Middle School Student Behavior

reply to post by Tayesin


You are correct. Encouraging children and teens to "fight the system" is asinine and dangerous. 99.9% of them (purely a speculative statistic) have been cared for their entire lives and lack the knowledge, skills, experience, etc. to make informed decisions about what are truly defects and flaws in "the system" and base their opinions only on what affects them on an emotional level. And, I expect most will agree, acting or reacting based solely on emotions seldom results in positive change.

Children/teens have had all of their needs supplied to them, without having to understand how. They have a warm bed and food on the table, supplied by others, shielding them from learning how to fend for themselves. They could not survive on their own, nor should they be expected to, because they have lived off the fruits of their parents/guardians, since birth. For those who doubt those statements, consider what draws runaways and neglected kids into gangs, prostitution and other destructive and/or criminal cultures.

Specifically, within the education system, kids have yet to learn what constitutes a good or bad education or a good or bad teacher. They have no experience or knowledge of the results of that system or teacher. They have never educated another person, therefor should not be judging the effectiveness of an educational curriculuum or tactic. When they say "That teacher sucks", they are only displaying their dissatisfaction, from an emotional perspective. They do not consider and will flatly ignore the fact that the same teacher may have several students who excel under their tutelage, while only a few do not. Unfortunately, those parents who encourage their students to rebel against "the system" also ignore the sensible approach and "emotionally" react to their own child's assumptions.

All of that may have just been an overly 'wordy' way of saying, I believe most educational blocks students blame on teachers and/or "the system" are, in reality, just self-imposed and perpetuated personality conflicts, with self fulfilling results.

If, on the first day of class, a student says "That teacher is dumb and he/she can't teach me anything", he/she will most likely not learn anything, regardless of the capabilities of the teacher.

Now, before some decide to break out the flame throwers, misinterpreting my statements, I have not said and do not believe children/teens are "stupid". If they do, they should go back and re-read the post.

I did some substitute teaching about ten years ago and middle school was horrific, younger kids were fine, older kids were fine. I'm pretty sure it's been this way forever. It's just a terrible age. It's a perfect storm of hormones, rebellion, and "I'm much smarter than grown-ups." Even the smart kids with great parents are twits at that age.

reply to post by SevenBeans


That was the point I had tried to make, that apparently nobody liked. There were monsters when I was in middle school many years back, yet mostly everyone got through it including the staff.

The only difference now is we have teachers who support the police state model, where drugging children going through natural hormonal changes & temporary imbalances is normal, punishments for minor things can be severe, punishments for major disturbances can destroy their lives forever. Even a food fight can lead to real criminal charges today whereas in my day it would of meant, suspensions, loss of cafeteria privileges or extra curricular activity's & probably scrubbing floors with toothbrushes etc.

Originally posted by verylowfrequency
The only difference now is we have teachers who support the police state model...

I honestly don't see it that way. What I do see is a ridiculously litigious society, with parents who think their children do no wrong and have forced school's do adopt "no tolerance" policies. Back in my primary and secondary school years, teachers and administrators were permitted to deal with the disciplinary issues on a case by case basis. Now, if you don't implement exactly the same discipline on Johnny as you do on Billy, on even slightly similar infractions, there is hell to pay.

...where drugging children going through natural hormonal changes & temporary imbalances is normal,

With this I agree completely. However, it is ultimately the parent's decision to drug their children, without fully educating themselves on the potential dangers of the drugs. The blame for this should not be placed on the school or the teachers.

I heard a good quote somewhere once. It went a little something like:

"Those who criticize this generation forget who raised it."

Whose really at fault? This is my rough estimate in percentage terms.
1. State Juvenile court judges and systems. 51%
2. LEOs and School principals/deans and guidance personel. 40%
3. Peer pressure / hormones / food "preservatives"/ vaccines 5%
4. Disgruntled school staff and deadbeat parents 3%
5. Parents who work 2 jobs to survive/pay bills 1% IMHO

I think that at some point the educational system will have to be restructured.

Imagine if school were considered a privilege instead of a requirement.

Think how the students attitudes would change if they had to pass a test to continue on in a decent high school. If you don't score high enough, you don't get to continue.

How about classrooms that are segregated by test scores. If you don't score high enough, then you have to be in one of the "lower" classes.

If you're a repeat problem, then perhaps you should be in the classroom with the padded walls.

I do think that the education system that we have in place today is a failure but it sure could stand some improvements. I think the biggest mistake is to allow behavior issues to disrupt a classroom. If the behavior issues continue, pull that kid out of that class and put them somewhere where they can then appreciate what they had.

reply to post by SamTGonzalez


I certainly didn't raise anyone in this generation. Lately there has been a trend by several students to refuse to do their class work. Here is a quote from one of them : "No, I am not doing that assignment. I will take an "F" for the day." And another one; "I have a right to fail and you can't make me do this assignment." This is a scary trend. When the parents of these students were called, their response was to blame the teacher for the students lack of interest in doing the work.

Before kids could be controlled and made to act against who they really are, or their nature. Now with the internet, and cellphones, kids won't be able to be controlled. Hate to say it, but it more than likely is going to be a trend. The kids shouldn't change though, the schools need to change because they are a failure for everyone. Smaller class sizes, different learning environments...separating boys and girls honestly wouldn't be a bad idea since they tend to have different learning styles. It'd introduce some discipline just separating them.

In short, kids are going to exert more force than what schools will be able to exert back, therefore schools need to change and adapt.

Originally posted by ghaleon12
Before kids could be controlled and made to act against who they really are, or their nature. Now with the internet, and cellphones, kids won't be able to be controlled. Hate to say it, but it more than likely is going to be a trend. The kids shouldn't change though, the schools need to change because they are a failure for everyone. Smaller class sizes, different learning environments...separating boys and girls honestly wouldn't be a bad idea since they tend to have different learning styles. It'd introduce some discipline just separating them.

In short, kids are going to exert more force than what schools will be able to exert back, therefore schools need to change and adapt.

Very good ghaleon12! What do you think about "jamming" devices, and webcams in every school that parents with internet access could monitor? I dont know enough about the pros and cons to say I am for or against. Also, I say this as possibly a "start", not that this is a "solution".

Originally posted by G.A.G.

Originally posted by ghaleon12
Before kids could be controlled and made to act against who they really are, or their nature. Now with the internet, and cellphones, kids won't be able to be controlled. Hate to say it, but it more than likely is going to be a trend. The kids shouldn't change though, the schools need to change because they are a failure for everyone. Smaller class sizes, different learning environments...separating boys and girls honestly wouldn't be a bad idea since they tend to have different learning styles. It'd introduce some discipline just separating them.

In short, kids are going to exert more force than what schools will be able to exert back, therefore schools need to change and adapt.

Very good ghaleon12! What do you think about "jamming" devices, and webcams in every school that parents with internet access could monitor? I dont know enough about the pros and cons to say I am for or against. Also, I say this as possibly a "start", not that this is a "solution".

I think you'd have to use those sorts of devices that jam cellphones. Kids are already not really in school in some ways since their attention is elsewhere, add texting to the mix and I wouldn't think it'd work out too well. Make school good enough where students will want to focus. Probably not webcams though.

Smaller schools would be a big help. If people don't want them acting like animals, don't keep them in zoos.