When it comes to the concept of Do No Harm, I believe it makes a lot of sense. Students don’t need 100 school rules when most of those rules would fall under the three categories: do not harm yourself, others, or the environment. There were several quotes that I read and heard that really stuck with me. One of them was “rules do not teach students to behave, people do.” I agree with that 100%. I have seen in my own classroom that students follow the rules when they feel they are being supervised, but once unsupervised they have no problem with breaking the rules. I think the reason for this is because students are constantly being told to behave, but not why they should behave. Another line that stuck with me was “when students don’t know how to read, we teach them. When they don’t know how to do math, we teach them. When they don’t know how to behave, we punish them.” As teachers it is our responsibility to teach students not only how to behave, but why it is important for them to do no harm to themselves, others, or the environment. By making students a part of the process, they become more accountable, empowered, and hopefully better understand the implications of their actions. I believe the restorative practice method is an amazing way to give students a voice and build a stronger community.
I completely connected with the idea that students always need opportunities to participate in instructional time. When punishing students by locking them out of class or sending them to the administrator’s office, they are missing out on valuable class time. I feel that it is these students that could benefit from this class time the most! When students already feel behind they become overwhelmed and are much less likely to participate or engage. If I were an administrator, students would be in class participating in instructional time as much as possible. Unless a student was a threat to themselves or others, they should remain in class and other disciplinary actions would take place.
In the Restorative Practices Handbook, the author explains that this constant push for academic achievement has led to less time in schools and classrooms for form relationships. The result of this is that students feel less connected to their community and to their learning, therefore becoming less likely to excel. If I were a school leader, I would make community building a big initiative at my school. I agree that improving relationships with and among students would improve academic success. I’ve talked about in earlier posts how important it is for teachers to really know their students and spend time building a rapport with them. If this were the case, I believe that teachers would have a much better understanding of what is going on in their students’ lives, and would be able to better support them in their needs. When a student acts out, the teacher may react differently, more sympathetically, improving the situation overall.
I feel that there is a lot of value in learning best practices for classroom management and that many teachers may have not had the opportunity to learn or discover some of these skills. The text talked about how rather than punishing students, we need to be able to teach them what unacceptable behavior is, why it is unacceptable, and how students can help restore bad situations that they may have caused. In my classroom, I try to always be very specific with students if they are doing something disruptive or inappropriate in class. Telling students “stop that” does not help them to learn what they were specifically doing wrong, or why it is not acceptable in class. Teachers need reminders of simple tips like that.
Being a Catholic school, we spend a lot of time discussing values. Some of the major values that we work to instill in our community is the idea of helping others and taking care of our environment. We aim to love and take care of all of God’s creatures. We have an anti-bullying program that taught monthly. Classroom teachers are also required to have class meetings (similar to circle from Restorative Practices Handbook) to discuss things going on in our community, in our classroom, on the playground, and in our individual lives. I do think that we put too much emphasis on following schools rules and are too quick to punish for things like uniform violations, haircuts, tardies, gum in class, etc.
Personally, I prefer to “choose my battles” (more with the parents than anything)... and I don’t really see the point in punishing students for things that are not harming themselves or others. The text also talks about inconsistency of rules being enforced. I would say that is definitely a factor at my school. Some teachers are old school and are quick to punish students to breaking school rules, while others, like myself would rather spend my time and energy on building relationships with my students rather than upsetting them.
This semester I will commit to:
I completely connected with the idea that students always need opportunities to participate in instructional time. When punishing students by locking them out of class or sending them to the administrator’s office, they are missing out on valuable class time. I feel that it is these students that could benefit from this class time the most! When students already feel behind they become overwhelmed and are much less likely to participate or engage. If I were an administrator, students would be in class participating in instructional time as much as possible. Unless a student was a threat to themselves or others, they should remain in class and other disciplinary actions would take place.
In the Restorative Practices Handbook, the author explains that this constant push for academic achievement has led to less time in schools and classrooms for form relationships. The result of this is that students feel less connected to their community and to their learning, therefore becoming less likely to excel. If I were a school leader, I would make community building a big initiative at my school. I agree that improving relationships with and among students would improve academic success. I’ve talked about in earlier posts how important it is for teachers to really know their students and spend time building a rapport with them. If this were the case, I believe that teachers would have a much better understanding of what is going on in their students’ lives, and would be able to better support them in their needs. When a student acts out, the teacher may react differently, more sympathetically, improving the situation overall.
I feel that there is a lot of value in learning best practices for classroom management and that many teachers may have not had the opportunity to learn or discover some of these skills. The text talked about how rather than punishing students, we need to be able to teach them what unacceptable behavior is, why it is unacceptable, and how students can help restore bad situations that they may have caused. In my classroom, I try to always be very specific with students if they are doing something disruptive or inappropriate in class. Telling students “stop that” does not help them to learn what they were specifically doing wrong, or why it is not acceptable in class. Teachers need reminders of simple tips like that.
Being a Catholic school, we spend a lot of time discussing values. Some of the major values that we work to instill in our community is the idea of helping others and taking care of our environment. We aim to love and take care of all of God’s creatures. We have an anti-bullying program that taught monthly. Classroom teachers are also required to have class meetings (similar to circle from Restorative Practices Handbook) to discuss things going on in our community, in our classroom, on the playground, and in our individual lives. I do think that we put too much emphasis on following schools rules and are too quick to punish for things like uniform violations, haircuts, tardies, gum in class, etc.
Personally, I prefer to “choose my battles” (more with the parents than anything)... and I don’t really see the point in punishing students for things that are not harming themselves or others. The text also talks about inconsistency of rules being enforced. I would say that is definitely a factor at my school. Some teachers are old school and are quick to punish students to breaking school rules, while others, like myself would rather spend my time and energy on building relationships with my students rather than upsetting them.
This semester I will commit to:
- Trying a circle time approach to my classroom meetings and invite new and perhaps more personal topics for class discussion.
- Being very clear with students on why certain behavior is unacceptable in the classroom.
- Sharing the idea of Do No Harm to my faculty and staff.
- Holding students accountable without forcing them into apologies.
- Working toward a restorative practice approach in my classroom where I have high control but offer high support.