Phalen After School

Busses begin to line up on Cypress Street in front of a big brick building which is an Elementary School. Kids board the busses when the 2:50 pm bell rings. However, the rest of the kids gather in the cafeteria to take advantage of a Community After School Program provided by Phalen Lake Elementary to enrich and advance their education.

Phalen Elementary is a PreK-6 grade school where 669 students fill up throughout the school day. It is a very diverse learning environment, but the Hmong population overpowers as Phalen is the learning home to Hmong refugees. In fact, they are the first Hmong Studies Knowledge Magnet school in the Saint Paul Public Schools. This creates an opportunity for the student to explore a different culture, not only do they provide the kids with Hmong but also Spanish. Phalen is a Core Knowledge School with rigorous courses; this provides students with a clear outline of content to be learned grade by grade without repetition or gaps. One of their educational advantages is their Community After School Program.

As the bell rings first, second, and third graders fill the tables of a small cafeteria. Chaotic and hyperactive, students are jumping and running around all over the place. Teachers begin a countdown as a signal for the students to settle down and become quite. After all the teachers, students and volunteers arrive, they begin to dismiss the students by classrooms.

“Third graders, line up at the door!” the program coordinator with a powerful voice begins to dismiss. The third graders all rush to the door to see who gets to be the line leader because that was the best position to be. We arrive at a smaller classroom, and I feel like a giant, all the desks and chairs were half my size I felt like I was going to break them as soon as I sat down. Right away when the class settles in, I feel third grade pupils staring me down. The teacher instructs the class to take out homework or a book and get to work, “It usually takes a while to get started with a class this big and most of them are unprepared.” April a volunteer runs around passing out pencils and helping kids with their homework. After a few ticks on the clock, the classroom turns from silence to chaos.

“I am going to go crazy!” I hear a kid yell at the top of his lungs with a frustrated look on his face. He raised both arms in desperate need of help or just for the attention as the teachers rather ignored him after helping him twice. There were two teachers to twenty students, and it seemed like all of the kids wanted help at the same time. There was constant movement for various reasons, some for a reason to sharpen a pencil but some just to distract others and get them off task. The teacher had enough and claps to get the attention off the students, “If you guys are quite at the end of class we will play a game for prizes” that usually got me quite in elementary school but this class was different as the proposition does not work and it get even louder.

“What are you writing?” Olivia asks nervously as we sit down in the hall where it was quite. I found out that the attention span of a third grader was small as her next comment was, “Your nose is big!” Being in third grade your brain has not really developed, but I asked her if she was thinking about college she answered, “I am not going to college, it is four years a waste of your life and it sucks! My dad didn’t go, why should I!” Influence is a constant problem with elementary students, relatives, music, television, or other stuff whatever the kid hears is sticks with them and if it is bad, they are less likely to succeed.

“So many kids are twirps in this class, we spend more time with behavior than learning and having fun” April spoke in a frustrated voice. In most schools behavior issues always creates a distraction not only for the surrounding classmates but for the teachers as well. “Advil helps headaches that I get from this class, they don’t get we are not here to stick them in a classroom, we are here to have fun.” Discipline is a factor in all schools, so I wanted to find out what is done to solve this problem.

Discipline is no different from any other part of education, you learn from doing it. “Begin the year strong and in charge. Even with the youngest students you have to establish who is in control.” (Hamilton) After a snack time, the kids again lined up and marched to their second class for the last hour of the program. When the cartooning class with fourth through sixth graders walked in quietly, I knew I was in an entire different ball game. They sat at the tables scattered at every corner of the classroom waiting for the teacher. In walked a short muscular high school volunteer with no emotion in his facial expression. They got papers out and started drawing without any instruction