Who’s responsible for teaching kids how to behave online?
Our community has had several unfortunate incidents of students involved in cyberbulling. I’d like to work with our middle schoolers on this issue. Some of our faculty members are supportive of my plans, but others feel that our students’ parents are responsible for teaching their kids appropriate online behavior. What’s your suggestion?
This is a hot topic that affects every community, and it’s important for students to know how to conduct themselves appropriately on online social networks. I commend you for wanting to work with your students on this issue, and I’m perplexed by the attitude of some of your colleagues. In a perfect world, parents would be totally responsible for teaching their kids how to behave in cyberspace, but unfortunately, that’s not the case. There are too many students who don’t have parents who are responsible enough to know how to guide them. Plus, adults who should know better have committed some of the worse instances of cyberbullying. Go head and develop your curriculum. Then, consider turning it into a parent workshop. I bet the PTA will sponsor the event or your local public library will let you present a community workshop for parents.
A substitute teacher told one of our fourth graders that Diary of a Wimpy Kid wasn’t an appropriate book for him because she saw it in a local bookstore’s young adult section. The student’s mother called me and asked me to explain the situation. This isn’t the first time I’ve had to deal with this issue. I blame the bookstore for this grief. What would you recommend?
Did the mother complain about the substitute teacher or the book? I hope she complained about the former, be-cause the book is quite popular with fourth graders. I’ve been in bookstores where they’ve shelved any book with chapters in the young adult section. This simply tells me that they don’t know much about the books. Here’s what I’d recommend saying to the mother: “I bought the ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid’ series for our school library because I know how much our students love these books. The book-store doesn’t classify them in the same way we do.”
A group of parents is demanding that our school board ban Scholastic Book Clubs in our district’s elementary and middle schools. The group isn’t objecting to a specific novel—it’s objecting to the “junk” offerings. The school board hasn’t issued a ruling, but my principal wants to see the book club’s latest list of offerings. We need your advice.
I’ve had a similar question related to book fairs. The solu-tion is simple. The parents who are causing the ruckus don’t have to purchase the materials that they’re com-plaining about. The purpose of these book clubs is to get some sort of reading materials into kids’ hands. This means that selections may include award-winning novels as well as high-interest activity books like “Mad Libs.” Teachers like using book clubs because they’re able to earn free books for their classrooms. And the clubs are a nice alternative for students who live in communities that don’t have a bookstore. Please stress to your principal that whether or not one buys books from a book club is a matter of choice. Perhaps the school board already realizes that.
I bought Marcus Zusak’s The Book Thief for our middle school library. A friend told me that her adult book club had read it, and she couldn’t understand why a middle school library would have the book in its collection. Now I’m afraid someone is going to challenge it. Did I make a mistake?
You made a professional judgment—now stick to it. Ex-plain to your friend why you chose the title. I know many middle school students who have read the novel and can speak passionately about it. And I know teachers who have used it successfully when teaching units on the Holocaust. Perhaps your friend and her book club underestimate the ability of middle school students.
