The first few weeks for me are always the hardest.  After a rather sedentary summer, I find myself swept into motion.  Energetically, I run from place to play, smile, give compliments, offer instruction.  I fail to learn all the names and I know even fewer of their stories.  Yet, the toughest part is that I always recieve pushback from high standards.  Despite the fact that I try to make lessons interesting and humorous, there is a sense that they resent the amount of reading and writing we do in a social studies class. 

This year was different.  Half of my class were students from last year, so they remained positive.  The others, for some reason, rose to the challenge without fighting it.  Yet, the one class that has given me trouble is my eighth grade honors.  To their credit, they lost their teacher from the year before when she was transferred.  However, I have been dissapointed with some of their reactions.  When I share my idea of a paragraph, they respond, "We always heard it had to be four sentences."  When I explain that we will read Plato, they say, "Junior high kids can't get philosophy."

I make no apologies for setting standards high.  I require homework daily.  I pull students in during my prep period for tutoring.  Students have a lot of fun, but they also write at least four paragraphs a day.  (Two during the class and two for homework)  To me, it is important, not just because they need it for college or for a job, but because these are skills they need for life.

What often happens is that well-intentioned teachers drop down the standards for their students.  Often with the "these kids" clause, they provide a sort of soft racism that can do major damage: "These kids have rough homes, so we shouldn't give homework" or "These kids come from a bad environment so they don't need more rules and strucutre at school."  "It's not fair to make a kid who is learning English read and write so much." They offer pseudo-sociological explanations that reveal a cultural bias: "Black kids are just louder and that's okay.  They should be loud in my class."  or "Latino kids aren't raised to have respect for authority."  Since when is disrespect a cultural trait? 

So, I think I might be soap boxing and building myself up in the process.  I just thing that low expectations are really hurting low-SES students. 

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