Struggling School-Age Boys

I'm a homschooler and it was the best decision I made for myself. The US public school system is F***ing Sh**ty. The USA public school system only care about if they get high enough test scores so they can keep getting federal money for their schools. This is absolutely shameful and pisses me off. THESE TESTS DO NOT PREPARE OUR KIDS FOR THE WORLD. HAVING A DESIRE TO LEARN PREPARES OUR KIDS FOR THE WORLD. Most kids who are on ADD or ADHD drugs probably don't need them. In the long term this just hurts them because it hurts their WILL TO LEARN. MENTAL MEDICATIONS ARE OVERLY USED. Parents need to educate themselves about where their kids are and how to help them. Granted a few kids truely do need some medication but most do not. I think the public school system should be erased from our country and replaced with other types of schools like homeschools clubs and private schools.
OUR GOVERNMENT SHOULD ALLOW PEOPLE TO CHOOSE WHERE TO SEND THEIR KIDS TO SCHOOL. OUR GOVERNMENT SHOULD NOT FORCE KIDS TO GO TO PUBLC SCHOOL. Shamefully some states force and/or make it very hard to choose a private school or to homeschool your child. That just makes me F**king pissed. Our Government shouldn't do this and in fact our government should by FOR THE PEOPLE AND BY THE PEOPLE.

We shouldn't just focus on gender regarding the inequities of the US education system, but focus on the socioeconomic aspects of it. It's more about the children who come from low and middle income neighborhoods who are suffering. There isn't enough funding for schools because of the lack of taxes that are being paid from the properties around the school. One school in the SF bay area calls around parents and neighbors surrounding the school to ask for donations to make up for the budget deficits. This is possible because the school is located in an affluent neighborhood. If the school was in downtown LA, this wouldn't happen because the parents wouldn't have the money to be able to donate to the school. Children are suffering because schools aren't receiving enough adaquate funding and the only way they can get money is to do well on tests. If they don't do well on the tests, then even more money gets taken away from the schools. All schools are not equal and something should be done about this.

We shouldn't just focus on gender regarding the inequities of the US education system, but focus on the socioeconomic aspects of it. It's more about the children who come from low income neighborhoods who are suffering. There isn't enough funding for schools because of the lack of taxes that are being paid from the properties around the school. One school in the SF bay area calls around parents and neighbors surrounding the school to ask for donations to make up for the budget deficits. This is possible because the school is located in an affluent neighborhood. If the school was in downtown LA, this wouldn't happen because the parents wouldn't have the money to be able to donate to the school. All schools are not equal and something should be done about this.

ATTN: LAErhardt, if only I had the room to comment about your worries. I'm sure I have a limit as to how many characters I can include in my comment. Let's start with #1...don't ever send your child to school without a well balanced breakfast. Mine eat breakfast at home and then again after arriving at school on the bus an hour later. And with the skimpy little "nutritional lunches" they feed the children at school, they arrive home famished!! Just because it's healthy doesn't mean it's fulfilling. My pre-teens have learned to keep snacks in their lockers so they don't starve while at school. By the way, my children are in now way over-weight. #2... I know it's terrible that your son is no longer affectionate, but children, especially boys, are taught not to be too "touchy-feely" because it might be inappropriate with their female classmates. The public teaches them at a very early age that it's wrong to show their feelings publicly. #3... do the activities he endures at school even closely resemble the attention and activities he has been used to for the past five years...or was he suddenly taken from his loving and caring family who understood what he needed and thrown into an environment that said he is nothing special and he has to act like everyone else? I know it sounds harsh, but your comment is the same one I expect to make about my 3-year-old son in two years when he is expected to start to kindergarten. Of course if I don't send him and his home schooled academic achievements fall short of what the gov't has decided they should be.... well, then, I could be sent to jail for child neglect!

My view on this subject is this: first of all, I blame the parents to some extent. Mothers tend to pamper their boys and some insist on them not doing certain things, around the home, for instance because it's not 'man's work', etc.
The next item for discussion, the games that we tend to buy for our boys, these computer games that more often than not tend to make them more hyper than anything else. To me it only stands to reason that if you give a child one of these games to play and they are on them constantly, they would become nervous wrecks.
Then there are the foods we/they eat. Filled with chemicals. And the answer to all of these and other things that our children (boys and girls) experience is to give them drugs, that would sort them out. That would make them right. Oh what a tangled web we weave

I teach 5th grade in a district that hs banned recess for 4th & 5th graders because it takes time out from academics. We have P.E once a week, though teachers have been screaming for twice a week for years. When I "sneak" my kids out for a morning fresh air break, they perform better until lunch. It's all about testing, these days, and how our school ranks with other schools---a terrible competition in our district. I have been teaching for 25 years, and I have never seen such a hypocritical program as No
child Left Behind. We are leaving our children behind in their development in exchange for high test scores. It's not working. Recess, play, art, movement, and a relaxed atmosphere will do more for academic achievement than banning these things.

The reason boys are failing these days is that the education system is run by women. Female educators produce a syllabus which favors the female student. Boys need to be taught differently.

Also, in the teen years, co-education is a major distraction for boys - naturally. Co-ed is good for elementary and high school students, but middle schoolers should be segregated: girls taught by mainly female teachers , and boys by mainly male teachers.

Have we learned nothing from history?

I thought this article was very interesting. I have also taken my son, recently, to see his pediatrician about his behavior. I thought maybe it was his school. He went to a Catholic school. He had problems with playing around in class, fighting, and not listening. This year I moved him to a county school in Maryland. In the first week he demonstrated the same behavior, The issues was really beginning to worry me. I called the pediatrician to have him evaluated.

My child has been in Kindergarten for 3 weeks now which you had to chose morning or afternoon for 3 hours. He was all excited about riding the bus with his older school friend across the street but in order for him to be on the bus he had to ready by 7:00 am to catch the bus which is about 2 miles away even tho he would not reach school untill 8:00 am. So we tried getting him up, dressed, backpack in place and breakfast eaten (the most important meal of the day) all by 7:00 am. Needless to say breakfast has suffered and he is not eating before he goes to school because he usually did not wake up till 8:00 am and he was never hungry till about 9:00 or 9:30 am. So I thought lets not do the bus I will just take him to school that way he can sleep a little longer and eat breakfast. What do you sacrifice breakfast or sleeping longer it seems one or the other suffers. Now 3 weeks later I have seen a normally loving child who comments at all times through the course of the day "Hey Mom I love you" to a child that no longer says those words and seems angry all the time. This has just been 3 weeks he is 5 what will happen when he is in first grade, and now I see this study which is why I am writing this comment. Help are there other parents that can give us some help do we always have to get professional help before we can help our children. Do I need to keep him out of school till 1st grade and then will he be behind the other kids and become angry again. I am 46 years old well educated live in a great school district and in 3 weeks I have seen my child change and not for the better, is every boy ADHA and needs medication? What did our parents do before the medical community diagnosed all these children with a disorder that needs medication with out knowing the long term effects of said medication. I don't remember my brother having these problems and neither do my parents. My problem is mess with me all you want but leave my child alone. What is the answer here? What can I do to provide my child with an education that does'nt change him into an angry person? My child is the future of this world along with every other child, what is the future going to be for any of them if we do not figure out what we need to do to ensure education and well being go hand in hand. Where to begin? I don't know, but there has to be others parents out there seeing this same thing. Does anyone else feel this frustration?

what do you think testosterone is? it's what drives boys and men. i'm sick of people trying to brainwash our children to all be the same robots. some are going to be marine corps snipers and some are going to be teachers in an elementary school. some are both hopefully. i'm proud that generations of my family have fought for this country. we hunt, fish, and garden. it's sad our whole country has given way to the thought that violence and guns are the same. it's just sad that everyone wants to pump our children full of drugs instead of working with them in other ways. violence is in our blood, if you think not, your blind to reality. freedom isn't free!

Over time, the social adaptation to the intensive handover of America's children to contracted childcare workers and educators will result in anarchy.

About the spanking, I'm not sure. I was never spanked, and my husband was spanked often. We are both well adjusted adults. As for not enough gym or recess, I agree. In elementary school, my son would come home complaining that one thing after another was being banned on the playground( tag and such). Now he's in middle school. He does not have any PE or gym class ever! Not one the entire year. He chose other electives, and I did let him. I think I would make a different choice if I could go back. My younger son is all boy, and he gets reprimanded for it at school constantly. He's only in 2nd grade.