School Shootings: My Latest Theory

[WriterDom]

Many school shooters were either bullied or outcasts. But I don't think it's any more common now then it was in the 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s or 70s.

 

[Ally C]

What do we want?

"All of the above!"

When do we want it?

"Now!"

When will we get it?

"Um ... mmmm ... erm ... duh ... shucks ..."

I think you've summed up things in a very even-handed and straightforward way BrainyBeauty. Now it's time for implementation ...

 

[Weird Harold]

So, my question is this or rather questions...
When did parents stop having to teach their children right from wrong?

Never. The problem I see is that the parents have to know right from wrong before they can teach it.

When did parents stop having to take responsibility for loving their children and taking time out for their kids, placing them on the top of the list of things-to-do?

When they were forced to make a choice between earning enough to feed a child and taking time out for them.

Why should schools be responsible for teaching our children values?

School is most children's first encounter with being given responsibility. It has always had the role of reinforcing the values acceptable to society.

Economicshas produced a generation of parents who have to make a choice between earning enough to support their family and spending the "quality time" with their children needed to teach them right from wrong. The daycare and preschools that substitute are constrained by fear of lawsuits from applying any realistic sort of discipline.

Nearly forty years of Peer Promotion has produce a certaintly in those same parents that they (and their children) deserve everything that everyone else has and failure to live up to expectations is no bar to getting everything.

Even in those who don't benefit from peer promotion, it sends a clear message to every student that results don't matter.

School is essentially everyone's first job. They come away from a system that demonstrates that "employers" don't expect completed assignments and qualifications have no bearing on fitness for promotion; A system in which the only allowable punishment is relief from the minimal requirement of showing a face in the classroom every day. They come out of that system and expect the same treatment from their employers, and don't expect any better from their employees.

Pshycologists say that a child's personality is essentially fully formed by the time they start school, so parents (and/or daycare providers) have to provide the discipline and guidance to teach right from wrong before school starts.

The schools, in turn, have to reinforce the concept that each student is responsible for their own actions. Failing a student for being stupid is one thing, and failing astudent for being lazy is another -- either way, if a student can't demonstrate they've learned the material, they should have to try again.

If they don't learn that meeting specific goals is required for rewards and advancement in school, where are they going to learn it?