Yr 1 - reward and de-merit system????

[beagle101]

My DD has just started year 1 and her new teacher (who is newly qualified - not that I am making a point about that just mentioning incase this is some new education philosophy that I don't know about!) has set up this huge landscape wallchart in the classroom.

The class is a mixed class of year 1 & 2

Each child is represented on the chart by a balloon face and they start up in the sky near the top of the chart - if they break a rule or talk (God knows what rules although I do know 'talking too loudly' is one that moves you down a level) they are made to get up from their seat and move their balloon face down the board towards the mud at the bottom. If they do really good work they get to go and move their balloon face up.

Kids who are in the stars at the top of this lovely landscape get the whole of 'golden time'- where they can choose a fun activity those further down the chart have their time reduced with those in the mud at the bottom getting no 'golden time'.

On Friday there were 3 kids (all Yr1 rather than Yr2)at the bottom of the chart who had to literally sit and watch the other kids playing. It wasn't my DD but I am absolutely HORRIFIED that such a system could be implemented.

A few of the other parents have expressed unease about this and DH and I are thinking of going in and speaking to the teacher and probably Head about this - surely this system is just humiliating for the kids in the mud - making them move their face things down in front of other kids and it teaches really unpleasant thing to all of the others.

It strikes me as just a really lazy way to impose rule obeyance and doesn't take account of the differences in children - am I wrong is this some new educational philosophy thing - what do others think?

Thanks!

Eeew - another one here who doesn't like the name. Sounds vaguely pornographic to me!

and

I have just read the socialogical perspectives on school and education(reid 1978) Most sociologists would agree that education esp in state schools is more about educating children to grow up and adapt to the sociological norms within society.Indeed many believe that the capitalist society requires well adapted workers more than non-conformist intellectuals.

In a private montessori school where the ethos is somewhat different it is to be expected that almost all issues are dealt with differently.

I agree with pixie, school should mirror society in its most civilised form.School is a place that shapes a child's understanding on many levels including behaviour. Of course it is better to treat the cause but in some situations that might require more skills than teachers have. I trained first as a social worker and my feeling is that teachers should be allowed to teach, if a child has more profound difficulties they should be tackled at root cause, usually at home. That is not a task for the education system.

Therefore teachers need to be free to use, consistent and easilly understood systems to reward behaviour, but equally to ensure a child understands the consequences of bad behaviour. In society we are eventually judged not by teachers but by our peers. No child likes to be judged by it's peers, but neither do we but it is a fact of life. So yes it also matters that the chart is easily visable to all children. As regards Golden time, does it matter, it's pedantic to worry about terminology, the children don't have problems with it, should we?

I don't like the traffic light style disapline sytems personally (as a TA ) as I think it relies on the teacher enfourcing it where as disapline is a whole team thing.

Having got over my inital shock at the whole system (and now read up about this circle time and golden time philosophy) I do understand the idea of rewards and consequences and I also understand the need for the teacher to be able to easily deal with behaviour problems but I really still think that many places are not implementing golden time properly - I read all the stuff from Jenny Mosely's site and message boards (creator of golden time) and it strikes me that the system probably is a really useful and good way to reward beviour and allow children to choose to behave BUT at my DD's school 3 yr 1's were able to loss ALL golden time in the first week of school and were made to sit and watch their peers for half an hour having fun - this is after being made to walk to the front of the class and move their little face things down into mud - okay yes let's teach children that behaviour has consequences but I can't think this level of humiliation is what circle time or golden time is about?

Yes, vesela, re staffing it was at pre-school.

The problem with rewards even more so than sanctions is that children expect a reward for what is essentially normal behaviour. If I do some cooking I need to clean up my mess. I don't get a badge for it. So why do pupils get rewards to helping to tidy up? Tidying up's just a part of life.

OTOH my daughter gave up her playtime today to be with a younger boy who was being excluded from a game by some children in her class because of his age. That was because she wanted to, and I am very proud of her. But that kind of thing goes unnoticed by the teachers. The reward for her is how she feels in herself about helping - so why reward something that is just the right thing to do? One teacher is so bad at remembering to give out 'citizenships' that every child who takes the register to the office gets one.

Every term the child with the most 'citizenships' gets a special award for being 'a kind, caring and helpful member of our school community and an example that all children should aspire to'. Dd1 had to sit there and watch one of her bullies get this award because the girl in question happens to be good at pleasing her teacher (and in case this sounds like sour grapes I wasn't the only parent to comment on this ).

As for 'Golden time', I have no problem with downtime on a Friday, so long as it isn't a reward and it isn't used to punish children by exclusion.

Beagle, that is shocking.

I'd really speak to the head asap.

Pixie - I've got a DD who's 3.

spiritmum, I completely agree with you on the "it's just part of life, get on and do it" thing. I think you need to expect that sort of behaviour, not buy it with rewards.

Also agree with downtime that's just downtime (like icecreams that are just icecreams, and stickers that are just stickers).

beagle101, if it's being implemented like that I reckon you have a good case for having a word without causing a revolution!

I totally agree with the idea of golden time.I think it is only right that the children who have controlled themselves well and behaved well all week should be rewarded for it.
(What I didn't agree with was at DD1s old school was that she told one of her peers that she didn't really like golden time.This child told the teacher and DD got in trouble for it because 'the teacher had put a lot of work into it!' That's one of the reasons it's now her 'old' school!

Spiritmum, I am really shocked, not by the system of rewards or punishments but by the fact that parents discuss other peoples children. That is horrendous

Minimaths, I take your point, but my dd was being bullied, and so was my friend's dd, and then we watched the bully get an award for being a good and helpful citizen.

Do you not think that sends out a mixed message?

And FWIW all the mums I know talk about other children, because we have girls, and their friendships are far from straightforward, and it is helpful to know who is being excluded this week, who is being teased for being 'uncool', and what (if anything) is being done about it.

And right now I'm beating myself up about not telling a mum I saw her dd being punched in the stomach by another girl when I should have done.

I meant to add that talking about other children does not mean judging them. It's possible to share information without being judgey. They are children.

Spiritmum, sorry I had no idea, I have boys. Maybe you should speak to the teacher. The teacher is guilty only of not seeing through the manipulative behaviour of the bully child. As for girls punching others, thats terrible. Actually I would be inclined to speak to the school about that while I was there.

I still find it shocking though that parents discuss who gets rewards, or reading levels or indeed anything to do with other peoples children.

That is v. nice about the boy at playtime, btw.

Citizenships?!!

Oh, Mini, I would never talk about academic stuff with other parents, not even my own dc's levels. Generally I steer clear of the reward thing too, but I admit this did make me a bit .

I have a ds too and even at 4 he's just soooooooooo much more straightforward.

As for the punching incident, that happened at a party, so not within the school's juristiction.

Golly spirit, I am so glad I have boys. However the system itself is not really at fault, how consistent and fair the teacher gives rewards/sanctions is more significant. I run clubs and it's very difficult with girls as they do tend to tittle tattle. Its extremely important to have a simple way that is easily followed by the children, so that eventually most will self regulate their own behaviour. Unfortunately some children never do. Perhaps the little girl will have told her mother about the punching incident.

We have a system similar to that of Loudlass. All kids start on green at the beginning of the day. If they're really good they get to be a superstar. If they slip up they go down to yellow, then orange and then red which involves a trip to see the head.

They've also got a jar for marbles which, when full, will result in a treat for the whole class. The school have been somewhat reticent on what form this treat will take.

This year they've also added houses and house points again, nominally behaviourly linked but also for work, sports results and similar.

2 weeks into term and my ds has no idea which house he's in, the jar has got 3 marbles in it and ds has had 2 superstars and 3 greens and 5 yellows. He's thoroughly demoralised by the traffic light scheme and has not been incentivized by the marble jar or the house points.

Mr dd's school had golden time too. My dd rarely loses any. However, she made me laugh the other day when she said they watched a dvd for golden time and she had 1 minute of outdoor play on top! Bet she had loads of fun in that minute.

I have a golden cloud in my class and white ones with -5, -10, -20 mins on them. VERY useful for dealing with low level disruption for my year3/4 class. They don't need to remember why they have lost 5 mins on a Friday as they were told the reason when they moved down. The power of the system is that they can float back up for good behaviour/work or whatever it is you are looking for. The chd have to believe you will follow through with the sanction and to be honest once they understand you do then you find less and less chd lose any actual time when the others are having their "Golden Time".
Works really well with my chd and have never had a problem from any parent.