My Corner for Education

I caught two students passing notes to each other. One notewrote, "When do you want to have sex?” I was so shocked to read thatnote. What do they, two eight-year-olds, know about “sex”? It isquite alarming and scary. I didn’t even know what “sex” meant whenI was in high school. I think children are growing too fast toosoon! Whenever I have found notes like these, I would have toquestion the children about what they know and why they wrote thenote. The sad truth is I have to find out if they have been exposedto sexually explicit materials or abusive situations at home beforeI can contact the parents. There are a lot of sick people outthere, and unfortunately, some of them are parents.

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Yesterday, police in Toronto charged the mother of a twelve-year-oldgirl, who traded her own daughter for drug. She forced thetwelve-year-old girl to take drug and had sex with six, possiblymore than ten, men. I was shocked (and disgusted) that this kind of crime wascommitted by the girl’s own mother. A drug addict would do anythingto get high. I have seen it first hand before but not to thatextent.

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One of my students was acting up the week before Christmas. Ifinally had enough with her, so two days before our Christmasbreak, I called her aside and questioned her about her out ofcontrolled behavior for the whole week. She told me that she wasjust very angry that her mother had stolen her Christmas presentsunder the Christmas tree, and her grandmother told her not to tell. Well, I knew the child did have pastrecord of lying and cheating in class, so I immediately contactedher guardian, her grandmother, regarding her behavior problems andthe story she told me. Sure enough, her grandmother confirmed thatthe child’s mother, her own daughter, did ripped open all thepresents given to the family from social agencies and tookeverything of value. The girl was the first one to discover thatall the presents were missing. That is a real-life Grinch story tome! I could not believe that anyone would steal from their ownmother and daughters, but she is a drug addict. An addict would doanything in order to buy drug and get high.

I ended up going Christmas shopping for that family of four thatnight before Christmas break. I wanted the girl and her family tohave a decent Christmas, I wanted them to know that ChristmasSpirit still existing in our society. There are people in oursociety who have compassion and deeply care about others. No matterwhat, we still have kindness and hope in humanity!

I asked my principal to deliver the presents to the family. Thegrandmother was told not to tell the girl that I was the one whobought them all the presents, and all the presents should godirectly to all three girls and herself. The first day back toschool after New Year, I was very happy to see the girl wear theshirt I bought her. The grandmother came into school to thank me oneday after the Christmas break. I was very happy to see thegrandmother, most importantly, with the scarf, the gloves and the hat I bought her forChristmas. The Christmas spirits live on!