Student Discipline - Another Way to Support Students & Teachers

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing repeatedly and getting the same results. This is how I felt as a new school principal when I dealt with discipline. Within a few weeks, I could tell you exactly what was going to happen when a discipline issue made its way to my office.

1. Teacher calls down to office about student.
2. Student either comes to office or I escort them to office.
3. Teacher shares what happens and leaves (because they have students in the classroom).
4. Student is upset.

   

   http://www.greatschoolsinwake.org/student-discipline/

5. Student either yells, cries, or goes silent.
6. Student eventually shares what happened.
7. Student and teacher story doesn’t match.
8. I wasn’t there and am now batting cleanup. The need to support the teacher is necessary, yet the student perspective weighs on my heart.
9. Offer a solution that isn’t really going to change behavior. I tried to use natural consequences.
10. I’ve spent anywhere from 15-30 minutes on the said discipline issue.

Sure, the steps may have varied time to time. But, this was the Groundhog’s Day experience.

Somewhere in my second or third year as principal two things made me turn behavior upside down in some cases.

• Teachers give up control when they send a student to the office and loss of respect and trust occur between student and teacher.
• The discipline issue almost always had a broken relationship between teacher and student.

Instead of following the 11 Steps of Madness, I turned the entire process on it’s head. I probably should have warned the first unknowing teacher what I was about to do. But, it came to me as I walked to her room from the office to retrieve a student for their 100^th time (it seemed like it).

I got to the door and the teacher shared all the infractions that said student did. She had him at the door ready to leave. He heard it all and I could see the anger in his face.

I asked the student to wait inside the classroom and asked the teacher to join me just outside the door. Then, the following happened.

• I shared that the only two people who can change the behavior in the classroom is the student and the teacher.
• I will support you (the teacher) in any consequence and even help brainstorm the consequence with you. But, you are going to deliver the consequence to the student.
• But, before the consequence you must spend 10-15 minutes talking with the student to learn his perspective, share your perspective, and get to the root cause of why the behaviors were occurring. The key is for you to listen to his feelings and perspective.
• You need to develop a plan that you can both agree upon.
• While you do this, I will teach your class.

You read the last bullet correctly! I traded spots with the teacher. While she had a conference with the student, I worked with the other 26 students in her classroom. What’s my thinking you are asking right now…

1. I am going to spend 15-30 minutes dealing with the incident and I wasn’t there.
2. The relationship is between the student and the teacher. By her conferencing with the student, the perceived power rests with the teacher and no longer with me. I am now just a “Yes Man”. I support and reiterate the decision of the teacher.
3. The teacher and student work on his/her relationship.
4. I get to work with 26 other students – something we rarely get to do!  I get to build different relationships because many of the students I rarely get to spend time with. Plus, I get to hone my own teaching skills so they don’t get rusty and I get too far removed from the art and science of teaching and learning.

The process worked beautifully. Did it solve all behavior issues? Of course not, but there were far less incidents. I didn’t use it every single time, but I used it frequently enough that we started to see our culture of discipline slowly change. There were less referrals, students were less angry at teachers, and everyone seemed to love what they did a little bit more.

Sure, there was a learning curve for everyone – students, teachers, and me. But, the benefits outweighed the challenges.

Remember, 100% of the students, 100% of the time. Think outside the box. Above all else – be tenacious!