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Ask for help > Problems with a teacher
Problems with a teacher
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Ide_Bere
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Problems with a teacher
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Hi, this is me again and I promess I won �t complain again, but I need advice.
As I posted a few days ago my daughter �s english teacher has some deficiencies with her English. As some of you wisely advice me I decied to wait some time and reinforce at home my daughter �s English. She has English HW every day and it �s really easy, since they �re learning the colors and school material.
The instruction was: "Color this page with blue chalk." As the instruction I bought blue chalk and explained to her what chalk is since the colors she already knows. She did the HW, I signed it but when we got back the notebook her teacher wrote " This is not chalk!" I think she probably wrote that in all the notebooks if some of them were wrong but that doesn �t mean that all of them had the HW wrong.
I don �t want to be a pushy mother with the teacher (been there), but I think it is unfair to my daughter to have a sad face in her notebook if she did the HW correctly.
What can I do? I wrote in her notebook "This is chalk" just to let her know that she did the HW correctly. I don �t want to correct her teacher all the school year.
Please, I need and objective advice, since my husband was like "don �t worry, as long as you teach her correctly it �s ok" but I don �t think so. I always tell my students that the HW is a reinforcement of what we learn in the classroom, if what is taught in the classroom is wrong, of course the HW would be wrong.
Thank you for your time.
Bere
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3 Sep 2010
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donapeter
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Well........I can tell you about our situation here; 1. If your kid is at a state school , it means you don �t pay the teacher (directly) , you can �t do much about it: parents here can �t change the teachers ( they are appointed at a certain school after they had had a national exam )even if they think&prove the teacher has major problems with the subject he/she teaches. 2. private school....well...here things are different: if you pay (directly), you can claim things you think are better for you.
On the other hand, maybe being too pushy and annoying the teacher can have further consequences: discrimination, frustration, lack of interest etc.
You can be the best teacher for your kid.  |
3 Sep 2010
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tuyettran
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You should discuss with the teacher about that. Even teachers can make mistakes at times. If it would be the teacher �s mistake, she would find the way to correct it and the students would follow.
Good luck!
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3 Sep 2010
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almaz
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Bere,
It seems to me that, on the face of it, it �s a simple case of miscommunication around the word �chalk � and one which I �m sure you don �t want to escalate.
She may have had a specific type of �crayon � in mind (possibly wax) but confused it with the term �chalk crayon � and used the attributive adjective rather than the noun and is either too stubborn to admit she �s wrong or maybe just feels a bit threatened by someone whose English is obviously better than hers.
Either way, I would suggest you nip any potential mutual hostility in the bud now (a school year is a long time to be at each other �s throat), arrange to have a little chat - one professional to another - and agree to work together on your daughter �s education. |
3 Sep 2010
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blunderbuster
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Ide Bere,
This may not be the best advice, but here is what I would do. I would write the teacher a short note, acting stupid, telling her that I didn �t understand her message "This is not chalk!" , because you went to the store and bought chalk for your child. I would apologize to her for not having been able to assist my child the way I should have and I would ask HER for advice on how I should support my child in the future in order to make sure something like that does not happen again since you want to avoid such frustrating and discouraging messages in your daughter�s materials. Then I would hope the teacher is smart enough to get the message and find out that the best way to learn something is to teach it.
Let us know how it goes.
The best of luck.
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3 Sep 2010
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Carla Horne
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Hi,
As an English teacher in the U.S., I would want to know how you feel. It must be a miscommunication, and I think that all of you will feel better if you have a polite conversation about it.
Many years ago I discovered that "pastels" were considered chalk by nonartists, but artists considered pastels to be much better than chalk. Maybe this is what she meant, but you won �t know until you ask her.
Good Luck! |
3 Sep 2010
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anitarobi
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I believe you should talk to the teacher alone. Without your kid present. I was in a similar situation as you last year, but things settled down (I have the state school problem with teacher, as Dona puts it). You can just ask what the problem is, since you were taught chalk means one thing, and there �s obviously some confussion about that. Tell the teacher you feel responsible because you directed your daughter this way. Perhaps there �s just some misunderstanding, perhaps more - at least you �ll know where you stand and where she stands, and you �ll have some diea how to handle the matter in the future. Your daughter will otherwise be in quite an unpleasant and cunfusing situation, which neither of the three of you needs. She �s just too small to know how to handle all the mixed sygnals... I mean, you don �t, and she �ll feel sth �s wrong. |
3 Sep 2010
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Ide_Bere
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Thank you so much for your answers. My daughter is going to a private school and as you said I don �t want her to have mixed sygnals about English because she really likes it. I �m going to make an appointment with her teacher and ask her about it, maybe she was thinking about other material rather than chalk.
You have actually calmed me down; I was getting frustated about the sitation. I �ll let you know how it go and hopefully we (the teacher and I) could work together.
Thank you so much.
Bere
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3 Sep 2010
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melahel7
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I didn �t get the whole chalk � �thing � �. Why would a teacher ask to use chalk to colour as homework. If I was to ask my students to colour something I would ask to use either markers or coloured pencils. There �s got to be something wrong with this teacher. Like everyone else said, you should ask for an appointment. |
3 Sep 2010
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Cartuxa
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Perhaps you could tell that teacher about this site as well, she could learn so much from it... ;o)
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3 Sep 2010
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