how quickly they learn...

Elementary students try to hijack school bus

Friday, January 21, 2005
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette


"Three 11-year-old boys and a 10-year-old girl tried to hijack their school bus near Punxsutawney this morning.

"State police said the four hatched the plot yesterday. Just after 8 a.m. today, one of the boys pulled a knife from a book bag and held it near another student. He demanded driver Janet McQuown, 52, stop and get off the bus.

"A police new release says she pulled over along Pine Tree Church Road in Oliver Township and "the knife was removed from the juvenile's possession." It doesn't say how.

"The bus, with the hijackers and about 40 other children, arrived safely at Mapleview Elementary, where the unnamed offenders were taken into custody.

"Two were turned over to juvenile authorities and two went home with their parents.

"The news release did not immediately say what the hijackers intended to do with the bus."



What's the reason something like this can happen with 11 year olds? Where did they get the idea? Television? Listening to adults? Video games? Fear?

Working with kids I see a lot of "adult" behavior. They pick it up from everything around them. They mimic things. It's the natural way that they "play" in order to put together their adult lives.

They are exposed to many things that only adults should handle. They are still putting together their own system of values. Since kids don't have the skills to completely discriminate between what is right and what is wrong, what is acceptable and what is not acceptable, or what is fair and what is not fair, they don't know how to play fair yet. It's not a fault; it's how each of us but our own ethos together.

Still, this kind of behavior should concern everyone. Children are the future of the world. The children in Palestine, Isreal, Northern Ireland, Iran, China and the United States are all exposed to influences with no one explaining things to them or giving them the chance to ask questions. No one listening to them. Their fears. Their anxieties. Their laughter.

We should be more afraid of this than a lot of other things.