Very very true and interestingly the restrictions on children for compliance increase as they get older when you’d think that we’d recognise that they are developing some control as they grow up. Look at any early years classroom and the 4-5 year olds have autonomy to choose who to play with, what to play with and for how long for the majority of their day. Hit Y1 and this instantly decreases. Fast forward to Y6 and children have to ask to leave their seat to sharpen a pencil. Move into secondary school and its detention for having the wrong shoes. Where did that autonomy go? We bred it out of them by our requirement for ‘behaviour management’ in classrooms and our lack of trust in their ability. If we want our young people to be high flyers, they need to experience and be ok with making mistakes along the way rather than assuming everything has only one correct answer. We need to teach them to be curious, explore and get things wrong, then ask why and help each other. Sadly far too few schools offer that process to our teenagers who are at a stage where they need it as much as the children in early years do.
As a former classroom teacher and a current home educator, I discovered that we don't even need to teach young people those things. They're born curious. We just need to give them a supportive environment and get out of the way.
100% to all this. I was quietly rebellious in years ten and eleven--I complied with all the rules but disengaged and stopped applying myself. I used to think this was an indication that I had a problem with authority, but now I realise it was a problem with passivity and being patronised. University was a revelation, as I was finally given back responsibility and choice over my learning!
I try and teach my adolescent students how to be independently accountable and integrity. It requires me to let go of trying to control every move they make, allowing them to mess up sometimes, and be held accountable.
My biggest struggle is how students can re-earn my trust after repeatedly breaking it. How can I trust students when I’ve been burned so many times? How do you handle this with teenagers?
I completely agree with the sentiment here. A fantastic headteacher I worked with once said that for him, compliance was the lowest level of desirable behaviour. He wanted children to be empowered to think critically, question, and challenge the world around them, including within the school. Sadly, this was eight years ago, and it feels very much at odds with the current climate.
Very very true and interestingly the restrictions on children for compliance increase as they get older when you’d think that we’d recognise that they are developing some control as they grow up. Look at any early years classroom and the 4-5 year olds have autonomy to choose who to play with, what to play with and for how long for the majority of their day. Hit Y1 and this instantly decreases. Fast forward to Y6 and children have to ask to leave their seat to sharpen a pencil. Move into secondary school and its detention for having the wrong shoes. Where did that autonomy go? We bred it out of them by our requirement for ‘behaviour management’ in classrooms and our lack of trust in their ability. If we want our young people to be high flyers, they need to experience and be ok with making mistakes along the way rather than assuming everything has only one correct answer. We need to teach them to be curious, explore and get things wrong, then ask why and help each other. Sadly far too few schools offer that process to our teenagers who are at a stage where they need it as much as the children in early years do.
As a former classroom teacher and a current home educator, I discovered that we don't even need to teach young people those things. They're born curious. We just need to give them a supportive environment and get out of the way.
100% to all this. I was quietly rebellious in years ten and eleven--I complied with all the rules but disengaged and stopped applying myself. I used to think this was an indication that I had a problem with authority, but now I realise it was a problem with passivity and being patronised. University was a revelation, as I was finally given back responsibility and choice over my learning!
I try and teach my adolescent students how to be independently accountable and integrity. It requires me to let go of trying to control every move they make, allowing them to mess up sometimes, and be held accountable.
My biggest struggle is how students can re-earn my trust after repeatedly breaking it. How can I trust students when I’ve been burned so many times? How do you handle this with teenagers?
It's very surprising how adults believe they know better, while in reality we don't. We're here to monitor, be facilitators not lecturers.
I completely agree with the sentiment here. A fantastic headteacher I worked with once said that for him, compliance was the lowest level of desirable behaviour. He wanted children to be empowered to think critically, question, and challenge the world around them, including within the school. Sadly, this was eight years ago, and it feels very much at odds with the current climate.