Dads as classroom volunteers
My husband is a teacher, and, one of the advantages (No, it’s not the pay, but that was a good guess. Not.) is that he can sometimes get to the kids’ school activities that are near the end of the school day.
Today was the kindergarten Halloween party, and, the room mother called me last week to see if I could help (disclaimer: I have helped at 2 other events already this year). I told her I couldn’t take off work today, but, that my husband could leave work early to get to the party.
When I told her that, she haltingly said, “Well, he’s going to have to work, we have all kinds of activities.”
I assured her that indeed, he had no problem with working, and, that he would be there.
She was nice and all, but, it was clear that she thought my husband wouldn’t be much help.
Dads? Do you volunteer in your child’s classroom? How are you received?
Tags: Career and Kids, teacher-schedule, Time offRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Busy Parenting, Kids' School
5 opinions for Dads as classroom volunteers
sherry
Nov 1, 2007 at 7:01 am
Oh that sort of thing just annoys me! Why would she assume that just because he’s a man that he wouldn’t be interested in actually doing stuff there? These days most fathers are very involved in family stuff and that includes volunteering. My husband is a musician and in December he will be going in to play some music for our daughter’s Kindergarten class, sing holiday songs with them, and even record them singing something. He would be so ticked off to hear what that teacher insinuated about fathers and their willingness to participate.
flybunny
Nov 1, 2007 at 8:10 am
People like that drive me crazy. My hubby also attends most school events, in fact yesterday he was 1 of 5 dad’s at the 3rd grade party and 1 of 7 at the 5th grade party. Of course he teaches at the same school so it is pretty easy for him to make it and the parents all know him so he doesn’t get much flack but still, he would be pissed if anyone thought that - Dad’s are people too!
Pete Aldin
Nov 4, 2007 at 5:10 pm
That’s appalling. It’s hard to believe this kind of stupidity is still around. I have attended excursions, read to my kids, taken out the kids falling behind for math games in small groups, and I’m an adult educator, not school teacher. But all of those teachers welcomed my input and occasionally even rang me to see if I could come to something.
If I was a violent man, I’d say that teacher needs a good thump upside the head! But I don’t advocate that of course… :) Your husband is a good man!
“Dad’s are people too!”. Flybunny, that’s cool.
JayMonster
Nov 5, 2007 at 8:20 pm
I stopped volunteering to do anything that required attendance, and have stuck to baking or some such other off site help ever since I encountered a group of mothers that felt it was “inappropriate” for a man to spend as much time with small children as I did when I used to help a lot. (One even went so far as to suggest that I had a “twisted ulterior motive” since it was not “natural” for men to do this)
So short answer. Nope. Not any more. I leave all direct contact with parents/teachers to the wife.
Leonard
Feb 24, 2008 at 5:55 pm
Fortunately I haven’t run into any problems, eventhough I am the only male room parent in my child’s school! Because I can’t bake or sew, I delegate these tasks to other parents. I basically act more of as a coordinator, using the Internet as the vehicle for communicating between the teacher and the other 20 parents (usually using Qlubb.com to organize events and delegate tasks, and YahooGroups for emails)
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