Excellent advice, IMHO. Being a mother, I could definitely go off half-cocked (as it were) in a situation like this. I already get pissy enough on the phone when people are being obtrusive or just plain nosy or wanting money for the police such-and-such. But the last usually hang up when I ask them how much of the money actually makes it to the charity...
I'm a singer. I've literally lost count of the people who tell me they used to love singing, but had their confidence crushed by an insensitive music teacher. The most common offence? Being told to mime singing while not actually making a noise.
On that score I offer you this excerpt from a biography of American composer Charles Ives. In the excerpt, George Ives is Charles Ives' father.
Just as importantly, George Ives taught his son to respect the power of vernacular music. As a Civil War band leader he understood how sentimental tunes such as "Tenting Tonight on the Old Camp Ground," "Aura Lee," Stephen Foster songs, and marches and bugle calls were woven into the experience of war and the memories of soldiers. Much as did Gustav Mahler a continent away, Charles Ives came to associate everyday music with profound emotions and spiritual aspirations. One of his father's most resonant pieces of wisdom came when he said of a stonemason's off-key hymn singing: "Look into his face and hear the music of the ages. Don't pay too much attention to the sounds--for if you do, you may miss the music. You won't get a wild, heroic ride to heaven on pretty little sounds."
My son played saxophone in a junior high school “all-star” jazz orchestra. I.e., the best, culled from multiple schools. Even so, the conductor was just counting on SOME of the musicians hitting the right notes at any given moment. That teacher should go back and watch The Music Man: “THAT’S MY JIMMIE!”
Our kid played French horn (and I thanked gawd she didn't choose the piccolo). The teacher would have her sit next to another student who played well but had absolutely no sense of rhythm. It worked for them.
Thank you for the note on identity-first versus person-first language! I’m autistic and my own preference is 100% identity first. My autism makes me who I am. Saying I’m a “person with autism” treats my neurotype like a disease to be cured rather than a fundamental part of my identity.
Thank you Emily! My nephew isn't able to communicate his preferences to me yet, but if he is one day, I will listen and adjust. I have autistic friends who are now in their forties who I'm grateful took the time to explain this to me, because otherwise I would've likely just copied what I saw in newspaper articles or books...which is not always the most sensitive way.
I have to ask, What if the kid was so bad at ringing bells that it was actually going to ruin the performance, perhaps make it so the other kids couldn't do their thing? Is it not possible that this kid flunked bell ringing and the teacher, by taking out the clapper, was trying to include the kid as much as possible without wrecking it for the others?
I'm with Lil Snot below. There's no reason to think the teacher intended to injure the kid and perhaps did not realize that said kid was going to lose their shit because of this. Asking the teacher to help sounds like a lot better way to 1) get help rather than encourage hostility (always a consequence of sternly worded letters, cc: one's boss) and 2) avoid worsening the life of a person who probably earns fuck-all and spends a lot of time crying because of all the time they spend being forced to ban books.
UPDATE: Reading more comments, I sympathize with those who thought the teacher could have been better (couldn't we all?) but still, it's no wonder teachers are quitting the profession in droves.
Yes, I can sympathize with the teacher. They are overworked and underpaid. But if the kid was really bad at the bells, there was almost certainly a better way to deal with the problem than taking the clackers out of the bell on the day of the performance and then telling them they have no sense of rhythm. If anyone doesn't understand how devastating that can be to a child, they probably should find a different profession. If this is indicative of how they usually deal with children, they should not be teaching. Just because teachers are undervalued, it doesn't mean there aren't bad teachers.
I think dear Sara left out a step, IMHO. I would first email the teacher and very diplomatically try to enlist her help. I would say that although she never intended to turn the kid away from all music, this is what has happened, and ask if she can help. Hopefully she spontaneously apologizes and offers to work with your kid in a supportive, positive way. If this doesn't work, proceed as outlined above. I just don't see why we jump to OFFICIAL COMPLAINT first. Give folks a chance to grow and learn.
1st grade trauma story: I was two weeks late to 1st grade because chicken pox, so I was the new kid already. The class had "cubbyholes" for each kid to store clay and stuff, and for one art/economics (?) lesson, we were told to make some kind of thing with our clay. Then we were supposed to put price tags on them as if to sell in a store (might've been something about buying them with fake money? Can't remember). Once the teacher approved all that, we *then* were supposed to put name tags on our piece(s) to give to another student. I think you cans see where this is going...
Some kids got more than one gifted piece, in part because some kids had made more than one piece. I looked over the table to find my name on something, in vain. I did not tell anyone because I was too ashamed, and I hoped no one would notice as they were all happily comparing the items they'd received and thanking friends. But honestly, what teacher couldn't see such an outcome for at least one child from a mile away? This was not the first or last trauma that woman inflicted on me. How I hated her.
Sometimes being a grown-up is so boring and annoying, for real. Like I really thought this would be wilder and I would eat ice cream for every meal and stay up all night and never get tired. Ugh.
The other one I'd add (unless Sara mentioned it and I somehow missed it) is that, as a kid, sometimes it's just nice to hear your parent say, "Honey, Mrs. So-and-so is WRONG!" Which is both affirming and often true.
She was likely assigned the bells because she would cause the least harm to the production that way.
However, that still created an obligation in the teacher to practice her up so that she could at least get through the performance.
Instead removing the clappers at the last minute when it became evident that she would be an impediment was a failure of teaching and was a nasty thing to do.
It's possible that the teacher is a pompous asshat who thinks that some clangy kiddie noise is Broadway. It's also possible that a demanding principal or parents who think that this is the AGT showcase for their little darlings may be crawling all over her and demanding perfection. However, the simple rule is that you don't dump your pressures on a kid.
That having been said, the parents are now handling this very poorly.
They are fostering a broken mentality instead of doing what my mother (herself a teacher, btw) did when my third-grade teacher made me the butt of her cruelty in the classroom - she told me that the teacher was the one at fault and was , frankly, "an idiot".
Kids are raised on a premise that adults are right and that adults in authority are very right, but kids also know when that is not so. There is a lot of cognitive dissonance in childhood.
My mother cut through that and gave me real armor.
Seriously, instead of therapizing this situation into a phobia, tell the kid that, yes, she was treated wrongly and that the best response is to enjoy music despite this jerk.
Unfortunately many do not have a mother (or father) like yours. Helicopter parenting doesn't seem to be a good model yet widely used. I can't imagine a child being raised by rwnj parents who are more concerned about themselves rather than their kids but make the biggest stinks over any slight.
I love this advice! I will say, after my daughter was **concussed** and left alone to make her way to the nurse I got zero in the way of restitution or apology (which is their way of CYA) and it made my decision to move her to another school much easier.
That was also the year that bullying and "the miasma of evil" she described at her middle school had her in a bad enough state we got help. I knew she couldn't do a therapist, so we paid for "private art lessons" with the most lovely woman. It gave my girl a safe space to talk things through with someone empathetic, or just keep her hands busy and do fun stuff. Best money I've ever spent, and the two of them are best friends now. Their lessons have transformed into a weekly lunch date. <3
When I was in second grade the teacher told me to just mouth the words to jingle bells for our Christmas concert. It did damage me and even now At 60 I am too ashamed to even sing happy birthday in public. I was told I was too loud and off key to sing I Christmas songs with my classmates. It hurt my feelings terribly
I was also told to mouth the words. That didn’t really do any damage. Even as a kid I knew what my voice sounded like, and that I couldn’t make it sound right no matter how hard I tried.
Being told by multiple adults that I have a weird laugh, however, still affects me. Unless I’m caught off guard by how funny something is, I usually just say “that’s funny!”. Which a lot of people think is genuinely weird. Weirder than my laugh, I’m sure.
It's sad how we can all remember the 1 bad thing out of the 100 good things. It's a survival mechanism I wish we could evolve from. We all have these stories. I hope one day you will sing like nobody is listening and dance like nobody is watching.
"English actress Julia Ormond is suing Harvey Weinstein for sexual battery and seeking damages from the entertainment companies she says enabled his behavior and failed to protect her. According to a suit filed in New York on Wednesday and obtained by Variety, Ormond, who is best known as a mainstay of ’90s films like Legends of the Fall and Sabrina, has accused the disgraced producer of sexually assaulting her after a business dinner in 1995. Ormond says Weinstein lured her into giving him a massage and then climbed on top of her, masturbated, and forced her to give him oral sex, an account consistent with his well-established patterns of sexual misconduct."
Everyone has to have their own path, and get closure in their own way, but there's no way I'd admit publicly to performing oral sex/getting raped by Harvey Weinstein. Ormond is suing Disney and CAA so there's potentially a lot of money involved, but I'd rather take that secret to my grave then have anyone know I was anywhere near Weinstein's penis. He's going to die in jail, and that would probably give me enough satisfaction. I still can't believe he managed to get away with his bullshit for as long as he did.
I just can’t endorse this comment. It feels like victim-blaming and shaming to me.
One thing I’ve learned in my years on this planet is that survivors of sexual trauma have very different reactions. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to respond, and we shouldn’t judge anyone for their particular response.
I was commenting on how I would feel. I would NOT want anyone to know what Harvey Weinstein did to me. I would say he sexually assaulted me, and leave it at that. That's why I specifically said "everyone has their own path."
I don't in any way blame her for what happened. Weinstein is a pig, and he deserves to be in jail for the rest of his life.
That could be the situation. I personally couldn't BEAR for anyone to know Harvey Weinstein touched me. I don't blame her for suing the companies involved with him, I would just have to do it quietly.
Nor could I but silence is acceptance in its various forms. Maybe she wants to do her part to stopping this monster. In the background doesn't expose him and monsters need to be exposed and held accountable.
I'd say Weinstein's been effectively stopped. He'll spend the rest of his life in jail, his wife left him, he lost all of his money, and he's a pariah. I was shocked when Bill Cosby got out of jail, but I don't think Weinstein will.
I haven't heard too much about Cosby since he left jail, but I'm pretty sure he's lost a lot of money, and can't go out in public without people hissing at him. Weinstein seemed to fare far worse than Cosby did, in part I think it's because of the time that elapsed for Cosby's crimes. Weinstein's crimes were pretty recent. He also looks like he's got a lot of medical problems, so I don't think he'll live through his jail term.
Cosby ended up getting out after 3 years. I believe on a technicality. He was planning a comedy tour this year, which I'm sure will be packed with his fellow Republicans.
Oh, I'm sure it's anger, and I don't think she's doing it for the money. My thing is that I would not want ANYONE to know Harvey Weinstein had been anywhere near me. I find him quite disgusting.
I find it strange that Weinstein got away with it for so long, but Bill Cosby got away with it even longer. I guess he was making people money, so they chose to look away. Kind of like the Catholic Church, you know there had to have been people who knew what those priests were doing to kids.
I wouldn't go into full detail, because I wouldn't want people to know what that pig had done to me. I wouldn't want to give him the satisfaction, either.
Excellent advice, IMHO. Being a mother, I could definitely go off half-cocked (as it were) in a situation like this. I already get pissy enough on the phone when people are being obtrusive or just plain nosy or wanting money for the police such-and-such. But the last usually hang up when I ask them how much of the money actually makes it to the charity...
a lawyer?????!!!!
All those big guys with tears in their eyes that used to roam the White House grounds? I just realized: They are unemployed town criers!
Ta, Sara. I'm grateful every day that I never had children.
I'm a singer. I've literally lost count of the people who tell me they used to love singing, but had their confidence crushed by an insensitive music teacher. The most common offence? Being told to mime singing while not actually making a noise.
On that score I offer you this excerpt from a biography of American composer Charles Ives. In the excerpt, George Ives is Charles Ives' father.
Just as importantly, George Ives taught his son to respect the power of vernacular music. As a Civil War band leader he understood how sentimental tunes such as "Tenting Tonight on the Old Camp Ground," "Aura Lee," Stephen Foster songs, and marches and bugle calls were woven into the experience of war and the memories of soldiers. Much as did Gustav Mahler a continent away, Charles Ives came to associate everyday music with profound emotions and spiritual aspirations. One of his father's most resonant pieces of wisdom came when he said of a stonemason's off-key hymn singing: "Look into his face and hear the music of the ages. Don't pay too much attention to the sounds--for if you do, you may miss the music. You won't get a wild, heroic ride to heaven on pretty little sounds."
My son played saxophone in a junior high school “all-star” jazz orchestra. I.e., the best, culled from multiple schools. Even so, the conductor was just counting on SOME of the musicians hitting the right notes at any given moment. That teacher should go back and watch The Music Man: “THAT’S MY JIMMIE!”
Our kid played French horn (and I thanked gawd she didn't choose the piccolo). The teacher would have her sit next to another student who played well but had absolutely no sense of rhythm. It worked for them.
Thank you for the note on identity-first versus person-first language! I’m autistic and my own preference is 100% identity first. My autism makes me who I am. Saying I’m a “person with autism” treats my neurotype like a disease to be cured rather than a fundamental part of my identity.
Thank you Emily! My nephew isn't able to communicate his preferences to me yet, but if he is one day, I will listen and adjust. I have autistic friends who are now in their forties who I'm grateful took the time to explain this to me, because otherwise I would've likely just copied what I saw in newspaper articles or books...which is not always the most sensitive way.
I have to ask, What if the kid was so bad at ringing bells that it was actually going to ruin the performance, perhaps make it so the other kids couldn't do their thing? Is it not possible that this kid flunked bell ringing and the teacher, by taking out the clapper, was trying to include the kid as much as possible without wrecking it for the others?
I'm with Lil Snot below. There's no reason to think the teacher intended to injure the kid and perhaps did not realize that said kid was going to lose their shit because of this. Asking the teacher to help sounds like a lot better way to 1) get help rather than encourage hostility (always a consequence of sternly worded letters, cc: one's boss) and 2) avoid worsening the life of a person who probably earns fuck-all and spends a lot of time crying because of all the time they spend being forced to ban books.
UPDATE: Reading more comments, I sympathize with those who thought the teacher could have been better (couldn't we all?) but still, it's no wonder teachers are quitting the profession in droves.
Yes, I can sympathize with the teacher. They are overworked and underpaid. But if the kid was really bad at the bells, there was almost certainly a better way to deal with the problem than taking the clackers out of the bell on the day of the performance and then telling them they have no sense of rhythm. If anyone doesn't understand how devastating that can be to a child, they probably should find a different profession. If this is indicative of how they usually deal with children, they should not be teaching. Just because teachers are undervalued, it doesn't mean there aren't bad teachers.
I think dear Sara left out a step, IMHO. I would first email the teacher and very diplomatically try to enlist her help. I would say that although she never intended to turn the kid away from all music, this is what has happened, and ask if she can help. Hopefully she spontaneously apologizes and offers to work with your kid in a supportive, positive way. If this doesn't work, proceed as outlined above. I just don't see why we jump to OFFICIAL COMPLAINT first. Give folks a chance to grow and learn.
1st grade trauma story: I was two weeks late to 1st grade because chicken pox, so I was the new kid already. The class had "cubbyholes" for each kid to store clay and stuff, and for one art/economics (?) lesson, we were told to make some kind of thing with our clay. Then we were supposed to put price tags on them as if to sell in a store (might've been something about buying them with fake money? Can't remember). Once the teacher approved all that, we *then* were supposed to put name tags on our piece(s) to give to another student. I think you cans see where this is going...
Some kids got more than one gifted piece, in part because some kids had made more than one piece. I looked over the table to find my name on something, in vain. I did not tell anyone because I was too ashamed, and I hoped no one would notice as they were all happily comparing the items they'd received and thanking friends. But honestly, what teacher couldn't see such an outcome for at least one child from a mile away? This was not the first or last trauma that woman inflicted on me. How I hated her.
"We consider our options — none of them nasty, violent, illegal, or retaliatory. We consult with our wise friends."
Being the grown up isn't very satisfying, sometimes.
Sometimes being a grown-up is so boring and annoying, for real. Like I really thought this would be wilder and I would eat ice cream for every meal and stay up all night and never get tired. Ugh.
The other one I'd add (unless Sara mentioned it and I somehow missed it) is that, as a kid, sometimes it's just nice to hear your parent say, "Honey, Mrs. So-and-so is WRONG!" Which is both affirming and often true.
Yes!
My mother did that for me (just below)
It gave me a power of resilience that has stayed with me.
There are musically talentless kids - I was one.
She was likely assigned the bells because she would cause the least harm to the production that way.
However, that still created an obligation in the teacher to practice her up so that she could at least get through the performance.
Instead removing the clappers at the last minute when it became evident that she would be an impediment was a failure of teaching and was a nasty thing to do.
It's possible that the teacher is a pompous asshat who thinks that some clangy kiddie noise is Broadway. It's also possible that a demanding principal or parents who think that this is the AGT showcase for their little darlings may be crawling all over her and demanding perfection. However, the simple rule is that you don't dump your pressures on a kid.
That having been said, the parents are now handling this very poorly.
They are fostering a broken mentality instead of doing what my mother (herself a teacher, btw) did when my third-grade teacher made me the butt of her cruelty in the classroom - she told me that the teacher was the one at fault and was , frankly, "an idiot".
Kids are raised on a premise that adults are right and that adults in authority are very right, but kids also know when that is not so. There is a lot of cognitive dissonance in childhood.
My mother cut through that and gave me real armor.
Seriously, instead of therapizing this situation into a phobia, tell the kid that, yes, she was treated wrongly and that the best response is to enjoy music despite this jerk.
Unfortunately many do not have a mother (or father) like yours. Helicopter parenting doesn't seem to be a good model yet widely used. I can't imagine a child being raised by rwnj parents who are more concerned about themselves rather than their kids but make the biggest stinks over any slight.
FTW!
Medal to my mom!
Sometimes you just need to cut right through the bullshit.
I love this advice! I will say, after my daughter was **concussed** and left alone to make her way to the nurse I got zero in the way of restitution or apology (which is their way of CYA) and it made my decision to move her to another school much easier.
That was also the year that bullying and "the miasma of evil" she described at her middle school had her in a bad enough state we got help. I knew she couldn't do a therapist, so we paid for "private art lessons" with the most lovely woman. It gave my girl a safe space to talk things through with someone empathetic, or just keep her hands busy and do fun stuff. Best money I've ever spent, and the two of them are best friends now. Their lessons have transformed into a weekly lunch date. <3
When I was in second grade the teacher told me to just mouth the words to jingle bells for our Christmas concert. It did damage me and even now At 60 I am too ashamed to even sing happy birthday in public. I was told I was too loud and off key to sing I Christmas songs with my classmates. It hurt my feelings terribly
I was also told to mouth the words. That didn’t really do any damage. Even as a kid I knew what my voice sounded like, and that I couldn’t make it sound right no matter how hard I tried.
Being told by multiple adults that I have a weird laugh, however, still affects me. Unless I’m caught off guard by how funny something is, I usually just say “that’s funny!”. Which a lot of people think is genuinely weird. Weirder than my laugh, I’m sure.
It's sad how we can all remember the 1 bad thing out of the 100 good things. It's a survival mechanism I wish we could evolve from. We all have these stories. I hope one day you will sing like nobody is listening and dance like nobody is watching.
"English actress Julia Ormond is suing Harvey Weinstein for sexual battery and seeking damages from the entertainment companies she says enabled his behavior and failed to protect her. According to a suit filed in New York on Wednesday and obtained by Variety, Ormond, who is best known as a mainstay of ’90s films like Legends of the Fall and Sabrina, has accused the disgraced producer of sexually assaulting her after a business dinner in 1995. Ormond says Weinstein lured her into giving him a massage and then climbed on top of her, masturbated, and forced her to give him oral sex, an account consistent with his well-established patterns of sexual misconduct."
Everyone has to have their own path, and get closure in their own way, but there's no way I'd admit publicly to performing oral sex/getting raped by Harvey Weinstein. Ormond is suing Disney and CAA so there's potentially a lot of money involved, but I'd rather take that secret to my grave then have anyone know I was anywhere near Weinstein's penis. He's going to die in jail, and that would probably give me enough satisfaction. I still can't believe he managed to get away with his bullshit for as long as he did.
I just can’t endorse this comment. It feels like victim-blaming and shaming to me.
One thing I’ve learned in my years on this planet is that survivors of sexual trauma have very different reactions. There is no “right” or “wrong” way to respond, and we shouldn’t judge anyone for their particular response.
I was commenting on how I would feel. I would NOT want anyone to know what Harvey Weinstein did to me. I would say he sexually assaulted me, and leave it at that. That's why I specifically said "everyone has their own path."
I don't in any way blame her for what happened. Weinstein is a pig, and he deserves to be in jail for the rest of his life.
Fair.
Maybe she just hit her limit and couldn't move forward without 'fixing' the past.
That could be the situation. I personally couldn't BEAR for anyone to know Harvey Weinstein touched me. I don't blame her for suing the companies involved with him, I would just have to do it quietly.
Nor could I but silence is acceptance in its various forms. Maybe she wants to do her part to stopping this monster. In the background doesn't expose him and monsters need to be exposed and held accountable.
I'd say Weinstein's been effectively stopped. He'll spend the rest of his life in jail, his wife left him, he lost all of his money, and he's a pariah. I was shocked when Bill Cosby got out of jail, but I don't think Weinstein will.
I haven't heard too much about Cosby since he left jail, but I'm pretty sure he's lost a lot of money, and can't go out in public without people hissing at him. Weinstein seemed to fare far worse than Cosby did, in part I think it's because of the time that elapsed for Cosby's crimes. Weinstein's crimes were pretty recent. He also looks like he's got a lot of medical problems, so I don't think he'll live through his jail term.
I was not aware of Cosby getting out. I hope they suffer for the rest of their lives as these women were changed forever with their crimes.
Cosby ended up getting out after 3 years. I believe on a technicality. He was planning a comedy tour this year, which I'm sure will be packed with his fellow Republicans.
Money could be a factor given the list of people she's suing. But there also might be a case of searing anger that might be hard to dismiss.
Money and exposure hit the wealthy harder than most.
Oh, I'm sure it's anger, and I don't think she's doing it for the money. My thing is that I would not want ANYONE to know Harvey Weinstein had been anywhere near me. I find him quite disgusting.
I find it strange that Weinstein got away with it for so long, but Bill Cosby got away with it even longer. I guess he was making people money, so they chose to look away. Kind of like the Catholic Church, you know there had to have been people who knew what those priests were doing to kids.
I would go into full detail so every asshole that covered up for him couldn't disguise it with euphemisms.
I wouldn't go into full detail, because I wouldn't want people to know what that pig had done to me. I wouldn't want to give him the satisfaction, either.