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The now-infamous Lecce school video. Potentially NSFW.
If you haven’t seen them already, some videos have been floating around that were allegedly taken in a classroom in Lecce, Italy. Right now, the only media source I could find that mentions the story is the hitherto unknown Malta Star, whose story is here.
The paper claims that Italian authorities have suspended the lecturer, presumably because she doesn’t react to the boys’ wildly aggressive harassment — even when they take it up a notch, as they do in their second cellphone video. (Again NSFW)
I suppose my revulsion while watching these videos is a clear sign that I’m getting old. The fact that the comments on YouTube seem generally positive and appreciative, while I just feel squicked out, pretty much confirms it. I now belong to the “goddamn-kids-these-days” generation.
The videos also reminded me of a rambunctious cellphone video that surfaced here in Slovenia a year ago. I had pretty much forgotten about it but if you want to see an example of the Slovenian educational system at its not-so-finest, here it is:
Slovenian dingleberries in action.
The video is of some high-school kids (aged 16-17) in Domžale, honing the skills they will need (screaming, arguing, roughhousing) for a lifetime of unemployment and heavy beer-drinking.
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Oh yeah, this Domžale video is a classic. Can’t wait, until someone brings a gun and starts shooting…
@Michael M.: So, you’ve go the same feeling, huh? About getting old, I mean…
@AzzQim: You can say that again… I remember the good old days when the mere threat of punishment was quite efferctive. The problem, of course is, the Slovene version of “no child left behind” - which translates as “no child displined as to not threaten his ever-so-doubtful future and get his parents of our backs“
Just to let you know, i’m 19 and i find these videos completely repulsive and unacceptable.
1. Why is the Italian teacher using her mobile phone in class any way? That’s completely unacceptable for a start.
2. What’s the teacher in Domžale doing about all of this? How stimulating is the content of his lesson? He obviously long since lost the respect of this group of louts, making his position untenable. This is the stuff of nightmares for education professionals the whole world over. When I taught in schools I would periodically awake in a cold sweat having had a dream something like this. I think that having the dream twice a year was enough to ensure it never happened in real life! But to see a video of it actually happening. Ouch. I feel sorry for the teacher, the kids and the school. They’ve all lost the plot! A compelling argument for a different style of education, I’d say!
I’m sorry but I simply can not see the teacher in the first video as a victim of abuse, harassment. I kind of understand the comments on youtube. I’m not saying she’s enjoying it, but she’s not doing anything to end it. She could for example MOVE. For that she really should gather all of her physical and mental strength. Right?
The teacher and the students must have some sort of quiet agreement. Like: You may grab me.
We’ve done some crazy stuff in our elementary and high school. But touching a teacher - or teacher touching a student - that was simply “no no never going to happen” situation.
On the other hand the video made in Domžale is quite different. At least the teacher here is trying to do something. Michael what I didn’t get is where exactly do you see the connection. Beside the fact that both videos where shot in classroom.
Miha: So there’s some hope!
Eva: The similarity is in the total breakdown of authority. In both cases, the teacher has absolutely lost control of the students, so that both classrooms have a certain Lord of the Flies vibe about them.
I do agree that the Italian teacher’s silence is puzzling, but perhaps there is a dynamic at work that isn’t clear. Perhaps she’s hoping that totally ignoring them will eventually(?) make them give up. Or perhaps she’s scared of provoking them by reacting. Maybe she’s just totally clueless. God only knows.
I remember doing this to substitute teachers from time to time just to see what we could get away with/ test their boundaries, but if this is their real teacher (in Domzale video) then this is shocking. While I agree these boys are totally lacking in discipline, I don’t see why the teacher didn’t try firmer tactics or even really raise his voice much. From what I understand, older people far outnumber young people in Slovenia. Couldn’t he have shouted some geriatric battle cry and brought in some back up to beat these kids down with walkers and canes?
@eva: The videos are strikingly similar. In the italian video the teacher is doing nothing (probably because she’s all out of options), whereas in the Domzale video, the teacher is raging impotently, because there’s nothing he can do… Disciplining the kids won’t work, because they don’t care about that. He can’t kick them out of classroom because that’s what they want, he can’t hit them, and if he complains to the headmaster he’ll look as a pussy. Which brings us back to the Italian teacher.
The problem with this kind of behaviour (and I’m trying not to generalize, especially due to miha’s comment) is that today schools are expected to do parenting as well, whereas parents throw money at the kids instead of teaching them values.
@pengovsky: I agree with you upon video in Domžale. There’s little left for a teacher to do when things reach certain point. They say things were different before. That now teachers have to deal with students, their parents and institutions ready to jump at the first sign of the slightest mistake. - I wouldn’t know. I guess I’m not old enough to draw that kind of conclusion.
But I can’t agree with you on saying that the Italian teacher is probably “all out of her options”. That statment really trubles me. It’s one thing to say, kinda like Michael did, that she is doing it because she is ignorant or for a bigger and better world someday (in the classrom). Maybe she should yell, notice parents, headmaster, someone. But how about for a start moving her bottock out of his hands?
That’s not exactly what they’ve been teaching us at pedagogical subjects but it seems (to me at least) a reasonable thing to do. Doesn’t matter if it is in the classroom, on the bus or on the street. Not that I don’t like being grabbed or grabbing others, I just think moving away is always an option.
(My grammar is hopeless. I know. Show mercy :).)
@pengovsky: Just adding… Schools (or rather teachers) are expected to do parenting, but have to obey strict limitations concerning the methods they use. In Slovenian elementary schools (kids of up to 15 years), it’s even forbidden for the teacher to raise their voice, because by some parents it’s considered as violence. And on the Slovenian market overflowing with the teaching working force a teacher dreads an upset parent.
On a more positive note, take a look at
this masterpiece:
users.volja.net/jkastr/Renegade_kduqa10444.jpg
And the guy only gets a 2 (a D for the English-speaking readers.
With the Italian teacher, who knows maybe she tried to do something in the past but nothing ever was done and she eventually gave up. Not likely but a slim possibility. Even saying that I don’t know who could put up with that crap.
@pengovsky: I agree with your comments that parents are expecting school/teachers to do the parenting & teach values. I don’t so much agree with the “nothing they can do”. I think there is a least one option. Unfortunately no schools I know of actually do this. Frankly if I were running the school, I’d make the “dingleberries” come in on their weekends and sit in a room for 10 hours each day, doing absolutely nothing. Eventually they’d learn to stfu and sit quiet in class, or there life for the next year would be a living hell.
Unfortunately I think parents would have a problem with this, but I would like to think if the parents saw a video like the one on here, they would be a little more willing to do something about it.
I don’t think this is the Italian teacher, it’s a hot girl in the class, you can hear the teacher lecturing in the background. I don’t think the teacher appears in any of the videos.
In any case, I feel old, too. Damn kids, get off my lawn!!!
Back when I was getting my elementary and high school education, which was in the 1990s (meaning a total system of values collapse), teachers had a simple way to discipline us:
If somebody was making trouble, teacher would quiz him/her. The pupil usually didn’t know anythin and would get a bad grade (1). Enough 1’s at the end of the year and you repeat the grade. Not a pleasant situation for anyone.
Grega: That’s a pretty heroic (and funny) effort, although I wonder if the teacher caught the blatant plagiarism of “Church Norris Facts“. Still: serious bonus points to him for mentioning Norris at all.
We had a teacher at my elementary school who loved hitting kids. He slapped me once for forgetting to say “sir” — I’ll never forget it. He was a crusty old bad-ass, and everyone feared him. Just like Tiberius.
Dejan: From what I understand, students pretty much can’t fail anymore. They just advance the next year into a group for the intellectually challenged.
Baldomi just e-mailed me this link about brats in China picking on a 70-year-old teacher:
www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=070529072143.3ltag6mm&show_article=1
Yikes.
Michael,
This was a long and well-loaded with links entry you posted just so you could use the phrase “Slovenian dingleberries”.
I applaud your efforts and, although I most certainly have heard the dingle-b mentioned (although that was a long time ago), the combination of “Slovenian” and “dingleberry” is a new one to my ancient ears. I’d go as far as stating that your posting is the first such incident of this version of the hanging chad.
I see two problems concerning the teacher in Lecce, if crni’s assumption is false:
a) we only know the videos and some vague newspaper articles, that the teacher was suspended, which isn’t very much in my eyes
b) does anyone know the circumstances down there? Ok, it’s just speculations, but who knows what it could mean in such areas to slap the wrong prat?
———-
I think, the guys absolutely deserve penalization, but one has to mind, that “violence” can cause “counter-violence” and the situation could escalate even more.
I also think, it’s strange, the teacher uses her phone during class - maybe there might be reasons, we don’t know. I doubt, we know enough to judge the teacher’s “not-reaction”
DarkoV: If I had the guts, I’d take it to the next level and start a “dingleberry” category. Maybe someday.
Dietmar: That’s a possibility I didn’t even consider but which would make the entire video about 50 times more depressing than it already is…
PS:
I found a German article from march, that mobile phones are now positively forbidden at Italian schools. If teachers catch studets with phones, they may take away the phones.
strange translation
@eva: When I said “all out of options” I meant that maybe she already did all that you suggest but it didn’t help (much like Michael N said it).
@BBLN: That’s what I meant… Teachers are suppose to help bring kids up, but cannot resort to basic tactics such as intimidation. When I went to highschool (mid-to-late 90s) I knew that a prospect of getting a negative mark or being disciplined was quite plausible - and I wasn’t what you might call a trouble maker (I went haywire years later :))
@Michael N: If you did that in Slovenia, you’d be soon faced with claims of child abuse and mental terorrism… I know of a case where a teacher was abused by parents other parents for standing up for a disadvantaged kid. In elementary school!
“other parents” sneaked in. Please disregard!
@pengovsky: Yes I have no doubt, that’s why I said it probably wouldn’t work. On the other hand if you show the parents video of their own children acting out; You’d hope they’d care enough to try and change it. Probably wishful thinking for some parents.
Well, the parents saw that video for sure, as well as the whole of Slovenia.
Remember they weren’t talking about anything else for weeks. Parents were saying that it’s teachers’ fault for not being strict, -yet in Spain aggressions by parents to the teacher for “shouting to my child” or “not letting him pass the exam with a score of 2 (over 10) are quite common- and that one of the poor children was trying to suicide. Ja ja.
A month or two past, the thing was forgotten and the poor children are same as before.
Even that Domžale school, aka Texas (that’s why the ‘Texas Rangers’) recently covered, or tried to, a case of raping inside it, not long ago.
Youth, divine treasure…
@Michael N.: Disablez put it quite well… Parents saw the video, but the power of denial was too strong
@Disablez: Alegged raping… From what I heard, it was most likely the girl trying to get some, but the boy refused, whereas she cried rape. It’s hearsay, I admit, but then again so is the claim of rape.
Well, this comes directly from one of the teachers there, mother-in-law :D, for what she says they received explicit orders to cover it.
Alleged or not, we won’t know… but as we say… “Fault is on the parents, who dress ‘em as bitchez”
PD. Just sentence from a movie. Androgyne / feminist associations please restrain from death-threatening me.
To ni mogoče verjeti sramota na SLovenske fante, zakaj je krivica narejena na punce
one niso posilile fante. Starši če se ne pozanimete zdaj,čakajte kdaj nimate več moč od starosti in vaši otroci bojo vaši varovanci. Prosim vas jaz sem videl velikokrat starše ki so prosili za zdravila in so se otroci smejali in za denar kregali.