A traumatic week

[Deb]

Re: A traumatic week

I've been wondering Elda....how is your grandson doing?

[Glesgalass]

Re: A traumatic week

Hi Deb,
Thanks for asking. He's doing well. Got a letter from the school a few weeks ago and my heart sank when I saw the envelope & return address. But it was a letter of praise from the English department saying how well he is doing considering he is doing different work from the rest of the students as it's carried over from his previous school and saying how hard he is working and is well placed to complete his senior year next year. (Our school year goes from January to December).

He has decided try to get his old job at Hungry Jacks in Sydney back. He can do this by only working weekends and can stay with his girlfriends family. Actually it was his girlfriends mother who suggested it. So he's only got half days lessons today and is hopping on the train to see his old boss to try to arrange that.

School holidays are coming up in 2 weeks and we are going up to Queensland for 1 week to visit his father & family. It will be the 1st time Jordan meets his stepmother, brother & sister.

Elda

[Marie]

Re: A traumatic week

Good news Elda !!
Glad it's working well for your grandson.:smile:

[Deb]

Re: A traumatic week

That's great news Elda. I'm happy to hear he's doing so well.

[Glesgalass]

Re: A traumatic week

There's been a change to the situation here. Jordan has moved back down to Sydney and has changed back to his old school. His aunt offered him accommodation so he took it up. He missed his friends and it was awkward with his part time job, spending all weekend in Sydney and not having the time for study. He has his own space set up in his aunt's garage which has been converted to living space. The main thing is that he is back in touch with his father and me.
We spent a week up in Brisbane and he got to know his step-mother and little brother & sister.
It's probably better this way. It's not easy for us dealing with a 16 year old at our age.

Elda

[Kelly d]

Re: A traumatic week

Elda,

You are doing the right thing even if you have a bit of doubt. Katy just turned 16 on the 10th. She is in her last year of school and preparing for College. She is a very good girl but has a mouth on her. I told her, "time for you to get a little job some where." She really got upset with me. I told her all her older siblings had to work for their name brand clothes and so must she. We are working through it.

Oh did you know they raised leaving school from 16 to 17? It started with Katy's year.

Wishing you the best!

[Glesgalass]

Re: A traumatic week

I hadn't heard about them raising the school leaving age to 17 in the UK. I remember when they raised it to 16. My sisters year was the 1st and she's just turned 55 :smile:
What they've done here is that they must stay at school until age 17 unless they have an apprenticeship or are enrolled in TAFE (Technical and further education). That just happened last year. Prior to that, in NSW anyway, they could legally leave school at 14years 9 months.

Elda

[Alastair]

Re: A traumatic week

There is certainly something to be said for having a longer time in school these days. Mind you in the old days in Scotland a 14 year old could be enrolled in the University.

Here in Canada there was a recent article about how boys are continuing to under perform girls and by all accounts it is getting worse. They really don't know what to do about it although one suggestion is to go back to single sex schools.

I can see interesting times ahead though with girls doing so well and the birth rates now skewed quite strongly to having more girls than boys.

[Glesgalass]

Re: A traumatic week

Yes Alastair, it's the same here. They say that girls out perform the boys all the time and disturbingly even in the sciences and mathematics which have been traditionally male subjects.
It seems that boys are more distracted by girls than the other way around. There is some argument in favour of single sex high schools.

Elda

[Alastair]

Re: A traumatic week

I do remember at my school which was mixed that you needed to take care how you dealt with your studies. There was a fine dividing line between being labeled a swot or a teachers pet and being just one of the boys.

I think what helped was that I was at boarding school and so two hours prep at night was mandatory. The boarding house master was one of the teachers at the school so he sat in with you. That way you could go to him for any assistance you might need. It also meant if you finished your homework that you still had to sit quietly and thus either read a book or write something. I think that two hours of prep each night during the week was the key. How you translate that to kids that stay at home is another matter.

Alastair

[1938 Observer]

Re: A traumatic week

Yes Alastair, it's the same here. They say that girls out perform the boys all the time and disturbingly even in the sciences and mathematics which have been traditionally male subjects.
It seems that boys are more distracted by girls than the other way around. There is some argument in favour of single sex high schools.

Elda

I've noticed the same thing here. The girls still notice the boys but have the ability to multi-task, subsequently they achieve better grades and and their career prospects are greatly enhanced. My daughter (now 30) and many of her former classmates (female) have furthered themselves to a greater degree than many of their male counterparts.
Gordon

[Alastair]

Re: A traumatic week

I might add that where I live there is a great deal of drug taking and many of the kids here grow up in dysfunctional homes. That usually means they can't break that circle. These parents are in and out of prison all the time and it seems like life is better for them when in prison. That way they actually get regular meals. That all makes me wonder if our so called social services are really on the right track.

I'm not in favour of corporal punishment for Kids but if you read our own Scottish history it's obvious that teachers in these days sure didn't spare the rod as they say and back then as a nation we seem to have produced many outstanding scholars. I did get the belt at my school but they also had a system of giving you lines. Like you've got to write out 100 lines and a line was the first rule of the school rule book which was actually 3 lines. I much preferred getting the belt as it was over and done with.

I don't remember too much of my early schooling up to 11 but what I do remember is that I enjoyed school and all the teachers were great. I don't remember getting into trouble back then. The only problem I ever had was when I had to go back to Scotland for 1 term. I'd been educated in Malta and Kuwait. My father had joined the Kuwait Oil Company but he wasn't allowed to bring the family until he'd been there for 6 months which meant when we left Malta I had to go to Scotland until they were ready to have us join him in Kuwait. I was so well educated in Kuwait that it was 18 months at boarding school before I got mathematics, algebra, geometry and French which I'd been studying in Kuwait. In fact most of my English grammar was learnt through studying French. As it happens most of my teachers were from Wales although there was one American there as well but no Scots as it happens.

You remember that old saying... spare the rod and spoil the child. Perhaps there is something in that after all.

Alastair

[Kelly d]

Re: A traumatic week

All of you have made a very good point about the girls excelling compared to the boys.

I remember hours of writing to have good handwriting. Something else that has changed in which I completely disagree with, children are not given vocabulary words to learn and spell each week. I remember all the way through school being assigned spelling and vocabulary words. I suffered from some kind of learning disorder because I was never good at spelling but I knew the words.

Teachers are treated badly as well due to the Child Protection Act of 1998 that took discipline from the schools. There are other ways to discipline other than smacking. Teachers are not allowed to in fear of being sued or arrested.

The Father - son syndrome is something I payed very close attention to while in my course studies at Newcastle College. I do believe society must achieve an avenue to successfully break the syndrome. The North East of England is well known for this as well as other impoverished societies.

I strongly believe it begins with proving to young adults how good it feels to actually achieve something whether it is a job and spending your first paycheck or winning an award or an acculade.

[Glesgalass]

Re: A traumatic week

I've never used corporal punishment except for a light smack on the hand or bottom more for the shock value when they have done something dangerous as toddlers.
I think my Dad was the original new age guy as he used to say that if you hit a child, you are teaching them violence.
The problem in schools by banning corporal punishment, as I see it, is that those teachers who are natural bullies turned to verbal abuse. One teacher once said to me "If all else fails, humiliate them". I told him those tactics don't work as all they do is to create resentment.
I've always favoured depriving them of something which they enjoy as a punishment.
I think that one of the reasons why girls seem to out perform the boys in high school is that girls mature earlier and can be reasoned with more than the boys at an earlier age.

Elda

[Alastair]

Re: A traumatic week

I kind of believe its both parents and teachers that set the scene. Have you noticed that some Kids are just great, helpful and obliging most of the time but others are real trouble makers? I often wondered how the "good" kids were brought up and how they became that way. There doesn't seem to be any partricularly good book on raising children but there must be some common factors that could be learned.

Mind you Nola sent me in an email and it was about Adam and Eve where God was forbidding them to eat the fruit. When Adam did eat the fruit God asked him why he'd done it when he told him not to. Dunno was Adam's response. So God made them have children of their own. The lesson from that was if God had problems with his children why should you think you can do any better! <grin>

Alastair