[quote=AN][quote=CA renter]Your cousin remembers that story, too. Not justifying it (not at all), but many people will point to a situation where someone telling them that they couldn’t do something was what pushed them to perform. Perhaps her teacher telling her this pushed her to do better.
Maybe your wife’s teacher was trying to push your wife even further because that teacher saw that your wife was just lucky, intellectually, and was skating because of her natural intelligence…and wanted her to work harder and reach for more (again, NOT justifying it!).
It wouldn’t be the first time a naysayer pushed someone to go beyond what they would have done without this experience.[/quote]Both are completely wrong assumptions. If your definition of a quite good teacher is one who tell an elementary kid they’ll amount to nothing, then we’ll just have to agree to disagree, because your definition of quite good is quite lacking.
As for my wife, that same teacher recently went through a divorce and most of the time in class, all she did was show movies. A separate but similar incident, she told my wife that “not everyone will like you”, as if that has anything to do with her grades.[/quote]
Neither one of us knows about the particular circumstances, nor do we know what prompted the teachers to say these things. Again, I’m not justifying it and have never said these types of things to either my students or my own kids (unfortunately, many parents do). But we need to know the context in order to ascertain what was going on at that given moment with the teacher and your wife.
FWIW, some movies are incredibly educational and can explain certain concepts in a way that a teacher never can. These movies often incorporate technology and can utilize some of the world’s most knowledgeable speakers who can present the information in a truly unique and relevant way. Again, not saying kids should just sit and watch movies, but you and I don’t know what was going on in that classroom. (And I’ve shown perhaps one movie/year in my classroom, if that.)
