Joshua Kaplowitz wrote a haunting personal account for the City Journal of his experience a 5th grade Teach For America teacher at a school in the “other half” of Washington, D.C.

Here’s a choice quote:

My optimism and naiveté evaporated within hours. I tried my best to be strict and set limits with my new students; but I wore my inexperience on my sleeve, and several of the kids jumped at the opportunity to misbehave. …

On a typical day, DeAngelo (a pseudonym, as are the other children’s names in this and the next paragraph) would throw a wad of paper in the middle of a lesson. Whether I disciplined him or ignored him, his actions would cause Kanisha to scream like an air-raid siren. In response, Lamond would get up, walk across the room, and try to slap Kanisha. Within one minute, the whole class was lost in a sea of noise and fists. I felt profoundly sorry for the majority of my students, whose education was being hijacked. Their plaintive cries punctuated the din: “Quiet everyone! Mr. Kaplowitz is trying to teach!”

Ayisha was my most gifted student. The daughter of Senegalese immigrants, she would tolerantly roll her eyes as Darnetta cut up for the ninth time in one hour, patiently waiting for the day when my class would settle down. Joseph was a brilliant writer who struggled mightily in math. When he needed help with a division problem, I tried to give him as much attention as I could, before three students wandering around the room inevitably distracted me. Eventually, I settled on tutoring him after school. Twenty more students’ educations were sabotaged, each kid with specific needs that I couldn’t attend to, because I was too busy putting out fires. …

To gain control, I tried imposing the kinds of consequences that the classroom-management handbooks recommend. None worked. My classroom was too small to give my students “time out.” I tried to take away their recess, but depriving them of their one sanctioned time to blow off steam just increased their penchant to use my classroom as a playground. When I called parents, they were often mistrustful and tended to question or even disbelieve outright what I told them about their children. It was sometimes worse when they believed me, though; the tenth time I heard a mother swear that her child was going to “get a beating for this one,” I almost decided not to call parents.

If you’re not used to it, calling a student’s parents can be the most terrifying experience imaginable. This is compounded when the purpose of the call is to “tell on” the student – “I wanted to let you know that Deangelo was throwing wads of paper in class today…” It’s only natural that, if the parent perceives that the issue is teacher-vs-student, it quite rapidly becomes either teacher-vs-student+parent (the parents are mistrustful, etc.), or, even worse, teacher+parent-vs-student (”going to get a beating for this one”). The nonviolent teacher must take the incredibly tricky step of making the issue not about punishment, but about working together to help Deangelo learn to calm himself down when he’s agitated – and to expect better of himself. But after all, they’re just kids. Many adults lack the self-control to sit in a classroom for hours learning things they’re not interested in without getting even a little agitated – it’s unreasonable to expect this of our children. But hopefully it’s a skill that can be taught; and what better age to learn than childhood?
Continue Reading How does a Nonviolent teacher cope with school violence?»

On this UN International Day of Peace, join Miki Kashtan, senior Nonviolent Communication (NVC) trainer, in exploring inspiring ideas and concrete tools for turning the idea that everyone matters into a reality in your life and beyond.

Sunday, September 21, 2008 from 9:30am to 5:00pm at the Women’s Building, 3543 18th St. San Francisco, CA. Requested Contribution is $85 – $170 (Sliding Scale, $40 Deposit). No one will be turned away for lack of funds. Sponsored by BayNVC. Registration and more Information at www.baynvc.org, register@baynvc.org or (510) 433-0700.

Education is just a means. If it is not accompanied by truthfulness, firmness, patience and other virtues, it remains sterile, and sometimes does harm instead of good. The object of education is not to be able to earn money, but to improve oneself and to serve the country. If this object is not realized, it must be taken that the money spent on education has been wasted.
–Mahatma Gandhi [Indian Opinion, 9 March 1907 (CW 6, p. 361)]

If the purpose of education is to improve one’s eligibility for employment, then we run into a problem, because the purpose of a degree is to out-compete one’s peers for a well-paying job.  You see, there’s competition built right into the value system.  This has reached a point in our culture where an activity does not have value for us unless it is ‘competitive’.  If you can’t be better than other people at something, why do it at all?  It’s a ridiculous notion, but it’s built into our culture.  Math can no longer be a hobby alone, as it was for Descartes or Fermat – instead we have nationwide math competitions.  We have large-scale, high-profile competition in nearly every sector of academia, in video games, in sports, in workplaces, in relationships, and even music, poetry, filmmaking.

Continue Reading The Competition Disease»

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