Working for Lifestyle/Extras
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| Mon, 11-20-2006 - 11:13am |
Hi Ladies :)
This is my first time on this debate board and I have been dying to jump into some of the topics, but I feel as though they are sooooo long (one in particular is over 1000 replies, yikes!) that starting my own specific one might work out better.
Anyhow, a recurring theme here seems to be what Moms should and shouldn't be going to work for. It seems some are of the opinion that is OK for Mom to work if she must to pay her bills but NOT if its to afford a nice car, house, good neighborhood. This is considered keeping up with the Johnses (who are they???) and thats bad.
Well, I want to know what in the heck is wrong with a women working to have nice things? I don't mean working and leaving baby in child care 16 hours a day, everyday...thats pretty extreme.
I enjoyed a certain lifestyle before having a child, should I have downsized that lifestyle once baby came so I didn't have to work? What about me *wanting* to maintain a certain lifestyle for myself, my husband, and my child makes me a (a) workaholic or (b) striving to keep up with the Joneses?
Don't some people (like myself) simply enjoy living in a nice place with nice things and want their children to have the same experience?
So please, anyone who thinks a women is wrong for WOH if she is not doing so to financially survive but does it to maintain a certain lifestyle...whats wrong with this?
Thanks all :)

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"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&
"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&
Jennie
I would expect to see more problems among teenagers and young adults whose parents had failed to find an effective work-family balance.
That reminds me of a little conversation I had with DH yesterday. I told him I'd like to sit down with him more often and discuss certain things regarding the "raising of DS." He looked at me funny and said, "Well, I think you're doing a great job. Why do we need to talk about it?" When I asked him to clarify, he said, "Right now you're really the main one raising DS." I really couldn't agree with him, since I wouldn't and couldn't SAH if he weren't in favor of it. It's a joint effort.
Maybe it's just a semantic problem with the word "raise." Your nanny isn't "raising" your boys. She has a lot of influence on their environment, yes, and she is assisting you in your efforts. I guess I would say that any othercare/school teachers/Sunday school teachers, etc. are "helping raise" one's children--and I would expect those people to do their best to make sure the job is done right.
Actually, in my experience teaching inner city teenagers, the most likely scenario was a single mother or mother plus stepfather--in both cases the family was generally drawing some government benefits (like free-reduced school lunch) and all adult members were working. Since I helped kids with FAFSA forms for college, I also found that most of the income was unreported, and frequently families had never filed income tax returns before their child needed government assistance to attend college.
Even in the inner city, most women do everything they can to provide for their children. Government benefits in Texas aren't really enough to provide all the living expenses for a SAHM and her children, or at least, most benefits were unavailable for the largely undocumented population of the area in which I taught.
Jennie
OK, no offense, but that was real educator talk, lol. Anyway, I googled the program. It is used in NY as well. Among the unwashed masses (i.e. parents without ed degrees) it is generally seen, rightly or wrongly, as WL "lite," a way to retain WL methods without having the parents scream too much.
In a couple of the articles there was reference to studies of achievement among students using the program. Unfortunately, the studies were done by the program owners and included only a handful of the schools in the program. The studies did show improvement in the bottom quartile, which goes back to our previous discussion.
Part of the problem we are having may have to do with the definition of ability grouping. Some take it to mean tracking. I take a much wider view. As already explained, when I was in school, teachers deliberately made sure that kids in the top quartile never got a chance to collaborate in a group setting. We were always distributed out among the lower-performing students. I see no particular value in rigid tracking with separate rooms etc, but nor do I understand why teachers would want to keep birds of a feather apart at all cost. So far, what I have read about LC only indicates that inclusion is preferred for the program, but I can't find much on how the differentation is implemented in a practical way and on whether the higher performing students are allowed to collaborate sometimes.
Finally, the goal and main thesis of LC, namely that all kids CAN learn to read, is most definitely worthy and one I believe in myself. OTOH, plenty of countries achieve 100% literacy without implementing complicated, expensive and high-maintenance literacy programs in its public schools. The real question is what you consider an acceptable minimum level, to be reached by ALL students and not just in reading, and how great a percentage you will accept reaching only the minimum.
When implementing reform, it would be useful IMO to assess the level reached by the top 20% and the bottom 20% in the old vs the new system. There is usually a trade-off there and it must be faced honestly.
which then means that, in general, the low-achievers will almost ALWAYS be with the same low achievers for pretty much their entire school career. Generally, these kids are also unmotivated -- often times due to hyperactivity or the fact that school (and learning) is really difficult for them. What a shame it would be to not challenge these kids to do better.
There will be a bit more shifting with your middle and high-end kids because they most likely know how to "do" school.
I imagine if you had one or two low-ability kids you would SERIOUSLY rethink ability grouping.
Carole
What's to assume? she quoted your words, "They are people like me who never had an inkling about how to be fiscally sound. Our parents all were good in paying their bills. We figured we would be too but were irresponsible where our parents weren't."
It appears as if you are saying:
1. you didn't know how to be "fiscally sound"
2. Irresponsible paying bills (where your parents weren't)
Color me confused, but they were your words.
Carole
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