Frazz by Jef Mallett for March 11, 2016
March 10, 2016
March 12, 2016
Transcript:
Caulfield: Is there really such thing as a "temporary fix"? Girl: Not according to my dad the veterinarian. Frazz: I'm still amazed you let Caulfield write a test. Mrs. Olsen: The students needed to think creatively. Caulfield needed to learn sometimes it's more work to get your own way and I needed to finish my crossword puzzle.
I’ve loved this week, and I hate to throw shade, but . . . I spent two years working towards an “alternate route” teaching license for high school math (I had two engineering degrees + 30 years experience at the time, contemplating a change of career). Caulfield is disruptive because he’s clever, and the other kids respond positively, and they’re all good kids (because it’s a comic strip). I can tell you that all it takes is one kid being disruptive because he’s just a jerk, and NOTHING works. Doesn’t matter if the disrupting one is smart, or stupid, or clinically unhinged; once the group is randomly offtrack, it goes nowhere. Caulfield’s interruptions and metaphysical / multi-entendre questions lead everyone to think, mainly because Jef Mallet is writing them for the adult readers as much as for the characters.
The biggest problem I saw in school was that, because the adults have to suppress the jerks and troublemakers, they also wind up suppressing the clever out-of-the-box thinkers, who will have to go on to succeed DESPITE their education rather than HELPED by it.