Teacher's "Discipline of first graders a bit too far?

Published on December 9, 2005 By ----- In Ethics

Source: Link

First-Graders Made To Clean A Bathroom

A charter school run by the United Federation of Teachers hired a new consultant this week after the principal raised the ire of parents by allegedly ordering a group of first-graders to clean up human waste in the bathroom.

The president of the teachers union, Randi Weingarten, apologized to parents at the school in the East New York section of Brooklyn on Tuesday night. The first-year principal, Rita Danis, also told the group of about two dozen parents that she was sorry.

Last month, Ms. Danis instructed four first-grade boys to tidy up the bathroom after she found them mucking it up. Two of the boys went home and allegedly told their parents that they had been forced to clean up feces.

"This is not something a 6-year-old should go through," the mother of one the boys allegedly involved in the incident, Shalese Lucas-Chisholm, told an NBC TV reporter before the Tuesday meeting. Her 6-year-old son, Bijean, added, "When I was asked to do it, I felt a little unhappy." Another parent said the incident had brought down her son's self-esteem.

The school, which is publicly funded but operated by the union, disciplined Ms. Danis and explained that she should not have made the students clean the bathroom. She also was disciplined for failing to report the incident to the school's board of trustees until November 22, about two weeks after it occurred.

"The school leader, who is an exemplary instructional leader, made two errors in judgment - for which the school is taking responsibility, and for which she has been disciplined," Ms. Weingarten said in a statement issued last night.

Right, Well. I can understand the teachers dismay at the children and what they did. On one hand, the children *did* do something wrong. But, on the other hand, should they have been told to do this? Is this a bit too far? Did the teacher stretch her authority? Perhaps the custodians could have cleaned up the mess.

IMO I think, that the teacher should have had the custodians take care of it and deal with the students in question alternatively. Another thing, in reference to the bolded part of the above text: "When I was asked to do it, I felt a little unhappy." Now, they shouldn't (IMO) have messed up the bathroom. But, IMO he (may) had a guilty conscience.

How far should a teacher go? What are a teachers rights when dealing with our children, who happen to behave badly.

--Lucas

Comments

Cordelia

on Dec 09, 2005

It seems like it depends on what the kids were doing. From the article:

"We may never learn exactly what happened," Ms. Weingarten said. "We think what happened is there were paper towels strewn in the boys' bathroom. Some people think there was something under the paper towels; some people think there wasn't. But the bottom line is this: Kids should not be cleaning up in a bathroom."

So...if they were just throwing paper towels around then they should be required to pick them up. The article says they were told to clean up human waste (allegedly). If they created the waste and didn't...ahem...put it where it was supposed to go, then they should clean that up too, IMO. If they just threw some paper towels around and were forced to scrub toilets, that would be excessive. The problem is that the article isn't terribly specific so it's hard to say whether or not the administration went overboard.

-----

on Dec 09, 2005

True Enough... but still... how far should a teacher be allowed to go?

Dr Guy

on Dec 09, 2005

Actually, for me, it was not "human waste". It was spitballs, and it was the 4th grade, and yes, we had to clean it up! (I did not do any, but all the boys had to help clean). First grade may be a bit young, but the idea is not in itself bad.

ParaTed2k

on Dec 09, 2005

WAH, WAH Kids had to clean up a bathroom as punishment!! Where's the humanity??? Call the International Committee fo the Red Cross, this has got to be "tantamount to torture!"

If these "parents" consider making kids clean a bathroom an "error in judgement", I'd hate to see what the bathrooms in their homes look like.

Shame on anyone who considers this innappropriate punishment!

"Messes are for other people to clean up".. nice lesson there.

MarcieMoo

on Dec 09, 2005

The issue that teachers and administrators sometimes face is making the "punishment" fit the "crime". I believe that when the consequences are natural and they have to do with making the "wrong" right again, that the discipline makes the most sense.

I have a student that likes to go into the restroom and push the soap dispenser button repeatedly and make a big puddle of it on the floor. I've had other students follow him back from the bathroom to tell me about it. I had the office call the custodian for me, and I asked him if he would like the student to help him clean it up. It's soap. He made the mess, so a logical consequence would be for him to help clean up his mess.

Then you have people who will complain because an adult at school disciplined their child in this manner. Now...in this case, I don't think we really know if there was feces involved or not. The educator said something about the boys "mucking" up a bathroom and the boys went home and told mom and dad that they had to clean up poop. Did this really happen? I don't know. Really, with poop? The children shouldn't be touching it at all, even with universal precautions, because it is poop. Do I have a good, logical consequence for this kind of poop-flinging behavior? Not really.

I think sometimes adults in schools are limited to in-school suspensions or detentions rather than natural consequences because parents don't want their kids to have to clean up their messes or have them have to apologize to someone they hurt. Detentions and in school suspensions are seen by kids as a priviledge sometimes, rather than a punishment--so an adult would be rewarding a child for poor behavior versus teaching them a life lesson--that real people, when they do the right thing, clean up after themselves or say "I'm sorry" if they hurt someone else intentionally or unintentionally.

In response to the kid's "I was a little unhappy" response--what kid *IS* happy about having to clean anything? Of course he was unhappy. He did something he KNEW he shouldn't have done and there were consequences for that action.

Gideon MacLeish

on Dec 31, 2005

WAH, WAH Kids had to clean up a bathroom as punishment!! Where's the humanity??? Call the International Committee fo the Red Cross, this has got to be "tantamount to torture!"

Actually,the superintendent for the school in our community lost his job because he had kids help the school janitor as punishment. People's parents were just too good to be forced to do menial labor.

I say what better consequence for children in school for ANY wrongful behaviour than doing the janitorial work. It sends a CRYSTAL clear message to the student: "if you don't take school a little more seriously, this is your life".

The fact that teachers aren't given ANY room to dicsipline children is a primary reason why we homeschool.

ParaTed2k

on Dec 31, 2005

Sounds like you lost a decent Superintendent to a bunch of whiney child spoiling "parents". Unfortunately, they did teach their kids something, that their parents are piss poor adults.

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