A Christmas Story With a Message for Parents

As my PsychologyToday.com article today, I offer a short-short story that while Christmas-themed has implications for parents and their children's education. 

A Tough Guy: A remarkable story of resilience

The guy who came to take care of my rodent problem, not only did that, but he told me his life story. Remarkable. It's my PsychologyToday.com article today.

An Active Boy Writes to His Teacher

I was an active boy. I couldn't sit still in school. If Ritalin had been around then, I would have been put on it intravenously.

I wouldn't have had the self-awareness nor the moxie to write the letter I posted on PsychologyToday.com to any of my teachers but perhaps your seeing it will help parents who are trying to get the teacher to accommodate to their active child rather than putting him on that risky Ritalin leash.

Would You be a Big Brother/Sister to a Neglected Smart Kid?

I am helping Big Brothers/Big Sisters of America to assess the viability of the following idea.

In so many of today's elementary schools, the focus has shifted from bright kids (those with the greatest potential to solve our social problems, cure our diseases, become wise leaders) to low-achieving kids, in part because of No Child Left Behind, which gives schools big carrots and sticks for helping low achievers achieve basic proficiency but no carrots or sticks for helping bright kids to live up to their potential.

As a result, countless bright kids, especially in working-class and lower-middle-class communities, wither in public elementary schools--bored, not even close to living up to their potential.

And if such a kid can't sit still for the six hours a day, five days a week of boredom, he or she is often endlessly put down by the teacher and/or put on a Ritalin leash. This group of kids has an enormous unmet need, a huge gap between how well they could be doing and how well they're actually doing, academically and especially socially and emotionally.

A mentoring relationship is perhaps the most potent way to help people live up to their potential. And that is why I am volunteering to help Brothers/Big Sisters assess the viability of its extending its outreach to specifically include bright kids in working-class and lower-middle class public schools and to Big Brothers/Sisters that would be particularly well-suited to mentoring them, for example, alumni of selective colleges.

So, do you think it would be difficult to recruit "Bigs" (mentors) for neglected bright kids in working-class public schools?

And theoretically, might you consider being a Big Brother to such a kid, for example, speaking with and/or seeing your "Little" periodically, say an hour a week?