To ohgetreal By Cathy-Dee

I have dealt with parents who have been anything but pleasant or fair. I have had parents swear at me, scream at me in hallways, I have seen teachers physically assaulted by parents. Our job is not always easy. Then there's the students, we have to deal with students who may be FAS, may be abused, neglected, violent. And then there's the administration and the school board. And finally there the rest of the world. And somewhere in all of this we are supposed to have our own lives. So when we hear comments like yours from someone who doesn't even support the public school system, yes, we tend to get just a tad defensive and rightly so.

And as far as responsibility for those little siblings - it is the teacher's regardless of who it should be. You can't tell me that if a little 2 year goes missing, you'd expect the teacher to just say to the parent, oh well the child was your responsibility so deal with it. Granted some parents can handle their younger children fine, but I've had parents bring their children even to our school assemblies and these children are running wild, start crying and screaming, and have even ended up on stage trying to find their sibling. Not all parents have control or even know how to have their children behave in public. And as a teacher I do not want the behaviours of a child who is not even part of my classroom to reflect on the rest of my kids because they were part of the field trip.

As I mentioned in an earlier post I was in the tourism business before I went into teaching. I worked in one of our cities tourist attractions which also had quite a few school groups visiting on a daily basis. I saw things that were terrible and I even called school principals to report on behaviours of students, teachers or others who may have been doing things that just were not acceptable. Such as starting water fights in the bathrooms, to lack of supervision. And quite often I did see parents who were obviously in charge of a group who did bring along a younger child or two and they were so busy with the little ones that the students they were supposed to be watching, well, were not being watched.

And I have no problems with anyone, parents, community members, staff, teachers, students questioning school policies AS LONG AS THEY ARE INFORMED. Simply questioning things because you don't like to "follow the crowd" is another way of saying you just like to cause trouble and stir things up as far as I'm concerned. We have policies changed every year because someone who is informed and has been a part of the process comes to us, discusses things and then brings up a possible better way to do things. Teachers and administrators are not afraid to make changes, we do it all the time. But... we tend to not listen nor respect those who come into our schools with the attitude that we are doing things wrong all the time.

I would venture to say that the schools you were involved with also breathed a sign of relief when you decided to pull out your kids. And it's too bad that parents like yourself make a bad name for home-schooled kids. As I also mentioned before there are times when a parent chooses to home school and it is for a good reason. The other homeschooling parent who posted here is a good example. She has been an educator so she should be more than qualified to give her children a good education. And her viewpoints seemed honest and well-thought out. I wish there were more home-schooling parents like her to help even the viewpoints that are out there about homeschooling.

I know children in my town who are also homeschooled. Some for religious reasons, others because they have special needs or circumstances. The parents do not put down the public school system, in fact at times they even participate in some of our events.

But I also know the parents who homeschool because they have a false concept of public schools and because they couldn't get their way all the time pulled their kids out. Sometimes because they thought they would hurt our feelings if they pulled their kids out. Now they have to homeschool because they would be too embarrassed to ask permission to put their kids back in the public school. And some who homeschool for other reasons but who lack the skills to ensure their children are learning all they can. I can honestly say I do not respect these parents nor their decisions to homeschool.

I teach because I enjoy being with children. I love to watch them learn and I like learning through them myself. I like the challenges (most of the time). Even I get tired of some of the rules and procedures, but they are there to help make things easier. And I will make rules for my classroom, whether it be no siblings on field trips to no recess if work isn't completed, because it makes my life easier and helps me to help the students complete the goals that they should be meeting. My first responsibility is to my students, then to my colleagues and then to the parents.

Oh and a few last questions-how long have you been home-schooling? When was the last time you were at a public school function or PTA meeting? And how often when your kids were in school did you attend these meetings?

It would be interesting to know how current your observations are and whether you even had the "experience" to be judging the system as you have been.