Back to school advertisements make me crazy!!! The Staples’ – “Its the most wonderful time of the year” advertisement is running continuously. The picture of those two children dreading school makes me sad. (Wow – the commercial is on again – second time since I started writing this post/rant). I so want school not to be something they dread – a bitter pill – nobody wants to take it but it is good for you so you must. The father skipping through the store so gleeful about sending the kids off – what are we saying to our kids??? (There it is again!! – granted it is 1:54 am so I am writing slowly but reeeaaally). Reality is that many kids do dread school – I really believe we can do better than this for our kids. As a parent I get that it is nice to have time away from the kids but could this not be something we keep to ourselves? I get that this commercial is intended to be cute and make people smile but it really just makes me sad.
I feel the same way about this commercial…
As a parent, I do understand the sentiment. As a teacher, I’m motivated to DO THINGS DIFFERENTLY THIS SCHOOL YEAR and beyond to ENGAGE my students. I’m overwhelmed at the thought of how to accomplish it with effective consistency given challenges and barriers I know already exist. I’M still GONNA DO IT. For starters… I’m workin’ on producing my own Staples commercial parody with quite the OPPOSITE student response when they find they’ll be in MY CLASS!!!
Great idea!! In the past I really felt these types of commercials societal stereotypes were the reason for this type of sentiment but more recently I think it IS about school. There are many reasons for this – it is not all about teachers, but there are ways we as teachers can work against various powers and influences in education to increase the engagement for our students. I attended a presentation by and have been reading the work of Andy Hargreaves which provides an better understanding in the societal and political context for why schools are lacking in creativity. Another two books I read this summer have really motivated me to work towards educational change are: Sir Ken Robinson’s The Element, and Ira Socol’s The Drool Room
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