ELLEN
BERG
Diary #32
Parents and the Proper Application of Mulch
Sunday afternoon my husband and I trudged down to the closest home-and -garden superstore to buy work gloves, weed killer, and mulch -- lots of it; 28 bags of the stuff. We had decided earlier that week that our neighbors were probably sick of looking at our weedy, unkempt yard, and so it was time to break down and take care of it all.
My husband and I are no fans or aficionados of gardening. In fact, I think you can safely say we land somewhere between "Garden Dummies" and "Garden Doofuses" (or is it Dooves? Doofi?) when it comes to gardening. Since we have little knowledge of what to do, when to do it or even how to do it, we avoid the task as much as possible. I had, however, observed many of the neighbors with nice, landscaped areas spreading out mulch over the past month or so, and I remembered they had done so in the past. I also recalled that the gentlemen who had owned the house before us (members of the Green Thumb Brigade, I am sure!) left instructions to mulch because it keeps the weeds down. As I put those two ideas together, I set about talking my husband into mulching as a way of reducing our yardwork throughout the summer. He, like I had been, was under the impression that mulching was purely for fertilizing plants and enriching the soil, and, as he puts it, "If all the plants die we can just cover everything with concrete." However, as I pointed out, the beautiful garden that the previous owners left us is much more attractive to a buyer than a concrete slab, so we should invest our time in mulching. There is a point to all of this.As I worked (and worked) and eventually broke my hoe as I was ripping out some particularly annoying bushes, I thought about the two purposes of mulch: to fertilize and enrich the soil, and to keep the weeds down. Being the education junkie that I am, I quickly made a connection to some problems we have had with our sixth grade parents this year, and a few ideas I have had to avoid the situation in the future.
The problem is equal parts parents and principal
We have had a lot of trouble with parents challenging grades, suspensions, and other disciplinary actions this school year. Many of them seem in denial about their children's behavior and prefer to go on the attack rather than to work to help their children develop more appropriate behavior or to assist them with their work.
I think part of the problem is the parents, but probably an equal part of the problem is the way the principal and the team deals with parents. I think the way school personnel -- myself included -- have approached parents has set us up for failure, regardless of our intent or the veracity of our complaints against these students.
I think our principal made a tactical error. She is so concerned about her reputation and how things "look" that she has retracted suspensions and attacked teachers privately or even in front of the parent. Though we have documented and documented and the problem is team-wide, she has singled some members out and challenged their records.
I think the word has spread in the community, because what was one complaint in the six years I have been at Turner has become seven or eight this year alone in the sixth grade. Two parents have gone to the Board of Education, and it seems as if she is trying to pin the "blame" on others instead of standing her ground. This could become a serious problem.
However, there is much our team needs to improve in our dealings with parents.
It shouldn't be "us" against "them"
I have been fairly unhappy with the tone that has developed among us when we are discussing working with our parents. I have joined in with my teammates in my frustrations with my principal and what seems to be a lack of administrative support, but I was wrong for doing so. We have made many assumptions about the motivations of our parents, and instead of trying to involve our parents in a positive way, instead of trying to engage in an equal partnership with ongoing dialogue, we tend to state our case as if to say, "Now fix your child." Hang with me, this does have something to do with mulch. I will admit that my weakest area is parental involvement. It is my deficiencies in that area that has kept me from pursuing National Board Certification. However, with our problems this year, it has become very clear to me that something must change. It is time to mulch our parents. At a recent inservice the presenter said that a common comment among educators is that the apple does not fall far from the tree, and that has largely been the case in my experience. What the presenter also said, however, is that we continue to complain about the rotten fruit, but we do nothing to help the tree become more healthy and thus produce healthy fruit. His analogy did not mean much to me until I realized for myself it was time to mulch the tree.First, we must mulch our parents to help them become stronger, more positive forces in the lives of their children. I think we need to provide more communication, more tools they can use to help their children, more constructive (not accusatory) criticism to help them fine tune their own skills.
If we engage them as partners and learn along with and from them, our relationships will be stronger, and students will no longer be able to pit one against the other. I think many of our parents are afraid to ask questions and feel uncomfortable in our schools, and unless we do more to welcome them and demonstrate that we really do want them involved and care about their opinions, we will continue to meet with opposition.
Weed control
A second reason to mulch is to keep the weeds down. As teachers, I think we have to do a lot more public relations type of stuff with our parents. We need to pull them in early and often for positive reasons, before problems arise. If we have chatted on the phone, if we have talked over potluck, if we have communicated all the great things that are happening with Johnny and the rest of our class frequently, our parents will be less likely to remove their support when we need it. If they know us and feel comfortable with us and know we are fair, they will begin to work with us as partners. But all of this only works if we take it to heart, if we begin to view our parents as valuable allies in the lives of their children rather than as enemies to prepare against. I have a lot to learn in this area, but I think I took my biggest step on Sunday as I cursed the weeds and prayed the mulch would do its job.
