Tools of the trade

Schools don’t need to invent problems because they already have plenty.

Poverty, drug abuse, and parental irresponsibility are societal problems that we’ve conveniently dropped off at the schoolhouse door. The American epidemics of narcissism, entitlement and incivility have infected our students.

Other school troubles are directly linked to instruction and education philosophies. We’ve yet to overcome nearly two generations of touchy-feely, student-centered, contentfree bad ideas. We’re still buckling under education laws and policies founded on the impossible mandate that all students will meet new high standards when they already aren’t meeting old, allegedly low standards. Add to those woes the tsunami of frivolous lawsuits, budget crunches, and nonacademic demands on school time and resources.

And then there’s bullying.

Before you get the wrong idea, I’m not making light of the violence and disruption to which students are subjected every day. It sickens and disheartens me that school politics and the prevailing fashions in discipline commonly render me powerless to protect my students from rampaging classmates. In a bitter irony, the more aberrant a student’s behavior, the more advocates argue that his problems license him to inflict that behavior on others.

Bullying today means those extreme cases. It means old-fashioned cruelty and playground scuffles, too. It also means a new hypersensitized brand of bullying, which policymakers define as “any written or verbal expression, or physical act or gesture … intended to cause distress.”

Your mother wears combat boots.

Sorry.

To this ever-swelling litany of offenses on which we’re spending more time and money every day, and with which we’re dealing less successfully every day, experts have added the “most unexpected bully of all,” classroom teachers. Advocates aren’t just talking through their hats. They’ve got research. Unfortunately, while talking through your hat is hardly the surest route to the truth, it’s usually more reliable than most education research.

A while back, a study of this “hidden trauma” asserted that teacher bullying is a bigger problem than anybody had imagined. Twenty-five percent of the teachers surveyed admitted to bullying students “a few times.”

To put that statistic in perspective, imagine the results of a survey asking parents if they’ve ever snapped at their kids or used the fact that they were bigger and in charge to control their children. Do those “few times” make most parents bullies?

Everybody’s either got or heard a story about the evil first-grade teacher who wouldn’t let some 6-yearold color the grass purple. Anybody who thinks that constitutes a life-changing trauma needs to spend a few hours in Syria.

Everybody’s also had or heard about a mean teacher. Mean teachers shouldn’t be on the job. Neither should mean nurses or mean desk clerks.

On the other hand, we need to be cautious when we rely on the perceptions of children to define and identify what’s “mean.” I’ve heard countless students complain that a teacher “yelled” at them when the teacher hadn’t raised his voice at all. That’s because children often define “yelling” as telling them something they don’t want to hear and “meanness” as denying them something they want.

Parents already know this.

Bully warriors object when teachers “sigh” or “roll their eyes.” They’re outraged by sarcasm and yelling. They condemn standing against the wall during recess as “public humiliation.” Some want teachers to “kneel to speak to students at their own level.”

Half the time, when I roll my eyes, I’m laughing at myself. Other times another student has asked the same question I’ve already answered nine times. Most students understand this. That’s because they have a sense of humor. Also, sometimes they roll their eyes, too.

Try keeping order in the company of 20 adolescents without ever raising your voice. Come to think of it, try keeping order in the company of one adolescent without ever raising your voice. Sometimes it’s the best way to make an impression. Other times, it’s the only way to be heard. I don’t yell often, but when I do, it’s not because I possess “poor social skills” or suffer from “feelings of inferiority or powerlessness.”

Try cafeteria duty for a few weeks. Then get back to me about yelling.

It’s ironic when critics complain about standing students against the wall during recess, especially when those students are usually there because they’ve been bullying other children. And while I’ve often sat with students to console them, there’s no way I’ll be kneeling down to explain to a disruptive student the finer points of why he should want to shut his mouth so the rest of us can study history.

I don’t set out to publicly reprimand, let alone humiliate a student. But when his misbehavior is public and immediate, I have little choice.

This isn’t the moment to be fabricating issues and epidemics. Our present problem isn’t that we have too many teachers who can control a classroom. If I can’t raise my voice, or alter its tone, or change the look on my face, or use my words to goad a student into behaving, or remove him from class, what exactly can I do to preserve the order necessary for a safe, productive learning environment?

My voice, my words, my eyes, and my bearing are the tools of my trade. I don’t want to use them to hurt anybody. But sometimes they’re essential to keep my students from hurting each other and themselves.