In my eleven years of teaching experience, I have never punished a single child I believe.
Quite obviously, I too came across my share of challenges in the form of either an over-talkative child or one completely oblivious of self-control. Some were dodgers while others wanted to set the rules. Each time, I knew that I would have to make them understand that conflict was not the way to go about but a compromise would work better. If a child would make a mistake, the focus would be the mistake and not the child.
When we want our children to learn right from wrong, we need to talk to them and let them analyze their roles as well. Learning through self analysis, builds a positive character trait and such students flourish in the real world.
Let me share some examples.
I had a girl of about 8 in my class who would blurt out foul language and the class would be horrified. Children would look at her with disgust and disbelief. I kept my calm and just looked at her with eyes that made her understand that I had not liked it. It happened twice or thrice in a term and each time, I simply gave her a meaningful look. The final gaze expressed disappointment and hurt. That was enough for her as she had this tremendous desire to please me all the time. I never let her weakness get in the way of our beautiful relationship otherwise and thats how in a few looks, I was able to teach her a little self-control. I found it quite annoying to see teachers lecturing students on how ashamed they should feel about it and punishing them to teach them a lesson.
Similarly, I had a really smart boy in class who was quite well informed in most subjects academically and worldly. He found it hard to stop himself from answering all the questions. It was an acute lack of self-control. His classmates stopped enjoying his participation in class and his presence in lessons became somewhat annoying. When despite reminders he failed to comply with the rules, I called in his parents who appeared to have made up their minds about the school being inefficient to have been unable to resolve the issue. After spending some time with the parents, I could make out that they had been called in many times over the years and been informed about the same problem and they seemed quite fed-up blaming the school all the time. Their response placed another challenge in front of me. I knew I was alone in this and it would have to be a new plan altogether.
There were two very important matters to be dealt with on priority and they were:
- Having an effective plan to work on with the parents to win their confidence back.
- Communicating with the boy on a different level and create some new games that would help him self-discipline.
The programme was made and I spoke to the parents and informed them about it. At the end of each week, he carried the weekly report home for the parents to sign in. At first the report went very well, but as time passed, he started to become a little careless about it. He was a regular student and it was that "1" day that he was unwell and didnt come to school. Unbelievably, each and every child missed him and spoke about the class being just too quiet. "Teacher, why is he absent?" or "Please can you call and ask how he's doing?". I was surprised to see that these children had accepted him so well and what irritated them about him, was also what they missed intensely about him. I decided to grab this oportunity and try to make a new plan. This time in the form of "missed you" cards.
Children spend a lot of fun time creating colourful pictures and I asked them to write inside the card as to why did they miss him so much. They came up with so many reasons that clearly indicated that he was recognized by his strength and not his weakness.
He walked in the classroom the next morning and found 25 cards waiting in the class mailbox for him. He was a reasoning child and not very expressive with his emotions. But the magnitude of love that filled those cards placed him in an uncomfortable zone for a minute. He looked at them and said 'thank you". It was a quiet day that followed and the children also got back to their normal routine comfortable with the jig-saw puzzle complete. I didnt have to worry about him in the coming months as he made a conscious effort to control his impulses and give others an equal right to speak. Whenever he completed his work, he pulled out his sketch book and began to draw his favourite action figures. He made his own plan of restraint for which I still feel proud to have been his teacher.
Another story that makes me feel special is that of the boy who simply refused to accept my authority in class. Whenever, I would ask him to complete his work, he would look me in the eye and drop his pencil down. I had never come across such defiance before. I asked him, "Are you not going to complete your work?" and he would simply stare at me with no answer. As a result his work started to accumulate and I called in the parents to sort the matter. His father turned up and when I related the problem to him, he lost his cool. He looked at me with blaming eyes and defended his son as any anxious father would. I handed him a glass of water which took him a little by surprise. He sipped the water and I could see that he was a little embarassed about his showdown.
I spoke to him with the same calm. "He is a capable and intelligent child. He will do well for himself. He will surely excel in whichever field he opts to set foot in. But, my concerns are beyond that. I am his teacher. I have the opportunity to give shape to his personality as well. He at no point will benefit from this confidence of defying authority or management. Rules are important because they streamline actions and behaviours. I'm sure you and I can work together to help him grow in this area and understand his true potential." He listened quietly nodding his head and then just got up suddenly and left. I was a little disappointed unsure of whether I had been convincing enough.
The next morning, I found a letter of apology on my table written by the boy, signed by his parents. I called him to myself and gave him a tight hug. I told him that I was very proud of him for being able to say "sorry". The arrogance had left his face completely and it was the face of an innocent, logical child.
In each of these cases, I didnt punish anyone. For I knew that each one of them was blessed with a strong "conscience". With children, its important to make reason. Its important to involve them in their growth. Its intergral to build the conscience that almost always brings out the winner in them.
Punishment is for temporary fixes. If you want permanent learning to happen, give way to the "conscience".
No comments:
Post a Comment