Where is Everybody?
by John Pearson
On the first day of school last week, I had 18 kids. Normally, that would be a fantastic class size, except it wasn't one class. I had 18 kids TOTAL that day -- 10 in my homeroom, and eight in my partner's homeroom. By the end of the week, my overall roster had exploded up to 22 students.
While the bilingual classes in third grade are each right around 20 kids, the other two ESL classes have numbers like mine. I walked into a second-grade classroom midweek, and there were seven kids sitting there. I even heard one fourth-grade class had a student-teacher ratio of four to one.
Where are all the kids??
The most likely answer is that they're coming; they're just not here yet. The opening day of school is apparently now viewed by many parents in the same way as the speed limit -- merely a suggestion.
I don't know if the pattern holds true across the nation, but at my school, kids gradually filter in and report to class over the first few weeks of school. We have a very large Hispanic population, and some of these families go to Mexico for summer vacation, not returning until after Labor Day.
Other families have alternate reasons for not showing up on time. Last week during my crosswalk duty, I saw the aunt of one of my students from last year as she was dropping her daughter off for the day. Last year, the aunt always dropped off her daughter and my student together, but since he wasn't with her I asked if he was still coming to our school or if he had moved. She replied, "Oh, he'll be coming sometime next week, his mom just hasn't had a chance to get his school supplies yet."
I was nice and didn't say anything, but I couldn't help but think that if this kid's mom had used the same excuse last year, he NEVER would have shown up. The kid never had school supplies!
As nice as it is to have so few students in class -- I feel I can devote a lot more time to each student's individual needs -- I do hope that a lot more kids show up soon. When class sizes are so low, the district starts reassigning teachers.
A few years ago, when our school didn't meet its expected enrollment numbers, we lost three teachers, one of whom was on the third-grade team. Fortunately, these teachers all found jobs at schools with too MANY kids, but it's still a very difficult transition once the school year has begun.
So parents, if you know anyone who still hasn't taken their kids to school yet, please tell them that their teachers are waiting! It's always much easier to supply a few missing pencils or folders than to have to catch up on weeks of missed instruction.
John Pearson is a third-grade math and science teacher in Dallas, Texas. He has degrees in mechanical engineering from Duke University and Texas A&M, so most consider his math abilities adequate enough to teach nine-year olds. He is also the author of Learn Me Good (Lulu, 2006), a funny, fictionalized account of his first year in education. Read more at learnmegood2.blogspot.com
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Posted by elementaryhistoryteacher on Sep 7, 2008 4:17 pm