Saturday, July 4, 2015

One of My Closest Friends for a Very Long Time:TV

my idea of heaven as a child


Until I have the birth of a new baby to report, I'll write frequently off and on about television and its impact on my life.  I should probably take the time to explain why television was such a huge deal to me even though I was limited to an hour of viewing time on school days and two hours a day on non-school days unless I was sick. While most of my contemporaries were children of technology, I was not. Early in my life, we did not have video games in our home. I played them on occasion at other people's houses, but because I didn't play them all that often, I wasn't very skilled at them. Who would be thrilled about playing a game that she was virtually guaranteed to lose every time she played?  Video games weren't usually my first choice of entertainment when I went to another child's house to play.

We had computers in our home since before I was born, as both parents used them for work purposes, and Matthew and  I were allowed to use them for research purposes and email. I then had the situation about which I wrote once in greater detail, in which I gave out too much information online to a child predator. My computer privileges were cut off for longer than two years to the point that in my early years of high school, I had to either take my brother's turn at doing the dishes for however many times we negotiated so that he would type a given paper for me (Matthew is a very skilled typist), or use an old IBM typewriter that my parents still had lying around to type the paper myself.

The school banned me from the use of technology as well. Since what happened did not happen on school computers or on school time, my parents could have challenged that ruling successfully, but they did not want me to have access to computers at home or at school. I was forbidden the use of technology everywhere.  Microfiche in our school library had just been discarded at and replaced  with a computerized version of the dinosaur  method of accessing ppast periodicals, limiting my access of past periodicals to those of which the school still had hard copies.

I wrote a research paper on the U.S. space program when I was a freshman. The paper ended with the  sentence: "Aerospace technology is increasing at such a rapid rate that man may soon land upon the moon." The sentence was a paraphrase from the most up-to-date volume on the subject of space technology that could be found in the library. I didn't cite it because the wording was sufficiently different that plagiarism could not have been charged based on the wording, and the sentiment was common knowledge at the time the book was published, which was 1965, if my recollection is correct.  

The library had thrown out much of its nonfiction section because the Internet had essentially rendered it obsolete. Magazine subscriptions were being cut back drastically as a cost-saving measure because the only magazines actually read by anyone other than faculty were Teen Vogue and Seventeen. The other pertinent information needed from the periodicals could be accessed from the Internet. The school didn't bother updating its volumes with much nonfiction because it wasn't being used. The library budget was spent on fiction and techological resources.

It was just an English paper, but the teacher gave me a failing grade for factual inaccuracy.  I challenged the grade on the premise that I was allowed to use only hard copies of books and magazines in the school library and wasn't granted access to the  public or university libraries because of my technology ban, which neither institution would have taken the responsibility of enforcing.  The English teacher looked in his spare time for a week, but could not find  a single book or magazine in the school library that made any reference to the apollo voyage. The appeal committee of the department chair and my counselor overrruled my English teacher, and the grade was , changed over the loud protests of the english teacher, to an A.  

Even though I won the challenge, my parents were upset with me for what they considered a smart-@$$ed maneuver, and grounded me from television for two weeks. I was expected to fly under the radar of trouble at school, and receiving an F grade on a paper, then challenging it on a technicality, did not constitute "flying under the radar" as far as my parents were concerned. It was at that point that my mother, who worked in upper-level administration for my school district,  instructed all school personnel to email her if either my brother or I as much as sneezed too loudly in class.  My brother still blames me for the Nazi-like regime under which we existed throughout high school.  I maintain that my brother was a much bigger trouble-maker than I, and my incident and my mother's action caused him to be extremely careful and sneaky to avoid ever getting caught.

I have complete respect for those of you who came of age in the '70's or '80's or earlier, who had to type all your papers with typewriters. Essays were bad enough, but the annotated research papers were killers.  I at least had the benefit of my teachers requiring APA or MLA formatting, both of which used parenthetical documentation. My dad has told me horror stories about the teachers who required the footnotes at the bottom of each applicable page. a student would type the page, then find that one of the footnotes did not fit on ther page. He would then have to re-type the entire page.  There was no making a few quick adjustments on a computer and reprinting. 

Matthew and I didn't get cell phones until high school. I was given one even though I was still under the technological ban. Due to a misunderstanding between myself and my parents, however, I was under the mistaken impression that our cell phone plan had unlimited texting. In the second month of ownership of my phone, I ran up a six-hundred-dollar bill through my own texting, not even counting anyone else's charges. I offered to take the six hundred dollars from either my long-term savings or my discretionary account, which was sizable for that f a child my age because I was well-paid as a part-time semi-professional musician. 

My parents refused my offer. Instead, my cell phone was replaced with a child's cell phone which had eight numbers I could call: both of my parents' work numbers (my dad's was somewhat moot, as he had so many of them, but he had an assistant at one location who could reach him at any time), both parents' cell numbers, our home phone number, andthe home and cell numbers of my Uncle Steve and Aunt Heather, along with 911, which was automatic with most models of kiddie phones. 

The kiddie phone  also had a major microchip feature that allowed either my parents or the 911 dispatcher to pinpoint my location very quickly. That feature, though I felt insulted at having it at the time, protected me from much worse injury than I would have otherwise sustained the time I was attacked in the school restroom. I don't buy into that line of which many peoplle are particularly fond about everything happening for a reason, but the sequence of events that forced me to give up my regular cell phone for that kiddie one was a bigger blessing than I'll probably ever know. 

Anyway, while other kids my age were playing video game [particularly the boys]. practically texting theit thumbs off,  and whiling away hours on Myspace and later Facebook, I was studying, practicing musical instruments, reading (which I loved and continue to love), participating to some degree in school sports, and watching television. Even though I probably watched less TV than the other kids who had technological privileges (they didn't spend as much time either studying, reading, or practicing musical instruments), TV was probably a much bigger factor in my life than it was in the lives of most of my peers.

Getting to watch the TV programs I absolutely had to see  became a major exercise in budgeting. The DVR became a life saver. There was an hour of Judge Alex that I couldn't miss. If Judge Alex appeared on any other program and I happened to know about it, I couldn't miss that, either.  Depending upon the year, there might have been Seventh Heaven, (sorry to make you gag, Knotty), Gilmore Girls, The Office, Roseanne reruns (which I usually saved up on the DVR for days when I was sick), and   the non-negotiables of House MDSouth Park, The Daily Show, and The Colbert Report.  At one time I was even a Law and Order junkie, though I had to stop watching SVU after the restroom assault incident. Any PBS-type documentary about the JFK-shooting or Watergate was also something I felt i could not miss, though my parents sometimes gave me a free pass on that sort of programming and allowed me to watch it without counting it against my tV viewing time. (Big Love I watched at Claire's house. We didn't have HBO, so she DVRed it for me.)

The programs I felt I must watch (though not all of them were on my list any given year) exceeded the nine hours a week during the school year, assuming there were no school holidays. Watching everything took some creativity on my part.  I knew which friends liked which programs, and I used them to record shows to watch with me when i visited them.  Additionally, my parents awarded us a one-time bonus of ten extra hours of tV viewing for each perfect report card, either quarter or semester. (Anything less than a perfect report -- even a minus behind an A on a mid-quarter progress report -- resulted in revocation of all TV privileges until the teacher reported to my parents that the grade was back to a full A.)

Even before the track and field injury and subsequent restroom assault, I was sick more than was the average child, and my parents placed no restrictions on TV when we were sick, at least in part because we had to display measurable or observable symptoms to stay home due to illness, and because neither of us, despite the extra TV privileges, wanted to stay home from school. I can remember being forced to remain at home or at my Aunt Heather's house, or having been forced to leave school during the day due to illness  on numerous occasions, but I don't once remember faking symptoms even during my half-year with Mrs. Moore. I remember not enjoying TV very much when I was sick, though it did take my mind off the discomfort to some degree.

Due to an extended babysitting experience with an incredibly lazy sitter, Matthew and I also had some early exposure to soap operas.  I'll share that at some point in the near future.

Just before I turned sixteen, in my final year of high school, my Godparents remodeled my room and placed a TV in it. They felt they had to give Matthew a TV as well to be fair. My parents relented because Matthew and I had shown ourselves to be responsible students. All limits were lifted.

In the upcoming days I shall expand upon my life as a TV junkie. I'll discuss programs i especially liked that, looking back, I cannot believe I ever liked. I'll talk a bit about how my political views were shaped in part by the TV I watched.  Perhaps most importantly, I'll share how I gradually came to the realization that, for me anway,  real life is actually better than television.

Happy Birthday, America. and Mr. President, I liked your soulful rendition of Amazing Grace. It took b@!!s to have done that.




27 comments:

  1. I think I hand wrote most of my papers except for big term papers. I had a typewriter in college, but there was also a computer lab and I used to go in there and write short stories.

    I watched a lot of TV when I was growing up, but I've kind of gotten out of the habit. The Internet is my friend.

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    1. My mom said in her day, haand-written term papers were accepted all the way through high school. Now teachers have gotten lazier, and even middle school teachers (some upper-elementary teachers as well) require almost everything to be typed. Typing is a great skill to master, particularly if kids are using the correct fingering, which I do not, but handwriting is important as well, and we're losing that. There's a connection that's made between the movement of the arm in writing and the brain, particularly wth cursive. Furthermore, we're developing a generation that cannot write legibly and cannot operate without spell-check, which still has its limits. (Eventually technology will catch up and even home computers will have programs that catch homphones reliably.)

      Technology nothwithstanding, and it's here to stay for better or worse, everything in education is cyclical. If you talk to any teacher who's taught more than twenty-five years or so, he or she has seen virtually every fad, style, or program come and go at least twice.

      Kindergarten is going back to being developmental, where they're moving toward having a playhouse/home center in every classroom, teaching children social skills, and having them cut and paste. The idea that because of so many working, wealthy, or financialy-deprived parents with children therefore eligible for funded preschool, 90% of the kids had gone through preschool and no longer needed the former kindergarten curriculum, has been debunked. Preschools varied widely in what experiences they gave children, and if the little hands weren't ready to cut or to hold a pencil or crayon properly, all the preschool in the world wasn't going to make them ready before they were physically mature enough. It was like thinking attending preschool was going to make their permanent teeth grow in faster.

      I think the experts are finally seeing that children exiting second grade, or even first grade in most cases, were not reading any better, and in most cases more poorly than did the children in generations when reading was not forced on kindergartners. I'm all for teaching children of any age to read who are ready to read. Because in a kindergarten classroom readiness would vary so widely, it would have to be highly individualized, so there would need to be a heavy home component, which isn't exactly fair to children of non-English speakers, uneducated people, or simply lazy paeople, but life is sometimes unfair. Just don't write a kid off as learning disabled because he doesn't come out of kindergarten reading. Generations of children did not read, for the most part, until first grade. We actually got a man on the moon under that educationl system.

      Many children are ready to read in kindergarten. Even Matthew read before kindergarten, and he's no genius, although he's not quite as stupid as i sometimes make him out to be. That was the beauty of whole language, which got a really bad name, largely for good reason, but was perfect for kindergarten because it allowed each child to be taught at what ever level he was upon entry. By first grade, it's time to hit the basics hard for anyone who hasn't already grasped them, but give children that one year of school being more fun than drudgery, (I think they could hit the basics hard in first grade yet still make school fun if they tried hard enough.)

      The only sad thing is that this, too, shall pass. Twelve or thirteen years down the road, some idiot with power is going to say, "What are these kids doing cutting and pasting and playing in kindergarten? That is what preschool is for!" and someone is going to listen, and kindergarten will no longer be kindergarten. I hope it doesn't happen until my kids have gotten through kindergarten.

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  2. I had a lot more internet exposure because of doing the online charter school, but up until high school it was conducted with adult supervision. After I had finished school for the day I wasn't allowed to do anything extra. My Nana was convinced that staring at a computer screen was going to ruin my eye sight and give me migraines. Outside of school if I was allowed on the computer, I did a lot of research on Judge Alex. I didn't get involved in social media until 2009, when I stumbled on Judge Alex's facebook page. I had to beg my parents to let me on facebook. At that point I didn't have a social life, at all and my therapist thought it might enable me to connect with friends that I wasn't otherwise able to interact with (it didn't). I was monitored pretty strictly in the beginning, though that eventually tapered off. I was majorly pissed when Jason was allowed to open a facebook page at 11. He's gotten to do more at a younger age than I was ever allowed to do at an older age. Although, his involvement on facebook lasted about a month and then it faded out. He also was allowed to have a cell phone a lot sooner than I was. Getting a cell phone wasn't a huge deal to me because I never really went anywhere that I needed a way to contact my parents. I got my first cell phone when I 19.

    I'm not really a big TV watcher, either. I do at night. Most of the time there really isn't anything on. I'll typically put the television on TLC or ABC.

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    1. Our Internet research before the ban was closely supervised. Once the predator incident happened, my dad had a foolproof log of access system installed. There were filters as well, but you can beat filters. His system logged every single keystroke recorded on our computers. matthew once thought he could get around it by installing another keyboard, but that accomplished nothing. When i finally got privileges back, they kept some filters and even kept the log for awhile. Eventually they lightened up a bit and just told us to be smart. We didn't do Facebook because my mom had dealt with so many school problems that had initiated in Facebook interactions that she wanted no part of it however irrational her policy might have been, as in theory we could have either harassed someone or could have been harassed with or without Facebook through other Internet venues. Other kids may have been talking all sorts of cr@p about us and we would have had no idea, but perhaps ignorance is bliss. i know i was a major source of discussion after the restroom assaault, but only complete thugs and "mean girls," both of whom were a very distinct minority at our school, were saying anything bad about me. I believe a few things were reported to school administration and disciplinary action was taken. Even though I was the "victim" I still don't see how it applies to school as long as it stays on the Internet and don't understand what gives the school the right to issue consequences for something that happened solely on Facebook and never reached campus, but I really had no dog in that fight and was in the loony bin most of that time, anyway. Now my parents still warn us that something or some stupid photo we post can affect future employment.

      Regarding Jason getting everything at an earlier age than you, i think it's a common phenomenon among families with multiple children. Sometimes there's a sexist element there as well, with boys getting privileges at earlier ages than their sisters, though I have no idea if that's where your mom was coming from. Since Matt and I were the same age, my parents were fair about allowing us the same privileges at the same time, with the exception of my technological ban and cell phone fiasco, which i brought on myself.

      Matthew got his driver's permit before I did, but I was in the loony bin, and my dad asked if it was OK if they let Matt get his permit and let me get mine as soon as it was practical. I decided none of it was Matt's fault and not to take it out on him. I got my permit before I got out of the loony bin. Dr. Jeff ended up being the one to teach me to drive because my parents were both nervous wrecks and they made me nervous, while Dr. Jeff was a lot calmer. Matthew learned to drive on my cousins' dairy starting when he was about five. He could even drive a stick shift when he was little. My parents didn't have to teach him anything. They expected it to be that easy with me, but my uncle was sexist and didn't let girls drive the farm vehicles.

      I think your nana's perception of viewing a screen for too long as being bad for eyes is a popular one for people of her generation. I'm not even sure the experts won't even- tually decide there's some truth to it.

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    2. Instead of using 'loony bin', can you please use the correct terminology. By using 'loony bin', you are insulting someone that I care about and it hurts, even if it is you.

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    3. Chuck i'm really sorry it bothers you. Using that term was just one of our coping mechanisms for being there. i won't use it in reference to any facility except the one in which I was treated, and only in reference to my own stay. It's really hard to verbalize the feelings that went along with being there, but it was just something I and several others there had to do to joke about it and make it feel at least a little bit OK. I still have to refer to it as such to make that time OK in my mind.

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    4. ♦ There is a saying. If you crunch the numbers you will see this is true. There is a fine line between genius and insanity. ♦Here is a story you can learn from. A girl had anorexia nervosa (for real) from age 14 to 18. She said about herself she is "a self-loathing, dysmorphic girl." Body dysmorphic disorder is a type of chronic mental illness in which you can't stop thinking about a flaw with your appearance — a flaw that is either minor or imagined. At age 17 she had a nervous breakdown.

      She is great. I wrote an article about her. You respect musicians. At age 20 she had no published music. Then she made this deal to get more money per album (over $1) than anyone ever got at that time. The album sold 16 million in the U.S. and 33 million world -wide. What kind of singer is she? Many say she is awful and her singing is nasal and whiny.

      So that album made her over $33 million. She had more albums. She was also in a few movies. In 2 of them , she did not play a crazy woman. She played God-- the almighty Lord. One producer said that she is more like God than anyone he had ever met.

      Her name is not Alexis. Her name is Alanis Morisette.
      http://chuck-bluestein.hubpages.com/hub/Is-Singer-Alanis-Morissette-Very-Lucky-or-Very-Loved

      Later in an article on attachment parenting, I have a picture of her wearing her baby. My article about her is called Is Singer Alanis Morisette Very Lucky or Very Loved. Alexis, you are very loved!

      What many doctors call disorders are considered spiritual crises. When people see unpolished diamonds, they think they are stupid rocks for children to play with.

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  4. Do you know the derogatory term for a young Jewish woman? It is JAP-- Jewish American Princess. Your parents should treat you like a princess. That is also how your future husband should treat you-- like a princess. If your school did not change grade from an F to an A, you could have sued them and showed the power of the law. Then you would get an A and $50,000 for pain and suffering.

    If you have a child that has a disagreement with their school, please side with your child and not the school. So what you said about your parents above reminds me of a song-- Where is the Love by the Black-Eye Peas.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpYeekQkAdc

    "People killing, people dying
    Children hurting, hear them crying
    Can you practice what you preach,
    Can you turn the other cheek
    Father, Father, Father, help us
    Send some guidance from above
    People got me, got me, questioning
    Where is the love, the love, the love
    Where is the love?"

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    1. I think there has to be a happy medium between siding with the school and siding with your child. for example, little Michael in kindergarten hit another child over the head hard with a stack of legos because he wanted all the legos and the teaching assistant (me) tried to mediate and help divide the legos evenly between the aggressor and the boy who was hit. The aggressor in this case didn't care that they had the same amount of legos. he wantd them aLL. He tried to hit me as well but I was quicker and n ducked. I saw this happen, and the teacher saw it happen. what would be the point of his parent siding with him? That would be anabling terrible behavior and helping to create a super-monster who knew mommy and daddy would side with him no matter what the teacher said because if Little darling says he did nothing wrong and it was all the other child's fault, then it HAD to be true. In this case, the parent did hold her child accountable.

      We had another case that summer where a child was angry because another child had mistakenly place his art prokject in the child's cubby. They were kindergartners. they're occasionally going to put things in the wrong slot. the teacher and I were dealing with a barf situation halfway across the room. She was cleaning the barfy child while i was cleaning the table and chair. I got to him as soon as I could clean my hands of the toxic barf, but by then he had removed nearly half the children's art projects from their cubbies and had torn them up. he wasn't a child who, in the estimation of numersous professionals, had a condition, such as a rage disorder or even ADHD with impulsivity as a majir coimponent, according to numerous professionals who had evaluated him. He was merely an inly child whose parents coddled him, gave him everything his heart desired as soon as the request came out of his mouth, or as soon as was practical. For example, every day after kindergarten summer school, he chose the restaurant -- fast food or otherwise -- and that's where his mom took him. I'm not exaggerating. Every single day!

      At the teacher's request, as vomiting child takes precedence over papers being torn up even if they are someone's artwork, as one does not want a vomiting chid to choke and aspirate, I handeled the situation by preventing him from destroying any other children's artwork. (The ironic thing was that one of the papers he took from a cubbie and mistakenly destroyed while I was there before I could stop him [I was just fourteen -- a smart fourteen but small] was his own art project, which he had mistakenly ploaced in another child's cubbie.

      When the teacher finished with the barfy child, She put the child in timeout for his behavior for five minutes, then allowed him to rejoin the activities. The teacher saved the destroyed art work to show his mother.

      When his mother arrived and the teacher showed his handiwork to his mother, he denied having done it. The mom said, "If james says he didn't do it, that means he didn't do it. James would not lie."

      The teacher exclaimed, "Ma'aam I saw it with y own eyes!"
      The mother siad, "You'r a liar!" to the teacher in front of the child andn the remaining children who had yet to be picked up.

      i'll continue this because i'm going to run out of space.

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    2. The teacher talked to the principal, who called the teacher who had been the child's teacher during the regular school year. The principal had dealt with the child to some degree, but good kindergarten teachers refer students to the administrators as seldom as possible because sending a child to the office loses its impact when it's uemployed too often as a disciplinary tactic. the school psychologist wasn't working summer school.

      So anyway, the child's regular teacher said that because of lack of parental support, this child couldn't be handled as other children would be. where a child would typically be given a short time-out to think about his or her misdeeds, at which time the teacher carefully explained why the child was to be excluded from the grup for a few minutes (typically one minute per year of developmental age; assuming a kindergartner was at adevelopmentally appropriate level for his chronological age, that would be five minutes.) The teacher would set a visual timer so that the child could see the time wind down and didn't have to wonder if he would be see the time elaps and wouldn't think he would have to remain in the time-out chair there forever. At the conclusion of the time-out, the teacher and the child would discuss better ways a similar situation might be handled in the future. then the child rejoined the grup, and all was forgiven. A child would not be given a time-out for a sinle error or for something he shouldn't have been expected to have known not to do. It was for the breaking of specific rules or failure repeatedly to follow teacher instructions directed to him or her.

      if time-out, didn't take care of the problem -- and only rarely did it not take care of the probolem -- the teacher would then consult with the parent.

      In the case of the little art project destroyer, his mother would not work with the school when he hurt other children or ran from teachers. she blamed the teachers. It took practically an act of congress to get the mother to allow the school psychologist to take a look at the child. In fact, the only way the school psychologist was able to gain access to the child was to call the father at work and ask for his permisssion. he came during his lunch break and signed the necessary form.

      TO BE CONTINUED

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  5. The psychologist discovered that the child had no behavioral issues as long as he was allowed to do exactly what he wanted and was given whatever he wanted. They psychologist brought in a "plant" child, who was very compliant and could be cued in to the behavior expected of him in the session and could be warned that the other child was capable of biting, so not to do anything to anger him if he could help it, and to get away fast if the child did get angry. For the most part the psychologist was able to remain ohysically between the two children, but she wanted to see a bit of interaction without her interference. The child was happy, perfect, non-impulsive, and non-defiant because there was nothing to defy. even when the psychologist made suggestions just to rule out oppositional/defiant disorder, the child was compliant because it was a fun task the psychologist asked him to complete.

    The psychologist then got rid of the other child and gradually transitioned the routine to more typical kindergarten expectations. As the expectations became less of what the child wanted to do, the behaviors the teacher described began to appear. at one point the child bit the psychologist because she refued to allow the student to use her computer. she showed it to him, showed him the programs, and showed him there were no games 9she had bloacked the Internet for that purpose. She told him it was her work computer so children could not play with it because important information could be lost. He didn't care, he wanted that computer, so he bit the psychologist. she gave him the benefit of the doubt and said perhaos he was developmentally four and not five, and =gave him a four minute time-out with the visual timer, which he tried to climb the counter to get because he said he was going to break it.

    After his four minute time-out and discussion of how the situation might better have been handled (the psychologist could have arranged that after his work was complete, they could have gone to a room with access to a student computer, and he might have earned ten minutes of computer time.

    The psychologist gave the child a pattern-copying task to be competed using plastic cubes. the simploe a/B pattern was obviously too simple for him, so she praised him for having learned that already, and tried aBC pattern, to which he had been introduced and pretty much knew. she asked him how he would like to use stickers this time to make a more complex pattern. he was all for the idea.

    she got out the stickers. She took a piece of paper and demonstrated ABAC pattern, It was a little more challenging, but with direction he was successful. (All this in terms of the patterning had taken place in about four minutes, so it''s not like he had tome to grow truly bored. regardless, he had other ideas about what he wanted to do with the colered happy face stickers. He wanted to put them all over the walls,floors, counters and furniture. The psychologist gently explained that stickers could not be put on walls, floors, counters, or furniture because they were sometimes very difficult to remove, but if he would complete the pattern 9which would have required maybe six more stickers on the strip of paper) she would get him a large piece of butcher paper 9she explained it as the paper on the bulletin boards, and showed it to him) and he would be able to decorate the big paper with stickers any way he liked. he then kicked her in the shin and tried to climb the counter to get to her computer, which had been placed out of his reach.

    TO BE CONTINUED

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  6. When the kindergarten day ended, the psychologist sent the child with an assistant to play while she explained the session to the mother. The mother said, "I don't think James would do thise things. i don't believe you."

    When James and his mother reuinted, his mother asked him if he really kicked the teacher. He said, "No, she's lying.
    "

    The mother said, "That's what I thought. you're a liar. James doesn't don things like that. The mother wanter to talk to the psychologist, but Jakmes wanted to leave. He ran from her, but there was a locked gate, so she caught up to him and more or less dragged him back. The whole time the mother was trying to berate the psychologist, saying that if James did anything out of the ordinary, he was provoked, Jamed was kicking, hitting, and scratching at his mother. She was adept at hoolding onto him while dodging his blows. It was clear she'd had experience.

    The psychologist called the father, who commiserated with her and acknowledged that jamkes essentially ran the house, and it was a constant battle with his wife to get her to try to encourage civilized behavior from James. The next day the psychologist met with both parents. The husband tried to reason with the wife that james needed to learn to function in society, but she cried and he felt bad and backed down.

    The next day the psych took James for session 2. He had various tasks, interspersed with fun activities and outdoor time on a playground apparatus in a small enclosure so that the psychologist wouldn't be in the position pof having to chase james, as having an adult chase him seemed to be one of his faavorite games.

    James refused to complete the first task, which was to write or trace (his choice) his name on a white board with a dry erase marker. the teacher told him he couldn't use the gear toys until he had done his taask. He threw the white board and the marker across the room. The psychologist picked them up, placed them in front of him, and said, ''Do not throw them again, James. We do not thow anything except soft balls or balloons in this room. Do not throw the marker and white board. james immediately threw them again.

    The psychologist put James in timeout again, but she was playing hard ball this time. James didn't have a four-minute time-out, but a twenty-minute one, with the vosual timer in his view but far out of his reach. The psychologist called in an assistant so that there was a witness that James was not being harmed and so that they could safely employ the legal restraints they had been trained to use. James screamed and carried n, but when the twenty minutes was up, he got up and wrote his name on the white board. he then had ten minutes of time with the gear toy.

    His next task was to, using a glue stick, glue the correct number of objects to three pages with corresponding numbers 92, 3, and 40. james thred the glue stick and the paper. This time there was no second chance, because he had already been told not to throw things in the classroom. The assitant came in, and he had a thirty-minute time-out. At the conclusion of the time-out, he very quickly got to work on the task. He had a bit of trouble counting four objects, but with the psychologist's help, he finished the task. he then got to play with the batman toy for ten minutes.

    TO BE CONTiNUED ( know this is long, chuck, but there is a point; which is that you should, as a parent, not ALWAYS take a child's side over that of an authority figure; I have to take a break, and I'll get to it)

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    1. The process repeated itself with several tasks. The timeouts got longer until the final one for the day was for thirty minutes.

      This was the day the psychologist spoke with both parents and found the father on the same page with him but the father was unable to hold firm when the wife brought on the tears.

      the next day, the rules changed a bit. if James refused to do the task and acted out, he still had the time-out. The psychologist was sticking with thirty-minute time outs. However, James also lost the privilege of the fun activity or use of preferred toy if he had not done the activity or had insisted on access to something he was not allowed to have. He'd just go from the academic task (which was developmentally appropriate and far from drudgery) to the next academic task, which initially meant he'd very soon go into another thirty-minutes time-out.

      The psychologist had an agreement with the father that the school would do anything legal in dealing with James and simly leave his mother out of the loop. If James complained to his mother at the end of the day adn she approached the psuchologist, she would be told that she cuold speak with the principal if she had concerns, The psychologist told the husband to call her any time with any concerns.

      After a few days, James was doing most of his tasks without major fits or outbursts. he still occasionally had timeouts for the occasional outburst. hH was then told that if he had to be physically held in timeout, the tie would be increased to forty-five minutes. he could see by the visual timer that 45 minutes was a significantly longer interval than 30n minutes. it took about two days of this for him to remain in the timeout chair himself. The psychologist also introduced the concept of giving james a single high-interst book to look at in time out as long as he didn't throw or abuse the book. he wanted to switch out books every thirty seconds and thought that gave him the right to get out of the chair, but when he lost the privilege of hasveing a book a few times, he grew interested in the book.

      His schedule was changed so that he had to complete two tasks before having a preferred activity, and then eventually three activities per preferred activity. It took a few timeouts to motivate James to complete the three activities before getting do do something he wanted to do.
      During this time, he was also held accountable for follwing the psychologist's instructions. Sometimes when toys were being played with, the psychologist would say, "James, in two more minutes it will be my turn to use that toy" in order to prepare him for sharing in the classroom. if he clung to the toy and refused to give it up, he lost his next toy or preferred activity privilege. if he threw the toy or was vilent, He had a timeout AND lost his next preferred activity privilege.

      Eventually it was time to transition James back to the kindergarten classroom. First, an assistant was present to faacilitate the transition. James was expected to do what the other children did, which was basically three teacher-selected activities for every student-selected activity. JJames had the same timeout policy as he had with the psychologist (in part because his only reasons for receiving timeouts were for refusing to do an activity, throwing objects across the classroom, or violent behavior. Other students were held to a slightly higher standard.. Rules were more lenient for James, but consequences were more stiff.

      Gradually James was weaned of his assistant, Still, if he refused to remain in timeout, the assistant would come, take james outside for his timeout, and request assistance if he had to be held in the chair so that there was a witness and so that no one was hurth. James was removed from the classroom so that class could continue uninterrupted.

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    2. When James' mother came to get him, periodically he would tell his mother that the tteacher had been mean to him. His mother would approach the teacher in a hostile manner and call her a liar. His mother said that the psychologist had had no trouble with James, so she didn't understand why the teacher culd not handle him. i don't know if she was crazy or not very smart or really believed that the teacher and the psychologist were not communicating. the teacher called the psychologist, who said that yes, she had experienced extreme difficulty with James before he finally realized that he had to play by her rules or not play at all, and that he was now having to learn the same thing in the classroom. The mother called both the teacher and psychologist liars and left. the principal called the mother and quoted a state law that it is illegal in the state if Utah t confront a teacher in the presence of students, and that in the future, if she had a problem with anyone's handling of James, she could come to the office and he woulld meet with her at his earliest convenience.

      James then began to bite otherr children and adults. Ordinarily, a child would be suspended the second time he bit anyone, or the first time if he broke the skin, and the parent would be informed that he or she would be liable for medical care not covered by insurance if the skin was broken. James' mother 'was informed of her liability, but James was not sent home because he wuold have looked upon it as a reward. Instead, he was placed in a chair and allowed to watch the other children for the remainder of the morning. It was tough, but biting cannot be tolerated. The biting stopped after James' third instance of sitting for the remainder of the day.

      When James began sumer school and the summer school teacher first shared concerns of his behavior with his mother. The mother stated that james teacher during the regular school year had no trouble whatsoever with him. It was the second day when he destroyed the art projects,

      The summer school teacher spoke with the summer school principa, who was just the head teacher during the regular school year. the head teacher knew there had been issues, but didn't know the specifics, so she called james teacher for the previous school year and hear the whle story. The summer school principal related to the summer school teacher what the plan was
      for disciplining this child. The summer school teacher fllowed it. the mother had to be reminded by the summer school teacher that the ban on approaching the teacher was still in effect even though it was summer school. the mother would have to speak with the principal about any concerns.

      james did not become the perfect angel because his mom tended to reward him on days when he complained of mistreatment, but he was a very functional student because the school gave this kid tough love and was consistent about it.

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    3. When James' mother came to get him, periodically he would tell his mother that the tteacher had been mean to him. His mother would approach the teacher in a hostile manner and call her a liar. His mother said that the psychologist had had no trouble with James, so she didn't understand why the teacher culd not handle him. i don't know if she was crazy or not very smart or really believed that the teacher and the psychologist were not communicating. the teacher called the psychologist, who said that yes, she had experienced extreme difficulty with James before he finally realized that he had to play by her rules or not play at all, and that he was now having to learn the same thing in the classroom. The mother called both the teacher and psychologist liars and left. the principal called the mother and quoted a state law that it is illegal in the state if Utah t confront a teacher in the presence of students, and that in the future, if she had a problem with anyone's handling of James, she could come to the office and he woulld meet with her at his earliest convenience.

      James then began to bite otherr children and adults. Ordinarily, a child would be suspended the second time he bit anyone, or the first time if he broke the skin, and the parent would be informed that he or she would be liable for medical care not covered by insurance if the skin was broken. James' mother 'was informed of her liability, but James was not sent home because he wuold have looked upon it as a reward. Instead, he was placed in a chair and allowed to watch the other children for the remainder of the morning. It was tough, but biting cannot be tolerated. The biting stopped after James' third instance of sitting for the remainder of the day.

      When James began sumer school and the summer school teacher first shared concerns of his behavior with his mother. The mother stated that james teacher during the regular school year had no trouble whatsoever with him. It was the second day when he destroyed the art projects,

      The summer school teacher spoke with the summer school principa, who was just the head teacher during the regular school year. the head teacher knew there had been issues, but didn't know the specifics, so she called james teacher for the previous school year and hear the whle story. The summer school principal related to the summer school teacher what the plan was
      for disciplining this child. The summer school teacher fllowed it. the mother had to be reminded by the summer school teacher that the ban on approaching the teacher was still in effect even though it was summer school. the mother would have to speak with the principal about any concerns.

      james did not become the perfect angel because his mom tended to reward him on days when he complained of mistreatment, but he was a very functional student because the school gave this kid tough love and was consistent about it.

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  7. It was on the second day of summer school that James destroyed the artwork. Even after the first day, the teacher expressed concerns to the mother, who insisted that james had experienced no difficulty with his regular teacher during the previous school year. after the art-destroying incident, when the teacher spoke with the summer school principal, who had been the head tacher during the regular year and so was smewhat familiar but not totally in the know. The summer school principal called the previous year's teacher, who suggested the discipline plan that had been worked out by the psychologist. the summer school teacher implemented it, and james functioned within the lower end of normal limits. James' mother tended to reward him if he said the teacher had been mean to him, which was possibly why he was at the lower end of appropriate.

    FYI. i know most of this because I had James father's permission to review jJmes' file for a case study in an Ap child development class I took in 11th grade. The names have obviously been changed to protect the guilty.

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  8. When I was in kindergarten, the teacher complained that i was finishing work ridiculously fast, then disturbong the other children and keeping them from completing their work. My mother worked with the teacher to help her tofind something productive for me to do once i'd finished my work, but she also told me i was under no circumstances to interfere with other children as they were doing their work.

    When I was taking a physics course, i was the youngest in the class. My instructor repeatedly called on me to answer questions because no one else knew the answers; then the older kids picked on me. my teacher also complained that i NEVER volunteered to answer a question,. My parents worked out a compromise where I would raise my hand once oer class session to answer a question, and the teacher could call on ,e one additional time, but then i was to be left alone. I was told that i must raise my hand once and must answer the question the teacher asked if I knew the answer, though, or I would lose privileges.

    when my parents found that i had a teacher who was legitimtely picking on me, they pulled me out of her class immediately.

    There's a time to support the school. There's a time to protect your child at all costs. The best solution is if the school and the parent can work together for a solution.

    Children and teens have been known to lie. This is especially true if a child or teen knows he or she will be believed no matter what evidence the teacher or other authority figure has. the only ones who won't lie under any circumstances are those whose parents won't do anything about it even if they do believe the teachers.

    If you have a school where no child is accountable to anyone and every parent takes his child's side over that of the teacher or school personnel, you will have bedlam and a very dangerous situation. someone has to be in charge if any order is to be maintained. I'm not saying it needs to be militaristic order,m, but order nonnetheless needs to be present. children need to understand that -- unless someone is violating their bodies or, in an exxtreme sense, their dignity, they need to do as they are told and seek justice later.



    Children need to be taught to respect authority or, unnless they're very passive children and maybe even then, they and their paarents will one day be telling their stories to a judge and not just to school authorities.

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    1. SORRY FOR THE DIATRIBE, BUT I COULD NOT EXPLAIN MY POINT OF VIEW THOROUGHLY WITH FEWER WORDS. IT'S INTENDED PRIMARILY FOR CHUCK, THOUGH ANYONE WHO WANTS IS FREE TO READ IT.

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  9. Alexis, Thank you very much for taking the time to write the above. I have an article on raising children. I say that in the article that in the movie, Karate Kid, Miyagi says that there are no bad students, only bad teachers. But what I say is that there are no bad children, only bad parents. If a child is tortured by his parents, then it is normal (not abnormal) for him to torture others.

    So I have to give your parents a lot of credit since you turned out wonderful. Since you are a very good person, you do good things. In the story about you and your parents, you tried your very best to do a good report with a genius intellect. You did nothing wrong. But your parents did not support you.

    Growing up I did good things and when there were conflicts, my mother supported me. She knew that I was a mensch. That is a Yiddish word for a good person or gentleman. In fact my mother thought that I was an extremely good person. My grandmother, who died when I was 6, was considered a Jewish saint by people that knew her. Of course the bible says that we are the chosen people.

    While in high school I did volunteer work in a hospital. I did not visit patients. I worked in the bacteriology lab developing slides to see if women had cancer. During the summer, I did that 5 days a week and I was a volunteer doing the work of a lab technician. Once a student lab technician did not know what to do and the other technicians were not around so she asked me. So I told her what to do and when the lab technicians got back, she was telling them that she was so surprised I knew what to do.

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  10. I forgot to mention above that before I started to develop slides in the bacteriology lab, they had me go and visit all the labs and I was given a kind of crash course of what the student lab technicians go through.

    Here is a hypothetical story (me writing fiction). So you are a teacher of a first grade class. The first day of class one of your students kills 3 other students that happen to be Jews. When the police ask you about it, you tell them that you are not surprised. So in this hypothetical story, why weren't you surprised?

    Well the father of this child was Adolf Hitler. So Dolph (nickname) comes in and explains that what his child did was a good thing because Jews are bad people. Then he shot and killed anyone that disagreed with him. Now this would be Adolf being true to himself and being a good parent.

    His child was just doing what he was 'taught' to do. Remember that children learn from imitation. So you cannot be surprised if the child that you talked about above is just like the parents.

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  11. So I guess when I was saying parents should support their children, I was saying that your parents should support you, since you are smarter and a better person than your parents. If you are trying to prove me wrong, you have done a terrible job! In all the stories that I have read of yours, you failed to convince me that you were a bad kid.

    In fact then you should have called yourself mean bitch Alexis on Twitter instead of the The Angel Alexis. You know that I idolize you like many idolize Alanis Morisette who played God in 2 movies. So you should tell me a story about you that will make me look up to you less, instead of all these stories that make me like you more.

    So give me a story about you where I will favor your parents or teacher instead of you. My mother considered me (I was much more precocious than my brother) to be like the best guy alive, even better than Jesus.

    Since my mother divorced our father when we were young, people would ask my my mother where our father was (Jews have less of a tendency to get divorced). Here is what she would explain each time. Can you guess what she said?

    She would explain scientifically that Mary had one immaculate conception (Jesus) but she (my mother) had 2 immaculate conceptions.

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  12. My mother used to say that truth is stranger than fiction. Wikipedia says that Alanis Morisette is an alternative rock singer instead of a conventional one so I guess that is why many people dis like her.

    You will find the following unbelievable. You may even think that I am lying to you. Ready! Above I am comparing you to Alanis Morisette. Guess what? She has a twin brother that is 12 minutes younger than her. Is your twin brother older or younger than you? By how many minutes? This will be needed on your Wikipedia page.

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  13. I was also a bit strong-willed. My parents were in charge and I had to do what was asked of me with minimal argument. I could debate a point legitimately and respectfully, but once I had made my particular point and it had been ruled upon, and perhaps my argument hadbeen rejected, that was the end of the discussion. Sometimes my parents conceded my points were valid and changed their position or ruling in my favor; they always listened to my point at least the first time I made it; I will give them that. I had to stop arguing or at least come up with a better argument after a ruling had been issued. I couldn't keep arguing the same point over and over, and if I did, I was sent to the library in our home.

    My parents knew what they were doing in sending me to the library, as it was a good, well-stocked library, and while I was "incarcerated" there (a very harsh word for being sent to a room with a comfortable sofa, an equally confortable loveseat, the greatest recliner in which I've ever sat, and tons of interesting books, and I LOVED to read) it wasn't really all that much of a punishment. In fact I'm now glad for the time I spent there because I otherwise probably would not have taken the time to find out just how many great books my parents owned, It really just gave my parents and me time away from each other when we needed it, The only thing I wish is that their had been a piano in there. My mom says she wishes there had been room for a piano there, too. My mom says when my arguments reached the point of disrespect, they had to do something, so they sent me to the library, where i cooled off, we got the much-needed space from each other, and I read books I never otherwise would have even known were in the house.

    Mostly I read "adult" books, but there were children's books as well, and I read a few of those. Had I not been confined to the library, I probably never would have taken the time to read the complete Laura Ingalls Wilder series, which I remember fondly to this day. I'll read the series to my own children before they're old enough to read, because I think there's so much great content in them, and they're the sort of books that inspire tiny
    children to want to learn to read. Without timeout in the library, i wouldn't have bothered with them because they just didn't look all that exciting. I found them so compelling that I read them when I was not in time out.

    I was also allowed to do homework when I was in timeout if that's what i chose. I tended to get through my homework quickly even with aP classes, so i was overly burdened by homework. Also, if i had a book in my room when i was sent to timeout, I was allowed to retrieve the book and take it with me if i wanted.

    I'll try to think of a single instance when i was genuinely "bad." i may not be able to think of one. The one teacher who said that I was bad and who mistreated me in other ways lost her job at the end of the year due to my mother repeatedly appearing at schoool board meeting to complain about this woman's emotional abuse of me. though my parents tended to support the teacher, they listened to my side, and when there was evidence i was being mistreated, they stood u for me.

    Still, I'll try to come up with an instance where my behavior was clearly out of line. My parents never once used the word "bad" to me in describing either me or my behavior, and would take on any othe adult who did. They, too, believe that children are not "bad,"
    and certainly I wasn't.

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  14. I'll write another message soon telling about the time the student plagiarized my work. my mom didn't even pause to question me when she was called to discuss it, because she knew it was impossible that the other student had written the paper and I had stolen it. She marched into the office instantly on my side without even bothering to ask me, totally on the offense against my accusers. It didn't even matter to her that she worked with the administrators involved.. She was on my side, no questions asked.

    We had law and order in our home, but my parents were humane and always at least listened to my side of the story, though they maintained that Matthew and I were expected to stay out of trouble at school. If the trouble was truly not all our fault, they either attempted to work out a compromise or they came to our defense.

    What the parents who sent me to timeout was saying by sending me to timeout was "You were disrespectful, and we both need time away from each other, so go do what you really love to do most, which is to read, and do it in a comfortable environment. the library was the room in our house that was never too hot or too cold. And there were cofortable throw blankets there, so if i was cranky and tired, which might have been the cause of my being disrespectful, i could curl up and take a nap for as long as i wanted.So it really wasn't a "punish ment." Only rarely did they truly punish me. they took away tV privileges when I let a grade get too low mid-quarter, and they disciplned me when I did things that I knew perfectly well were dangerous because they didn't want me to be hurt or killed.

    I was also allowed to do homework when I was in timeout if that's what I chose. I tended to get through my homework quickly even with AP classes, so i was overly burdened by homework. Also, if i had a book in my room when i was sent to timeout, I was allowed to retrieve the book and take it with me if i wanted.

    What my parents who sent me to timeout was saying by sending me to timeout was "You were disrespectful, and we both need time away from each other, so go do what you really love to do most, which is to read, and do it in a comfortable environment. the library was the room in our house that was never too hot or too cold. And there were comfortable quilts and throw blankets there, so if i was cranky and tired, which might have been the cause of my being disrespectful, i could curl up and take a nap for as long as I wanted.

    I'll write another message soon telling about the time the student plagiarized my work. my mom didn't even pause to question me when she was called to discuss it, because she knew it was impossible that the other student had written the paper and I had stolen it. She marched into the office instantly on my side without even bothering to ask me, totally on the offense against my accusers. It didn't even matter to her that she worked with the administrators involved.. She was on my side, no questions asked.

    Still, I'll try to come up with an instance where my behavior was clearly out of line. My parents never once used the word "bad" to me in describing either me or my behavior, and would take on any othe adult who did. They, too, believe that children are not "bad," and certainly I wasn't.


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  15. So it really wasn't a "punishement." Only rarely did they truly punish me. they took away tV privileges when i let a grade get too low mid-quarter, and they disciplned me when i did things that i knew perfectly well were dangerous becausse they didn't want me to be hurt or killed.I'll try to think of a single instance when I was genuinely "bad." I may not be able to think of one. The one teacher who said that I was bad and who mistreated me in other ways lost her job at the end of the year due to my mother repeatedly appearing at schoool board meeting to complain about this woman's emotional abuse of me. though my parents tended to support the teacher, they listened to my side, and when there was evidence i was being mistreated, they stood up for me.

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  16. As far as the aerospace paperwasconcerned, i deserved an a. and I got it through the appeals process. i deserved an a, but I did not deserve compensation fro pain and suffering. My parents were right that i ended with the line I used solely to be a pain in the butt.

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