Whether you care for the president or not, is your opinion. I'm not going to sway you one way or the other. I don't care, if you voted for him or if you can't stand him. Neither one doesn't change the fact that he's still the president. Take away all the issues that's been going on recently (take your pick), his position still demands respect.
Students today are losing respect. Respect for themselves, each other, teachers, family, and authority. It's very stressful being a student in school today. Not only are there high stakes assessments, but the pace is faster since most teachers have to play "catch up" to help bring students up to what's current. A student who trips and falls may not be able to bring themselves back up again.
Which brings up to the big speech this Tuesday morning. Here is a link to the president's speech. Here's a man in a position of respect talking to students to try to get them motivated to succeed. He does this by adding pieces of his personal life, bringing in other children who have risen to success, and famous celebrities who have overcome difficulties. He's not trying to brainwash children, rather try to get them focused and ready for the coming year.
Some parent's are pulling their children out of class so they can miss it. Think about that for a moment. Parents are pulling their children out of classes so they can miss a speech about staying in school and being motivated to succeed. If you find yourself caught up in this huge drama, take a moment and think about what you want best for your kids. Do you want them to be successful later on life? Do you want them to not get discouraged or give up easily after they fail at something
The students who I used to work with needed a positive role model to look up to. It's hard to find that in the media today, and for some it might be even harder to find in their own family. I'm glad that the president is trying to address this issue. Hopefully students will listen to it with an open mind and will leave with the confidence to do anything they want.
4 comments:
I am disappointed in how local school districts are handling this. Rather than standing up and modeling respect for the Presidency, many are putting the decision on the principal to determine if it will be shown at each school.
My son isn't in social studies during the address, so his options to view the speech are limited to after school (which interferes with his after school activities) or before school the following day. What a lost opportunity!
We will be pulling him for school in order for him to see President Obama's address. We want our son to understand that respect isn't contigent upon agreement with someone's views.
I agree with both of you. I felt very sad for our country when parents and educators made uneducated decisions in regards to whether or not children would be able to watch the President's speech. President Obama should have been given the same level of respect that has been shown to other presidents throughout the years. I feel that those who did not take time nor used the opportunity to read the speech prior to it being given and then in turn reacted harshly to it only showed ignorance due to their rash decisions on either not watching it or pulling children from school or classrooms.
Actually, I have friends who are very conservative, but they took the time to read the speech prior to President Obama delivering the speech. They allowed their children to watch the speech, but these same parents also took the time to print out the speech to discuss it further with their children.
I think your main point is that respect should not be contingent based on our individual political views.
The ideas that President Obama spoke to our children about ring through no matter what your background might be because these ideas are the same ideas that parents, teachers and administrators continue to promote every year to our students. Our students needed a speech like this help boost our students' spirits along with reminding them of their personal responsibility for being good students and citizens.
In reflection I realized that those parents who did choose to pull their child out of class, created a horrible example of how to problem solve.
In classes, when two people had a disagreement I would bring them to each other and have one talk to the other about their feelings. Most often, one student was upset because of something that was misunderstood. In those rare times when that isn't the case, there is still an opportunity to come to terms and manage to work together.
By taking their children out of school, those parents moduled how to act out on emotions and throw common sesne out the window. What they were doing in fact, was justifying their irrational behavior because they didn't like the person's policies or ideology.
Everything that I have taught my students about how to problem solve when upset, was just thrown out the window by their parent's actions. It is sad to see that happen, and I only hope that this has created a dialogue so that more awareness to prevent such irrational behaviors from happening again. Time will only tell.
It is true that the parents created a poor example in regards to problem solving regarding the situation, but I have to ask myself honestly "was this really a situation?"
I think many people overreacted in regards to the speech. I almost felt embarrassed for the kids because the parents were being irrational. We try to talk to the kids about understanding other kids’ beliefs and differences, but this some of these parents went off the deep end.
It is a shame because you are right that only time will tell in the end.
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