Theory: Empathy
“Empathy is the ability to project oneself into another person’s point of view so as experience the other’s thoughts and feelings”. (pg. 78)
This journal is based on a conversation between my daughter and me. I found out that she was skipping school and I wanted to sit down after dinner to talk. This is her last year of high school and for the first semester she was placed in a class that she felt wasn’t necessary or useful. I found out through this discussion that she tried on several occasions to change the class with her guidance counsellor but it was too late, so instead of talking to us, she decided to skip class and hang with her friends.
Dialogue
Me: How was your day?
Daughter: It was good
Me: Really? Your Business teacher called today, He had some interesting things to say, How comes you didn’t go to class?
Daughter: I was in the library working on my English assignment.
Me: Did you get permission from your teacher to skip class to work on another class project? He told me that you’ve missed about eight classes! What’s going on? Where are you going when you leave for school?
Daughter: I’m going to school
Me: Yea but not to your classes, why aren’t you in class?
Daughter: I don’t know
Me: So how long have you been skipping this class? Who are you with?
Daughter: My friends, they all have spares, so I hanging out with them.
Me: You’re not thinking about your education, you’re supposed to be in class. Do you understand that if you fail your classes, your chance of graduating next year won’t be happening? I guess you want to repeat another year when all of your friends will be moving on to college or university?
Daughter: Well I didn’t want to do this class anyways, it was forced on me, I tried to change it with the guidance counsellor a few times, and he said it was too late to change it.
Me: So you decided not to show up at all?
Daughter: Yea because I don’t know what going on anyways.
Me: Maybe...