Earning the Cell

You know those blogs that tell you how to be a good parent.  They always sound a little pretentious.  They sound like they have all the answers.  They make it sound like you don’t have any of the answers.  The sad thing is, anybody reading the blog about effective parenting is usually a self-selective group of people who have a lot of good ideas about parenting.  This isn’t a parenting blog but one about education.  It will suggest some ways to fix public schools that are habitually failing. 

            Kids don’t like school.  I mean, most kids don’t like school.  It’s almost all of them right.  My wife has a son that is legally mine and he likes school.  He is such a people person that he’d gladly go to school year round.  He is like Zach Morris from, Saved By the Bell, who said, “I love school, I just don’t like the classes.”  I know I shouldn’t have quotation marks for a paraphrase, but that’s a paraphrase.  I think a lot of kids fall into this category.  They like other kids, but they don’t like classes, reading, homework, grades, or tests.  They don’t like the rules, dress codes, and discipline. 

            And when did we think that schools should be fun?  When did we decide as a society that teachers are supposed to be guides on intellectual adventures?  At what point in time was Magic School Bus’s teacher, Miss Frizzle made the teacher du jour?  I think we spend too much time worrying about whether or not kids are getting engaged and not enough time making sure that students are incentivized to achieve.  Yes, I think engagement is important, but I also believe engagement to be impossible for some kids because they have too much other stuff reaching them.  Their phones can pipe in everything in the world to them instantaneously and thus, how can teachers interest them?

            Yes, there are ways.  I think there are a lot of micro options for engagement.  You have to create a template for engagement based on your personality and demeanor.  We can’t all be Jamie Escalante, but all teachers can get better at reaching the unreachable children of the 21^st century.  But how can parent help?  Is there some incentive that almost every student will work to achieve?  Is there something, the loss of which will incite action and effort for 90% of all students?

At my school, Elgin Middle School, there are more than 50% of the students who are ‘at risk.’  This means that the majority of the students on my campus have at least some issues with money and parents that make enough of it.  Now guess in this campus how many students have cell phones.  It’s not all and I’m sure it’s much different between sixth and eighth grades but the students I had in the eighth grade had about 90 percent cell phones.  Then there was about 20% A-B honor roll. 

            If every parent told their kid that they couldn’t have a cell phone unless they got A-B Honor Roll, what percent do you think would pass?  It wouldn’t be all.  Some students might try to succeed and still fall a little bit short.  Some kids would be defiant and might make their parents enforce the rule.  But really, how many do you think would get A-B Honor Roll in order to keep their phone?  My guess is 80 percent.  I guess there would be 5% that don’t want their kids to have a phone because they aren’t mature enough.  I think 5% couldn’t afford it.  I think 5% would try and still not be able to succeed.  I think 5% would be defiant and lose access to their phones every six weeks. 

            That is my eerily accurate unscientific estimation.  We’d go from a school who has 20% A-B to one that has 80% A-B.  This might change other things.  Like, I take late work even if it’s five weeks late.  I don’t think teachers would give as many chances and might start expecting more accountability if the kids were earning incentives at home.  I think students wouldn’t come to me or other teachers and just ask, ‘what do I have to do?’  With this system they might actually try to self-govern their own responsibilities. They might self-advocate ways to boost grades.  They might do the extra credit I have posted.  If there was group work all the student would rely on each other to produce good work so they can all either achieve cell phone status or avoid cell phone confiscation.

            This idea isn’t one that I thought of on my own.  I’m sure there are tons of parents who do this.  I had two students in my class this year.  Their parents had a rule that the girls would lose their phones if they didn’t get all A’s, not all A’s and B’s.  Once, one of the girls had an 88 the last week of the semester came to me and got a lot of extra credit and I offer a lot of extra credit.  She ended the grading period with a 91.  I didn’t bump her grade because she showed me a lot of effort.  She earned it.  The other girl got a bad grade on a test and did all the extra credit I offered in the grading period and ended with a 96.  These two girls, best buddies, had parents with the simple rule that all parent ought to have.  No A’s and B’s, no phone.

            But…you say your kid needs to get in touch with you.  No, they don’t.  Your schools have rules against the use of your student using their phone and every time they call you within school hours you undermine your school's authority.  'My kid’s teachers are okay with them texting and calling when they aren’t working in class.'  Well your teacher ought to explain to you why they have so much free time.  They could do that after they explain to the administration why they aren’t enforcing the no phone policy.  My school literally told me to not confiscate phones, but to just write students up if I saw them with a phone.  Thanks, parents.  I sure that call home to ask you to bring them lunch was seriously needed.  How many times did we call home before every kid had a cell phone?  None.    

            ‘My kid has some sort of disease or there might be an accident.’  Give them the phone.  Lock the phone from anything but calls to the police.  Am I saying that there is no reason to have a student have a phone?  No.  I’m saying earning all privileges should be a consistent ethic your children should learn. 

            ‘But my kid is too old, you don’t understand.  They’d get violent if I took away their phone.’  Okay give up.  My suggestion is about encouraging parents to have a more active role in the educational lives of their children.  If your response is that is, 'its too hard,' then I can’t actually argue that point.  But leave a comment about how I don’t know anything and that I cannot make blanket statements and how I don’t know everyone’s situation and how I shouldn’t try to tell you how to raise your kids. 

            And I understand there are people who don’t think their kids should have cell phones at all and some that don’t think they should earn them with good grades.  Use some other carrot so the school doesn’t have to use the stick so much.  Please leave a comment about how I’m bad for even suggesting students should sometimes have cell phones or what you use as the carrot to get achievement out of your kids other than a cell.  One of my parents had a kid who level of lack of effort was uncanny.  He improved a little second semester and I asked what she’d said or offered.  She said Jehovah deserved all the credit.  That would be awesome, I thought.  He returned to his old ways and failed the semester with less than a 40 the last six weeks. 

            Like I said, I think reading a blog self-selects the kind of parents who might already be doing these things or things like them.  So, if you agree with this blog/article, please try asking your friends if their kids have a phone and if they have achievement expectations to receive it.  Ask them if they have any achievement rewards.  The idea of creating measurable expectations for our kids’ success and some sort of payment for success in the classroom needs to be part of our societal vernacular.

Is it part of yours?