Give tip/hack/advice based on your professional experience

amother

Silver

Wed, Jan 17 2024, 12:16 pm

As a nurse in hospital..to get better care for yourself and/ or family..
Be nice. Friendly, respectful, grateful. Even if the dr/ nurse/ therapist is not. We're only human, usually overworked and underpaid. If you come in demanding, complaining..Even if you're complaints are 100% valid!! You will just earn yourself a name as a difficult patient.
If you start off thanks for everything, I really appreciate it, here's some chocolate for all of you I know you work so hard, etc and by the way can you also xyz..you'll get much better results.
I see it specifically in hospital, but really it's good advice for most interactions..

amother

Daisy

Wed, Jan 17 2024, 12:41 pm

amother Jean wrote:

This! This! This!

I don't know why teachers think that we have the magic answers.

I've gotten calls about DC's hard time following directions, not being organized, and I want to yell at the teachers - as soon as I figure out how to help their father I'll work on the child!!!! Obviously I cant say this to them, and then I'm stuck with the "bad mother" label.

I've also gotten calls about other things over the years- and seriously, what do the teachers want us parents to do? Not everything is fixable, do you teachers realize this???

Former teacher now assistant principal here.

We tell our teachers only to call home for the following reasons:
1. There's something we want the parent to do (Esther is having a hard time keeping her backpack in order and it's affecting her learning. Would you be able to set an alarm for the same time every evening to remind her to clean out her backpack? She would really benefit from that)
2. The parent needs to be aware of something important that happened
(I just want to let you know that Yoni got into a fist fight with a classmate today. It is being addressed in school and we are taking care of it but I wanted you to be aware.)
3. To ask the parents for info
(Leah has been very quiet lately. Is everything ok at home?)

If you get a call from a teacher and it is just bringing up issues without offering any next steps, ask. Say something like "Thank you for sharing that, I appreciate you reaching out, where do you want to go from here?" And see what they say

amother

Wed, Jan 17 2024, 7:49 pm

amother Cinnamon wrote:

Preschool morah-please be careful what you say or do in front of your kids, they're not babies anymore-they can talk about what they see or hear and I hear so much TMI, I can barely look at some parents by PTA embarrassed

Please please share!

As an aside, you may be mortified for me if my child says, "Mommy and Daddy kissed each other," but I actually don't mind at all. It's normal for spouses to kiss.

amother

Gold

Wed, Jan 17 2024, 9:38 pm

amother Daisy wrote:

#1 on your list (and every teacher and principal) should be Nachas calls. Call the parents when the child shows outstanding Middos, or when a child achieves something academic that shows unusual effort. These calls are invaluable.

zaq

Wed, Jan 17 2024, 10:58 pm

amother Dustypink wrote:

Im a wholesaler, never ever ever ever never ever use a family member in your business even if you have the best relationship with her!

Personally I don't believe in doing business with relatives, but there are many many successful businesses operated by families who get along just fine. Some of them have been doing so for several generations. Just as you have to know your customers, you have to know yourself and your family to know if working together will be hiney-mah-tov-umah-naim or milchemet Gog uMagog.

.

ora_43

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 2:46 am

Research perspective is probably less relevant? but I think it's interesting, so

1. Careful of findings that might be flukes.

Eg if there's a study showing an intervention is good, that doesn't necessarily mean it's good; there might also be 10 studies showing it's neutral and 5 showing it's bad. There's a certain amount of randomness in sampling so look at as many studies as possible.
(this is important eg when looking at academic research to try to find answers to health-related questions, eg figuring out which type of therapy/intervention might be effective)

2. Know what media bias looks like.

eg
- which stories does the network consider 'newsworthy', and what parts of the country/world are they not reporting on?
- when they report on countries that are less than democratic, how are they getting their news? how free are they to say what's really going on?
- look out for emotional words like "brutal," "savage," "horrific," "devastating." Where are they used, where are they not used?

An hour or two of learning how people can distort the truth -> a lifetime of being able to read articles and know what it is they want you to think (which isn't always wrong, but awareness is important).

3. If you were wrong, how would you know?

One of the most valuable research tools for daily life, IMHO, is the question: if I were wrong about this, what would show me that I was wrong?

It's very easy to find reasons that you're right about something, even if you're not. The trick is to try to prove yourself wrong, and fail. That's how you know you're onto something.

Obviously necessary thinking in research but I think it's very important in interpersonal relationships too. So often our opinions about other people are a mix of facts, assumptions, and fiction.

amother

Tulip

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 3:00 am

Hi

Love this thread! Thank you!

Im a nursery teacher and I just want to say that so much of what your child does in school is so so normal.

Not everything is something to be worried about.

Accidents are very normal for this age too.

Also at the end of the day Im sorry I dont always have something to say about your child, it just doesnt come to my mind quick enough but I would definitely tell you if theres something significant.

Pick up time is busy busy and I wish I could remember something nice to say every day.

It doesnt mean your child wasnt a darling today.

amother

Daisy

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 4:42 am

amother Gold wrote:

Of course

This is in regard to an issue happening. We don't want parents getting calls just listing things their child isn't doing well and the parents feel like the previous poster, thinking what do they even want from me?

amother

Jean

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 5:11 am

amother Daisy wrote:

I want to say thank you to you and to all our wonderful teachers and principals who put their heart and soul into our children and do so much for them. Your post reminded me that most teachers do as you described but unfortunately our brains tend to remember the one teacher or principal that was hurtful acted as I described...

I was describing some of my experiences and some of my friends' experiences as well. When teachers call with unhelpful information and with unrealistic expectations of how to solve the problem, it sticks in your mind more than the teachers who call with nachas reports (unfortunately!).

One example that comes to mind was something that happened a while ago. My son was in preschool and the Morah called me that my child should be evaluated for speech. There are no free services for speech where I live and I did not have the money to pay out of pocket. After multiple urgings, I did have him evaluated; his evaluation came out that he was above average. When I told the Morah, this was not good enough for her, apparently he needed to be WAY above average. No speech therapist will treat a child who is above average... but she kept insisting he needed speech therapy, paid out of pocket with money I didn't have. These kind of stories tend to stick in your mind...

amother

Jean

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 5:16 am

amother Daisy wrote:

Of course

When a teacher called to tell me that my child was the last one to get ready for the bus at the end of the day, I wondered what she wanted me to do? Do you want me to fix his internal clock? Do you have any suggestions on how to do that? Vague comments such as "he does things slowly" are really not helpful.

The truth is that most teachers are not diagnosticians and often don't know themselves what they want the parent to do. It's not the teachers fault, but it does get frustrating for parents.

amother

Mocha

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 6:10 am

Thank you to the teachers who posted. The timing was great for me.
Last night, DD's teacher called to discuss a minor issue with DD. She presented the problem, then told me how the school wanted to address it. She wanted my permission to move forward.
I think I would have agreed regardless but after reading all these posts, I was extra careful to come across as grateful and collaborative.

Edited to add: To the school and the teacher who called me with a problem AND a solution-- I appreciate you and realize how lucky we are to have our child in your class/school.

amother

Daisy

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 6:41 am

amother Jean wrote:

Ouch. Yes that's not a productive phone call at all.

I would encourage any parent on the receiving end of this kind of call to respond with something like "thank you for bringing this to my attention, is there anything specific that you feel I can do to help with this?" If they say yes, great! If no then you can say "I appreciate you sharing this with me. If at any point you feel there's something I can do that will help, please let me know"
This shows the teacher that you value what she called to share and you are ready to help if needed.

amother

Firethorn

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 7:28 am

amother Daisy wrote:

They’ll tell you they think the kid should “work with someone”.

amother

Garnet

Thu, Jan 18 2024, 9:32 am

amother Jean wrote:

I feel so validated! Thank you!