A teacher can rouse indiscipline among students
Apr 07, 2009
Students misbehave for various reasons. They will rebel, threaten others, refuse to study, insult and bully others, or even burn school property.
BY RONALD OMARA
Students misbehave for various reasons. They will rebel, threaten others, refuse to study, insult and bully others, or even burn school property.
Some are brought up badly, naturally problematic or social misfits. But sometimes teachers are to blame for such kinds of behaviour. How to control mischief:
- Reluctance to enforce rules and regulations gives students room to misbehave. Some teachers leave the responsibility of discipline to the disciplinary master or administrators. In their absence, the school could degenerate into chaos. Every teacher must be a disciplinarian for students to take them seriously.
- Inflicting excessive physical pain like whipping can have reverse effect on a child. Inappropriate disciplinary action is eventually perceived as torture instead of a disciplinary measure. It is important that punishments are commensurate with the offences, explained and understood by the culprit.
- Ridiculing students in public causes them to feel small and unimportant. One can decide to be rebellious or insolent as a result. A student might decide to insult a teacher, to revenge for being treated ‘unfairly’.
Other times, the student withdraws or stops participating in class. Students should be reprimanded in private and only punished in public to deter others from indiscipline.
- A constant display of anger and impatience portrays intolerance to students. Students avoid teachers they deem unapproachable, while others make fun of them.
- A teacher should not hold a grudge against his students. Real or perceived, it portrays an image of immaturity and could cause students to disrespect him. Do not hang onto a students’ past mistakes. discipline them and let go of the past.
- Lack of enthusiasm rubs off on students. When a teacher is lazy to mark students’ work, they follow suit. The same applies to absenteeism. A teacher cannot discipline absentee students when he gives a bad example.
- Dwelling on students’ failure destroys their character and the teacher’s. Give students hope, even when you have your doubts and support them. They will appreciate your belief in them and probably would not forget your help when hope was out of the door.
- Expecting so much from students is disheartenening. Expressions such as “You should know this,†“How can you ask such a silly question?†or “where have you been?†cause students to avoid asking questions.
- Giving tests and assignments while expecting students to fail is despairing. It is even worse when a teacher brags about it.
It paints a sadistic impression of the teacher, and demoralises students, causing them to dodge tests and assignments.
- Set tasks for assessment, not malice.
Students are usually observant and what they do not see, they speculate about.
Quote of the day:
“Don’t try to fix the students, fix ourselves first. The good teacher makes the poor student good and the good student superior. When our students fail, we, as teachers have failed. — Marva Collins
Students misbehave for various reasons. They will rebel, threaten others, refuse to study, insult and bully others, or even burn school property.
Some are brought up badly, naturally problematic or social misfits. But sometimes teachers are to blame for such kinds of behaviour. How to control mischief:
- Reluctance to enforce rules and regulations gives students room to misbehave. Some teachers leave the responsibility of discipline to the disciplinary master or administrators. In their absence, the school could degenerate into chaos. Every teacher must be a disciplinarian for students to take them seriously.
- Inflicting excessive physical pain like whipping can have reverse effect on a child. Inappropriate disciplinary action is eventually perceived as torture instead of a disciplinary measure. It is important that punishments are commensurate with the offences, explained and understood by the culprit.
- Ridiculing students in public causes them to feel small and unimportant. One can decide to be rebellious or insolent as a result. A student might decide to insult a teacher, to revenge for being treated ‘unfairly’.
Other times, the student withdraws or stops participating in class. Students should be reprimanded in private and only punished in public to deter others from indiscipline.
- A constant display of anger and impatience portrays intolerance to students. Students avoid teachers they deem unapproachable, while others make fun of them.
- A teacher should not hold a grudge against his students. Real or perceived, it portrays an image of immaturity and could cause students to disrespect him. Do not hang onto a students’ past mistakes. discipline them and let go of the past.
- Lack of enthusiasm rubs off on students. When a teacher is lazy to mark students’ work, they follow suit. The same applies to absenteeism. A teacher cannot discipline absentee students when he gives a bad example.
- Dwelling on students’ failure destroys their character and the teacher’s. Give students hope, even when you have your doubts and support them. They will appreciate your belief in them and probably would not forget your help when hope was out of the door.
- Expecting so much from students is disheartenening. Expressions such as “You should know this,†“How can you ask such a silly question?†or “where have you been?†cause students to avoid asking questions.
- Giving tests and assignments while expecting students to fail is despairing. It is even worse when a teacher brags about it.
It paints a sadistic impression of the teacher, and demoralises students, causing them to dodge tests and assignments.
- Set tasks for assessment, not malice.
Students are usually observant and what they do not see, they speculate about.
Quote of the day:
“Don’t try to fix the students, fix ourselves first. The good teacher makes the poor student good and the good student superior. When our students fail, we, as teachers have failed. — Marva Collins