Old as Dirt

I am 52 years old.

To young to live in a retirement community or collect CPP.

Old enough to drink, vote, buy a house and work full time.

And, as I am learning, DEFINITELY TOO OLD to teach in 2021.

Covid has not helped but we continue to lower our academic standards to such a point that we have almost no expectations of students. With the onset of Covid-19, we shifted our focus from academics and actual curriculum to the mental health needs of our students. While I wholeheartedly agree that their mental health and happiness is of the utmost importance, I feel like we are doing them a disservice in expecting so little of them.

In one Grade 8 class that I am currently teaching, the principal asked me to adapt my expectations for one of my students and to be happy if he came to class and kept his head up off the desk rather than sleeping. This is a far cry from what the curriculum says a Grade 8 student should be able to do by the end of the year.

At our school, it has always been a “rule” that kids do not wear hats or pull up the hoods on their hoodies in class. I always appreciated this rule but did not realize how much until this year. When we asked our principal for clarification before school started to be sure that this rule (or guideline, I guess is a better word) would still be in place, she surprised us by saying that she would not be enforcing it this year. She later sent out an article in an email stating that to ask adolescents to not wear their hats and hoodies in class would be to revert to “A Euro-Centric Tradition that Upholds the Racist Practices Embedded in Colonialism”.

WTAF

I just want kids to be respectful.

Apparently that has become too much to ask.

Take today for example.

I have to learn the names of 350+ students this year. A task which is difficult enough in normal times but this year it is particularly challenging because not only do they have hats on and hoodies tied tight around their faces but they have a mask from their bottom eyelids to their chins.

I was in a Grade 7 class in which more than a third of the class were wearing their hats and hoodies, many tied shut to completely hide their faces.

Aside from learning names, it is difficult to hear when kids share answers, which, I have to say, is important for a teacher trying to ascertain an oral mark. After asking a student to repeat his answer a third time and still not hearing it, the request took a turn for the worst.

Me: Could you please undo your hoodie and lay your hat on your desk while we are in French class so that I can hear what you are saying and see your face while we are talking?

Kid: NO!

Me: I am not being unreasonable. I can’t hear what you are saying and the hoodie and hat are making it more difficult than it needs to be.

Kid: You have no right to tell me to take off my hat and hoodie and I am not going to.

Me: I am not asking you to do it all day or for forever but in this class, when I have to hear what you are saying, I would like your hat on your desk. I am not wearing a hat or hood in class so don’t think it is too much to ask you to set yours aside for 50 minutes.

Kid: Good thing you aren’t. You would look stupid.

Me: OK. One last chance. Take your hat off and repeat your answer so I can hear it and we can move on to the next part.

Kid: NO

By this point, you may be surprised by the amount of time wasted on such a simple request.

Same!

But it is not rare – in fact, like I said, it is becoming the norm.

By now, other students have tightened their hoodie strings and some completely covered faces with their hats.

Such a fun age.

Thankfully, the teacher working with me caught my eye and understood I wanted her to take them out. She took this particular student and two others to the office.

The problem is … for me it is no longer that they are wearing hats. It is that they are being completely disrespectful and not doing what they are being asked to do – which was not out of the realm of their ability.

Know that I rarely send students to the office because I prefer to deal with behaviour myself. However, this battle was not going to end and I wanted to get on with the lesson for the sake of the other 27 students in the room.

Sadly, two of the three students returned about 8 minutes later and one literally danced across the room IN HIS HAT and say down in his seat to promptly tie his hoodie shut around his face while looking right at me.

I no longer had any control over the situation and had to control my anger until the end of the class.

I went to the office and … uhm … let’s say “expressed myself” to the poor vice principal who was not the one who would have made the decision to send them back. My voice was very clear and not difficult to hear – probably because I was not wearing a hat and hoodie.

At the end of the day I got an email from admin thanking me for remembering that all of our learners come from different places and we need to keep that in mind as we teach them. And that if I have a request for or need to talk to the student who was arguing with me, I should take him out in the hall, in private, to limit his anxiety.

…..

Lesson learned? In the Ontario education system, manners and respect are a thing of the past and I am WAAAAY too old to teach! Countdown to retirement is ON!

As a side note – I did send an apology email to my VP which I have never done before.