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I almost started crying at school today. No one was even being mean to me. We were watching the Hunger Games in Social Studies and I just felt like I was going to start crying. I can't tell anyone about my sister because I'm just not supposed to. My two closest friends found out by accident(I was showing them something I'd said to this girl on kik) and apparently I mentioned that Tess is depressed. So they found out and my other friends found out I'm keeping a secret from them and they're really mad at me. I really can't keep this secret any longer. It's like it actually physically hurts. So I'm going to tell the guy I like about Tess(I think I can trust him not to tell anyone and I really need to tell someone) if I can get a chance to talk to him that is. So I'm going to try to talk to him next week at recess and I'm going to have Abigail and Jordyn help me because they already know. I'm having a sleepover at the end of the school year(next Friday June 7) and we're going to watch Pitch Perfect and Beautiful Creatures
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Why the heck were you watching movies in Social Studies? I read about one kid who had a teacher who let them watch horror movies or sitcoms in class, maybe both, and the kid felt that that wasn't helping him learning anything (plus other problems he had with his school) and he started homeschooling. Like me.
No, I do not know this kid personally. I read about him (or her, I forget which) in a book. Don't waste keystrokes requesting that I ask him or her some questions.
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I can't speak for anything but my own experiences, of course, but as a general rule movie-watching in public schools happens because (a) it's an English class and the teacher thinks that watching film adaption of something the class has finished reading will encourage a greater range of analytical thinking about the work in question (i.e., reading the Scottish Play and then watching one of the myriad of movies of it), or (b) it's a science or social sciences class and the movie is a documentary pertaining to the subject at hand (i.e. biology classes showing videos about immune systems, or a world history class watching something about, say, Stonehenge).
The practice helps those students who are visual learners, because the information is presented with much better visual aids than would be available on, for example, a powerpoint presentation. Generally speaking all (good) teachers are looking for more ways to reach all their kids, not just the ones who can magically stay awake and absorb adequate amounts of information during lectures.
One reason that homeschooling can be great if done correctly is that there's so much one-on-one time between parent/teacher and child/student, and of course the parent knows their child better than a teacher in a public school could by fact of having raised them, so they have both the means and the time to tailor the education to the child's needs. Homeschooling also lends itself better to educational field trips like visiting museums or maybe even actual historical sites, if financially feasible.
That can't happen in public schools, because there's a much greater ratio of students to teachers and personalization of instruction simply isn't practical. The aim of public school teachers, then, isn't to reach every kid on a very individual level, but to convey the same information in as many ways as possible so that general understanding of each concept will be consistent, i.e. so no child falls behind as a result of not being able to learn strictly from working out of a workbook.
Further, there do exist social science classes where the entire point is to watch movies, i.e. film study classes. A lot of times these are more college-y type social sciences, but I bring it up because my high school offered one.
Rambling aside, the point I'm trying to get across is that watching movies in class isn't automatically condemnable, IF the movie pertains to the material being taught and is, you know, educational. Any teacher who let their students watch movies for no reason but entertainment is really bad at their job, and shouldn't be accepted as indicative as public schools as a whole.
As to why The Hunger Games would be an admissibal movie to watch in a social sciences class: the whole point of the Hunger Games is to critique problems with modern media culture and offer a dystopic future extrapolation of current trends. Watching or reading it in a humanities course would be no different from watching or reading Brave New World or 1984 or even more YA-targeted work like The Giver.
That said, it was the end of May when Maggie mentioned this. It might have been a hooray-it's-the-last-week-of-school-let's-have-a-party thing, too.
TL; DR: I'm weirdly defensive of public schooling because my childhood education until I was ten was a Christian school run by my church and then homeschooling, and I hated both of them and was pretty much miserable the whole time and it took me until I was eight to even learn how to read more than monosyllables because I was so anxious all. the. time. that I couldn't process information correctly. Public school went a very long way to correcting that, bad hormone years in middle school notwithstanding.
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@JDD
About fighting with your parents: if you feel like you're going to fight with them WALK AWAY. Make a POLITE excuse and go think about what you're going to say. When you're calm, go talk to them. Write down what you're going to say if you have to.
Time management: That one's easy. Unplug. When you think you're wasting too much time, just hide all your electronics.
General Life Goals: Just keep working at it. You'll get there someday. Always be on the lookout for opportunities. When a filmmaking contest opens up, enter. Go to camp. Stuff like that will give you an edge over the wannabe filmakers who just sit on their butts all day and do nothing.
@Maggie
You said you don't want to talk to an adult about it, but you have to if you want it to go away. Just tell your doctor the next time you're in there. It may sound awkward, but trust me, they'll probably be the person who can do something about it.
@Ruby
I have no idea what this secret is. I'm not going to try to guess. If you're so stressed out about it though, you should talk to someone about it. Do you know anyone who can relate? Maybe they can give you advice on how to deal with this.
Alright, did I miss anybody while I was pretending to be Dr. Phil?
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re: Walking away: I'd advise caution here. Depending on what one's parents are like, walking away can make things much, much worse. There is a certain type of person whose response to another person trying to remove themselves from the argument is to dig in even harder and try to follow, and when you're the one trying to get away this kind of situation is really, really awful and kind of scary.
So if you try to walk away and your parents don't let you, be careful of trying to keep walking away because chances are good that it's going to blow up in your face. At that point it's best to breathe and stay as calm as you possibly can and, I've found, let them yell themselves out and then apologize in the least passive aggressive manner you can manage so they'll leave you alone.
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Oh, yeah, just a footnote if I was didn't say this before. Don't just walk away. Say something before you do, and not just "I don't want to hear it." That will definitely make it worse. Use homework as an excuse if you absoutely have to.
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I can't speak for anyone but myself, but if I were having an argument with my mother and I tried to stop it by saying "I have homework I have to do" and then leaving I would be in so much trouble. What I was saying above is that some people won't except even the validest and most polite of excuses and with those sorts of people it's probably not a good idea to keep trying, but to find a way of defusing them, so to speak.
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I thought for a while one of my friends had part of the same problem I had so I was super excited. However, from what I've heard from her, she's just pretending. I was very mad at her for a long time but now I'm not mad anymore.
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We were watching a movie in Social Studies because EOGs were over. Ms Ladd made sure we could all watch PG-13 movies though. I told the guy I like about Tess and he understood. He's helped me so much more than he'll ever know. Tess told some of her really close friends her secret, and one of them told Tiara and Tiara wouldn't tell me who told her because with her it's all about getting even
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Religion and nonreligion. This is something I've been dealing with for a while now, but only recently I decided that enough was enough and told my parents. They're both Christian, and they've raised me and my younger sister Christian. We went to church pretty much every Sunday, I went to youth group, my sister went to youth group for fifth graders, we did VBS and I've volunteered to help with VBS and everything. The church had a small group for each grade and gender, so I was still going to the freshman girls group at the beginning of the year. I stopped for a while because of the tennis team, and after that it got harder and harder to go because of homework and because I hadn't really wanted to go for a few months and it became easier and easier to excuse myself and not go. I stopped going to youth group for the same reasons. I didn't want to tell my parents I was an atheist for the longest time because I honestly had no idea how they would react.
I finally did tell them, about a month or so ago. The youth director of our church was leaving (I'm not clear on the reasons) and summer is when the high schoolers have a three-week thing: First is volunteering and leading a group of middle school kids for a week in RSG (Ready Set Go, the VBS for middle schoolers) then a week-long trip down to this camp in Georgia, and then a week-long misson trip to build houses in West Virginia. My family has always been involved in the church, and I had been too. My mom has been a deacon for something like five years, and my dad has been volunteering with a program my sister went to for six years, ever since I was in that program. I decided that it was better for me to tell them now rather than later, and they took it pretty well. I learned a lot about what they believe and why they go to church, and I thought everything was alright.
And then, (we had the conversation on a Thursday) the Sunday a week after our conversation, it was, "[Real Name] we're going to church." And I said no, I wasn't, and hadn't we discussed this? But they made me go, and I could have put up more of a fight, but it was eight in the morning three weeks before finals. I went, and rationalized it- my sister was playing violin in church that day, so that's why they made me go. But the next Sunday, it was the same thing, and I said no, I wasn't going and we had a really big argument that ended with me in tears because whenever I argue about something like this with my parents, it ends with me crying. But in the end, I haven't had to go because my parents had two main reasons they wanted me to go: it was a family activity and it was because of the community. I told them that the church community was based on the assumption that everybody had the same set of beliefs about a certain subject, and I did not share those beliefs. I also told them that I would be doing the same thing I had been doing for a few months: I would sit in the service, then walk home, and in the process talk to four people.
So I don't have any idea how this is going to finally end up. They haven't made me do anything since. I honestly understand if they want me to go because my younger sister is performing or something, and I'll go then if she does. My parents hold all the power, and I'm scared.
There's other things too: I hate USTA tennis tournaments, and most tennis tournaments in general, but I still have to do them. I don't like playing piano, and I haven't since fifth grade, but I'm still taking lessons and going to contests. School was mostly easy this year, partly because I was lucky in the teachers I got, and partly because I did well enough in my classes that it didn't really matter what I got on my finals and I'd still keep my A.
I have two friends circles: the group of people I generally hang out with, eat lunch with, and the church group of friends, none of which I had any classes (not even the same lunch period) with or did any of the same sports, so we haven't really talked too much this year, but I still count them as my friends. I haven't told them anything, but I've mentioned to a few of them that I won't be doing the summer church stuff this year, but I haven't told them why.
Sorry for the long and rambly post.
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I'm not an atheist, but I've been increasingly agnostic and disillusioned with the Christian faith since probably starting around thirteen or fourteen, which would have been about six years ago. My family belongs to a fairly conservative nondenominational church, and I haven't told them or anyone else who might mention it to them, so as far as they know I still agree with them on all counts.
It's a lot easier for me than it is for you, because when I'm in college I don't have to attend a church or Bible studies or what-have-you and I'm also really good at saying the correct things to fly under everyone's radar.
That said, when I'm at home/living with my family, I go to church with them without complaint. Part of this is because otherwise the whole "I don't identify as Christian and haven't done for six years" thing would come up and there would be a HUGE fight and it would potentially jeopardize things that I really want, like the trip to New York I'm taking next fall, or really need, like my college education (they've threatened to pull the plug on their very significant portion of the tuition over much, much less). Also, there's people at the church who I enjoy spending time with and wouldn't otherwise get to see.
My advice, for what it's worth, is to continue going to church with your family, but try to make it clear to them in as polite a way possible that your participation does not correlate to an acceptance of the ideas being espoused there. You are, to the best of my knowledge, not legally an adult and so it's really their prerogative if they want you to go to church or tennis tournaments or take piano lessons. So probably the best thing to do is to be as rational and calm as you can when you explain WHY you don't want to do those things, and whenever possible offer alternatives to fill up the time normally taken by those activities. I know it's not fun, but them's the breaks until you're legally able to leave and make decisions for yourself.
Well said, TNO. Thank you. I'd like to add, SC, that as you continue to attend church, keep an open mind. Beliefs can keep developing or changing for a lifetime. You may find some parts you do believe or want to participate in. In some churches people are allowed to disagree. Even if you don't believe that Jesus is the Son of God, you may appreciate the history of a man who helped many people, taught them to love their neighbors, and is a good role model.
Admin
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@Admin
That last sentence is completely right. While I'm definitely a Catholic/Christian, Jesus is a good example even if you don't believe some things about him.
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I'm really sorry about your situation. I got really lucky in having really open-minded parents, but I can imagine it must be really difficult. Hopefully they won't make you go any longer, but if that's not the case, TNO's right. There's not much you can do other than talk to them as calmly as you can. (Personally, if I'm concerned that I might not be able to talk about something as calmly as I'd like, I do it through email or similar method of communication. I'm sure some parents would prefer face-to-face conversations, though.). The other things are worth talking about, too; depending on your interests and your parents' reasons for making you do the activities, they might be willing to let you do other activities that you enjoy more, even if they won't just let you spend your time however you like.
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@TNO
I guess it really depends on the person then.