[quote=AN]CAR, I find it a little funny that you think parents involvement are essential for improvement, yet you think most parents don’t know anything about educating their kids, so their input is not meaningful. AFAIK, the parents who are the most critical of the teachers are the parents who are most involved. The parents that don’t care tend to have no critical assessment of the teacher.
So, are you essentially saying that have parents be fully involve, but only to be a drone and listen to the teacher? Especially since you think bad teachers are few and far in between while bad parents are more abundant than not. Do I understand that correctly>[/quote]
There is a HUGE difference between reading to your kids, taking them to museums, working with them on number concepts, having discussions with them regarding current events, explaining personal finance, etc. vs. managing a classroom full of children with a wide disparity of abilities and behavioral attributes. Knowing how to be a good parent is NOT like knowing how to be a good teacher in a school setting. While some skills can transfer, they are not the same.
And yes, there are FAR more bad parents (as a percentage of parents) than there are bad teachers (as a percentage of teachers); I would say it’s many, many multiples worse. Why? Because all you have to do in order to become a parent is have sex. Teachers, especially public school teachers, have to:
1.) have a college degree (a B.A./B.S., at minimum)
2.) have a teaching credential which almost always requires two full years of post-baccalaureate classes and teaching experience under the guidance of a master teacher and college professors
3.) pass criminal background checks
4.) submit to ongoing observations by on-site administrators and, possibly, master teachers.
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In general, the parents who are most critical of the teachers are the stay-at-home moms who have no life outside of their children, and who have managed to maintain a 7th-grade emotional disposition WRT malicious gossiping, cattiness, and insecurity.
The parents who help their kids the most are the ones who work with their children when the kids are in their care, and then send well-rested, well-fed children to school who are ready, willing, and able to stay on task and not cause problems in the classroom.
