The online world was watching very carefully when a Danish aid worker was on a rescue mission in Nigeria in January, 2016. She saw a starving child who was dying and the moment was caught in a photograph that was quite haunting. She was tilting a water bottle toward the boys lips and it is … Read more
As any father would, he asked his daughter what she’d learned in school that day. Since she was still only in grade school, he assumed he’d be regaled with stories of the ABCs and learning the value of sharing. You know what they say about assuming, right? “Today,” she said proudly, “we learned that boys … Read more
My daughter Callie is, to me, one of the sweetest people I know. She gets good grades, has lovely friends, and still finds time to be a wonderful loving daughter. I have never had to ground her in high school, and she had never given me reason to believe she is acting out. I am … Read more
Michael Neri is the founder of Talking Props Theatre School in Birmingham, UK. Recently, he received a shocking text from a mother of two of his students. His reply? Absolutelly brilliant.
One November afternoon when my daughter was in kindergarten, I picked her up after school. She bobbed out to the car and crawled into the back seat. “What did you do today?” I asked. She couldn’t wait to tell me. “We learned that boys are different from girls,” she chirped. Looking into the rear view … Read more
According to a news report, a certain private school in Washington was faced with a unique problem. A number of 12 year old girls were beginning to use lipstick and would put it on in the bathroom. Applying and wearing the lipstick was fine, but after they put on their lipstick they would press their lips … Read more
Today I resigned from the school district. I would like to share with you what I gave them. Feel free to share it if it strikes you as important. I love teaching. I love seeing my students’ eyes light up when they grasp a new concept and their bodies straighten with pride and satisfaction when … Read more
TEACHER: Maria, go to the map and find North America. MARIA: Here it is. TEACHER: Correct. Now class, who discovered America? CLASS: Maria. TEACHER: John, why are you doing your math multiplication on the floor? JOHN: You told me to do it without using tables. TEACHER: Glenn, how do you spell “crocodile?” GLENN: K-R-O-K-O-D-I-A-L TEACHER: … Read more
The pickle jar as far back as I can remember sat on the floor beside the dresser in my parents’ bedroom. When he got ready for bed, Dad would empty his pockets and toss his coins into the jar. As a small boy I was always fascinated at the sounds the coins made as they … Read more
I picked my niece up from school today because she got suspended and I asked the principal what happened and he said “she was talking about something she shouldn’t even know about and it’s wrong for her to know it. You should be ashamed of yourself for teacher her”. He didn’t say what she was … Read more
I’ve been teaching now for about fifteen years. I have two kids myself, but the best birth story I know is the one I saw in my own second-grade classroom a few years back. Usually, show-and-tell is pretty tame. Kids bring in pet turtles, model airplanes, pictures of fish they catch, stuff like that. And … Read more
I was 15 and moved to Philly from Texas. I had a pretty strong accent and had never been out of the state before so I didn’t know what to expect socially. On my first day of school I had the bad judgement to wear a Dallas Cowboys jersey thinking people will just laugh. Throughout … Read more
He was in the first third grade class I taught at Saint Mary’s School in Morris, Minnesota. All 34 of my students were dear to me, but Mark Eklund was one in a million. Very neat in appearance, but had that happy-to-be-alive attitude that made even his occasional mischievousness delightful. Mark talked incessantly. I had … Read more
A teacher noticed that a little boy at the back of the class, was squirming around, scratching his crotch and not paying attention. She went back to find out what was going on. He was quite embarrassed and whispered that he had just recently been circumcised and he was quite itchy. The teacher told him … Read more
The kids filed back into class Monday morning. They were very excited. Their weekend assignment had been to sell something, then give a talk on productive salesmanship. Little Sally led off: “I sold Girl Scout cookies and I made $30,” she said proudly. “My sales approach was to appeal to the customer’s civic spirit and … Read more
Times have changed a lot since the 1950s; not just in terms of technology or how we spend our free time… a lot has changed in High Schools across the country. Here’s a few scenarios to illustrate how people reacted to certain situation in 1950s vs Now.
Teacher: “If I gave you 2 cats and another 2 cats and another 2, how many will you have?” Johnny: “Seven.” Teacher: “No, listen carefully… If I gave you 2 cats, and another 2 cats and another 2, how many will you have?” Johnny: “Seven.” Teacher: “Let me put it to you differently. If I … Read more
There was a graduation ceremony filled with students who were very religious. Unfortunately, they could not pray during the ceremonies, even when they wanted to, because of a court ruling that infringed on their right to religious expression. But then, they came up with a clever little solution that allowed them to invoke God after … Read more