I am an educator but I am asking my question as a parent because I teach much older students. My just turned 7 year old adhd inattentive daughter is in 1st grade. The model they use for discipline has steps which are great job, warning, consequences, note/call home, detention, principal’s office. My daughter usually has fairly good behavior and was even student of the month for February. We had an incident last week on Friday where her step was note home from the regular classroom teacher. She went out of the room for her remedial reading group and got into trouble for her behavior. The policy is when she returns to the regular classroom her spot goes down one step. So my daughter ended up with a detention for “silly behavior. talking, laughing and clapping hands.” I have a problem with this as I don’t think that detention is appropriate for first grade. My daughter didn’t even know what detention meant when I talked to her about this.
It was identified earlier in the year in a school meeting that there were some social interaction issues that needed to be worked on. As far as I know nothing has been done in that regard. My question is I would like to suggest to the school some other options that would better help educate/model acceptable school behavior to my child and I could use some help. I don’t think detention will help her in any real way at all. What suggestions do you have as to address this in the classroom before it gets to a detention level?
Your help is greatly appreciated.
discipline
:o Please excuse my grammer. I left some words out and misspelled one or two. That’s what happens when you don’t proofread.
Re: discipline in the classroom
Thank you Shalonda. Please don’t worry about grammar. Can you give me specifics on ideas you have relating to incentives? I’m trying to come up with ideas that don’t make my daughter stand out too much from the other kids. I think the time out suggestion is good and I don’t know if they’ve tried it. That’s something that can be done tactfully and discreetly if done in certain ways. That’s also something that works at home. Not time out for punishment but to get herself together.
discipline systems
Schools are running scared and somewhat desperate these days - hence detention given to 1st graders which I agree is sadly silly. The phrases which are present in our society “Zero tolerance” “Do the crime, do the time” spill over into our schools. Schools think they must emulate prisons.
Whatever happened to teaching young children what is the right thing to do? As a teacher myself, I was sad to see it go and be replaced with detention and warning cards. Such things take the teacher out of the loop of response and put in a warning card and detention instead.
In 1st graders, such a discipline system assumes so much. It assumes they know in every moment what is the right thing to do and how to do it. And how sad that laughing and clapping hands is a punishable offense.
Yet if you question this, you will be labeled an ‘overindulgent parent’ so as a parent and a teacher, I’d gently warn you to tread carefully around this. How long has the detention system been in place?
In any case, good luck. I watched my own children’s school become more and more rigid and deliberate with its ‘discipline’ - I think it’s happening everywhere - for better or worse.
Classroom Discipline
Jen,
My suggestion would be to use a behavior reduction method like DRO (Differential Reinforcement of Other Behaviors). In this method reinforcement is delivered when the targeted inappropriate behavior is not exhibited. So if the targeted behavior is talking out, you reinforce the student for not talking out even if other inappropriate behaviors are occurring.
Because you mentioned inattentiveness as a problem, you might also look in to using DRI (Differential Reinforcment of Incompatible Behaviors). This is a lot like DRO, except you are reinforcing the student for engaging in a response incompatible with the disruptive response. Since your child cannot be attentive and inattentive at the same time, they are truly incompatible. Reinforce your child for the desired behaivor.
:) I would suggest that teacher a behavior contract with her which will allow her an opprotunity to be rewarded when she demonstrate appropriate behavior and also lose incentives when the undesired behavior occurs. Point systems work well, it offer rewards and loss of incentives to prevent the behavior to escalating to the point when referrals are given. In class time outs may work as well. Have they tried any of these strategies?