This is a follow up email to the one yesterday. In it, we see an excellent restatement of the author’s original point:
“Thanks for the compliment. I cannot wait until those new standards are passed. [ed. note: They are passed, but will teachers align their instruction with them?] There will be resistance, I know, but still they will do great things for the system, I’m sure, because shaming kids to the point where they compare themselves with others and think that they are a less valuable human being is wrong, as I know you realize and have realized for a long time. That’s one of the many things I like about you. I also know that, until teachers know that they are shaming kids, it is impossible for them to stop. This is why after class the other day I asked my teacher to stop complimenting me in French class because then the other students wouldn’t feel that their speaking was lacking.
“I hadn’t thought about the confidence comparison either until during our race when I fell (laughing, as I did) and the girl that affirmed the fact that this kid sucked at French offered to help me up. It was at this point that I realized that every time I fall people help me and people are very patient with me on the stairs (don’t use elevator anymore), in gym class, etc. I’m sure that, just like previous years, all the kids will congratulate me regardless of how I do. All of this seems nice on the surface. Yet, for this kid and many other kids my classmates won’t wait when it takes a student longer to understand a concept (like it takes me longer to do stairs). In fact, regardless of that student’s effort, if that student’s performance is not up to par, then the class and sometimes the teacher basically say they suck.
“This does some serious damage to confidence and self-esteem. The most harm that comes from a fall is a cut or bruise and maybe a little soreness or stiffness. These things can be fixed easily – a bandaid and advil do the trick. Plus, you can expect to fall (if you’re me anyway), so the damage is less each time because you’ll know it will happen. But self esteem can’t be repaired nearly as easily – sometimes it never gets repaired, and it’s certainly not expected. It’s not like you say … every Monday, “I will be embarassed and have my self-esteem crushed by my classmates and teacher because somehow Mondays don’t seem to be complete without a dose of teacher humilation.”
“Ranting over. So it’s not fair that I’m helped up when the damage to me is very little and no one helps these kids who really have a lot of damaged confidence. For this kid, it took a foot race, with me falling several times to rebuild some of his confidence. It was worth it though.”
K.