In this province March break was over last week.  Kids have been back to school for one full week - five days - and already Grandson has been sent to the office.  His buddy has been sent twice.   Other kids from this classroom have also made the trip down the hall.

These kids are six years old, in Grade 1.  There are 21 kids in this class.  One child has a high functioning type of autism and therefore there is a full time TA in the classroom in addition to the teacher.  The school is not in a 'difficult' part of town. 

This was not Grandson's first trip.  It's happened before - for 'acting silly'.   This time apparently he stuck his pencil in his ear to make the other kids laugh.  

It's been a long time since I was in the classroom.  It seems to me that this type of behaviour would result in the child being told:

"Alfred, that is not appropriate use for a pencil.  Please put it down on your desk, and line up properly and quietly with the class."    If he didn't, then the next step might be to send him back to his seat, or to an appropriate quiet place in the classroom and tell him to put his head down.  A few minutes later, after the other kids had been given their assignment, to come over to Alfred, tell him what he had done wrong and that it was disruptive or 'silly', and have him rejoin the group.   Only if he swore at the teacher, or kicked and screamed if she tried to take the pencil from him and return him to his seat, would she be justified in sending him to the office and requesting intervention. 

Apparently this teacher yells at the kids, and they tune her out.  Trips to the office are so routine that they are taken for granted.  (My son was in Grade 5 when he was first sent to the office for an infraction and he was mortified - we all considered it a big deal, something to be discussed with him and with the teacher.)   Grandson shrugs his shoulders.  His mother asks what did you do?  He doesn't know.  'The teacher said I was being silly.'   Does he even know what specific behaviour was considered silly?  I have noticed that if he is standing in line (say in the line up for supplies at Sunday School) he will get bored, look up at the ceiling and start turning in circles getting himself dizzy.  I tell him to stop and he does.  Maybe at school the other kids giggle.  

Whatever is going on in that classroom, we are counting the days until the term is over.  It is a small school - there is only the one Grade 1 class - no chance of a transfer.  

 I think it can be overused by teachers, especially if they are unable to control a class (and not just individuals).

I remember being sent once, by a substitute.  Our class was pretty rowdy and she never established control at the beginning so it just got worse and worse.  I had been suffering from the initial symptoms of a migraine and the extra noise started to bring on a lot of pain.  I asked to get a drink, she wouldn't let me.  I told her I needed to take medication so needed to get a drink, she still wouldn't let me.  I grabbed my pills and headed for the fountain anyway, I figured she was concerned I wouldn't come back and it would be fine when she realized I did just need a drink.  She stood in front of the door and I did my best to get around her but she physically held it shut.  Now the class had completely lost it and were making some pretty mean comments to her to back me up.  So she sent me to the principal's office.  I heard people yelling at her from down the hall.  You just sent *chemgal* to the principals office?!  Now you're in trouble!  I was the best academically in the class, and was one of the better well behaved.

I never actually saw the principal, the minute I got to the office they just sighed, told me to take my medication if I hadn't already and to go back to class.  I heard later that she was sobbing once our class was over.  I felt bad for her, but she had crossed a line with me.  I was one of the few who was actually doing work and when she physically kept me in the room that was a problem.  She also had access to a sheet that listed relevant medical conditions of the students.  Luckily, she was just a one-time sub for us.  I was very good about holding a grudge when I was younger.

 Maybe your daughter could have a talk with her son.  It sounds like the teacher doesn't know how to handle the class.  Maybe she's a new teacher, or is used to dealing with a different grade or even a completely different type of class.

Perhaps a discussion with him about how if he's making people laugh it means they are not paying attention to the teacher and aren't learning what they need to will help.  You probably aren't hearing the full story either, that might have been the 5th time he was 'silly' that day.  If the principal isn't getting mad at the kids, it could at least be somewhat beneficial.  The teacher gets a break from the kid she's getting fed up with, so she's not losing her temper hopefully, and the kids attention is also hopefully being brought back to what they should be doing.

chemgal - thanks for the story about your experiences - it reminds us that the teacher isn't always right.  Some teachers don't seem to have the ability to control a class. 

But this is little kids - grade one.  And a small class.  And a full time TA.  She is not a new teacher - she's probably middle-aged and she has been at this small school, outside the city limits, for a long time.  I get the impression that many of the parents and the other staff just roll their eyes at Mrs. D.     I get the impression that many of the kids don't even get to see the principal.  She has a school to run, and does some teaching herself.  The secretary just has them sit for a few minutes.  If its getting late in the day, they can sit until the bell rings - otherwise she sends them back to the room. 

Seelergirl does talk to her son - she tries to determine what happened and helps him figure out what consistutes 'acting silly'.   Often it seems to be boredom - 'I was just trying to see how long I could hold my breath.' or 'I was just trying to count the number of squares on the ceiling.'  or 'I laughed when James fell out of his seat.' 

He does have trouble with seat-work - writing his stories, etc.  His mind travels faster than his pencil, or he can't think of the words he needs.  A reminder to finish what he is doing instead of looking out the window might help.  Or a few qustions  to help him think of a topic and get him started.   Sending him out of the room certainly doesn't.

If it were just Grandson we might think the fault was his.  But it is quite a few of the kids.  And not all at once - its not that they are a group that work together to disrupt the class.  Rather its James this morning - Bart after recess - Grandson in the afternoon. 

And he doesn't seem to be learning anything.  Last fall some education students from the university spent some time at the school and this teacher recommended that one of them work with Grandson.  In two months he went from being a poor reader to reading at the level required by the end of Grade One (Level 3, I believe it is in the system they use.)   Since the student left he is still bringing home books at that level.  He reads more difficult books at home.  I gave him two for Christmas and his parents got him started on the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. 

We wonder how far behind he (and the majority of the class) might be in other subjects.

Just wanted to add, I didn't think he should have been sent to the principal's office.  The teacher just might have something like a very strict 3 strikes and you're out kind of rule.  You got kids around you giggling 3 times - time to go to the principal's office.  That's sill going to be a lot of principal visits, kids do giggle and act silly.  The teacher seems to have little patience, I remember goofing off a little bit with classmates (silly discussions, faces, whatever) while we were still doing work, as long as we weren't too loud, teachers didn't mind.  That's how you make work fun!

The learning is a separate (though possibly related problem).  Unfortunately almost everyone will have a few bad teachers.  The students who do well learn how to teach themselves.  Other students unfortunately either do poorly or else get tutors or other help.

It is an unfortunate fact of life that all teachers aren't worthy of the name.

One of my kids had a Grade 1 teacher who was approaching retirement and had never adjusted to modern life.  She only liked the angelic little girls who never had a creative thought, you know the ones, they do exactly what they are told the moment they are told it.  They have tidy writing, produce boring cliched drawings and tattle on the other kids!  They are always squeeky clean because they don't play rough or fun activities EVER.

My son was an normal active child whose clothing usually looked like it came out of the rummage sale rejects. He couldn't sit still, wasn't allowed to fidgit and spent most of the year outside the classroom door.  Needless to say he didn't learn anything useful there.  Once (that I know of) he actually left the school grounds and went to the closest store to spend the money he found on the floor.  I learned about this from someone who saw hm there. 

I doubt there is much parents can actually do about poor teachers and poor teaching.  You can try to keep the communication open - not blame the child for everything, not blame the teacher when the child initiates something negative.  It seems small consolation to know that they aren't getting strapped for theleast infraction!

A kid sticking a pencil in his ear is not so much a disruptive act as a dangerous act.

Braille was just a little kid running with his hands fuill.

Judd - that's why telling the child that is inappropriate use of the pencil and telling him to put it on the desk would be an appropriate response. 

That's also why we have a pain reflex.  As soon as a child feels pain, he knows that he shouldn't push the pencil in any further.  The danger would be if he accidently fell or if another person bumped his elbow. 

But sending him to the principal's office doesn't accomplish anything.   It's happened so often that the embarassment factor is gone.  It is just another thing to be endured in this boring day.   And he hasn't learned a thing.

Most schools have some kind of discipline procedure that the teachers are supposed to follow and they vary from school to school depending upon what works best there.  In our school (middle school) teachers kind of "do their own thing" in the classroom and then when the limits are pushed, we use the multi step program in place.  I use 3 strikes...first warning is name on the board, second warning is a check mark and the 3rd warning is another check and it's recorded and an official "incident" in the school's tracking system online.  For a first offence, that's pretty much just a note home and a short detention to discuss the situation with the student.  A second incident is a phone call home and another detention, and a 3rd incident means the student will be on a behaviour tracker for 2 weeks so the teacher's can record his/her behaviour with a green, yellow or red dot each period.  Lots of greens means the student can get off the tracker, but lots of reds means that the further intervention is necessary, starting with the guidance counsellor, then the admin.  (We also make use of alternative work spaces, either in our own classes or in other teacher's rooms, with permission from the other teacher, of course.) 

For hard core, repeat offenders we have a behavioural teaching assistant in the school who works with the kids a few times a week and they can be sent to his room (the responsibility room) during the day.  The principal's office is mostly for more extreme stuff, like fighting, vandalism, racist comments, etc.  The principal and VP aren't usually involved unless it's suspendable OR it's ongoing and nothing else has worked. Some schools do it differently, though.  In a smaller school, the principal might prefer to be more involved, for instance. 

My daughter got detention for failing to turn in an assignment(s?). I think that's wrong. I think it should be for actual misbehavior. I could see giving a F for missing work, but not detention.

That was interesting to read Mists, sure seems like the school you are at has a real protocol.

My guess is that this teacher is a bit burned out.

the probel though is like any punishment, if it is given all the time it begins to mean nothing.

Luckily it is close to the end of the year but i think it is very tricky to confront a teacher over what seems to be odd behaviour.  It is a dicey situation for all.

I recently had a call from my 9 year old daughter's teacher.  She had done something inappropriate.  She is ADHD with severe anxiety disorder and her behaviour was a result of this anxiety.  The behaviour was not acceptable and she felt badly afterward and cried for hours.  I was fine with everything until the teacher told me that she (the teacher) was "angry".  I told her that her response was inappropriate.  An appropriate response would have been concern, or disappointment but not anger.  Luckily the punishment was appropriate but I was left wondering about the teacher's reaction...cms

You reminded me of when my girl was little. Very quickly she quit asking if I was mad at her, she'd just ask if I was frustrated, because I'd always say "no, but I am frustrated". It was adorable how she made "frustrated" into four syllables. Also if she did something good she'd ask if I was happy at her.

We're not allowed to give failing grades or to deduct marks for work that is incomplete.  The reasoning behind it is to separate academic understanding from learning skills.  If a child doesn't hand in an assignment or if the assignment is late, teachers are told that the grade in the subject area shouldn't be affected by it.  We're supposed to grade on what the child HAS demonstrated, and if they don't demonstrate enough to accurately assess their knowledge, they should get an incomplete.  Of course, students also don't fail grades any more, either, so even a report card filled with incompletes doesn't mean anything. 

MoS

THat is insane.  In that situation I would have done NOTHING.  AS it was I did pretty close to nothing and got by with 50-65% for many years--until my Grade 9 Language Arts teacher finally gave me the mark I had actually earned.  In Grade 8 I actually had a teacher tell me that she was not going to subtract the 10% she would normally subtract for undone work because a 48% would not look good on my report card.  I of course learned that I could get awsay with not doing any work.

Sometimes we have to be taught, and teach, more than the subject matter.

Misty - I don't understand.  Maybe I'm dense, but if an assignment or project was worth 15% of the final mark, and there were three assignments that year, and the child didn't pass in any of them, it seems to me that he or she would lose 45% of the final mark for the year.  They would have to write a perfect final exam to make 55%, which is unlikely for anyone, especially someone who hasn't been doing the work.   Even if for each assignment they handed it in two days late, obviously scribbled out in 1/2 hour and incomplete, and they got 5% on each, they would still be 30 marks behind going in to their final exam. 

How could you possibly evaluate their academic ability in the subject if they don't do the work?   And how could you motivate anyone to do the work if some of the kids don't need to but still get good marks?

This could be a problem, but it is different than a grade one child being shouted at for taking too long to choose a book from a shelf, or being sent to the office for playing with a pencil, turning in circles when he is supposed to be standing waiting his turn, or 'acting silly'.

I'm glad to see that it isn't just teachers who see the problem with the system.  You're completely right...the result is that they learn that they don't have to do anything, at least not until they reach high school when they can fail a specific class.  The "can't fail" referred to elementary and middle school.  In 10 years of teaching, I've only known 2 students who were held back a year.  One had a mom who had been fighting to have him held back for 5 years and FINALLY a principal was willing to do it (the mom felt he had been too immature when he started school and needed to repeat a year to catch up) and the other was a boy who had skipped 2 grades (another thing they don't do anymore...grade skipping virtually never happens) and who was held back 1 grade later because he wasn't adjusting well.

It's all part of the need to graduate kids from high school and on one hand I do get it.

In the past kids failed and flunked out and that set them up for a life of delivering pizza's without a highschool education.  SO , at least in Ontario there is this big push to make them stay in school.  And I sort of get it.  We all know people who hated highschool, did poorly, dropped out but sometimes it was simply that highschool didn't fit their needs.  Sometimes if they got that highschool education and were able to get to college they actually discovered that they liked education.

But to me it also makes a mockery of highschool.  If your kid is good at school and is conscientious and does the reports and studies for the tests and makes the presentations they also see that there are kids who don't go to class, don't do the work, spend the day hiding out somewhere and graduate anyway.  I think the acceptation of anything goes affects the other kids and can result in the slacking off by everyone.

As a parent you get the "it's due Monday but no one cares so I'll get to it......"  Or worse, your kid spends the weekend finishing a big report to get there and no one else has so the teacher extends the deadline by a week and the kid gets no credit for being done on time.

i dont' know the answer but this doesn't feel exactly right

I'm a bit mixed on this scenario.  My one daughter in high school knows that if she doesn't feel like doing the work and she fails a course that she can do a couple of weeks of "course recovery" and get the credit.  I don't believe that she has learned anything.  My youngest, because of her learning and mental disabilities often struggles at her appropriate grade.  However, taking her away from her peer group would have devastating results because she needs the comfort of being with the people she knows. 

My son, OTOH, is in a program that requires that he keeps his marks up and if they slip, he can be removed from the program (which he loves) and sent back to his regular school.  His class spends about 1 days a week out side of the classroom so they must work harder to get their school work done in the other hours so there is no time for fooling around.  If a child cannot work diligently or in this type of environment, for their own benefit they need to return to a regular class.  So my son knows that not in an assignment is not an option nor is failing a subject...cms

The reason most school districts will not hold a child back in elementary school is that this is one of the few areas in education which has substantial research to show that holding kids back does not improve educational outcomes.  It doesn't work.  That's why they don't do it.    When I taught elementary school it was the student's responsibility to complete their work.  If it wasn't done, they completed it with me after school.   I guess you could call it a detention - I called it a tutorial.  I think the students were better served by being made to complete their assigned tasks rather than be allowed to accept a zero.  It also gave the struggling learners more of my time to help them individually and build relationships.  It wasn't a punitive, unpleasant time - it was quite fun.

 This whole notion of "sliding kids through" school is foreign to me, and I've been teaching for 20 years.    When a student is consistently not meeting learning outcomes, a whole process falls into place where the school and parents work together to figure out what is going wrong and how to help support that child's learning.    If the problem is the home life - ie there is no support for schooling, the child is hungry, the child is frequently absent - and the parent is unwilling or unable to change, to we punish the child by failing them or holding them back?  Is that helpful?   If the child is truly struggling to learn the material, then supports need to be put in place as soon as possible to help them.  Holding them back to try again without support may just result in more failure.  If the child is capable but unmotivated - then the school and parents need to work together to provide the structures to engage the student.   Homework expectations at home, perhaps, before computer time?   Perhaps this is the type of learner who might learn from the consequences of being "held back"......but look at the posters right here - and people I'm sure we all know in real life - who say they put pretty much no effort into school back in the day, and yet tuned into learning when they found their passion or their niche as adults.  And we always have to be careful about these kinds of students, too, because sometimes their apparent capabilities will mask some underlying learning struggles which are the real issue.   my experience has been that for every struggling learner, the school - to the best of its ability and resources - tries to get to the bottom of why this is happening, and what can be done to improve things.  Any school that doesn't isn't doing its job, in my thinking.

I have to admit I cringe when I hear that we should be holding back the "lazy" kids.....there's just so much more to it than some of our  common sense solutions would imply.   Not that there shouldn't be consequences!!!  it's just that blanket solutions tend not to work for individual children.

Diana,

I have two very good friends for whom being held back was not oonly the right decision it was the best decision. ANd one of hteir parents was an elementary school principal who fought strenuoous ly to have his son held back because he simply was not even close to being ready to go forward.

Admirtedly it is something that has to be done very carefully but the current climate of never doing it is not helpful either.  AS you say, blanket solutions don't work.

My school years were in the US.

"The principal's office" meant a paddle. Corporal punishment is still legal in almost half the US states.

My siblings and I got the paddle in the front of class or in the hall or the principal's office at least once a week. We often did not have homework done because of our home life, with a mentally ill mom. I got paddled a lot because kids could read at my age and I was just being stubborn and refusing to learn. They were, after all, teachers who taught kids to read. If I could not, well.....  

Being held back was also pretty normal in the US in the 1970-80's 

Mysiblings were in regular classes. My brother failed K, 3, 5.. and I am not sure that is all. He was 16 in grade 7. He quit school, got a job and took a GED at 18, because he would have likely been 35 before he graduated. My sister was 17 and in grade 9 when she quit.

I was 19 when I graduated and should have been 17 because of my birthday, but it was not due to failing any grade levels. I dropped out in grade 7 because I was being passed and could not read (special ed) I went back when I should have been in grade 11, but went into grade10 because I needed to acquire credits.

Principal's office or no principal's office, passing and holding kids back... it depends....

If holding kids back is a problem (or a solution), I just wish that at some point, perhaps at the end of middle school, or sometime in high school, a team of teachers or guidance people had talked to Seelerboy and us, his parents and made some concrete plans for keeping him in school an extra year.  

The problem was that all through elementary school he had been at the top of his class academically.  In middle school (called junior high then) we requested that he be put in a special class where he would do more work in French, and perhaps become functional in French  (Frency immersilon had been introduced in Grade 1 when he was in grade 3).  This special class stayed together for three years, and since many of the kids were top students, almost all the teachers treated them as though they were expected to outproform other classes in all subjects.  Seelerboy went from being one of the brightest kids in his class in elementary to one of many bright kids, and it was here that his imatureity really began to show.  (With his December birthday he was the youngest in his class)   Spending a year in a regular class in middle school might have given him a year to grow up and be more ready to fit into the full life of high school. 

In high school he was again in the main stream of kids - and he had done a lot of reading ahead, watching nature and geography programs on TV, etc.  Work came easy to him - but he had discovered that sliding by was easier than keeping at the top, and doing assignments between classes rather than as homework, was acceptable.  So he slide through highschool with acceptable marks.  At parent teacher interviews I only encountered two teachers who seemed to realize that he had a great deal more potential.  (My brother-in-law, home on vacation was talking to the physics teacher whom he knew and mentioned he had a nephew in the school  - 'He's a really smart boy.' he was told.   Seelerboy really worked for these two teachers but not for the others.  He graduated at 17 and started university.  OK for some kids - too young and immature for him.

But who ever heard of holding a kid back who could, and sometimes did, work at the top of his class?

Seeler - I'm not convinced that I would want a teacher to determine who is mature enough to pass or fail.  Ultimately the school should be determining if the student understands the curriculum.  OTOH, the school should be open to parents/caregivers who say that a child is not ready to advance...cms

cjms - I think rather than the teacher determining to hold a student back because of his/her level of maturity, this should be a joint decision, thought about and talked over with the parents, guidance counsellor, teachers in several subjects, and the student himself.  Options, advantages, disadvantages should be offered - alternatives pointed out.  And finally a decision they all could live with.  Maybe instead of taking an extra year, and more credits, at high school my son should have been encouraged to work in the real world for a year - hopefully with a schedule fexible enough so that he could pick up a couple of extra credits - maybe in a subject he hadn't thought about when choosing his high school program at age thirteen. 

I don't disagree.  This seems like a reasonable approach.

 I was only called to the principal's office once in my life.  It was because I won an award (ha ha).  I was scared!

I was in the principal's office ONCE in Junior High. 

I was getting a lecture from the teacher for something stupid.  I smiled during the lecture because I wasn't listening I was thinking about how I was going to brag to my friends about how I got into trouble for something stupid.  Because I smiled the lecture was cut short and the bus was waiting anyway.  So by the next morning I forgot all about it.  Before announcements the next morning there was a an announcement over the intercom "Serena __________ report to the principal's office immediately"  The other kids were like "Oh Serena what did you do....Oh Serena you are in trouble now.   So I went.  The secretary sent me into the principal's office.  I couldn't remember what I did.

The principal did the announcements from the waiting area in the office.  He never came into his office.  I waited.  Presumeably, he went to teach his first class.  It was 9:30 am now and he did not come back.  I watched the clock on the wall.  At recess the principal finally came in.  He gave me a big lecture about how disrespectful I was.  He showed me his strap and said if I was so disrespectful again I would get the strap.  He also told me I had detention for noon recess and last recess.  By the time the lecture was over the end of recess bell had rung.  I tried to negotiate for time served for first recess.  I was unsuccessful.    To this day I don't know why it was such a big deal.  That is the only time I ever got into trouble.

I liste

I had a busy day planned, when my daughter arrived on my doorstep with Grandson.   She's driven him to school - he cried and wouldn't get out of the car.  His teacher 'doesn't like me.  She's always yelling at me.  Please don't make me go in."  She talked to him, calmed him down.  By then the other kids had entered the building so he didn't have the safety of numbers, so she walked him to the door.  He started crying again.  So she took him back to the car and brought him to my place before going on to work.

"I guess since you didn't go to school, we'll have to do school work at Grammy's." I told him.  He nodded.  

I don't have any grade one curriculum, but I went to a shelf of children's books and choose 'Chicken Soup for Little Souls'.  Thinking back to my kids and to Granddaughter at that age, I thought the vocabulary and plot seemed about right for someone completing grade one. 

"You read one page, I'll read the next.  Who starts first."   So we started.   Sometimes I had to tell him a word, sometimes he got it by sounding it out or by the context.  Slowly we worked our way through - stopping every second page or so to discuss the story, to make sure he understood what he was reading. 

I had things to do.  He helped me freeze fiddleheads by operating the vegetable spinner to dry them after blanching and cooling.   And we did science as I taught him the word "centrifugal' and I explained how centrifugal force removed the water from the fiddleheads.  

Then I suggested that he paint a picture - he has enjoyed painting in the past.  But he 'don't know what to paint'.   So we discussed possibilities.  Grampy passed by and suggested that he paint a squirrel.  No grey paint - I showed him how to combine dark brown, blue and white to get a squirrel grey (more science).  And he had an idea.   I went and made the beds.  Came back - he had a brown tree trunk, a green canopy, a knot hole in the tree, and a small squirrel on the side of the trunk.   I suggested some grass to finish the picture.  Came back - the bottom was 1/2 green under the tree, and 1/2 blue where there was a lake. 

Next I gave him paper and pencil and suggested that he write a story about his picture.  He couldn't think of one.  So I wrote about Sam Squirrel taking seeds from Grampy's birdfeeder and the game Grampy plays trying to prevent it from happening.   We read the story together.  Then Grampy came and talked to him more about the picture and he wrote a few lines of his own.  

I gave him free time to play games on the computer while I made french toast for lunch.   After lunch I suggested the Grampy found something that needed sorting and counting or that Granddaughter play a game with him that would involve counting and reasoning.  

But my observations were:  He reads no better than he did last fall.  His printing is poor.  He is nervous, lacks confidence in starting anything himself, and that he needs a few suggestions and some encouragement and praise.  Not to be shouted at.

His Grade One year is almost over.  He has learned that the teacher doesn't like him, that his work is no good, that he is stupid but that he can get some self respect back by acting silly and making the other kids laugh.    What a negative experience!   And a handful of other boys in the class have learned the same lessons.  Thank goodness the term will soon be over.  He will have a different teacher next year - maybe he/she can undo some of the damage. 

If my daughter hadn't been so sick last fall, maybe we would have been able to do something about it - have him transferred to another school, or maybe just spend a few days each week with me. 

Moral of this story, if there is one:   watch what is happening in your kids schools, be sensitive to whether the teacher is right for your child, do something before the situation gets worse.  

he certainly sounds like he had a great day with you.  Too bad all his days aren't so enriching.

this has been a tough year for his family and it is beyond belief that the teacher isn't more supportive.  hopefully he can have more days at grandmas school room

what a good teacher you are Seeler!  I think fondly of the idea of homeschooling, but I know on a longer basis that it is a different thing. 

Hugs to that kid!  I hope he learns soon how wonderful he is, even to a teacher.