When a student taught me a lesson

I have been taught many valuable life lessons by students during my career as an educator. One of them, I will write about here, hit me squarely in the face like a brick wall.

As a former teacher and principal I have disciplined many students. Most incidents have been very short and to the point, like 'stop that' or 'don't do that'. And, I have to admit, I do not remember most of the experiences. The disciplinary actions I do remember usually have to do with very major incidents that were rules that were severely broken.

I do, however, remember an incident that to me was very minor, but to the girl involved it was very major to her. I would have forgotten this incident had it not been brought to my attention that the girl was very upset with me about the situation.

Here is sort of how it played out: On a normal day at Dahlgren Grade School I would be present everywhere in the school. I usually walked through the buildings several times and would stop and help in the gym for duty either at P.E. or recess at lunch.

At lunch recess in the gym one day I was watching at one end of the gym and briefly told a student to stop what she was doing. It was a very minor incident, like pushing or something, that I thought was unsafe. I immediately forgot about the incident and then proceeded to watch other students as I walked around the gym during recess. However, the student did not forget the incident. In fact, another staff member noticed that she was visibly upset later in the day and she asked her what was wrong. She said, " Why does Mr. Pryer always talk and show attention to all the bullies and mean kids? And he never speaks to me unless it is to 'get onto me'."

This particular student was a very well behaved girl that teachers would all like to have a classroom that is full of students just like her. She had noticed that I had been focusing most of my attention on the behavior problems of the school. What this made me realize was that I should have been focusing more of my attention on the well behaved students. I should have been engaging myself in conversations and activities with the good students of Dahlgren Grade School more than I had been. As a result I began to try to be present in each and every student's day by giving eye contact or speaking to all of them on a daily basis.

I think that as an educator and a parent I had focused too much on negative behavior and should have been paying more attention to reinforcing good behavior in students and also in noticing students who seemed to be down and out for the day. This incident made me examine my whole life and how I treat others. I really had not helped the 'mean' kids by focusing on them so much. And I definitely had not helped the 'good' or 'normal' students by ignoring them.

Just by smiling, saying some kind words, and being present in others' daily lives, we can improve on the way we treat others. This is something that I work on daily and I feel that I fail daily with.

Coping With Abuse - Building and Dismantling Areas of the Brain

Have you ever wondered why abused men and women almost seek abuse by continuing to get into relationships that involve abuse? It is as if they are attracted to those who abuse them.

As a teacher I have always wondered why some students will work very hard to make everyone else miserable. I have known students to keep harassing me or their peers until they get the response they want. And usually the response is being yelled at.

I attended a workshop a few years back where Phillip Hamberg spoke of issues like this. He described students and adults like those above that either crave abuse or being yelled at. He says the brain builds and dismantles areas all the time. We have always been told to use it or lose it, and as we age we are told to exercise our brains to keep the cobwebs from forming.

Phillip says that our brains build new areas to survive. Have you ever wondered how someone could survive abuse and torture? He says the brain will build areas to cope with abuse and torture so you can survive and get through those situations. I guess these are areas of desensitization so that you can be desensitized against certain environmental factors to survive.

Phillip says the brain will try to keep all areas that it builds intact. If an area has been built in the brain to cope with something and the brain is not exposed to that particular situation for an extended period of time, then it starts to dismantle the area that was built. However, the brain will try to keep the area intact by craving or asking for the factor (abuse or torture) that caused the area to be built in the first place. It is like the brain gets a 'fix' when it is yelled at or abused.

The brain can be fixed on craving caffeine or certain drugs and will do almost anything to get you to acquire what it thinks it needs. How do we get past the cycle of being yelled at or abused to keep the coping area of the brain intact, so that the area will dismantle and thus break the abuse cycle? He says it would take several months of desensitization and not being exposed to the abuse, torture, or drug that has caused the area of the brain to be built.

So. in the case of a student that gets a 'fix' by being yelled at, everyone that the student comes in contact with will have to play along and keep from yelling at him no matter what he tries. If the brain begins to dismantle the area that copes with yelling, because it thinks it does not need it anymore, it will try to keep the area intact by getting the student to act out until someone yells.

This all sounds logical, but it would be tough to provide an environment to break the cycle of abuse or addiction.

This is definitely something to ponder!

By the way, at the time that I wrote this, which was several years ago, Phillip Hamberg had not written a book about his work. I, and many others had asked him to. He said that he just had not been able to take the time to write about his clinical experiences. Today, I did a search on him and I noticed he now has written a book 'Attach Me If You Can' which can be found on Amazon. The book deals with his experiences dealing with children and helping them with coping skills.

The Music Box

One of the best ways to get kids quiet in a classroom was given to me by someone else. In fact, most of the ideas I used in the classroom were not my original ideas. The Music Box idea was given to me by another teacher who had used the idea to get her class quiet during independent work time and transition time.

Most teachers, myself included, find themselves getting louder and louder telling their class to get quiet. The idea of the Music Box is to get your class to quiet down without even saying anything to them at all.

Here is the idea: buy a music box that will run for two to five minutes each time you wind it up. The box needs to have a lid or an easy way to stop it and start it. Then tell the class that when the music box is opened it will run until they are quiet. Give them some type of reward as a class that they can earn if the box does not run out each week.

Rewind it each week to begin the week. This works amazingly well. In fact, the first year I tried this idea I had a talkative student that came up to my desk to ask where I had bought the music box. He said that his mom needed one because she babysat and this could really keep the kids quiet when she needed them to play quietly.

I also used the music box to help my students behave in the library, music, chorus, band, the cafeteria, P.E., etc.. If my class misbehaved anywhere else in the building, I would open the music box and let it run for several seconds. If their behavior had been particularly bad, then I might actually let the box run out completely. My class would lose the reward for the week and then I would rewind the box and begin the next week early. So, if the box ran out early in the week then the class really had to be good to keep it from running out before the end of the next week.

The reward I used was to give them an extra game period during Friday afternoon. All of my classes loved the extra game period.

I used the music box to also reward good behavior. If anyone in my class received an unsolicited compliment from any adult in the building, I would wind the box up a little to add more time on it. They loved getting rewarded like that. They also liked it that more time could be added back when they thought they were being punished for something that only one or two students had been responsible for.

This idea really works and you have to stick with it. I would find myself not wanting to open the music box and I would go back to using my voice to get them quiet. My voice would get louder and louder to get them quiet and then I would be upset because I had to raise my voice. So, I would then realize my mistake and begin using the music box again. It would immediately start working when I would use it.

I taught sixth grade, and they never thought it was too babyish. It is probably the best idea I ever tried to help students with their behavior at school.

Homeschooling

Homeschooling

I got to witness something on Tuesday that warmed my heart and soul. The local homeschool group that meets regularly at Ten Mile Baptist put on a short program for relatives and friends.

What I witnessed was unbelievable. One group of kids recited chorally a timeline of history from ancient times until now. And this was not just Biblical history. It was all of history. I have taught world history in sixth grade for many years and I can not recite a timeline of history. In fact, Lily can tell me things like the purpose of the Monroe Doctrine, facts about the War of 1812, and numerous other events in history. Again, I can not do this from memory, I would have to do an Internet search. Also, during the program, the older students gave lengthy reports and essays that would put my writing ability to shame. A musical presentation was presented by all ages.

I have, in the past, not supported homeschooling because I have seen many homeschoolers reenter the school system a few years behind their counterparts and never able to catch up.

However, when Jared and Melissa told us they planned to homeschool, I knew it would work out. Melissa has such drive and determination that I knew she and the girls would stick with it. It looks like this group of teachers and homeschoolers are moving in the right direction.

There are advantages and disadvantages of both homeschooling and public education that I won' t get into in this post. I will say a couple, though, the homeschoolers can actually study the Bible and they can go on numerous educational field trips.

Another story:

A former superintendent of Hamilton County Unit 10 decided to substitute teach during his retirement. On the playground one day when he substituted in the sixth grade, we had a conversation about his point of view as a superintendent and as a substitute. He told me that he no longer believed in compulsory education. He felt that some students did not want to be in school and he felt their parents did not care either. He made a point to say that he felt the majority of students really did want an education, though.

For the few that didn't want an education, he didn't know what the answer was, but he felt we were going in the wrong direction with our educational system for those students.

NCLB & Common Core

What was very frustrating to me as an educator was the utter impossibility of the end objective of NCLB (No Child Left Behind). I will not go into a tirade about this because probably everything has been said that possibly can be about this 'good intentions gone crazy' law. And now it is Common Core.

I will say, though, that George Bush was right. We should not be leaving our kids behind. I do, however, think that our education system is doing a very good job of educating our children in Reading, Math, and other academics. It is amazing what teachers can get out of kids despite having so many obstacles working against them.

We are, though, leaving our children behind when it comes to providing them with adequate coping and 'getting along' skills. We as a society and an education system are failing miserably when it comes to teaching our kids how to get along with each other and how to cope with life in general.

Yet we are hounded to the point of harrassment by our government about academics, when we need to provide our schools and social institutions with more support staff that are trained to teach coping and life skills to our children.

If we could provide our children with a good base of skills on how to cope with the many issues that they face each and every day, then the academics will even be easier to achieve.

The end result will be a better society as a whole.

Technology and Books A Laptop For Every Student

Technology can be very expensive when it comes to equipping every student with a laptop. Textbooks are very expensive, too.

I have talked before about the high cost of educating our students. One of the ways of cutting expenses just may be through technology. Equipping every student with a laptop, desktop, smart board, smart slate, smart phone, or smart tablet just might be one way of cutting costs in schools.

One of the high costs in schools that has been necessary in education has been textbooks. Textbooks have consistently been very expensive and have had to be updated every few years. School districts usually replace textbooks on a cycle based on subject matter. Districts have been able to use government funds for a few free textbooks each year. These extra funds have been stretched by extending the life of currently used textbooks to the point of them falling apart and also becoming out of date with subject matter.

Textbook companies are quickly moving away from printing textbooks. Curriculum is now being made available online or through software. With technology, textbooks can now be available at any place the technology is located. And we all know that technology and wifi are just about everywhere now. Some cities are even making wifi available to a large section of their city for free.

The costs of the software or accessing textbooks over the internet are surprisingly cheap compared to the purchasing of printed books. The textbook companies have come to realize that a move from printing books is very cost effective to all parties involved. Textbooks and curriculum can also be continuously updated so that the purchase of one license or one annual fee can be pennies compared to the buying of actual books.

Smart phones have become so widely available that maybe each student does not even need a laptop. At one time cell phones were basically banned in our schools. But now we have many schools embracing the use of these devices that can be used to surf the internet and maybe even access textbooks anywhere. So maybe our schools do not even need to equip most of our students with any technology at all because our students are probably carrying the technology they need right in their pockets.

This all can seem confusing to those of us that have gone through having basically no technology back in the 50's, 60's, and 70's to having so much technology at our fingertips today. But, if we are to save our schools from bankruptcy we need to embrace the onslaught of technology being used in every phase of our lives today.

Schools As We Know Them Are Becoming Too Costly

The cost of running schools has become too costly. One of my professors in graduate school made a statement that shocked me about our education system. He said that school buildings will become so costly that he thought there will be a day when schools will no longer have buildings from which to educate our kids.

As time goes by, I think that he may be right. It is costing a fortune to build and maintain our school buildings today. The costs of staff salaries, building upkeep, and all the other expenses that go along with running our schools is huge.

State governments have become financially strapped lately, so education and new building funds have been cut tremendously from many state government budgets. So, funding is going to be an issue for the long term in education.

He mentioned that he thought there will be education kiosks that will be placed in malls, businesses, and public buildings where students will receive their education. Since then, online courses have become a commonplace, and many online colleges have emerged on the internet.

Home schooling has become more popular lately. Curriculum is becoming easily accessible to parents at home because of the internet and video on demand services. This has caused a small exodus of students leaving school buildings for an education at home.

Transportation and field trips have become casualties of budget cuts. Parents have become the transportation to athletic events and field trips.

So, many are educating their kids at home with the internet and taking field trips on their own to libraries, museums, science centers, art exhibits, and theaters for the arts.

Somehow our current education system is going to have to go through a revolution to stay in business and find ways to educate without bankrupting the system.