PEORIA, IL -- The Peoria Public School District 150 Board meeting has such a different ambience from the past it's difficult to believe what has occurred. Instead of hostility there's collegiality, interest, acceptance when audience members rise to present comments.
Critics of the past such as Terry Knapp now often complement the board. On August 13 Knapp thanked the board for successful bargaining with the teachers union. Then he suggested "you can do this (bargaining) by yourselves," and do not need the Chicago law firm until the finale, to check the results. That would save money, he said.
Knapp then thanked pro basketball star Shawn Livingston, a Peoria High School alum, who appeared at a school event. Knapp suggested that successful alums be celebrated by the district, an idea that the superintendent later seconded. "When people achieve things they should be recognized," Knapp said.
Here is a recording of the comments.
Activist Sharon Crews suggested that the schools teach self discipline and other social skills to the students, which the district is also doing. Her remarks are printed below.
-- Elaine Hopkins
From Sharon Crews:
When public schools are discussed, I often hear people blaming parents for the discipline problems. We’ve been playing this blame game for years, but so far the discipline problems continue to worsen. If parents (especially young parents or single mothers) do not have an adult in their lives to guide them in teaching their own children the need for self-discipline, where do you expect them to learn those skills?
If we look at the history of why public schools were established, one of the main reasons was to teach children to live productively in society. Today we have to find ways to teach children to control aspects of their own lives and temperaments.
The only other source of help and direction would probably be the church. Therefore, I think you will have to acknowledge that it is the job of the public school to inform and help parents teach their children how to behave outside the home and up to schools to find ways through consequences, etc., to teach students how to behave in groups—that is inform parents of the behaviors that are not only expected but also demanded of their children at school. Both students and their parents have to adhere to the district’s policies.
I hope that any efforts to achieve these goals would be planned and carried out by Wisconsin Avenue administrators through their own ideas without purchasing any programs.
I am sure programs have already been purchased, but I hope that all discipline-related programs for parents and students will be given the personal touch. Teachers should be asked to help with these plans. However, parents must understand that the policies, consequences, etc., are instilled with and carried out by the highest authority in the district.
Behavior problems are so serious in our schools that an all-out effort must be made to restore healthy classroom environments.
Years of high-stake testing took up excessive time when students should have been engaged in learning experiences that involved the interaction of teachers with students and of students with other students.
A greater problem is that discipline problems take up so much of the teachers’ time that students have to be given work that probably could be considered busy work. Keeping students busy with little interaction with each other is often necessary because students have not been taught how to socialize—an effort that must start long before middle school. K through 8 schools allowed for more continuity.
Students need to know how to get along in school and in this world. Children should be given the freedom to socialize, Learning how to socialize in school will obviously impact how children will socialize as adults. At school and at home, children should learn negotiation skills, problem solving, and self-control. Of course, children must, also, learn how to accept and appreciate classmates who may be different from themselves.
With the onslaught of NCLB and just before I retired, I was appalled by a trend toward cutting out the teaching of literature to make room for teaching and testing the basics of grammar and math.
Children and young adults absorb much about life through reading and discussing literature in English classes. I fear that classic literature is not as much a part of English classes as it once was—I hope I’m wrong.
Good literature allows young people to identify with the characters in a novel or drama and thus to find ways to solve their own problems. Good literature helps young people understand historical periods and cultures that are unfamiliar to them.
Of course, reading is the most effective, if not the only way for students to expand their vocabularies. Just as we learn to do almost everything through imitation, students learn to write by reading good literature.
In the 1970’s I chose the book Five Smooth Stones, published in 1966 about the Civil Rights Movement, for my freshman enriched class to read. I still recommend it as a way for young people to come to grips with the problems of that era and how young people coped with the racism of that era.
Of course, a return to courses such as home ec and child development would help prepare males and females to be parents. Please put your hearts and souls into showing Peoria’s young people how they can control themselves and their lives. - 30 -
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