Monday, March 20, 2017

No More Excuses

I have read the article about "That Kid" several times. Teachers love to share it and show how they have sympathy for what parents may be feeling. I get it. There is so much we can't tell the other parents.

BUT

We have to stop making excuses to the detriment of the rest of the kids. Kids with physical challenges and emotional challenges shouldn't be shoved in a classroom and forgotten. Absolutely not! But it is also wrong to shove them in a classroom with a single teacher, who must accommodate all learning abilities while struggling to keep kids safe from the child who is having a melt down on a regular basis. It is WRONG for parents who trust schools to keep their kids safe, to not be informed of the risks and concerns posed by having those kids in the same class. To indignantly defend the rights of those kids is to invalidate the rights of the kids who do behave. Kids shouldn't think it is normal to have to work in a classroom where things are thrown and threats are levied. Parents shouldn't be told that things are being handled when we are doing nothing.

If we are to teach understanding, we need to brainstorm ways to accommodate challenges without sacrificing the safety and learning of all students.

*Inclusion at specific times rather than all day is an option.
*Recruiting volunteers to help is an option.
*Being a training ground for future teachers is an option.
*Requiring parents to be involved and part of the solution is an option.
*Hiring more staff.
I'm sure there are many, many other options.

These aggressive behaviors are becoming the norm and the longer they are allowed to continue, the more difficult the learning community will become. The more the behaviors we see in schools today become the norm, the more angry and violent society as a whole will become.

It is not OK.

There are parents of those kids that are doing the best they can.

However there are more parents contributing to the behaviors of those kids.

School should be a safe place where rules are enforced and expectations are high. Excusing behavior doesn't help That Kid and it definitely doesn't help those in his or her sphere of influence.

We owe kids more.

All kids deserve more.


4 comments:

  1. I completely agree: all kids deserve more! In my classroom, this situation is occurring, and it severely impacts the entire classroom and overall learning environment.

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  2. I completely agree: all kids deserve more! In my classroom, this situation is occurring, and it severely impacts the entire classroom and overall learning environment.

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  3. This is such a difficult situation, especially when you can see both sides, but I do think it would benefit us to take a look at the impact on learning caused my students with severe behavioral/emotional issues. Sometimes parents request their children not be with that dangerous kid - but sometimes there's nowhere else to go when you have a handful of classrooms. Either way, passing around an article (or watching a TED talk - we see a lot of the same ones in my district) isn't really addressing the problem.

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  4. Change ONLY happens when someone in leadership--principal, classroom teacher, etc.--starts acting differently. Schools giving only lip service will never change, period. But as the saying goes, a small committed group of individuals working together can change the world. We know how to do this, folks--we just have to have the courage to step up and do it, and ALL of the kids will be in a better environment, which is kind of the goal, right?

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