Aug

6

A positive attittude is key to maintaining a positive classroom climate

Filed Under "At-risk" students, Behaviour Management, Uncategorized, motivating students, positive climate | 5 Comments

A positive attitude is key to maintaining a positive classroom environment.

I couldn’t agree more with Wade Boggs when he says

A positive attitude causes a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events and outcomes. It is a catalyst and it sparks extraordinary results.

In an earlier post, I wrote about how I set about establishing a positive classroom climate at the beginning of the semester and included the Slideshare presentation that I created to summarize  the classroom agreements and what they meant.  If you want a copy of the Slideshare presentation I’ve  created , just email me I’d be delighted  to send it to you.

Implementing the  classroom agreements of mutual respect, appreciation/no put downs,  attentive listening and the right to pass establishes a positive classroom climate where students can feel save and valued.  Of course establishing a safe, positive climate and maintaining it day in and day out are two different things.   What’s the key to maintaining that safe, positive classroom climate once it is established. Without a doubt, it’s a positive attitude.

If you have a positive attitude you’ll believe and act as if all students will be successful in your class.  If you have a positive attitude there are no losers in your classroom despite what you’ve might have heard.    Students will live up to your expectations. Think and act as if students are trouble, believe me they won’t disappoint you. I’ve learned that the hard way in my early years of teaching.

Let me give you an example of what I mean. I’ve found that often well meaning colleagues will give me a heads up about the troublemakers they’ve had in their classes. When they find out I’ll be teaching these kids,  they tell me how bad the students were.  Just for a nanosecond I think great. Just what I need- trouble making students. But then I quickly remind myself that attitude is not a useful attitude to have about these new students whom I don’t even know.   I really try hard not to prejudge them.  I figure even if these kids were troublesome in the past, it doesn’t mean they are now.  Things change.

A few years back I had  two students whom I’ll call Chris and Kyle, not their real names of course. They came to my class with a negative reputation and promptly started living up to it. After a few days I decided that I wasn’t going to  engage these kids in their battle.  It would be totally counter productive to use all my energy  battling with these two fourteen year olds, and besides they’d probably win the battle. So I decided that I needed to sit down and talk with them to see what’s going on.

Chris and Kyle proudly told me about their reputation for being bad in class. I told them I didn’t believe they it. They couldn’t believe that I hadn’t heard about them, so  they promptly gave me all kinds of proof to support their reputation.

I decided that I would show them I didn’t believe that they were trouble makers  and would treat them with respect and worked extra hard to develop a positive relationship with them.  Whenever they were disrespectful to me, I’d go to them quietly and ask them why they were being disrespectful to me when I wasn’t being disrespectful to them. I did  the same thing  when they weren’t listening attentively or showing appreciation. They’d actually apologize for their inappropriate behaviour.  I figured being disrespectful had just become a habit with them, and they would learn to be respectful over time.  It wasn’t easy,  but these two students got to see that they didn’t need to live up to their reputation as trouble makers  because I refused to see our relationship as student vs teacher, as them vs me.  I really did respect them as human beings and really did expect them to respect me as a human being.

I thank the classroom agreements of mutual respect/no put downs , appreciation, attentive listening and the right to pass for establishing a positive framework that enabled mutual respect to develop.  Chris and Kyle became my biggest boosters and did all kinds of positive PR for me and even came back to visit all the time to laugh about how immature they were in grade nine and how they were not like that now.  They were proud of being respectful and not of being troublesome.

I truly believe that a teacher’s positive attitude does cause  a chain reaction of positive thoughts, events and outcomes. A teacher’s positive attitude is a catalyst and it sparks extraordinary results. Just because  I believe this doesn’t mean that  I don’t forget this lesson too from time to time because I get distracted by the challenges of my own life, and I regretfully adopt a negative attitude towards a student. I know better, but I also know I’m human and not perfect.  When this happens, I apologize to show my respect for them. I want them to see mutual respect in action in my classroom.

 
icon for podpress  A positive attittude is key to maintaining a positive classroom climate [5:02m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (166)

Jul

2

The village is volunteering to educate the child

Filed Under "At-risk" students, Goals, Teacher Support, motivating students | 1 Comment

It takes a village to raise a child. We’ve probably all heard that said many times before. I feel that educating a child also takes the village. Teachers in their classrooms can’t do it alone. There’s just not enough time to give all students the one- on -one attention they deserve. Teachers need help from the community, from the village, and thankfully many people do volunteer their time and talents to help kids learn in and out of school. For that teachers and kids are grateful because we really do need the help.

I’d like to share a video with you that @wfryer via Twitter brought to my attention about what some communities are doing to educate their children. “Dave Eggers: 2008 TED Prize wish: Once Upon a School”.

You’ll be blown away by what you’ll see and hear- talk about thinking outside the box about ways to engage kids to learn. It’s absolutely amazing. I encourage you to go to Once Upon a School after you have viewed the video to take up the challenge with the practical ideas that people have shared.

Let me just tell you a bit about Dave Eggers

Dave Eggers’ first book, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. Since then he’s written two more novels and launched an independent publishing house, which publishes books, a quarterly literary journal (McSweeney’s), a DVD-based review of short films (Wholpin), a monthly magazine (The Believer) and the Voice of Witness project.

Meanwhile, Eggers has established himself as a philanthropist and teacher-at-large. In 1998 he launched 826 Valencia, a San Francisco-based writing and tutoring lab for young people, which has since opened six more chapters across the United States. He has extended his advocacy of students by supporting their educators, instituting a monthly grant for exceptional Bay Area teachers. His TED Prize wish is for more people to follow him into getting involved in your local school — and talk about it — through the website

May

2

Twenty percent of kids sitting in classrooms are mentally ill.

Filed Under "At-risk" students | 3 Comments

 
icon for podpress  Twenty percent of kids sitting in classrooms are mentally ill. [8:41m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (332)

Twenty percent of kids sitting in classrooms today are mentally ill. That’s shocking. What’s even more shocking is that only 1/5 of that twenty percent are getting treatment.

I could hardly believe my ears tonight when I heard that statistic on TVO’s The Agenda with Steve Paikin. Next week, May 3 - May 10, 2008 , is Children’s Mental Health Week and I suppose that’s why the program, “Kids aren’t right” aired tonight.

Steve Paikin discussed mental health issues with a panel consisting of

Leena Augimeri is the director of Program Development and Centre for Children Committing Offenses at the Child Development Institute, and adjunct assistant professor and sessional lecturer at the University of Toronto.

Carol Ann Curnock is a Special Education teacher for the Toronto District School Board. She teaches a self-contained class for learning disabled students in grades 6, 7, and 8. Dr. Curnock has degrees in Education and Counseling Psychology and a diverse background in both education and mental health.

Cathy Dandy is trustee for Ward 15 with the Toronto District School Board.

Susan Hess is president of Parents for Children’s Mental Health and the mother of a daughter with serious mental health problems. Susan was the driving force behind the creation of a Quilt of Honour, designed to be a visible testament to all children who struggle with mental illness.

Richard Meen is associate professor in the Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry at the University of Toronto, Faculty of Medicine. He is clinical director and psychiatric consultant with Kinark Child and Family Services.

Steven Singerman is a school social worker with the Toronto District School Board. Steven is also director of Clinical Development Resources & Concerned Parents’ Seminars and has a private practice in counseling and psychotherapy.

a distinguished panel to say the least.

At first I was totally shocked by the number of kids who are suffering from mental health issues. Twenty percent of kids in classrooms are suffering from mental health issues - that’s an average of 5 kids in a class of 25 students. Wow. Many classes are larger than 25 students. No wonder sometimes classes are so chaotic despite the teacher’s best efforts.

I said at first I was shocked and really didn’t believe was that large, but as I watched and listened to the panel discussion and began to better understand the problem, I realized a lot of inappropriate behaviour that I saw in classrooms could actually be dues mental health issues and not behavioural issues.

Let me just say here, that although I put down my cup of tea, grabbed a piece of paper and took notes furiously, I’m sure I didn’t get everything. Please keep that in mind. I’ve put a link to the web page so that you can watch the video for yourself. I realize my notes reflect who I am - a special education teacher who works with trouble, troubling and troublesome kids all day. I’m going to share what I learned and my thoughts about what I learned.

First, I learned mental health issues can look like behavior issues.

  • Falling asleep in class to block out everything, breaking things like pencils, throwing things like chairs or books, shouting and refusing to do what is asked can be a sign of an anxiety disorder.
  • Irritability, behaviour problems, explosive behaviour, disruptive behaviour, ADHD type behaviour of not focusing, not be able to concentrate , not being able to sit still can be a sign of depression. Depression is not just quiet behaviour of withdrawn.
  • Anger is sometime mislabeled as bad and the assumption is that kids can be disciplined into good behaviour. Sometimes kids who are bullied respond in anger and that behaviour gets misdiagnosed.

I’m not a counselor, a social worker or therapist. I am a special education behaviour specialist. I can suspect mental health issues and then bring my concerns to professionals like social workers , counselors or therapists who are trained to provide treatment.

In fact, even as a special education behaviour specialist , I don’t know that much about mental health issues. My special education training was mostly about identifying behaviours and trying to put strategies in place to change the undesirable behaviour into a desirable behaviour. I’m not a special education specialist in mental health issues. Maybe there needs to be such a thing If 20% of kids are suffering from mental health issues.

Now, if I as a special education specialist has difficulty recognizing and identifying potential mental health issues , how does a regular classroom teacher fare. The panel maintained that the regular classroom teacher doesn’t get enough training to recognize mental health issues when they arise in the classroom. Teacher training is more concerned with curriculum and classroom management. That definitely needs to change. There’s no doubt about that.

Teachers have to have more training in recognizing potential mental health issues so that they can identify kids and bring their concerns to administration so that kids can get the appropriate help. We have meetings every month where we raise concerns about kids, but because our model is mostly behavioural that’s what we see. Our behavioural lenses determines what we see. What we need are bifocal lenses so that we can see the mental health issues as well.

I know that it’s really important for these kids to get help

  • Some of these kids are so disruptive in the classroom that they preventing other kids from learning. It takes so much of the teachers time to deal with those disruptive 20% that we have little time for the other 80% of the class.
  • All kids have a right to learn and anything that interferes with that learning is not acceptable and needs to be dealt with in an appropriate way. If a student is acting a certain way because of mental health issues lets not punish the student but get treatment for that student so he too can learn and be successful in school.
  • These kids need help so when they grow up and become adults they can function optimally to become contributing members of society.
  • These kids need help so that the family dynamics and life can improve.
  • These kids need to be identified and receive treatment so that they can develop to their full potential and lead satisfying life.

There’s just no excuse.

I’ve also learned that there are seven years of warning about mental health issues. The first warning happens at age 7 when kids get into minor problems at school, then age 9.5 , then age 12 and finally age 14.5 when kids get into very serious problems with the law. When we look back, we can see the signs. Let’s not wait until kids get themselves into trouble and all we can say is “He was trouble in grade two. What do you expect”. I expect better.

Unfortunately, I’ve seen that pattern myself but didn’t recognize it for what it was. I thought it was a behaviour problem, just as I was trained to do and then devised strategies to help turn that behaviour around. Regrettably, sometimes none of the strategies worked and I could only feel badly. What good is feeling badly. I’m getting angry now just thinking about how the system is failing kids. I’ve thought that grade nine is too late to to help some of these kids.They really need help in grade one. I wasn’t wrong.

I’ve learned that in the Toronto Board there is one social worker for every seven schools, and it can take up to seven months for non emergency cases to have a psychological assessment done. I’m not sure what it is in other district but I know that it takes about the same time in my district. Getting a quick psychological assessment seems impossible at this time. That’s got to change if we are serious about helping these kids.

I’m still shocked about this whole thing. Twenty percent of kids sitting in classrooms have mental health issues and only 1/5 of them get treatment. I’m really glad I decided to sit down and have that cup of tea and watch The Agenda tonight. I have to say that this program tonight has been an eye opener. I have to do something. What I’m not sure yet. The first thing I’ve done is to write this post and share what I’ve learned with you. Beyond that, I don’t know yet. But I cannot, not do anything. My conscience won’t let me.

What will you do?

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