My Advice to New Teachers: Be Careful What You Ask For

My Advice to Teachers: Be Careful What You Ask For

By Jill Jenkins

                Be careful what you ask for.  Adults often make the assumption that students think like adults, that they have lofty academic goals.  They don’t.  Kids just want to have fun, even the intellectually gifted.  As an educator you can either use that trait to your advantage or they will use it against you.

                For example, I once received a phone call from my daughter’s principal, Mrs. Puhr when she was in the fifth grade.  On this occasion, Mrs. Puhr had called each student individually into her office on a fact finding mission to ascertain who was responsible for the paint fight that had occurred while a substitute teacher was present.  Mrs. Puhr laughingly said, “Jill, I had to share this with you.”  When asked who was responsible, my daughter, Jeanette, had answered, “The teacher.  She told us to do anything we wanted when we finished our work.  When you’re in fifth grade, you just might want to have a paint fight.” Ironically, she was right.  It is important to give students options, but as an educator you must decide what those options are, because you may not like their choices.

                Never give a student an option that you can’t live with.  When I was in a seventh grade honors program, my class was assigned a first year Spanish teacher, Mr. Panko.  We all loved his enthusiasm, but took advantage of his lack of rules by behaving disruptively: throwing spit wads, talking to each other and generally misbehaving.  Finally out of frustration he said, “Tomorrow anyone who does not care about learning can turn his desks to the back wall and I will only teach those who really want to learn.”  It was an invitation to destruction.  The next day, everyone’s desk was facing the back wall, except Patty. It was a victory for the students.

                Students love to play games.  Use that. You need to establish a starting line-up activity to begin your class every day.  Think about how do we line up for a race and use that kind of procedure to control students’ behavior. Include word tag games and races to teach vocabulary.  Get them out of their seats and moving to help increase the flow of blood from their butts to their brains.  Add fabulous prizes for the winners:  stamps, stickers, rubber ducks, and my fifth grade teachers gave rocks.  It really doesn’t matter what you give them as long as you sell them on the idea that this is one thing they cannot live without.   You need to be the game show host and they students are the contestants.  Everyone will win.  Make your class both memorable and exciting. Never let them forget---you are in charge, so be careful what you ask for, because they would love to be in charge.   

What Is The Single Most Important Lesson We Should Teach

What is the Single Most Important Lesson We Should Teach

By, Jill Jenkins

“Keep your eyes on the horizon and the bends in the road will take care of themselves,” my father once advised me while teaching me to drive which was no small feat considering he was teaching me in a 1964 Chevy Suburban with a standard transmission (four on the floor) and I was a five-foot-one (almost) ninety pound fifteen-year-old who had difficulty seeing over the steering wheel whenever I put in the clutch to change gears.  In those days the seats did not adjust like they do now, so I had a pillow under me and a pillow behind me.  His words eventually became my philosophy for life, not just for driving: focus on what is important and the distractions or difficulties in life will take care of themselves.  

 At 18, I decided to go to college.  Since no one in my family had ever attended, let alone graduated from an institute of higher learning, my father tried to dissuade me (He was from a different generation and culture.)  by telling me it should be one of my brothers who pursued an education, because women’s purpose should be to get married and have children, but I kept my eyes on the horizon and graduated early Magna Cum Laude.

Later in life, my former husband left me deeply in debt with no assets and a ten year old daughter. Emotionally I was destroyed, financially devastated, so I often joked with my sister that I would hang myself in the garage, but I couldn’t afford to buy a rope and I didn’t have any rafters.  My mother reminded me that “mental breakdowns are for people who could afford them, so pull myself together and focus on what is important: your daughter and your job.” I did.  I kept my eyes on the horizon and faced each obstacle and eventually the bends in the road took care of themselves.  I am now married to a wonderful man, retired after a successful career in education and my daughter graduated from Judge Memorial High School with honors, Westminster College with honors and received her Master’s Degree from New York City University in Journalism landing a job as an Assistant Photography Editor with Popular Photography’s website.  

What is important to pass on to our children and students?  Perseverance is the key to success.  I hope to help them understand that are lots of bends in the roads: distractions like alcohol, drugs,  and poison people, set backs like divorce, financial worries and failures.  More importantly, I hope to help them look beyond and focus on the horizon. Decide what goals and great expectations they want to achieve and focus on that horizon.They will get there with they keep eyes on the horizons and avoid being distracted by the bends in the roads. 

Nursing Homes: Killing Time or Someone You Love

Our society carefully monitors the safety of children in public schools with qualified educators, security cameras, and carefully planned and monitored activities, but this is not the case in the care of the elderly.  Over the course of several years, I have heard nothing but horror stories from the facilities in my state and I could guess the problem is every where.  Most middle income people work and can not afford to take time off to care for an aging parent, so they often select an assisted living facility where the elderly parent is provided care with a certain degree of freedom.  For my father, this was the route my siblings selected for him.  He was becoming senile and was profoundly deaf and in a wheelchair.  The facility that was selected looked clean and comfortable, but looks can be deceiving.  Every time I visited my father, he was sitting in his own feces.  His wheelchair was encrusted with dried feces and never appeared to have been cleaned.  Since his mental facilities had declined with lack of any interaction, he didn't seem to notice or care that he was in this state.  He didn't want to be in the institute and left often,  sometimes traveling as far as five miles trying to find his home.The police were often summoned after he had been gone for several hours, but I was never contacted.  I was personally never notified of any of this although my siblings may have been.

 During his final days, he appeared to have disappeared again as he was lost from two to four hours before they contacted my older brother (again, I was never contacted).  When they found him, he was at the bottom of a very steep staircase.  He had apparently opened a door, and ridden his wheelchair down the stairs where he lay for four hours. My brother noted that although both of his shoes had fallen off, they were neatly found at the bottom of the stairs side by side next to his head.  He was sent to the hospital and returned to the center after a few hours in the emergency room as he had no broken bones. My brother called me and told me, "Dad rode his wheelchairs down some stairs. He was taken to the hospital, but he has no broken bones,  They gave him something for pain. He is sleeping now, so there is no reason for you to come up."

He died two days later.  If the facility had G.P.S. devices on each patient, they could have found him.  If the facility had alarms on each of the doors leading to the staircase or if the facility had a cameras in the halls, they could have discovered where he had gone and if any individual (as I suspect) helped him down those stairs.  If the facility had a caring staff who checked on the patients and cared for them, especially those with diminished capacities, he might not have died.

When I spoke with a friend whose a mother had been in another facility, she told me that her mother required assistance to visit the rest room. After buzzing the nurses for two hours, she attempted to take herself into the bathroom, but slipped and fell.  She lay on the floor for two more hours before anyone checked on her.

I realize that people with less financial clout can never expect the level of care of the wealthy, but still some level of professionalism is expected.  With the technology that is available, these two situation should never have occurred.  As a retired teacher, I know schools work vigilantly to make schools safe.  I know legislation and policing of these centers could give the other elderly (our other vulnerable population) safe as well.