School Problems

Steve Smith’s letter, “Students’ Poor Performance,” Jan. 31, states that students scored much higher when parents were involved with their reading programs. Obviously, if they are not taught at school, they will do better if they are taught at home.

Also, quite obvious is the more you study or the more teaching you get, the better you will do. But that is the whole point. Schools are for teaching, not the home. If I wanted to teach my kids at home, I would do so. I expect the school to do so. Apparently they are not.

I went to a country school. We did not have homework because kids were expected to do chores after school, not schoolwork.

Schoolwork was for school. My mother may have met my teacher when I enrolled and she might have met her again when I graduated.

My father never met her. I would estimate that 80% of the males went on to college. Girls, unfortunately, rarely did so. As far as reading is concerned, I read a good part of the classics before I got out of high school.

I might mention some other aspects.

This was a poor country school. The readers had pages missing; so much for money. The one big difference, as far as parents are concerned, is that nobody for any reason interrupted school. If you did, you not only got it from the teacher, you got it worse when you got home.

Now, if a teacher touches a child she is sued and if parents touch the child they are in jail. It is bad enough our teaching methods are bogus (with many notable exceptions, even in public schools) but even if they were any good, you can’t teach uncontrollable children.

JOHN WAUGEN

Anaheim