Former Marine, Current Student, Future Teacher, but always a Dad!

At both schools, CHAMPs, a program that sets boundaries for behavior in classrooms and during class activities, has cut discipline problems. At Highland, suspensions in 2005-06 numbered 19, down from 25 the year before. This year so far, six students have been suspended.

Highland’s focus on discipline can be seen everywhere, even on the floors. Two years ago the school painted lines of red arrows in the hallways. Now, students must follow the arrows as they travel throughout the school. There is no meandering. If they stray, teachers quickly point them back to the arrows.

“My first year here, the students ran the school,” said Ivan Brown, a fifth-grade teacher at Highland. “Once we got that shared vision, everybody got on board and said this is what we have to do, that’s what turned the school around.”

Last year, Highland’s reading score on CATS climbed from a 54.2 to a 66.2. School officials attribute the jump to the Reading Mastery program, which focuses on phonics, spelling and comprehension, and includes 90 minutes of reading instruction a day. Students are grouped by skill level, and their progress is tracked weekly.

“It wasn’t random acts of improvement. We moved from that to a much more laser-like focus,” said McCloud. “In other words, we calmed the chaos.”

A stable environment

Before these changes, school wasn’t as exciting, students say. Now students say they look forward to being rewarded for doing well on assignments and don’t act up in fear that these incentives will be taken away.

Daja Wheeler, 10, and Carah Rucks, 9, both fourth-graders, enjoy the constant praise and feedback they get from teachers.

“She kept on complimenting us for just doing good,” said Carah about her reading teacher. “We were better than all the other classes, she said.”

During a recent morning at Highland, students barely made a peep while eating breakfast. They then sat in neat rows waiting for their cue to stand. A few students took the stage with microphones and led the school in an animated recitation of the Pledge of Allegiance and the school’s mission statement. Energy filled the cafeteria when students shrilled the school song — “Tell me how you spell success? Everybody now!”

An awards ceremony was the highlight of the morning assembly. Students climbed onto the stage and received applause and a strand of colored beads for doing well on practice test questions.

Fourth-grader Brodrick White, 9, was one of a dozen students who received a silver beaded necklace for scoring high on a writing assessment. He wore the necklace all day and hoped to earn another one. If students earn 10 necklaces, they receive a special prize.

“It makes it more fun, and then the students, they like to have more fun, so they try to work harder … to get better stuff,” said Devon Averitt, 10, a fifth-grader, who earned a necklace.

At this point in my reading about the methodology of teaching reading it seems like it has come down to a pretty one sided debate between phonics and whole language. It is hard to ignore the chronological history of this debate and the system-wide failures of whole language. While phonics based curriculum has its share of failure, those are instances of individual students or small portions of the student body. The truth of the matter that as an educator in literacy its is impossible to ignore the success of phonics.

That being said I think that it is important to comment on a couple of important points that need to be recognized to contextualize the argument. In every article I have read where a phonics based curriculum, such as the Reading Mastery program cited in the article above, has replaced whole language or a derivative of whole language it has been accompanied by two identical variables that must be taken into account. First, in every single one of these cases the change in curriculum was accompanied by policy that mandated an effort to increase discipline and improved classroom management. In most cases this policy was implemented by a new administrative change whether it was a principal or new superintendent or overhaul of a school-board. The second correlative is the use of some sort of token reinforcement system where by students are given prizes or rewards for improvement and or good behavior. 

The fact that there was an emphasis placed on discipline through written policy and followed through with a concerted effert by the staff of these schools cannot be overlooked. I am sure that the test scores would not have improved as greatly without the change to phonics but also believe that just by increasing discipline and taking control of educational situation that the culture was changed in these schools. Through this change academics were again put in focus and alot of the outside distraction was eliminated. We must also state that most of the phonics based curriculum is backed with an proganizational plan that forces and carries proped classroom management. In other words lesson are more planned, more structured and teachers become better managers of there classroom. Whether you choose to believe this or not it has been my experience that when a group of students is disciplined and lead by an individual who is organized, prepared, and “with it” in the educational setting, they have better moral and thus are in a frame of mind better suited to learn and achieve.

The other issue of token reinforcement must be taken into account when looking at results and the correlation involved in the change to phonics. It is easy to see how token reinforcement could be viewed as only a positive. Children are learning as a result of it, their grades are improving, the classroom is much more manageable, and schools results on standardized tests are being affected in a positive way.  When we look at this system through a more critical lens is when we see the flaws. One problem with token reinforcement is that hide or camouflages the poor skills and management of some of the teachers using it. The teachers don’t have the benefit to see how the curriculum, material, and lesson is truly reaching the student and thus these things aren’t tweaked, improved, or eliminated. Another problem is this leads to learning that is extrinsically motivated in nature. The students are not fostering a genuine interest in learning, developing strategies to solve problems, or gaining the proper intention of the life skills of respect, discipline, or understanding. They are instead just trying to earn the tokens, rewards or prizes accompanied with good grades and behavior. If and when these prizes are removed from the equation then many of these students will regress back to bad behavior and/or stagnate at the current academic ability.  

Most often in the current educational culture of standardized testing we look at what method is being used or what the curriculum includes but what is being overlooked are basic fundamentals of teaching. Terms such as management, discipline, and bearing are overlooked. These characteristics lead to a withitness the teacher possesses. To be able take control of a classroom and lead students through a lesson in a stable and organized way are skills and traits that need to be acknowledged and emphasized as much as the pedagogy being used.  

Brandenton Herald
Exemplary elementary
By Raviya H. Ismail
March 11, 2007