All right, maybe ‘torture’ is too strong a word, but it is the word that comes to mind when I see children struggling to learn, struggling to understand something, trying to please a teacher or a parent.
Teachers ‘torture’ children in classrooms. They don’t mean to but they do. They do it when they expect a child to learn when he or she does not have the skills they need to be able to learn.
For example; a six year old I worked with was about to be kicked out of school because his behavior was so bad. The teachers did not know what to do with him, he kept bothering other children, did not do what the playground assistants told him to do, and took ages to start doing his work. When he did start to work he would copy what other children were doing and seemed incapable of working on his own. The school was trying to help. He had extra support several times a week and, in a small group, seemed to be making some progress, but this never transfered back to the classroom.
His parents had been called into the office to discuss their son’s behavior and lack of progress. The implication was that the parents were allowing this child to run wild at home. Naturally, the boy’s parents were very upset. The boy was well behaved at home so they had no idea why he was having difficulties at school.
In the classroom the boy was being made to work at a desk that was away from the other children so that he did not disturb them, and he was kept in at recess if he had not done his work. These are regular classroom practices and will work with most children, but not with this boy. Whatever the teacher did to try to get him to settle down and work failed.
That was when I was asked to help. His parents wanted to know why their youngest child was causing problems in school.
What I discovered was that this boy had difficulties with understanding language. He could talk and chat with people on a social level, but he could not understand more complex language. He had very good visual skills and could understand some things he was told when he could see what the issue was, but when he had no visual references to use he had no idea what people were telling him.
Just think about that for a minute.
His teacher spent the day telling him what to do, and unless he could see what he had to do, he had no idea what she was talking about. Yet he was expected to do the work.
He wanted to be around other children because he had learned that if he watched what they were doing he had some idea of what he was supposed to do. Yet he was disciplined for bothering them.
He was disciplined for his bad behavior on the playground by the teacher in class, or the Principal in the school office. They told him why his behavior was unacceptable and how he had to stop doing it. Yet, because he could not see what they were talking about he had no idea what they were telling him.
This boy was trying hard to fit in, to be part of the class and to do what was expected of him. Yet, no matter what he did, it never seemed to please the teachers. Despite what it looked like, he was not being deliberately naughty, he was trying to make sense of his surroundings, and he was getting blamed for doing it.
Why do I say that we ‘torture’ our children? Because there are many children like this boy trying to learn without the skills to be able to do so. When we try to teach children without making sure that they know how to learn we are asking them to do something they can’t do. When they fail to learn because they can’t learn we call them lazy, or not motivated, or badly behaved.
In my long experience as a teacher I have met only a very few children who were truly lazy, unmotivated, or badly behaved. Most of the children I have worked with who acted that way were children who do not have the skills they need to be able to learn. They were like the boy described here, are trying to do their best, but unable to do what is asked of them because they do not have the skills they need to learn.
That is why I say we ‘torture’ our children. When they fail to make the grade, when they struggle to learn, we ask them to try harder, to spend more time studying, to remember more, to do it again, without even wondering if they have the skills they need to be able to learn we are asking them to do something they cannot do. We are not making sure that they have the tools they need to get the job done.
It is up to us, parents and teachers, to make sure that children have the learning tools they need before we blame them for not doing a good job.
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