Get Schooled

By holdingAJCaccountable

November 7, 2006 12:51 PM | Link to this

Character education doesn’t do a BIT of good…absent consequences for misbehavior.

If students can’t even get concrete subjects, how are they going to get abstract subjects like character education?

Talk to a child until you’re blue in the face…see what that will get you (“Ohhh…NOW I understand it’s wrong when I say ‘f-ck you’ and throw a chair at you when you ask me to move my seat. Thank you for explaining it to me.” They KNOW it’s wrong, they CHOOSE to do it because there is no compelling reason not to.)

Take the same child, REMOVE him from the environment, REMOVE him from his audience, REMOVE him from his power (the power to disrupt class) and ISOLATE him…and do this consistently and you WILL see a change. If you don’t, he has no business being in a regular ed classroom.

By jim d

November 7, 2006 01:20 PM | Link to this

Patti,

Webster defines character as moral excellence and firmness.

If our schools are actually attempting to instill these traits they are failing miserably. By ignoring or condoning inappropriate behavior they are enabling those of lesser morals and sending a message to those that strive for this type of excellence, that it really doesn’t matter.

The real problem is that our schools refuse to bring legal charges when students do anything short of murder. I ask you, does that promote moral excellence and firmness?

By penguinmom

November 7, 2006 01:27 PM | Link to this

Hurting someone’s feelings is violence? What happens if you have an incredibly sensitive child in the school? Is everyone then going to be guilty of violence? Absurd definitions like this and ‘zero tolerance’ don’t do anything to help the situation of trying to make kids behave.

While I believe character issues can be explained and taught (ChickFilA’s Core Essentials is a good program), they can’t truly be learned until there are consequences for their absence. You don’t learn responsibility by having someone say, be responsible or by reading a cute little poster. You learn responsibility by having to face the consequences of your actions.

Children aren’t going to learn kindness and respect by having their school plead with them. They are going to learn kindness and respect by being treated that way and by having expectation that they will treat others that way. Then, when they screw up (which they will), they learn the importance of the value by suffering appropriate consequences. If they do not suffer any consequences (or too lenient of consequences), they just learn that the value isn’t very important and they ignore it.

By jim d

November 7, 2006 01:37 PM | Link to this

Oh ME!!!

I’ve hurt more than a few feelings right here on these blogs.

Hope I’m not banned for 7 yrs to life.

By Gwinnett Teacher

November 7, 2006 02:15 PM | Link to this

jim d - I don’t think you’ve ever hurt anyone’s feelings on these blogs! The most you’ve ever done is cause one to shake his/her head and think, “Poor fool!”

By Stacey

November 7, 2006 02:21 PM | Link to this

I agree with penguinmom regarding “zero tolerance”. When I was a kid, the worse thing that would happen if you were caught with your GI Joe doll and his weapons is that the teacher would keep it for the rest of the semester. Now, it’s akin to bringing a real gun to school.

My son’s feelings get hurt because someone didn’t want to play with him at recess or sit with him at lunch. This isn’t kids being violent, it’s kids choosing who they want to play with.

By jim d

November 7, 2006 02:25 PM | Link to this

Well Gwinett Teach,

Now you went and hurt mine. (LOL)

By SNY

November 7, 2006 03:43 PM | Link to this

You know what, if your child is a punk and gets his or her feelings hurt very easily, why should other kids be punished for that? The bottom line is that kids are cruel. We were cruel to one another and we all turned out fine. (Give or take a few of us.) If a child is not threatening or hitting another child, what is the problem?

By Taxpayer

November 7, 2006 04:17 PM | Link to this

C’mon, guys — be realistic. Do you really think that policy was enacted because of little namby pamby kid-stuff insults? Most kids let that junk just roll right off and give as good as they get. But think about the horrific violence and carnage we’ve seen in schools, often caused by kids who have been bullied and picked on. If that policy can make even one child think twice before he/she hurts another — who may decide to retaliate with a weapon — then I say let it stand.

By Competitive

November 7, 2006 04:49 PM | Link to this

I think this is a very poor definition of violence. Everyone in the world would be considered violent because we all say things at times that hurt another person’s feelings. Is it violent to tell your girlfriend you are breaking up with her?

Character ed is still taught in schools. My gwinnett middle school requires us to take 30 minutes every Friday to teach our kids how to behave towards one another. It’s a scripted program called “Second Step” and I’m sure we spent plenty of money on it. Also, we are to have class meetings where everyone gets in a circle and discuss our feelings and problem solving.

My experience is that these programs don’t work. I agree with the earlier post that most kids know right from wrong, but some choose to do wrong. I know I did at times when I was young. True character comes from family, friends, and other who you have an internal respect for. Most school officials do not fit that definition for most students.

Save money and time. Get rid of character ed programs and use it to increase extracurricular activities that really help teach character through teamwork, commitment, responsibility, and hard work.

By Lisa B.

November 7, 2006 05:26 PM | Link to this

I really don’t think defining a character word per week and having kids write the definition, write the word in a sentence, etc., helps build character. I’ve been doing the character word daily for the last six or seven years. What really works is discussing novels read in class, things children see on tv and read elsewhere, and real-life problems. The character word plan was just another quick fix thing teachers are still required to waste time on.

By jim d

November 7, 2006 05:42 PM | Link to this

Competitive,

We spend plenty of money on everything in the GCPS. And I guess I’m one of the few that cares.

By Janine

November 7, 2006 06:40 PM | Link to this

Patti..Character ed is just another Cure du Jour….I agree with * Lisa B.* about reading novels and discussing literature in class being a much better way. When our middle school was allowed to have a Reading Dept. [it was dropped in favor of the scripted SRA reading program] we read wonderful novels and the students not only improved their reading skills, but also identified with characters and easily saw moral issues. I particularly liked when we studied fables,which as you know , were actually written to teach moral lessons. You would be surprised at how many middle schoolers have never heard or thought about little ditties like the THE ANT AND THE GRASSHOPPER, etc….

By Competitive

November 7, 2006 07:03 PM | Link to this

Jim D-

Gwinnett wastes more money everyday than I will make in my lifetime! I’m glad that you care and hope that the money will be put to good use in the future.

By SET

November 7, 2006 07:03 PM | Link to this

“Violence is…any word, sign or action that hurts another person’s feelings, body or things.”

That silly statement is illustrative of the destructive politically correct nonsense these so called schools drum into the students and the workers. Public discourse hurts people’s feelings - have you seen the campaign commercials? Mind you I’m not saying I have a problem with school rules that students have to keep their hands and their mouths to themselves…

Nothing wrong with violence. “It is the supreme authority from which all other authority derives” (Robert A. Heinlien - Starship Troopers). It must be wielded by the good guys if we are to have a decent society.

While annoying someone else is not violence in any sense of the word I was taught, - it’s wrong for a school to teach kids that they shouldn’t annoy someone. There is a time and place for that.

Children (as well as adults) are in fact morally required to annoy, hurt and kill if possible other people in certain circumstances. I think there used to be Disney Movies on this in the 1960’s - the practice was called saving people from evil men… “Swiss Family Robinson”, etc..

What the schools are teaching is that anything goes, and all the sheep are supposed to do is stand around and bleat.

It goes without saying that the schools should be teaching that one has a right to expect thay violence will not be used against people asleep in their beds or doing their homework or otherwise minding their own business - and if it does occur we go into the chapter about self defense and defense of others - or calling 911 and making police statements and testifying in court so that other people can be given detention, executed or given a 3 strikes sentence or probation or whatever.

The reason we are having school and workplace violence is that the actors correctly see that they can get away with the bad acting (with an occasional psychotic thrown in for variety).

If the bad actors saw that threats and violence against students and staff led to instantaneous reactions from manhandling - culminating in expulsion and possibly jail, we wouldn’t have school violence and certainly not repeat behavior from the same people. My primary school teachers were 5’4”, 99lb Irish Nuns. They could easily intimidate police officers and stray dogs, not to mention students and their parents.

All the schools have to do is to out-violence the troublemakers. Exactly how they do that is up to them. Either administration wants an orderly school or they don’t. Our local public schools have musclebound “control staff” at every campus. The students know what happens when they physically defy them. They are taken down to the ground and carried to the office. These are also the first line of defense when intruders periodically come onto campus to attack students.

By all means teach character education. Teach everybody Intolerance. Let all the students, parents and staff know how far is too far and what the teachers and staff will not put up with. Then when trouble starts - put it down directly. Use whatever lawful means are handy - referral slips - suspension orders - or muscular school control staff/police officers. Do it openly and gloat about the event. Stop trying to save, rehabilitate, understand, change or fix the troublemakers. That requires special schools with higher paid staff.

By Jeff

November 7, 2006 07:30 PM | Link to this

Don’t know about other schools, but it was not big where I was and does not exist (other than in my teammate’s classroom) at my current school.

Agree with those that point out that without CONSEQUENCES, it really doesn’t matter.

One my students are learning (and I’m sure I’ll get a LOT of complaints about): Don’t do the assigned work in my class, you fail my class. End of discussion.

I’ve LITERALLY got grades in the single digits in some cases, and the ONLY reason is lack of doing the work. I’ve got kids that are failing virtually everything - but they turn it in! - and they’re decently close to passing, simply due to the sheer VOLUME of work I’m giving them. (I’m working on getting that “Percent of Spreadsheet” number as close to IF NOT UNDER 1 as possible. Which means that to fail my class, you’ve got to have the equivalent of at LEAST 30 zeroes….)

By Molly

November 8, 2006 08:42 AM | Link to this

The DeKalb schools adopted that particular Orwellian definition of violence a few years ago. They must have required all classrooms to post that idiotic sign, because I have seen quite a few of them. My dictionary defines violence as the use of physical force. Children (and adults) certainly engage in plenty of mean-spirited, anti-social non-violent behavior that should not be tolerated, but that doesn’t change the definition of the word violence.

Character education as I have seen it in the DeKalb schools is a complete waste of time. Teachers have many opportunities to address character issues in the classroom, but the “character trait of the month” approach is worthless. As the latest evangelical preacher caught in a sex, drugs and lies scandal could tell you, talking about character is not the same a living with character.

By jim d

November 8, 2006 08:49 AM | Link to this

Competitive,

Don’t look for any changes in spending habits of the GCPS system. They were just handed a carte blanche yesterady at the polls to keep spending tax dollars behind closed doors, to continue with an IBM on a negotiated price contract that has already nearly doubled from the origional estimate and to continue spending tax diollars on items that would curl the publics hair if they knew how it was being spent. Not even Thurbert Baker or a Gwinnett Grand Jury can stop them now. We just handed them what they consider a mandate to continue with business as usual.

By Hmm

November 13, 2006 03:51 PM | Link to this

Is North Fulton and/or North Atlanta better at this? Molly’s comments regarding Dekalb’s character ed ring true for me. I’m just wondering if anywhere’s better in particular? Is it just more problems, different flavor?

I’d love to see some real consequences and common-sense approaches to discipline. The number of rules and paths to disobedience outlined in Dekalb’s handbook is awe-inspiring. I’ll never forget the first time my son was sent to the principal’s office. We moved to GA from WA (back home…) when he was in 4th grade. A girl asked him for a ruler, he tossed it (underhanded) from 2 desks away and she screamed that he (the white kid) attacked her (the black kid) with a ruler. It landed on her foot. He was sent off the Principal’s office over it. It’s funny now, but back then it broke his heart especially since it was his first day of school and he was such an outsider at the new school.