Tuesday, April 26, 2005
All you need is Love (in St. Petersburg)
What kind of society do we live in that we can build schools, write curricula, develop policies for delivering those curricula and educating students and then forget that the students we are teaching are our own precious children?
If you look at the videos that accompany this article about the poor 5-year-old who was handcuffed in St. Petersburg because of her behavior, you see teachers using "behavior management strategies" with this distressed child. Presumably they are following district policy when they call the police to further control the child.
The police abruptly alter the mood by barging in and grabbing the girl by the arms and slapping the 'cuffs on her. Two of the police are rookies on their first day. Hooray! It's their first collar! I'm sure the sarge will excuse them if they are a little over zealous about bringing the bad guy - uh - girl in chains . . .
As if it isn't already a tragedy, the deepest tragedy of all is that no one in the video seems to really care about this little girl. A child this angry has a 'hurt' inside trying to get out - - she is crying out not for harsh words and management techniques but for love. Never once did we hear from the adults in the room in their words or their tone of voice any indication of sympathy for the struggle that that little girl was going through. They were so tied up in getting their techniques right that they forgot that this little girl was a human being needing love and nurturing, someone far more fragile than that porcelain apple she broke.
The handcuffs the police put on this girl were only physical symbols of the emotional handcuffs this poor child was living with in this sterile environment.
Pray that it changes for her.
If you look at the videos that accompany this article about the poor 5-year-old who was handcuffed in St. Petersburg because of her behavior, you see teachers using "behavior management strategies" with this distressed child. Presumably they are following district policy when they call the police to further control the child.
The police abruptly alter the mood by barging in and grabbing the girl by the arms and slapping the 'cuffs on her. Two of the police are rookies on their first day. Hooray! It's their first collar! I'm sure the sarge will excuse them if they are a little over zealous about bringing the bad guy - uh - girl in chains . . .
As if it isn't already a tragedy, the deepest tragedy of all is that no one in the video seems to really care about this little girl. A child this angry has a 'hurt' inside trying to get out - - she is crying out not for harsh words and management techniques but for love. Never once did we hear from the adults in the room in their words or their tone of voice any indication of sympathy for the struggle that that little girl was going through. They were so tied up in getting their techniques right that they forgot that this little girl was a human being needing love and nurturing, someone far more fragile than that porcelain apple she broke.
The handcuffs the police put on this girl were only physical symbols of the emotional handcuffs this poor child was living with in this sterile environment.
Pray that it changes for her.
# posted by Michael Christopher : 2:38 AM
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