Entering my class I was very nervous. I thought to myself, would the kids like me? Would the teacher be kind to me? It turns out that I did not have much to worry about since I was greeted with smiles and a warm hello. My assigned classroom has almost twenty second graders, all of Hispanic or African American background. The teacher of the class is an older woman with a nasal like voice who we'll call Mrs. Rose. Mrs. Rose has a strong disciplinarian attitude and does not take any misbehavior in her classroom. she uses a color card system to discipline the kids. It involves changing the color of your card every time you do something wrong. While I am not positive as to what each color necessarily means, I know red is not the color you want to have. The classroom is cramped with many large tables and a reading rug in the corner. I have three students that I work with every week who all are a little behind where they should be at a second grade reading level. We are working hard together and they truly are making progress!
It seems that what my school values the most is discipline. In my classroom, my teachers word is rule. She does not allow any room for misbehaving, and when a child does misbehave they are quickly scolded. Mrs. Rose clearly wants absolute compliance from students. I noticed this same attitude with many of the other teachers in the school. Upon taking a bathroom break with the class, I observed many other teachers disciplining or yelling at their students for things such as stepping out of their lines or talking too loudly. While I do believe that it is important to set rules and boundaries in a classroom, I feel as if this specific school disciplines a little too much. I look forward to discovering what else my school values over the weeks to come.
As I was reading your post about how the teachers scold the children I was brought back to my third grade teacher, when I was younger. I remember her always yelling, and for no specific reason. As I look back as an adult, I know that we weren't "misbehaving" but it was more like we had spirit as younger children do. I wonder if after years and years of teachers yelling at students, doees this eventually break a childs spirit, to madke the child conform to whatever the teachers want them to be. This leads me to think about the Banking system that we had learned in class. This classroom doesn't sound like the teacher and the students are co-existing in a learning environment. It sounds as though she is just expecting the students to act as adults, and not the children they really are. It can be very enjoyable to be fortunate to work in a classroom with children of that age, their joy and curiosity is so refreshing. Hopefully this teacher will learn that her students have something to offer her.
ReplyDelete