The Assignment
Summarize the article by answering the three questions listed below. Each question should have an answer that has a minimum of 5 sentences. Please make sure you read the statement on Plagiarism. Also, do not copy and paste the article- that is plagiarism.
1. What is the main focus of the article? What is the “problem” with rules?
2. What are three strategies that are discussed in the article? How can teachers move from rules to
guidelines?
3. How will you implement the strategies/ideas (from paragraph 2) when working with children? How will you implement this new knowledge into your classroom?
Article Link: Guidance Matters.docx
(If you have difficulty accessing this pdf, contact your instructor for assistance)
Grading Criteria
The summary is graded on a 100 point scale. Maximum points are given when length of 3 paragraphs with each paragraph containing a minimum of 5 sentences is met and content summarizes key strategies to use with young children and families.
20 points – Three paragraphs are included, each paragraph has a minimum of five sentences
20 points – First paragraph summarizes the main focus of the article
30 points – Second paragraph summarizes three strategies from the article.
30 points – Third paragraph gives specific strategies/ideas you will use when working with young children.
Points are deducted for errors in grammar and spelling. Also noted is clarity of the summary and students comprehension of the content.
56 Young Children • January 2012
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From Rules to Guidelines
Dan Gartrell
Guidance Matters
Moving to the Positive
At the end of a wing in an elementary school, a prekindergarten class walks past primary grade classrooms four times a day. The preschoolers have trouble remembering not to talk. With doors open due to the school’s old air conditioning system, their chatter distracts the primary children and their teachers. The principal discusses the problem with Renilda and Cathi, the pre-K teachers. They agree to figure out a way to have the preschoolers walk in line more quietly. Renilda recalls a group punishment from her own schooldays—when some children talked in line, the entire class had to “practice” walking up and down the hall five times in complete silence. Renilda shares with Cathi how she still feels bummed out about the experi- ence—she wasn’t one of the ones talking—and how negative the class felt toward the “talkers” and upset they were with the teacher. Not wanting to introduce the nega- tive dynamics of group punishment in their classroom, the two teachers hold a class meeting. They matter-of-factly explain the problem to the children and ask what would help them remember to walk quietly. The teachers acknowledge each idea the children offer. One child says, “We could be mommy and daddy elephants. We have to tiptoe so we don’t wake the babies.” Everyone likes this idea, and they decide to try it. As the children line up the next day, the teachers ask them if they remember how they are going to walk quietly. The children remember. When the class tiptoes by the principal’s office, he
Dan Gartrell, EdD, is emeritus professor of early childhood and foundations educa- tion at Bemidji State University in northern Minnesota. A former Head Start teacher, Dan is the author of The Power of Guidance, A Guidance Approach for the Encour- aging Classroom and What the Kids Said Today. Please send possible guidance anecdotes and other comments to dgartrell@ bemidjistate.edu. Portions of this article originally appeared in Exchange magazine (July/August 2010; www.ChildCareExchange.com). A study guide for this article is available through www.naeyc.org/memberlogin. This column is also available in an online archive at www.naeyc.org/yc/columns. Guidance Matters has a new schedule. It appears in the January, May, and Sep- tember issues of Young Children.
notices them and declares, “I like how you boys and girls are walking quietly down the hall.” “Shh,” one child says, “you’ll wake the babies.”
The problem with rules
Think about the likely differences in learning climate in these settings:
• One classroom has the rule, “No talk- ing in line.” Another has the guideline, “We are quiet in line so we don’t wake the babies” (or with older students, “ . . . so we don’t bother children in other classrooms”).
• One classroom has the rule, “Don’t hand in work with careless mistakes.” Another has the guideline, “Mistakes are okay. We just need to learn from them.”
In a Young Children article worth revisiting, Wien (2004) makes the case that rules tend not to be helpful in
early childhood communities. Rules are usually stated as negatives. In fact, the way most rules are worded, it seems as if adults expect children to break them (Wien 2004). For example, with the rule “No hitting,” teachers often feel pressure to be hypervigilant for this behavior, and then basically can only ignore the behavior or pun- ish the child when it happens—lim- ited options indeed. Even when rules are not totally negative, such as “Be nice to your friends,” they may have an unspoken “or else” implication in teachers’ minds. When an adult enforces rules with children, the children know they have done something wrong. However, the negative experience in rule enforce- ment does not teach them what to do instead (Readdick & Chapman 2000); for example, “You know the rule, no hitting! Go to the time-out chair.” Busy with enforcement, adults easily forget the importance of teaching children positive strategies like using words or walking away as alternatives to hurt- ing a classmate. Rules can cause teachers to label children, lump them in groups, and enforce rules accordingly: be lenient with the “good children,” who mostly obey rules, and be strict with the “naughty children,” who often break rules. Studies show that children
frequently subjected to punitive rule enforcement feel rejected, develop negative self-images, and may have long-term problems with aggressive- ness in school and life (Ladd 2008; Ettekal & Ladd 2009). Professor Gary Ladd, at Arizona State University, and his associates have conducted landmark studies on the long-term impact of rejection on young children (Ladd 2006; Buhs, Ladd, & Herald-Brown 2010). Such children are rejected by peers, who are bothered by their classmate’s aggression, and by teachers, who pun- ish the children for breaking the rules. (Remember that time-out is really temporary expulsion from the group [Readdick & Chapman 2000].) Rules tend to reduce teaching to law enforcement. A rule-enforcement orientation can make teachers stricter than they really want to be (Gartrell 2010a). A joke about this is the teacher who meant only “not to smile until Christmas”—but didn’t smile for 30 years! Over those years, what are the implications for the groups this adult leads? For the teacher’s aspira- tions to be a positive professional?
Toward guidelines
The purpose of having guidelines is to teach children to use them. For instance, with the guideline “We are friendly with our mates,” the adult can calm down an upset child, then teach the child how to use friendlier words to express her feelings. (This teaching is built on a positive adult-child rela- tionship that the adult is always work- ing to improve [Watson 2003].) In this sense, guidelines are not just “permis- sive rules”—a common misperception (Gartrell 2010a). When there is danger of harm, teachers must be firm—but firm and friendly, not firm and harsh. Techniques like guidance talks and conflict mediation work well, along with class meetings, in the firm but friendly teaching of guidelines (Gartrell 2010a). The expectation is that children live up to guidelines all the time, not just sometimes. Guidelines identify classroom stan- dards that teachers assist children (and other adults in the classroom) to learn and to use. When adults model positive expec- tations, they teach children the skills
they need for civil living (Copple & Bredekamp 2009). From the guideline “We are friendly with our mates,” a child extrapolates saying, “Please share the markers.” Perhaps with a teacher looking on, the comment invites dialogue and problem resolu- tion. This set of interactions sure beats demanding, refusing, grabbing, pushing away, and the teacher’s enforcing a “No fighting” rule. With infants and toddlers, guide- lines are expectations in teachers’ minds. Teachers consistently refer to and model them in teaching prosocial behaviors. An example is “Friendly touches, Freddie,” as the teacher helps Freddie give gentle pats to another child. With older children, writing and post- ing guidelines provides a functional literacy activity as well as a quick visual reminder. Just a few guidelines work well; one classroom (as men- tioned) had only one: “We are friendly with our mates.” (These teachers preferred the term mates, as in class- mates, to friends. They respected the children’s right to define their own friendships.)
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Young Children • January 2012
In the elementary grades, three or four guidelines work well (too many makes things complicated) (Gartrell 2010). Examples are
• We are friendly with others and ourselves.
• We solve problems together.
• Mistakes are okay. We just need to learn from them.
Class meetings
In the vignette Renilda and Cathi use a guidance fundamental, the class meeting, to engage children in work- ing with guidelines. Teachers remark that solutions to problems reached through class meetings—such as tip- toeing like mommy and daddy ele- phants—are frequently more creative than what they themselves might have come up with (Gartrell 2010b). Class meetings can involve children in set- ting new guidelines and re-teach the use of existing ones (Gartrell 2006). Teachers often hold class meetings at the beginning of the year to invite the group to develop a few overall guide- lines (Vance & Jimenez Weaver 2002). Class meetings empower children to be contributing citizens of a learning community, work together to attain a sense of belonging, and develop indi- vidual responsibility (Vance & Jimenez Weaver 2002; DeVries & Zan 2003).
Toward the positive
As I see it, moving to the posi- tive requires an attitude shift by the teacher from being a technician to being a professional. A technician operates with the ongoing mission of rule enforcement. In contrast, a teacher who is a professional continu- ously makes judgments about situ- ations based on a mission to under- stand and guide—a mission greatly aided by the use of guidelines that transcend rules and their baggage. In the process of becoming more effective professionals, teachers need to trust in and refine their developing skills of observation, communication, and relationship building. Change, which often takes some courage, begins within the mind of the teacher. Adults learn even as they teach, and that is a good thing—for the children and for the adults.
References Buhs, E.S., G.W. Ladd, & S.L. Herald-Brown. 2010. “Victimization and Exclusion: Links to Peer Rejection, Classroom Engagement, and Achievement.” Handbook of Bullying in Schools: An International Perspective, eds. S.R. Jimerson, S.M. Swearer, & D.L. Espelage. New York: Routledge.
Copple, C., & S. Bredekamp, eds. 2009. Develop- mentally Appropriate Practice in Early Child- hood Programs Serving Children from Birth through Age 8. 3rd ed. Washington, DC: NAEYC.
DeVries, R., & B. Zan. 2003. “When Children Make Rules.” Educational Leadership 61 (1): 22–29.
Ettekal, I., & G.W. Ladd. 2009. “The Stability of Aggressive Behavior toward Peers as a Pre- dictor of Externalizing Problems from Child- hood through Adolescence.” Handbook of Aggressive Behavior Research, eds. C. Quinn & S. Tawse. Hauppauge, NY: Nova Science Publishers.
Gartrell, D. 2006. “The Beauty of Class Meet- ings.” Guidance Matters. Young Children 61 (6): 54–55.
Gartrell, D. 2010a. A Guidance Approach for the Encouraging Classroom. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth/Cengage.
Gartrell, D. 2010b. “Beyond Rules to Guidelines.” ChildCare Exchange (July/August): 52–56.
Kontos, S., & A. Wilcox-Herzog. 1997. “Teach- ers’ Interactions with Children: Why Are They So Important?” Young Children 52 (2): 4–12.
Ladd, G.W. 2006. “Peer Rejection, Aggressive or Withdrawn Behavior, and Psychological Maladjustment from Ages 5 to 12: An Exami- nation of Four Predictive Models.” Child Development 77 (4): 822–46.
Ladd, G.W. 2008. “Social Competence and Peer Relations: Significance for Young Children and Their Service Providers.” Early Child- hood Services 2 (3):129–48.
Readdick, C.A., & P.L. Chapman. 2000. “Young Children’s Perceptions of Time Out.” Journal of Research in Childhood Education 15 (1): 81–87.
Vance, E., & P. Jimenez Weaver. 2002. Class Meetings: Solving Problems Together. Wash- ington, DC: NAEYC.
Watson, M. 2003. “Attachment Theory and Challenging Behaviors: Reconstructing the Nature of Relationships.” Young Children 58 (4): 12–20.
Wien, C.A. 2004. “From Policing to Participation: Overturning the Rules and Creating Amiable Classrooms.” Young Children 59 (1): 34–40.
Copyright © 2012 by the National Association for the Education of Young Children. See Permissions and Reprints online at www.naeyc.org/yc/permissions
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