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DISCIPLINE NVITH DIGNITYI'm the one who always came,While your chair sat empty;I'm the one whose dreams were hidden,as yours were fulfilled;I'm the one who cared,while you butchered knowledge;I'm the one who watched your petty warsover something you couldn't understand;I'm the one who reasoned,as you discussed,I'm the one who will rememberwhen all of you will forget.Dedicated to Laurawho understood.For at least the eight decades between the writings of Dr. Bagleyand Heather, teachers and students have needed courage to face eachother. School is a battleground for too many participants, a placewhere major confrontations and minor skirmishes occur daily. Whymust this be so? Teachers and students share the same space, time,goals, and needs. They spend most of the day communicating witheach other, thinking about each other, scheming against each other,and judging each other. When they are antagonistic, they expend asmuch if not more time and energy trying to outsmart each other andwin, or at least achieve a standoff. If things get bad enough, theyhave the power to ruin each others' lives. When things go well, theyshare tender moments, meaningful triumphs, and genuine respectand love. Regardless of how it goes, teachers and students neverforget each other.We contend that it is essential to replace competitive metaphorsin schools with new images of cooperation, mutual respect, and commitment to common goals for the good of everyone in the classroom.Courage must always be a part of the learning process, but we prefercourage to be used to explore new worlds or to make meaningfulchanges in perceptions and behaviors.For most teachers and students, a main battlefield revolvesaround discipline. Much has been written about discipline over theyears, and many programs and methods have been tried and retriedwith new names. The issue will always be an integral part of schoolbecause students will always learn more than the content of the curriculum. They will learn about their behavior, their choices, and their213

DISCIPLINEimpact on others. Instead of trying to solve the discipline problem, itmight be wiser to try to positively affect the lives of children. Westrongly advocate a model of discipline based on a positive valuesystem and suggest many practical methods to implement such asystem in the classroom. One of our goals is for all the suggestionsin this book to be consistent with what we believe to be best forchildren.In this book you will learn strategies for developing a philosophyabout behavior management based on sound educational, psychological, and commonsense principles:Developing a comprehensive classroom discipline plan.Stopping misbehavior when it occurs without attacking thedignity of the student.Resolving problems with students who chronically disrupt thelea: ing process.Reducing student stress as well as your own.Using special guidelines for rules and consequences that work.Few woula argue that maintaining goo(' discipline is a necessaryprecondition to establishing a school or classroom climate that isconducive to learning. James Coleman, the controversial Universityof Chicago sociologist, recently studied the effects of private versuspublic school education. After surveying 58,728 sophomores andseniors in 1,016 high schools, he concluded that private schools do abatcr job of educating than public schools.' Coleman pointed to theability of private schools to maintain better discipline and providemore challenging academic demands. He found that public schoolsophomores appear twice as likely to disobey, fight, or commit acts ofvandalism than their private school counterparts.While one may question Coleman's ability in light of his 1966study, which found that schools make little difference in educatingstudents, it is unlikely that contemporary educators will argue againstthe notion that discipline problems in schools throughout Americaare on the rise in scope and intensity.The many problems in schools today can generally be categorized with out-of-school or in-school causes. In discussing today'sstudent, Dillon notes:Teachers today are working with a different kind of student. Parents more and more frequently admit that theycannot control their children. Many even abandon them.Many students act as free agents. They do not live at home

r--DISCIPLINE WITH DIGNITYand are responsible to no one. They have few personalrestraints. The number of students placed on permanent suspension from school for misbehavior ormaladjustment is increasing. The age of those being suspended is decreasing. Growing numbers of elementarystudents are out of school because they are disruptive to theteaching-learning process. The growing clarity of studentrights and due process has taken away traditional disciplinestrategies in which many teachers found security; and manyteachers are without skills to replace them?In schools that "care:' it is common for a disruptive student tobe referred to guidance, mental health, and administrative resourcesfor an evaluation. Following the evaluation, a conference is called toinform the teacher about the student's background, home situation,test results, and other descriptive information. The teacher alreadyknows most of this information, but using it to take concrete andspecific action is rare. The teacher, while filled with empathy, oftenfeels incapable of responding differently because he views these recommendations as not feasible for a regular class setting. But he doesnot want to appear rigid and uncaring, so he simply nods his headin agreement with the recommendations and proceeds to do the besthe can.Psychologists or social workers, well-trained in counseling, areoften unavailable for needed intervention because of their limitedtime and excessive caseloads in most schools. Instead they meet withthe child's parents, suggest the need for individual or family coun-seling at the lecal child guidance clinic, aad write their reports;perhaps 9 times out of 10, no further action ensues. The administrator, wanting to support the teacher, makes himself available for crises,which occur with frequency, and often elicits a series of temporarypromises from the student to try harder and behave better. Theoverall effects of this process: a lot of understanding and very littlechange!Much of this book addresses what can be done about disciplineproblems, but it is first necessary to consider those factors responsiblefor the alienation experienced by too many youths in schools. Thecauses of discipline problems are discussed briefly because it is ourbelief that schools waste far too much time and energy trying tounderstand why students misbehave when they should be trying tochange their pattern of misbehavior.

DISCIPLINESchools do not exist as isolated institutions untouched by thesocial events surrounding them. Schools are both a mirror image ofwhat transpires in their communities and a force that attempts toconvey and shape the values, beliefs, and attitudes of students. Beingboth a mirror image and a dynamic force makes it essential that weunderstand how factors that occur both within and outside theboundaries of schools interact to create discipline problems. 011ie thecontext is understood, teachers can learn how to act upon thosefactors that are within their control and how to live with those thatare not.Out-of-School Causes of Discipline ProblemsViolence in SocietyWithout belaboring the social ills of our world, the fact is thatwe live in a society where resolving problems through shootings,knifings, fist fights, extortion, and threats of injury is commonplace.Every day we pick up the newspaper and learn of another violentdeath. People's inhumanity to one another is not news. Children areconstantly exposed to violence and have become insensitive to it.Shortly after the assassination attempt on President Reagan, we inter-viewed school-age children to learn of their reaction. We wereastounded by the near absence of emotion to the event. That absenceof shock is a sad commentary on how easily we seem to accept violenceas a natural way of life.Effects of the MediaTelevision has often been blamed, with justification, for theincrease in violence among children. We recently noted at least 50acts of violence during a half-hour broadcast of a well-known, dailycartoon show. Try observing children's television and notice how themost popular shows glamorize and glorify anti-authority protagonistsas they behave irresponsibly.A recent study that reviewed a decade of research concerningtelevision and 'youth concluded that children will have viewed approx-imately 18,000 acts of television violence by the time they enteradolescence.' Although it is impossible to know the full extent of theinfluence of standard programming, we believe that television andother media have a potentially damaging effect on children. And kidswith special needs seem particularly at risk. Sprafkin, Kelly, andGadow (1987) found that emotionally and learning-disabled children516

DISCIPLINE WITH DIGNITYare less able to distinguish between fantasy and reality on televisionprograms and commercials.5In Media Sexploitation (1976) and Subliminal Seduction (1973), Wil-son Bryant Key points out how violent and sexual messages areimplicitly and explicitly built into television and print advertisements.His studies show that people become agitated when confronted withthese messages, which are really selling sex, death, and violence."Me" GenerationThe absence of emotional nourishment for many of our children,in a nation still reeling from the values permeated by what Christopher Lasch calls the "me generation;' is another external cause ofschool discipline problems. We have become a throw-away societythat discards husbands, wives, children, and things. Rightly orwrongly, many people seek refuge from unhappiness and depressionin ways that leave little time and commitment for their children.Recent statistics have suggested that between 35 and 50 percentof all school-age children will experience significant shifts in theirfamily constellation before they complete school.' Twelve of 100 chil-dren in 1986 were born to unmarried parents, 40 were born toparents who will divorce before the child is 18, 5 have parents whowill separate, and 2 have parents who will die. In all, only 41 percentwill reach their 18th birthday in "traditional" family units.It is no secret, therefore, that many students come to school moreconcerned for their basic security needs than for learning their timestables. The loss of reliance upon parents for basic security has createda large group of children who are desperate for help in healthyemotional development. Many students have adopted the me-gener-ation attitude of, "Meet my needs first. I do not intend to wait. Icome first:'Lack of a Secure Family EnvironmentPerhaps the largest single influence on children is the quality oftheir home life. Throughout the last century, our society has undergone major shifts in values and traditions. The extended family hasbeen replaced by smaller nuclear units in a multitude of configurations. Single-parent families, two working-parent families, and oneand two-child families are all common. The divorce rate has steadilyrisen so that some states have more divorces than marriages. Allthose changes, while neither good nor bad in themselves, have madeit increasingly difficult to raise children in the traditional ways. And617,,

DISCIPLINEbecause we have not been as successful in developing family systemsthat match these shifting life styles, many parents have no newoptions for providing a secure family structure.Much research shows that how parents respond to their child'smisbehavior has major consequences for the child's future development. For example, Holmes and Robbins (1987) found that unfair,inconsistent, and harsh discipline by parents predicted later alcoholand depressive disorders.' Self-concepts are first developed and moststrongly influenced in the home, and parents need to learn moreskills for helping children develop amid constantly shifting familypatterns.Difficult TemperamentSome recent studies (Maziade et al. 1986) have found children'stemperaments to be more "plastic" than formerly believed. Particularly at the extreme ends of the continuum, children who are veryeasy or very difficult to deal with are likely to remain that way foryears. Clearly, some children a. e difficult to manage despite adequateparenting and relative absence of all the psychosocial factors alreadymentioned. But parents can influence such children to change in"desirable" ways when a firm, consistent, and loving approach todiscipline is offered.In-School Causes of Discipline ProblemsStudent BoredomTeachers have spent many years accumulating a body of knowledge that they value, and they are excited with heir work when theyfeel their students are enthusiastic about what is being offered.Nobody wants to have students in class who appear uninterested, donot participate, and do not do their assignments.Some students do not present themselves as discipline problemsbecause they have developed good classroom etiquette. Ti-.-y sit upstraight, appear attentive by making eye contact, nod their headsevery so often, and present themselves as interested and somewhatinvolved, even when they are downright bored. But there are somestudents who don't have (or won't develop) these survival skills.Instead they act out to satisfy their needs. They have no desire tohide their boredom, acid they appear unconcerned with the consequences of poor grades, a trip to the principal's office, or a phonecall home. Most teachers feel fed up and angry with such students,718

DISCIPLINE WITH DIGNITYand they view them as a waste of their time. Such students derivepleasure from making the teacher angry, and their teachers derive ameasure of satisfaction in catching them being "bad:' When thisinteraction continues, conflict ensues. The teacher will often resort,consciously or not, to labeling the student negatively, and the studentwill then accuse the teacher of picking on him unjustly. A disciplineproblem has occurred, and both are responsible!PowerlessnessPowerlessness is another factor in school and classroom disciplineproblems. Some students rebel as a way of voicing their dissatisfactionwith their lack of power. In most schools, students are told for sixhours every day where to go, what time to be there, how long to takefor basic biological necessities, which learning is relevant, what tolearn, and how their learning will be evaluated. These decisions areoften made by the local school board or by the school administrationin consultation with members of the school community. Student participation in decision making is often excluded. The result is that onegroup develops rules and procedures that define behavioral stan-dards for another group that has had little or no input. More thanone revolution has been precipitated by a similar division of power.Schools that exclude students from school or classroom policy-making committees run a major risk of widespread dissatisfaction withrules that are perceived as arbitrary and unfair. Students show theirdissatisfaction by acting out when they perceive themselves as havingno say in how the classroom is run. "Powerless" students have morepower than many school personnel give them credit for, and manystudents are more than willing to show just how much power theyreally have.Unclear LimitsAt the very least, teachers and administrators must clearly andspecifically inform students of the standards of acceptable behaviorbefore they are violated and what will happen when these standards areviolated. At best, students are often presented with unclear rules andless clear consequences. In most schools, students are unwittinglyencouraged to break rules because they are not informed of them inadvance. When limits are unclear, students will test the system to findout what they are. The following case illustrates the necessity forclear rules and consequences.19 ,.8

DISCIPLINEA junior high school we recently worked with was having aproblem with student fighting. We discovered that a no-fighting ruleexisted in the student handbook, but no mention was made of consequences. An interview with the principal revealed that the actual,unwritten consequences ranged from teachers not even referring thestudent, to a talk with the student, to a one-day suspension. Becausefighting had become a serious problem, we suggested an immediate,short-term solution to the problema solution that reveals one of ourbiases. We met with faculty members, and they agreed that anystudent who fought on school grounds would be suspended from oneto five days, depending on the severity of the infraction. The studentwould not be allowed to return to school until he had developed awritten plan for how he would behave if the circumstance happenedagain. In addition, a parent conference was mandatory before thestudent could return to school.The principal was initially uncomfortable with the recommen-dation because he believed that suspension was an ineffectiveresponse to student misbehavior. He believed it would not help togive the offender a sanctioned vacation. We believed that if all teach-ers agreed on the procedure, it was worth trying. Furthermore, wefelt that all students (and teachers) have a right to attend schoolwithout concern for their own safety. If people are fearful, theirability to learn (and to teach) is adversely affected. If a studentchooses to fight, then he is violating the safety rights of others and ischoosing to be temporarily excluded from school.Feeling desperate, the principal reluctantly agreed to try theplan. He next met with every faculty team, and they presented theplan to the students. In short, the principal specified the rule, solicitedsupport from his staff members, and told students in advance whatwould happen if fighting occurred. Fighting increased during thefirst few days after the plan was implemented. But after one week,the incidence of fighting dropped to near zero. Students needed totest the rule, and when they found out that the rule would be strictlyenforced, they stopped.Lack of Acceptable Outlets for FeelingsAnother source of discipline problems is the lack of acceptableoutlets for expressing feelings. Don't run. Don't fight. Don't throwfood. Most teachers have rules so stud

1. Discipline 1 2. Dignity and Responsibility in the Classroom 20 3. Three-Dimensional Discipline 32 4. The Social Contract 47 5. Consequences 65 6. Taking Action 94 7. Stress and Discipline 113 8. Creative Discipline for Out-of-Control Students 135 9. Discipline and the Process of Teaching