Frustration...

As a teacher I generally love my job! I mean really, it is a great job and it tends to be pretty fun. But there are days when I get so frustrated I want to take parents and shake them...yes parents! As I am high school teacher, I fundamentally believe that teenagers should be held accountable for their actions and when I see parents fighting with all they have to help their children avoid consequences it makes me want to scream.

By the time your child is in high school, they understand right and wrong (or they should). When a child chooses to smoke pot at school or come to a school event drunk, it is not a mistake it is a choice. It is a choice to not only to break school rules, but to break the law, and should be treated as such. Teenagers make choices all the time, just today I saw a teenager choosing to text and drink a Starbucks, while driving. That's not a mistake- that's a choice (which is also against the law). We all made choices as teenagers, we choose what information to share with our parents, and what not to share, we choose to do our homework or not, we choose who we hung out with and who we dated. A million different choices in our teenage years, and each time we learned. If it was a bad choice- say dating the wrong person- we paid with our hearts. It hurt, we swore we'd never recover, but we did and we got smarter about the people we give our hearts to.

The only way we ever learn is through consequences. We make mistakes and they hurt and we learn. As a teacher I am constantly watching parents do all they can to keep their children from being held accountable for their choices. They say it was a mistake, or their just kids messing around or my favorite- "he really is a good kid". Let me say this- good kids- don't get busted for drugs! Good kids don't show up to school hammered! Good kids come to school, treat their teachers and fellow students with respect, turn in homework and study for tests- those are good kids. Your children might be nice or funny or even talented, but to be good kids they must exhibit good traits and if they don't, that's their choice. Your response should be to the help with those teachable moments. Pick them up when they fall, hug them and remind them that you love them and you will show that love through allowing them to be held accountable. Teach them the lesson we all learned- you are responsible for your choices.

Sorry for the rant today...I need to get it out! :) I promise the next blog will be all sunshine and butterflies...okay no it won't...we all know that!

I read a great article last night in Time magazine about the trend in parenting in the last 20 years, I highly recommend it to everyone! Take some time and read it.

http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1940395,00.html