The Middle/High School Educator’s Most Powerful and Effective Disciplinary Tools
Aug 16, 2023- Landon stood toe-to-toe with the alternative high school administrator. He stood as tall as and outweighed the school administrator by a solid 15 lbs, and he was pissed! On the other side of the room I witnessed this unfolding conflict going nowhere good fast. The altercation ended with Landon swearing at the administrator and subsequently being given suspension.
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It was the morning grammar exercise and 12 yr. old Margo was having none of it. I was a visitor observing the class and watched as Margo squirmed in her seat, found any excuse to leave her seat, and when the relatively new teacher called on her to give the answer to the daily question, Margo made a joke. While the class laughed, the teacher promptly sent Margo to the office.
What’s going on?
So what’s happening here in these scenarios where the discipline ends with the student being banished from the classroom? Many factors impact these types of interactions. Please note that this is not about blaming anyone but simply to map the communication breakdowns that are ultimately detrimental for all involved, including:
authoritarian approaches to discipline
a lack of curiosity about behaviors
a particular way the student and the educator view one another
difficulty navigating anger in teenagers
a lack of respectful behavior from both the teenager and the adult
I know some of the arguments waiting to be presented by exasperated and overwhelmed educators, including:
“I don’t have enough time to deal with that behavior.
“One student’s behavior can’t monopolize my attention.
“They know the rules, therefore they should know better.
“Students need to learn how to behave appropriately and to be held accountable.
“I’m a teacher-I want to teach!”
Each is a valid argument, and they aren’t enough to address many disciplinary issues. Educators need more effective tools that do not add to their already over-burdened load.
The Tools
I developed these tools from my decades as an educator. In fact, I didn’t know that’s what I was doing. I followed a gut instinct in establishing relationships with my students over the years that worked for them, for me, and for my classrooms and programs. I offer these tried and true tools here.
#1 The process and practice of validation
If you were to take only one thing away from this post, this is the one. Each and every one of us are seeking at any given moment to be seen, heard, accepted, and valued for who we are in that moment as we are. You are the teacher or administrator and every single one of your students want and need to be validated by you. It is a basic human need that gives us the embodied knowing that we matter, that we belong, that we are safe. Learning will not happen, will not be integrated if the student does not feel psychologically, emotionally safe.
This safety is crucial, especially for adolescents who are showing up in our classrooms and school hallways carrying earlier traumas in their bodies. Not only that, but if the ecology is invalidating enough, it may cause trauma—what we call traumatic invalidation.
Learn to validate your students, your colleagues, your staff, and all support staff in your building. I cannot stress enough the power of this communication skill and this way of being with one another. It will save your program time, money, absenteeism, staff burnout, and student behavioral issues.
#2 Have compassionately curious conversations
We have to talk to students anyway! So it might as well be a different kind of conversation than the one we normally have when we discipline—which often takes up time, energy, and makes the environment uncomfortable at best and unsafe at worst.
When we talk with students with compassionate curiosity it is an attempt to connect rather than to correct. Connection is an essential need for all of us, and for adolescents as they make their way into adulthood in a very challenging world these connections are especially vital. If you want your students to be invested in their learning and in the school community, this is how you’re going to foster that.
In the scenario above with Landon, compassionate curiosity sounds like:
Landon, you’re mad. What’s going on? I know you’re upset that I’m not letting you leave the classroom. I can see it. You’re pissed! Help me understand why.
Let’s say Landon responds with “That teacher hates me. She picks on me all the time!”
Now the administrator understands that Landon feels persecuted. It doesn’t matter whether the teacher actually hates Landon. Right now that’s Landon’s experience, and no one who feels persecuted feels safe. From this point, problem solving can happen. All Landon needs in that moment is to feel like someone cares enough to hear him. The conversation would take just a minute or two, the same amount of time and possibly less time than the traditional authoritarian way of dealing with the situation.
#3 Love and courage as antidotes to fear
In the second scenario above, I could see the teacher’s momentary freeze when Margo made the joke. While he was not the butt of the joke, I could see his stricken face and then the flash of anger. I imagine that this was a moment of fear for this new educator—that he was going to lose control of the class; that Margo had gotten the best of him; that the students no longer respected him; and most importantly, that he had lost his position of authority in the class. While all of these may have been true, a strong rule of thumb in navigating classroom discipline is to not operate from a place of fear. It does not go well.
It takes courage to face our insecurities, but after having many conversations with hundreds of young people over the years I can assure you that there is nothing they respect more than an adult who has the courage to admit to their vulnerabilities in the moment. We role model for our kids how to be imperfect, fallible, authentic, and human.
#4 Come to understand the essential nature of Adolescence
If you teach adolescents, that is, ages 11 to 21 or 22 yrs, then you need to understand this stage of development. It’s filled with unique challenges that, without understanding, will create barriers to your efficacy in a disciplined classroom and school. There are many resources out there, including Dan Siegel’s Brainstorm, Richard Frankel’s very psychoanalytical but invaluable book The Adolescent Psyche, as well as a number of blog postings here at The Shiftless Wanderer to give you a basic foundation to this fascinating and complex stage of life.
In conclusion
With the right tools, your classroom can be a place where powerful things happen. The experiences and the relationships you build go beyond the required curriculum to invaluable life lessons that will inform you and them for the rest of your lives.
Image by: Mat Hayward