Teachers of MN help !!!

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DS 6.2, yr2. Basically gets onto sad side at school too often in my opinion - often (if I believe him) for not doing what he should be as he's worried, Tom, Dick and Harry aren't doing it and will get into trouble.

These children get sad sided too - mostly not being quick enough to put a book back, wash hands and be sat down. He then goes to get them as they'll get into trouble and ends up there too.

I always back up the school when he moans about it but I'm a bit ed that Monday he got moved down 2 spaces for talking and the boy he was talking too/with didn't and this was the same punishment a girl got last Friday for kicking him in the head during Golden Time.

Please help me, What can I say to get him to stop it?

What a ridiculous system. I'd get the school to stop it not him. Can't the teacher have a kindly and explanatory chat with him?

I don't like the system but its the schools choice so unfortunatly can't change it. In yr R they went straight to cloud and I was shocked that they could tidy pencils to move back up. I would have thought that correcting the behaviour should get moved up and moving up automatically when behaviours are done spontanously. In YR 1 and YR 2 there are 3 'sad' ways to move down and 1 happy side which I've always felt unbalanced and it seems it leads to sad side for undesirable things - such as daudling (sp?) but little scope for positive reinforcement. There fore I nee advice as to what I can say to him beyond 'concentrate on what your doing'

TBH, when my dc were (briefly) in a school that had systems like that, I told them to just ignore it as it was just plain silly. I said that unfortunately schools, like life, had good bits and bad bits and they just had to put up with the bad bits, but it didn't stop them being downright silly nonsense.

So shoot me.

I'm glad as I'm on the verge of telling DS the same thing. The teacher he had Monday seems to have an issue with DS (actualy pretty much told me one day she didn't like him) and she seems to go into punishing him all guns blazing.

Good. Because also, if you don't, they live in a weird psychological double think land which does em no good in the end.

My dd had a teacher one year (who I liked on a personal level) but who was so obsessed with discipline that she would spend the entire PE lesson making them line up quietly to do PE, except that of course they never got to the PE bit. They were all of 6.

And don't get me started on the whole clap clap click click thing to get them to pay attention. Every fucking five minutes, drove me insane.

have you been into school to talk about htis? it's the only way really. Non- confrontational, pleasant but assertive. And don't paint him as an angel becasue for 50% of the time he might just be guitly.
I am a teacher.

Oh god he's no angel he's a 6yo boy .

I did go in last year when DS came home with glue all up the back of his jumper and was upset as he'd been on sad side for it. Turned out that boy had done it too him and he'd retaliated - he'd been only one in trouble.

Parents eve next week so will discuss it with teacher.

It sounds like a rather inconsistent system if deliberate kicks in the head have the same consequence as talking!

Until next week's parents' evening I would encourage your DS to do all he can to follow instructions immediately and to let others make their own decisions about their behaviour i.e. don't go and hurry them up because that means 4 people get 'sad sides' whereas it may have only needed to be 3. Explain to him that you will ask her to explain the system to you next week and that hopefully that will help make things clearer.

At parents' evening ask the teacher about strategies for helping your DS to remain on the 'happy' bit. I would try to avoid explaining away his off-task behaviour and focus instead on the specific things the teacher is looking for in order to reward your DS (and others). At the same time ask if she would give you a copy of the behaviour policy so that you can go through it with your son (the relevant bits, obviously) to help him appreciate that just as he has to stick to rules at school, so too does his teacher and so if he chooses to engage in X behaviour he is, in essence, making a choice to accept Y consequence from his teacher no matter how unfair it may feel.

Such a request will either prompt her to look a bit harder for the times that your DS is doing the right thing or to challenge a policy that gives greater emphasis to negative behaviours than to positive. If she doesn't give you a copy of the policy ask at the office. I don't particularly like the behaviour system at my current school but I stick with that as a method of dealing with negative behaviour and have introduced my own systems for reinforcing and rewarded positive behaviour. That may be an option for your DS's teacher but she mayn't realise/have the confidence to do so/ask about it until she's challenged.

Thanks SE13. Thats exactly my line of thinking - a reward chart for following an instruction and completing it. DS does find it hard to follow more than one instruction so sometimes is generally just inability oppossed to naughtyness iyswim.

Love the idea of explaining 4 instead of 3 on sad side - he will get that if explained in terms of numbers. (he's a mathematical thinker).

I will difinatly question the equal punishment thing especially as DS has questioned me about this and I at least owe him an informed answer.

I was told by head DS would get a sticker chart in January of yr R (nearly 2 yrs ago) and everytime they complain about his behaviour I mention it but they never do it.

DS is the DepHT so could probably have some input in changing the system but the school just love it.

I didn't mention a reward chart!?! That's one thing I avoid wherever possible. I tend to use raffle tickets as a whole class incentive; anyone who's spotted doing the right thing is identified, "X, that's a raffle ticket". They take a raffle ticket from their own stash and put it in a box on my desk. Then, on a Friday I draw two names from the box and those two children get to choose some tat from a prize box. It works on two levels, firstly the reinforcing of a desired behaviour but secondly by teaching children that if they do the right thing more often they will be noticed/rewarded more often and so stand a greater chance of their name being drawn from the raffle. It helps for teaching probability too! Children who need extra encouragement often appreciate the tangiable nature of moving a ticket from A to B and can also be set a target of 5/10/whatever tickets to be gained in a day. I have set up 'deals' whereby children report the daily raffle ticket total to their parents who then reward them if they've met their target. It's crucial that raffle tickets are never taken away as it then reinforces the wrong behaviour.

If your DS's teacher didn't want to do a whole class system it would be easy enough to have tickets for your DS which he could be awarded, with a target set. At the end of each day you could find out how many he's got and if he's met his target, could reward him at home too.

By using this system I can ignore a lot of unwanted behaviour. The phrase, "that's a raffle ticket for X, Y and Z" is far more powerful than, "sad side for A, B, C (and D because you're interfering...again!)". The children whose parents are going to additionally reward X raffle tickets will often modify their behaviour far more rapidly if s/he believes there might be a ticket in it.

That's my experience anyway.

Love the raffle ticket idea - thats brilliant

Actually can see your point about the reward chart - I am fully supporting the positive at home and the negative as well. He gets 50p from me when he gets onto the wow side which he uses to buy some stickers, or will save towards a toy he really wants.

I am lucky that at home he's well behaved and if he doesn't listen then a simple 'if you do it again your lose computer time' is enough warning for him. Then again he's an only child and I'm a single parent so the waiting and interferring aren't really relevant at home iyswim.