Common sense without stress

Public education has problems, but many of them aren’t at school. They’re alive and unwell at home or thriving in society at large. More children come from single-parent households, multiple divorces and serial relationships, a turmoil that distresses hosts of students every school day.

American society is less civil than it used to be, from supermarkets and traffic lights to prime time and politics. We’re also more brazen, selfabsorbed and complacent. Our sense of entitlement dwarfs our sense of duty. We’re obsessed with our rights but far less concerned about our obligations. Self-reliance is obsolete and gratitude is nearly extinct. Too many of us really think the world owes us a living and more.

All these ills spill over into the classroom.

On the other hand, schools are hardly blameless when it comes to the downward spiral of academic achievement. For starters, we’ve succumbed to some crazy ideas. An expert announces that native intelligence doesn’t exist and that all children are gifted and talented.

His bizarre notions are mainstream enough that the NEA spotlights him as an “innovator.” A professor contends that teaching American history is an unnecessary, “hollow mission” because half of us don’t vote and students don’t care anyway. Or how about the superintendent who decrees schools shouldn’t teach English anymore since students already use it in their other subjects. This, by the way, was his remedy for high school graduates who can’t read and write well.

Follies like these really do factor into school goals and policies. One contemporary guru, Marvin Marshall, promotes a packaged approach to classroom management he bills as “discipline without stress.” According to Dr. Marshall’s rosecolored theory, classroom discipline is simply a matter of cultivating and appealing to students’ “internal desires,” which apparently will miraculously coincide with our own as long as we don’t try to coerce them into agreeing with us.

Instead of asking, “How do we get these kids to behave?” we’re supposed to “support” students as they “learn to channel and direct their positive energy in ways that accomplish their goals and those of their community.”

Dr. Marshall doesn’t believe in punishments or rewards because they’re too “external.” Instead of keeping your 6-year-old at the table until he eats his Brussels sprouts, you tell him he can play with his friends when he eats them. In case you’re confused, this is not a reward. It’s a “contingency.”

Dr. Marshall concedes that sometimes “consequences are necessary.” His secret to creating a “positive” learning environment is not telling students ahead of time what those consequences are, a bizarre tactic designed to make them too “insecure” to misbehave. When somebody does misbehave, you ask him to name an appropriate consequence. This gives him “ownership.” Then you reply, “What else? What else?” until he comes up with what you want him to say. This is supposed to make him think you didn’t punish him.

Discipline doesn’t have to smack of tyranny. There are ways to deal with misbehavior that breed less resentment and rebellion than others. You can be fair. You can be friendly. Anyone who’s been stopped by a cop knows this. But no matter how polite and reasonable the officer, I never drove away assuming I gave myself the ticket. Students aren’t that dumb either.

Dr. Marshall is really at sea when it comes to running a classroom. If a student launches a paper airplane during class, he recommends stopping the lesson, praising the outlaw for his airplane design, and then allowing him to teach everybody else in the class how to make paper airplanes, following which everybody goes outside to fly them.

If a student is slumping in his chair, the teacher should also slump to establish “rapport.” If a student keeps tapping his pencil, you can “redirect the object to the student’s thigh.” An alternative less likely to prompt both a lawsuit and your arrest is to tap your pencil, too. After a while you slow down and tap softer until hopefully both of you stop.

Dr. Marshall’s system involves four behavior levels. Level B isn’t good. When a student misbehaves, you interrupt the class and ask him what level he’s at. In case he won’t tell you, the doctor offers sample scripts for guidance. My favorite ends with the teacher asking, “What letter comes after A?” When the child answers, “B,” the teacher just says, “Thank you.” According to the doctor, “the objective has been met; Level B behavior has been acknowledged.”

Unfortunately, getting him to say “B” wasn’t really the objective. Getting him to stop wasting everybody’s time was, and all we’ve done is help him waste more of it. Just so you know, Dr. Marshall insists that “time is not wasted” by his method.

Imagine the cumulative effect of 300 pages of this, presented as valid in teacher training classes and in-service workshops across the country.

Schools and teachers are often accused of being slow to change with the times. The truth is, we’ve more often been too willing to change, too eager to follow every pied piping expert and snake oil peddler.

We’ve embraced enough nonsense. We need instead to stand for common sense. When it comes to school reform, this would be a good first step.

It won’t be easy. But it will surely help.