Google is NOT for First Grade

For those of you who blog, surf the net or have any kind of basic common sense you know that Google images is like a crap shoot.  You could put in the most bland word and get all kinds of fucked up shit.  So if you were to Google a phrase like……oh…..say…Haiti Earthquake Buildings…..what do you think you would get? Tents or dead bodies? That being said would you Google that phrase on the internet with the monitor facing a room full of First Graders? In fact would you Google ANYTHING with a monitor facing a room full of first graders?  

I wish I could say that this teacher, who has been teaching in the district for THIRTY YEARS had the same kind of common sense that the rest of us have but sadly, she doesn’t.  Here is what happened:

Green’s school does this cool thing where a few days a week they take all the kids from all three first grade classes and break them up into new groups with a different teacher.  It’s a pretty cool program and it gets the kids used to going to different classes, working with other kids and other teachers and Green really likes it.  They do social studies during this time. A few days ago my kid comes home and says to me “Today in school we learned about the earthquake in Haiti and the kids there don’t have houses and their moms and dads died. The houses fell on the people and we saw pictures of dead people.  Oh and we had an earthquake practice and Mrs. C told us to imagine that she was dead so we did.  I didn’t like it though because I don’t want to imagine that Mrs. C is dead.”  

Ummmmmmmm….. WHAT THE FUCK???

 There is just SO much that is wrong with what he said.  I freely admit that Green is an imaginative child but he usually doesn’t imagine such detailed lame stuff.  Then he starts describing to me the same exact images I have seen on the  internet.  The same images I have busted my ass to make sure he DIDN’T see. Yep. Green is telling his mama the truth so help him goddess. 

This becomes one of those rare moment I miss Waldorf School.  Okay fine, Princess didn’t learn math or reading but she could knit, find fairies and she never ever saw shit like that in school.  There is no Google in Waldorf.  Don’t get me wrong, I am not bagging on Google.  I love Google.  In fact Google is my bitch and sometimes Google and I make out. Google however, is my big kid toy and Google is not designed for First Graders.  Which is why I cannot figure out what the fuck this woman was thinking when she clicked SEARCH IMAGES? Can we say STOOPID?

Needless to say I was pissed.  Before I could go and ream her a new asshole Green got hit with trauma number two at school: His friend’s mom died and that led to a myriad of issues ever since.   Now I have a kid who used to be the a happy roll with the punches guy to a kid who is afraid of his own shadow.  Just to add fuel to the fire Green comes home the other day with a note from school that he got in trouble FIVE times, had to write an apology note to two classmates, was benched and sent to the office.  All in one day.  Yes the same little Green who is known at school as the Reigning King of Achievement Awards.  This in-trouble version of Green is SOOO not my kid. That is not to say he doesn’t get in his fair share of shit because as you all know he does, but being mean to other kids and acting up at school isn’t really his style. 

I marched my ass into the school office yesterday morning to talk to the principal.  She didn’t have “time” for me but I insisted and told her it was important. VERY important.  It was obvious she didn’t want to meet with a pissed parent but she said she could give me “five minutes”..great thats all I need.  So I told her what happened with Mrs. C and that I’m pretty pissed.  At first she tried to act like she didn’t think that was what REALLY happened but then when she saw I was not budging on this she said “well Mrs. C came to me the other day and let me know a parent would be coming to see me upset about her showing the kids a picture of Haiti but nothing really bad.”   Really? A minute ago you didn’t think it happened.  Hmmmm… So later  I had a meeting with the principal, Mrs. C and Green’s regular teacher who I lovingly call Miss Honey (I swear she is the real Miss Honey from the movie Matilda and Green is in love with her…I don’t blame him).  Now the story is that she was talking about homes and community for the social studies and a kid said that people live in tents in Haiti so she was Googling an image of a tent in Haiti to show them how that is a home.

What? Huh? Really?  

Oh and the she accidentally showed a picture of a collapsed building with legs sticking out of it….oh and some kids hurt and bleeding…and crying…ummmm…..what?

Well, it seems that this whole fiasco gets worse by the minute and by the explanation.   So let me get this straight: First Green was making it all up, then you were showing a picture of tents, then it actually was a picture of a collapsed building, oh and a dead person in it and wait, hold on… a kid crying and hurt…so then Green was telling the truth…except the part about imagining you were dead because he made that part up?  Sure.  Now I have no problem believing you really ARE THAT stupid. 

Now everyone is standing upside down to keep me from going nutso on them and I am actually about to go nutso but I managed to contain myself and take a deep breath and did a pretty good job of being a grown up.  I calmly informed them that if they EVER show my kid something like that again I will personally go straight to the Superintendent and have their ass.  I also informed them that now this whole thing has snowballed to epic proportions for my kid and THEY need to fix it. Lastly, in the future please have the same amount of common sense that a monkey does and DO NOT use Google images with a monitor facing a room full of children and wait to see what comes up for ya.  Okay?  What happened to the days of using the fucking chalkboard and drawing a picture of tents, houses, etc?

Later on today I have a meeting with Miss Honey, the principal and the school shrink.  I look forward to  having my kid back the way he was.  I don’t want this to turn into some HUGE head shrinking psycho-analysis thing but I do want my kid to feel like himself again.  I want my old Green back.  I intend to make his life magic again.

~RM1