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Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction
A question for the teachers here, but is part of the problem that teachers don't have the tools to discipline kids like they used to? When I was in school, there were pretty heavy handed tactics to break kids and correct distracting and impulsive behaviour.
I am not saying we have to go back to full on corporeal punishment, but I will say that when my grade 5 teacher shattered a meter stick across my lower back, I didn't act up after that.
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Fair question. Depends how deep in the debate you want to go. For example, the old debate about "self-esteem" versus reality.
But really i'd say that the behaviour is far more complex and we have a greater societal awareness. 30-40 years ago if you went to public school the diversity you would have seen, in elementary, in Alberta might have been racial/cultural and maybe you would have had a couple of those impuslive and loud boys taking Ritalin. Other than that could you name a student with autism that was in your classes? What about students with an AAC device to help them communicate because they are non-verbal?
Has discipline changed? Ya and for a few reasons.
- Human rights legislation, the Alberta Education Act and Policy state that all kids should be afforded the opportunity to be in school (and can't be discriminated against due to various reasons...including their abilities). So all kids have the right to be in their public, designated school.
- So if they must be in a school setting and they have difficult (explosive) behaviours, we have no choice but to try and work through them. And, to be transparent, i'd say the success rate with this is around 70%. But it takes years. So that kid in your kids grade 1 class might figure it out with the right supports and parents by grade 4 or 5. But that is a significant amount of time.
- SO if the student has to be at school and we have to do our best to support them we know that suspending a student just means a break. They will come back and their brain hasn't changed nor has their home situation. They will have the same behaviours. (P.S. Principals in Alberta have the legal authority to suspend UP TO 5 days. Nothing more. They don't control expulsion).
- Research shows that for most kids (and adults) restorative practices have far greater than impact than punitive measures like suspensions. So that is where we start...teaching, conversations, feelings. And this is why after 4-5 years generally 70% of kids improve.
- Compound all of this with the fact that school budgets are decreasing yearly while the complexity of students (medically fragile, autistic, non-verbal, assisted hygiene, and complex behaviour) increases yearly.
Basically schools are stuck in a hard place. We are required to provide quality education for all students AND required to support students with the trickiest of behaviours day in and day out. Parents are mad because a kid is causing their child's class to have to evacuate for safety and the parent of the kid with big behaviours is adamant that they can't help anymore.