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Case: Feeling Betrayed I have had a wonderful school year with my 26 third graders all of whom were bilingual. Most of my students were Chinese Americans with two from India. I used very engaging interactive strategies with my students throughout the year. They have responded to my teaching strategies very well, and made a lot of progress in all content areas. To my surprise and disappointment, my school principal informed me that she received a letter signed by most of the parents of my students stating that I did not teach their enough math. In the letter, they indicated the previous year students came home with a lot of homework and completed a large number of worksheets, while this year they have been given fewer worksheets. I explained to my principal that I was more interested in using math manipulatives and meaningful real world math problems than repetitive worksheets. What disappointed me (or hurt me) the most was that I have had four meetings with all the parents, and they did not raise any concerns in these meetings. Why would they directly go to the principal? What did I do wrong? Is this cultural? How should I respond to these parents? Solution: (Rates are posted for this solution!) The parents definitely should have come to you first and expressed their issues to you before going to the principal. This way, you would have been able to explain to the parents that you were looking out for the students and by using manipulatives, it is more meaningful and effective. Worksheets are not very good and students view them as busy work. The things that students do on worksheets is very repetitive and more than likely, the students will not use any of it in the real world after school. Therefore, using manipulatives will allow the students to work hands on and apply their new knowledge. I think that you could have a meeting with all of the parents and explain to them what you are doing in the classroom. You can also tell the parents that if they would like, you can send home extra worksheets for the students to do for practice at home. |
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