The Decision To Homeschool

So let's just be clear. I understand the hardship there is on teachers. I am a substitute for a public Pre-K. Meaning it's government funded, and there's a lot of stuff we have to do in order to stay licensed and blah blah blah. I understand that teachers of public school systems are underpaid, overworked, held to extreme standards, policies, and rules, and being a teacher is just flat out fucking stressful - no matter grade you teach.

I also know that there are some kids that are just awful, nasty, hateful, mean, gross, and disruptive to teaching. And I know that a lot of the times, these kids aren't this way because they are bad kids. It's because there's issues at home, a parental problem, a behavioral issue stemmed from things such as ADHD, Autism, sensory issues, abuse, or what-have-you.

Before we get into this, I would just like to iterate this: Children are like dogs, there is no such thing as a bad dog or a bad child - only bad teachers, parents and owners. If there is a 'bad' child or dog, it's because there is a root problem, and they aren't at fault for having a root problem. Young children and dogs can't speak up for themselves, and it takes an investigative process to figure out what the root of the behavior.

That all being said. My 5-year-old daughter does not have behavioral issues. She might have a little ADHD - but not to the point of where she'd been diagnosed. She has a short attention span. She loves to talk, especially to other kids her age. She loves to sing. She has a bad habit of drawing on tables with crayons or pencils but that is about the worst of her behavior. At school, not at home. Let's be clear... She's way better behaved at school then she is at home.

She's an August baby, so that means she's on the cusp of the weird age where she's either 'to old' for school or 'too young' for school. I started her in Pre-K - the same one I substitute at. So as a kindergartener, she's a few months younger than a lot of the kids there. And her teacher, really likes to bring that up when she's talking about how 'immature' my daughter is.

Yes you read that right. Her Kinder teacher says that my 5-year-old is 'immature.' She's said this several times. Now granted, my kid is not completely innocent.

There was an incident, a couple weeks ago. When all this started. The teacher has no help, and does not like to let her students go to the bathroom by themselves. So she has regularly scheduled potty breaks. Which is good, and the amount of potty breaks she has are sufficient for the kids, I've seen the schedule.

But these kids are not used to that. It's a process. School has been in session for less than a month. These are 5-year-old children. They go out to potty before recess, which is right before they get to go home. And my child didn't use the potty. Apparently when they went outside, right before time to go, my child had an accident. The teacher said she squatted on the ground and went through her pants.

Well, upon talking to my child, Sky expressed she was afraid to ask her teavher to go to the bathroom when she had to go. Explaining to her that she had to use the potty during the scheduled potty breaks wasn't an issue. When I asked her why she didn't go when she had the chance, she said,

"Mommy...I didn't have to go right then."

So I said:

"Well, you have to try, even if you don't feel like you have to go potty, when you go line up before recess, you need to try to go potty. Why didn't you ask to go into the bathroom?"

"Mommy, I was afraid I would get in trouble. We get in trouble if we have to go potty during recess. The teacher gets mad."

OH? Excuse me?

Again. 5-year-olds, not all of them have even been to Pre-school, so ya know, a little leniency would be nice. I understand if you're a teacher alone on a school ground and its a big issue to have to bring everyone inside to go potty, but these are kids. Little kids. Less than a month of school. They are still essentially babies!

Okay. It didn’t help that the next day - Sky apparently didn’t use the bathroom again at that time, and the teacher had to take the class inside to use the rest room. I iterated it to her again, and then reminded her to TEY to use the potty EVERY potty break, even if she doesn’t feel like she has to go. We haven’t had this issue since.

The other complaint. Almost every day this teacher complains: "She doesn't follow directions. She talks too much. I put her at a table with older girls who have neat work hoping that will help but it doesn't. She doesn't pay attention. She sings in class. She swings her hair around. She has a hard time paying attention. You know you can pull her out of school by September 11th, and let her wait a year."

So you mean, my child is doing regular five-year-old things? . And this teacher is making her out to be so disruptive that she just can't teach. But with the regular complaints, I started getting suspicious. Now, again, as a teacher I understand about disruptive students. So at first, I worked really hard to talk to Sky. Remind her EVERY morning to pay attention, do her work. The teacher, if the work is not done up to her standards, sends the sheets home for the students to re-do.

Sky has had to re-do a few work sheets, not gonna lie. But I can count the amount she's had to re-do on one hand. ONE hand. Less than five. It's been like 3 weeks of school, and my kid has had little bring home work. And, it kind of doesn't help the teacher make her case to me when she sends all the work she made the students do through the week home, so we can see the progress as parents.

Kinders do a suprisingly large amount of ESL work. I bet you I could count the pages of work my child has brought home to show me that she did at school, and it's well over 150 pages work of Kindergartender level worksheets. And my childs had to do like... 5 pages over? So how is it that this teacher is texting me everyday, telling me how disruptive my child is and how she never does her work? And I Checked her back pack - EVERY DAY.

Is she not sending all the work she wants Sky to redo home? I don't know, but I'm not impressed with this teacher. She calls a barely turned 5-year-old immature, talks about how she doesn't do her work and disrupts the class so much, then why isn't more work being sent home?

You are taking these 5 and 6 year old children, and making them work 8 hours a day. And then you’re upset when they don’t act like soldiers and they get distracted? They aren’t machines that can stay silent all damn day. They are KIDS.

And why did you not respond to my suggestion of a positive reinforcement program that we can do over the school communication app, DoJo? I've explained to you that Sky is very positive reinforcement based. Negative reinforcement, like me bitching at her everyday to pay attention doesn't work. She responds well to rewards, and things that she can see that says she did a very good job.

In DoJo the teacher can award the students point for doing well. I've suggested a reward based program using the points, and disciplinary actions on the days that she did very bad. Let me tell you, the teacher did not respond to this. And for about two weeks, I jumped down my 5-year-olds throat every day for being 'bad in school.'

Oddly, during her reading homework that I make her do, or I make her write words as practice for homework, she does very good. No problems. So obviously she's learning in school. She's showing signs of intellectual progress, telling me about what she learned in school. Usually kids who don't do well and are disruptive and don't pay attention can't tell you that they learned what a rhyme is, and list off 20 examples of 10 seconds flat. Right?

So I've come to the conclusion. Her teacher doesn't want to deal with her. Her whole "I'm not saying you SHOULD pull her out of school" but she brings it up at least twice a week kind of screams "PLEASE PULL YOUR KID FROM MY CLASS." Her teacher is incapable of handling the load of students. Now she seems like a young teacher. She looks young. I don't know if she can't handle a copious amount of young kids, or if she doesn't want to.

But my problem is, I could go to the school. But I live in a small, small rural community. So small in fact, that one of the Kinder teachers at my daughters school, is the wife of my middle school homeroom teacher - whom my mother had to pin against the wall and threaten because he would laugh with the other kids when someone was getting bullied. I remember one of the students tripping me while walking to my desk, and I fell and smashed my face and arm on a desk. Why would I want my daughter associated with anyone whose like that? Even if it is just association by marriage.

I could have her put in another class. But then the teachers would get together, and talk about my kid, and talk about me. And then my kid would be isolated and treated like crap - especially if I go to that school an tell them exactly what I think. They can use the excuse of her 'behavior,' and how she's 'so young' and acts much more 'immature.' These teachers all grew up together, so it means their noses have been stuck up each other's asses since childhood. That's how the toxic small town thing works. The 'popular' people are only popular because they have a family name that goes back generations, or they know the person whose name goes back generations.

It doesn't mean anything but trouble for my kid if I go and fight for her. And it would cause trouble for me because I work within the school system.

Its the issue I have with public schools. Especially ones in my county. They aren't worth a damn. The teachers don't care because they aren't paid their worth and children have a way of being absolutely taxing.

Don't get me wrong. I have left my school squawling like a baby, snot and tears down my face because the day I had was absolutely awful and none of the kids decided to behave. I am not saying that my kid is innoceent. She probably is disruptive at times. Like every single child. Ever. But when a teacher makes a mom feel pressured to pull their kid out of school - that is a teacher issue not a kid issue.

A good teacher may have days where their head hurts. Or they go home crying because the kids were hard on them. Or there are weeks when you are just so glad it's the weekend because you need to get drunk. But a good teacher doesn't give up on a kid because they are 'immature' or 'disruptive.' I understand that it's HARD. Especially with a whole class of kids.

But you know what a good teacher does? They teach. They don't give up on the kid and beg the parent to pull them out of school. They work hard with the parent (if the parent is willing, because lets face it, not all parents are like me) to work with the child. They put in place an environment where this kid can feel safe and secure and be willing to learn and progress.

Again, I understand not all parents are as cooperative as I was willing to be and tried to be. I'm extremely involved. I'm hard on my kids. I'm strict on them. I understand that I am their first teacher, their main teacher, and as their parent it's MY job to make sure they learn and they know how to behave.

They are all young, but I'm the kind of parent who can take all three of my young babies out and get complimented on how well behaved and adorable they are - because I'm the parent that only has to give her children a certain look and them kids be good or they know I will spank them right there in front of everyone and Jesus, and then I will make them apologize to strangers for behaving so badly and making other people have to witness their bad behavior.

So that being said, after this rant. This teacher, of a public school, has decided that if public schools can't handle teaching my child I will just do it myself. I don't understand people who don't understand or like children but they become teachers. If you want a child to act like an adult, become a high school teacher or a college professor. If you can't handle a little girl with a short attention span, don't become a Kindergarten teacher. If you can't handle 5-year-olds acting like 5-year-olds, it's probably not wise to become a teacher to a grade that is literally made up of 5-year-olds.

But hey. What do I know? I'm just a substitute teacher who does love kids, and since I'm a mom, I guess I understand that kids will always be kids, no matter where they are. And they need to be taught how to behave - you know... the thing that teachers are supposed to do.

End of super angry rant.

I've started enrolling her into K-12, a homeschooling program that has a lot of tuition-free programs, where you can homeschool your child for free like a public school. There are teachers that help, and everything. It's a great program.

Anyone else having parent life issues? Let me know in the comments!