09-19-2014, 09:23 PM
|
#4
|
Not a casual user
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: A simple man leading a complicated life....
|
A first year teacher pens a letter to other teachers on the use of stoplights in the classroom...
The letter is about teachers who use a stoplight for publicly tracking a students behaviour and what is wrong with public shaming. Red, yellow and green and a childs name beside each colour. Red representing the worst behaviour and green being the best.
Quote:
As a first year teacher, I remember ‘writing names on the board.’ That’s what I was told to do, and that’s what my teachers did when I was in school. But then I started paying attention to the hurt, the shame, the frustration, and even the apathy in the eyes of those students whose names appeared in chalk day after day. They were six and seven years old, and I knew they deserved better.
I absolutely understand why you want it to work. It’s a very big and very unwieldy job to be in charge of educating dozens of young children for six hours/day. But we both have to admit that a major part of the stoplight equation, even if it works, is shaming. And shaming children simply isn’t what we educators are supposed to do.
We also know the predictable pattern the stoplight creates. Think about how it feels to see your name, day after day, moving towards that red circle, broadcast to your peers and anyone who walks into your classroom. Those are the very children who struggle with “school behavior,” and they deserve our support, not embarrassment.
Or you could think about how it feels to be 5 or 6 or 7 years old and to worry daily about your name being moved from its perch on green. I promise, there are more authentic ways to get children to think about their behavior and more compassionate ways to help children to develop those executive functioning skills. There really are.
|
http://germantownavenueparents.com/2...-for-behavior/
__________________
|
|
|