OT A little reminder to how lucky we all are

She was actually chosen as teacher of the year in Arkansas that school year

THE CLASSROOM WITHOUT DESKS

Back in September of 2005, on the first day of school, Martha Cothren, a social studies school teacher at Robinson High School in Little Rock, did something not to be forgotten. On the first day of school, with the permission of the school superintendent, the principal and the building supervisor, she removed all of the desks out of her classroom..

When the first period High School Students entered the room they discovered that there were no desks. 'Ms. Cothren, where are our desks?'
She replied, 'You can't have a desk until you tell me how you earn the right to sit at a desk.'

They thought, 'Well, maybe it's our grades.'
'No,' she said..
'Maybe it's our behavior.'
She told them, 'No, it's not even your behavior.'
And so, they came and went, the first period, second period, third
period. Still no desks in the classroom.

By early afternoon, television news crews had started gathering in Ms. Cothren's classroom to report about this crazy teacher who had taken all the desks out of her room.

The final period of the day came and as the puzzled students found seats on the floor of the deskless classroom, Martha Cothren said, throughout the day no one has been able to tell me just what he/she has done to earn the right to sit at the desks that are ordinarily found in this classroom. Now I am going to tell you.'

At this point, Martha Cothren went over to the door of her classroom and opened it.

Twenty-seven (27) U.S. Veterans, all in uniforms, walked into that classroom, each one carrying a school desk. The Vets began placing the school desks in rows and then they would walk over and stand alongside the wall. By the time the last soldier had set the final desk in place those kids started to understand, perhaps for the first time in their lives, just how the right to sit at those desks had been earned.

Martha said, 'You didn't earn the right to sit at these desks. These
heroes did it for you. They placed the desks here for you. Now, it's up to you to sit in them. It is your responsibility to learn, to be good students, to be good citizens. They paid the price so that you could have the freedom to get an education. Don't ever forget it.'

Please consider passing this along so others won't forget that the
freedoms we have in this great country were earned by U.S. Veterans.

By the way, this is a true story.

I give up! Was it the teacher, the students or the VETS that were OC?

Thank you, Ani. I am proud to have served, and I am very grateful to all who have served before me and to all who are serving now. I saw a bumper sticker the other day that said "Freedom isn't free." No it's not, and I was happy to see that someone "got it."

None, just a e-mail I got from a friend whose husband is a Veteran and I thought it would be nice to show some appreciation to all the Veterans who are on the forum.

Ruby said:

Thank you, Ani. I am proud to have served, and I am very grateful to all who have served before me and to all who are serving now. I saw a bumper sticker the other day that said "Freedom isn't free." No it's not, and I was happy to see that someone "got it."

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Thank you Ruby for without you and everyone else we'd have someone telling us what to say, do and be.

Yes it probably should've gone in the social lounge, but ...

I don't know how you do things in Virginia, but here in Washington we take care of our newbies, instead of belittling them. I informed the poster of the Social Lounge for future threads like this.

In the future, respect the members of my state's forum please, especially those that I am married to. That is all.

Goose said:

I don't know how you do things in Virginia, but here in Washington we take care of our newbies, instead of belittling them. I informed the poster of the Social Lounge for future threads like this.

In the future, respect the members of my state's forum please, especially those that I am married to. That is all.

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...there's more than one?

lol Paddy. Just don't tell Ani

Oops, I'll close my eyes.

Geez ruby, arent you glad you spent the time to share something good with your Washington friends. I thought it was a good story, Thank you.

amzbrady said:

Geez ruby, arent you glad you spent the time to share something good with your Washington friends. I thought it was a good story, Thank you.

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Ani was the one who shared the story, not me; I just commented on it. And Goose, I don't see any post from Virginia on this thread; not sure what is going on there. And I live here in Washington state, thank God. Sounds to me like there is some confusion going on here. LOL

What's even more refreshing about this Story is that it is totally true. All too often these are "feel good" stories that are part of a Politician's campaign speeches but this one has even been vetted by none other than Snopes.com.

If it weren't for our Veterans a lot of things would be different in this country. Too bad the "freeloaders" in this country don't recognize that their good fortune was often paid for with the lives of others.

Thanks, Ani.

It is a great story. In regards to the social lounge though. Why can't they make a lounge for each state? Since many of the stories that are off topic may not relate to another state at all. I think that would be a great idea to bring up to the owners.

tombrewster421 said:

It is a great story. In regards to the social lounge though. Why can't they make a lounge for each state? Since many of the stories that are off topic may not relate to another state at all. I think that would be a great idea to bring up to the owners.

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I share that thought.

deskless classroom

Being the suspicious type that I am, I looked this up on Snopes.com - it's the real deal from Little Rock,AR.




http://www.snopes.com/glurge/nodesks.asp

We need more teachers like this who can think outside of the box.

Thanks Ani, good story.

Goose good luck it was nice knowing you.

Contrarian said:

Being the suspicious type that I am, I looked this up on Snopes.com - it's the real deal from Little Rock,AR.




http://www.snopes.com/glurge/nodesks.asp

We need more teachers like this who can think outside of the box.

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The problem with that is we have too many teachers that don't even know what is inside the box in order to think out of it. My mother taught for over 40 years, my wife just retired after 36 years, I have two daughters that are teachers and I work at a college so I am familiar with the teaching profession and the problems.

Problem number one is the parents or in way too many cases the lack of parents. A teacher cannot teach without help from the parents and that is all too lacking these days.

Problem number two is the government and their PC requirements such as students cannot be grouped by ability because it may segregate students by race or sex. This forces a teacher to teach to the lowest level in the class and prohibits any advancement of students with high ability. This is not meant to be a racist statement as it is not but the guidelines have moved around so much that race is not a factor in the class assignment but every class must have all levels of ability. The guidelines are so screwed up that it is hurting everyone.

Problem number three is the laws on hiring and firing. One may call it the unionization but even in states where there is no union it is almost impossible to fire a poor teacher and the ones that should be fired are usually the ones that fight the most to stay in the schools. If they succeed in getting rid of one they usually just wind up in a different district.

Problem number four is that due to all the regulations and laws teachers are now taught how to teach but not what to teach. We have too many that are just plain ignorant of what they need to be teaching especially in subjects such as sceince and math. A fourth grade teacher is required to teach all the subjects in the cirruculum but has no idea of how to do the work themselves.

Watch the show "Are you smarter than a fifth grader" and you see that most people are not including too many teachers and way too many parents.

The teacher in the OP was wonderful and everything came together for her. I appreciate someone posting it even if it wasn't OC related. But while I am on this I think that gun safety should be taught in the fifth grade and I disagree with many on here about what should be taught. I really don't care if someone can hit the 10 ring from 10 yards 90% of the time. I don't care if they know the weaver stance or anything else from their training. I just want everyone to know the four rules of gun safety front to back and the laws on using guns. Beyond that as long as they know which end of the barrel the bullet comes out of and can fire it without closing their eyes and looking away it is fine with me. Anything beyond that is optional and I think that somewhere along the line everyone should be required to know those things whether or not they ever shoot a gun after that.