When a student is ten minutes late to a 40-minute class, they are losing more than a fourth of the class time.  They actually lose at least half of the class because it takes them another 10 minutes to catch up with what's happening in the class. Their efficiency in learning for that class is greatly diminished. Not only that, if you are paying 100 yuan for the class, you just threw away 50 yuan.

When parents bring primary or middle school kids to class late, there are certain things that they must do. I will share with you 'how to enter a class late.'

First, let's talk about why you're late. I've been a teacher for over 30 years. I owned my own school in America for 15 years. I had about 750 students. We prepared students for the top 5% of colleges and universities in America. We demanded excellence from parents and teachers.

I've been teaching English in China for the past 9 years. We produce the top 1% of students in Henan Province. We've had students who have been accepted to Harvard, Yale, Princeton, University of Southern California. Our average student who takes the SAT in America (American gaokao) will score 1530 out of 1600 points. Our average TOEFL student will get 110 out of 120 on that exam.

I think I've heard every excuse for being late to class. The most common excuses are weather (such as rain) or traffic jams. If you've lived longer than a month in China and you drive a car, you know that there will be traffic delays when it rains. You also know that there will very likely be a traffic jam.

Let me tell you what to do when you encounter these obstacles to getting your child to class on time.

What do you do? You plan for it. How do you plan for it? You leave earlier. It is quite simple. There are always going to be delays and traffic jams whether it is raining or not. But, we (parents) are adults and we know this. A traffic jam in China is not a surprise. It is normal. 

Sometimes, a child is delayed from finishing another class they've attended. Each teacher should be responsible and respectful enough to start their classes on time and finish their classes on time. Any professional teacher will do this.

We know that there are those teachers who want to impress the parent by going longer than the scheduled time for the class to finish. In my opinion, this is just a superficial and very naive way to try to impress parents. In my opinion, it is a silly way to try to show how 'hard-working' that they are. I think most parents are smart enough to know that this is quite immature and a facade.

When you are late due to circumstances beyond your control, let me share with you the right and wrong ways to deliver your child to the class.

WRONG WAY - This way is disrespectful, rude and uncivilized.

- The child is very excited and the parent is allowing them to run to the classroom.

- The child enters the classroom and is very disruptive to the class and disrespectful to the teacher. The class doesn't start when you arrive. The class starts on schedule.

- The parent delivers the child late and continues talking to the child after the child has entered the classroom.

- The parent delivers the child and tries to talk to the teacher after their child has come late to the class.

RIGHT WAY

- Calm your child down before going to the class.

- Take your child to the class and lightly knock on the door.

- Deliver your child safely to the class and leave immediately.

- Be respectful.

The ancient culture taught everyone to respect education by respecting the teacher, the school and the classroom. It seems that modern people have forgotten this. I guess that they need to be reminded.