February 11th, 2021
COVID-19 and OUR responsibility to Educate OUR Children!
Hello, Class! School is now in session, and today our topic is COVID-19 and OUR responsibility to Educate Our Children!
The Novel CoronaVirus has sparked an educational crisis being faced all over the country. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, many school districts have resorted to online learning either in part or in full. Many students have suffered, struggling with the online systems and many parents and guardians are concerned that their children are falling behind and not receiving the same level of instruction as before. School administrators and teachers are at odds over when and how to return to in person instruction, with lock-outs and strikes threatened if teachers are required to return before certain requirements are met. In Chicago, no plan to return to in-person learning has even been decided upon for high school students! Many students failed to log on for class and Administrators are privately (and publicly!) concerned about poor attendance numbers even when in-person learning resumes! While I believe that the best place for young people is to be physically present in school, I don’t want to talk about that now. I want to talk about the responsibility of parents, guardians and the community to educate OUR children!
The American school system is arguably the best in the world! Even the worst schools offer unlimited educational opportunities for the average child. I could go into numerous reasons why this is the case, but I mention it to bring up the point that while the current school system, with all of its flaws, is where young people should be, the ultimate responsibility of educating our children must fall on us as parents, guardians and community!
I’ve taught in schools as a certified teacher for over 15 years, almost every grade from K-12. I’ve written hundreds of lessons and unit plans, and taught thousands of classes varying in length. And I can tell you from experience that between the mandates from the state, the need to cover unexpected topics (i.e. hygiene, conflict resolution, trauma from PTSD, etc.!), extreme weather (snow, sub-zero temps, etc. ) and limited resources, there is hardly enough time to cover everything a child needs to be successful in school…or in life! The curriculum for the school year is usually mapped out ahead of time as much as possible, and a teacher tries his or her damndest to stay on pace and cover all the needed material in order for the students to successfully take the various standardized tests required for promotion to the next grade.
It seems like the year flies by! Challenges a teacher faces in sticking to the pacing plan include students missing time from school for various reasons, the need to cover topics multiple times due to poor student comprehension, teacher’s personal time off (ha!) and a million other things that happen to throw off “the best laid plans of mice and men.” Naturally this leads to concern from parents and guardians that children aren’t learning enough or that the school system isn’t adequately preparing them for life as adults.
See, the thing is, while school is great, it’s YOUR job as a parent or guardian to make sure that your child is well educated and prepared for success in the future. Here’s three steps that anyone can take to ensure that, along with the education that they receive in school, young people are educated and prepared to be successful in life.
One: turn your children into lifelong readers. Studies have shown that the more words a child reads, the better his/her test scores will be, the more their writing skills will develop and their overall comprehension will improve. Reading can and should be a fun activity and there are a lot of places to get books now. Especially if your child reads online, like with a tablet, laptop or on their phone. The Chicago Public Library has an awesome collection of reading materials, including comic books and graphic novels that appeal to youth of all ages. They also have a digital library collection that is available as well. All available for free with a library card! Reading helps youth to become more resourceful in finding answers to questions, good listeners, more patient and better conversationalists. It keeps them out of trouble: they see reading as a pleasurable activity and it could potentially keep them from making those youthful mistakes that come from having too much time on their hands and the bad decisions that come from them! The key is to help them to pick books on topics they are interested in and that is at their reading level.
There are tons of Chicago Public Library Branches in the city which leads me to my second point: take your children out to see their world! Part of education that schools can’t provide is being a well traveled young person. The best schools take field trips, but there’s only so many days children can be out of school, not to mention the logistics of arranging, transporting and paying for multiple groups of kids to go to various places. As a parent or guardian, it’s much easier to take your children on more frequent outings than a school can. As mentioned before, the CPL is a great field trip for you and your youth. For instance, you can plan a trip to a library branch in a different ethnic neighborhood than the one you live in, go to a branch, pick out some books, see some local sights, and grab some different cuisine than you usually eat for breakfast or lunch. Italian? Ethiopian? Hispanic? ... the possibilities are endless! This leads to more exposure to cultural diversity which is definitely helpful in college and in the modern workplace where many environments are multicultural. Trips out of town on vacation, or to see family, or to visit high schools, colleges or universities are also excellent ways to help your child see more of the world and help give them a vision for the future. It’s also a great way to spend quality time with each other and helps to create fun family memories that will last a lifetime.
Thirdly, have conversations with your child about education on a regular basis. Tell them that they are smart and that you EXPECT them to achieve great things. Ask them what did they learn today? What do they know/think/feel about current events, politics, religion, music, etc.? And LISTEN...really LISTEN! You know, by just sharing your points of view on what you’ve learned in your life and listening to theirs, you’re showing them the value of education and intelligent communication. This may seem obvious, but you’d probably be surprised to know that too many families, unfortunately, never have these types of discussions. There’s a very important psychological reason why it’s important to let your children know that you love them, and that you think they are intelligent and expect them to be successful in life.
And for those of you out there who are spiritual or religious, an old fashioned prayer for your child’s success in school and for their intelligence work miracles. “The prayer of a good man (or woman!) availeth much.”
It takes a village to raise a child. Even if you don’t have children yourself, these are still good activities to practice with your nieces and nephews, godchildren, mentees and any important young person in your life.
We live in the greatest country in the world with a great educational system, but in the end, remember, while schools are here to help, it’s no one’s responsibility to make sure that YOUR child is educated but YOU.
Who knows? In the process you might actually learn a thing or two yourself!
Until next time, remember! Time waits for no man...or woman. So, Carpe Diem, my friends, SEIZE THE DAY!!
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