rest of it.