Butt In -OR- Butt Out

     Watching TODAY with Hoda, Kathie Lee is gone.

She and Shawn Stockman,

 her co-host from The Sing-Off, were talking to two regulars about: When Should Parents But In or When Should They Butt Out?

     I get the feeling hat Hoda is close to people who have called teachers and the child suffered the consequences . . . she just seemed to say on that topic.

     It brought back SO MANY memories I have of conflict with parents.

     When I first started teaching, in Brownsburg, Indiana, right down the road from the Indianapolis 500 race track . . . not right down the road, like driving downtown, but closer than you would think. I had the best relationships with parents except for one.

     I can't remember her surname . . Romine/Romig . . . no, Romig was a family from Logan that were a good family with good kids. Couldn't have asked for better  people.

     Anyway, I digress . . there i is, I LOVE the word digress! ! ! !

     I can't remember the circumstances of the meeting between the momma, who was a high school teacher, Ron Volpatti, our principal, and myself. IF I were a guessing woman I would guess that I had made him responsible for something and he had complained to momma. Instead of talking to me, she DEMANDS a meeting with the principal. He called me down and that irritated her because she didn't want me in there.

     The gist of the meeting was . . . the principal told her that I had done absolutely nothing wrong and he believed I could sue her for defamation of character for what she had been saying.

     Man, I left that meeting with my head swimming. I was just doing my job and was amazed hat what she had been saying about me had been so bad.

     Flash forward to my middle school experience . . . pre-telephones in teacher's rooms. If a parent called Mr. McKeever to complain about a teacher I NEVER, and I mean NEVER heard of him discuss it with he parent UNLESS hey had already talked to the teacher to see what could be done about whatever the problem was. I was so GREAT . . . parents would arrange times to meet with, or call us when we were out of class, and so many things would get ironed out. . . . this was so nice.

     Then, we get phones in our rooms and Internet access so that parents have ways to contact us with ease. What happens . . . they still call the principal first . . . . amazing.

     I have NEVER been associated with a teacher who has retaliated against a child for what a parent has said. I know children who have told their parents there has been retaliation when there wasn't, but NEVER, NEVER, NEVER have I worked with a retaliatory teacher.

     I know, myself, from personal experiences, that I have had to stand back and look at myself several times and see what the child was seeing from their point of view. Quite interesting, I might say
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     So, I say to you, my readers,  who are parents of school age children, get to know the teachers of your children whether the child is in kindergarten or a senior in high school. If you had no called and introduced yourself, or visited the school and introduced yourself to your child's teacher . . . if you haven't, do it RIGHT NOW ! ! ! ! !

     Your children need everyone associated with them to be working off of "the same page."

     Believe me, people, well, 99.999999999% of the people, who go into education do it because they honestly do like children and feel that they could make a difference in a child' life by teaching. hey don't get into it for the BIG BUCKS! And the saying, "hose who can do, those who can't teach" is so far from wrong.

On my grave stone I want this written, not really, but I would if I were still single:

I cared, therefore I taught!

Now, how many others can say the same thing?