FISH! and discipline in schools; questions from an Aussie grad student
Dear Steve,
I am writing to you from Perth, Western Australia about Fish in schools. I am currently undertaking a Graduate Diploma in Education Primary (Grades 1-7). I am highly interested in incorporating the Fish philosophy into my classroom next year. I have a couple of questions;
- How and what are the corrective strategies if discipline problems arise?
- Are there connections to more traditional discipline models or theories? I am specifically interested in what academic / professional support there is for this philosophy.
- Do you conduct road show training sessions in Australia?
I look forward to your reply.
Arletta Ralph
Grad.Dip.Edu. (Primary)
ECU, Joondalup campus
Steve (who's a little too busy right now to post this himself -- plus, he's a little bit of a Luddite) wrote back:
Thank you for your e-mail, I am eager to help you on your journey incorporating The FISH! Philosophy into your classroom. I've got responses to your questions along with some information I hope is helpful.
We'll start with question three.
At this time, we do not have any roadshow trainings planned in Australia, although I'd love the opportunity to come to Perth and meet with educators. We do have some US national events in the near future. If you want to come to Seattle in October or Florida in January, please go to www.fishforschools.com and click on national events for all the details. You'll notice that I've CC-ed a number of people. Each team member shares responsibility for everything from international distribution to producing events and providing service to education customers. Additionally, we have a distributor in Australia - Mind Resources.
Contact: Min Van Deursen at Phone: 61200-655-133.Question Two: The research support comes from a number of places. The following is a sampling of the research underpinnings of the FISH! For Schools program/curriculum. It is posted on our FISH! for Schools website in the Research area of Teacher Tools. The studies and works cited all contributed to the thinking and/or content of the staff development elements as well as the student lesson components.
Question One: As to the question of corrective strategies and discipline. FISH! For Schools was not designed as a discipline program, so there is not a prescription for corrective action. And, it was not intended to replace whatever structures schools already have in place. Rather, it should serve as a filter or enhancement to whatever discipline strategies already exist.
As an example, if a student fails to bring his homework for several days, there may be a consequence determined by the discipline code. My expectation is that because of FISH! For Schools, before the instructor chooses to mete out the consequence, she might approach the student and say, "I'm worried about you - Is everything okay?" This approach is responsive, not reactive, and it is focused on building a relationship that will enhance learning.
I'd love to explore all of this more and I know that there are others who would like to chime in or benefit from the conversation, so I am also including Griff Wigley, our web community guy. He may want to post elements of our conversation (but not without your okay) and get others involved.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Vicki Miles on
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Steve, Griff and Arletta,
We have used FISH to assist us with our whole school approach to Student Welfare (I'm very reluctant to even go near the word discipline!). We have engaged our whole student body in determining the values that our school holds we have 6 (these where determined in consultation with students, parents staff and our wider community). The FISH philosophy is the tool that we use to uphold the values. In each classroom the kids are introduced to the FISH principles one at a time, and each grade is asked to brainstorm what they think these would mean to us in our school. Kids are great at knowing exactly what is required (though not always good at doing). We then use these ideas as starting points in our conversations with kids that have not followed the principles........... eg: When you did that was it "making xxxx day?" "what could you have done to make their day" Remember at Trafalgar Primary we try to make people's day." We use the FISH language as much as possible with the kids, we reinforce through our actions and dialogue that we all expect the principles to be followed. Of course we also have rules, but again the kids devise them we have 5.
Our philosophy has changed from one of punishment to one of teaching. Raelee heard this great conversation once and it has stuck with us.........If a kid can't spell we teach it to spell, if it cant do maths then we teach maths, but if a kid cant behave we "punish"............our job as teachers is to teach kids to behave, they do this best in a environment that is consistent, patient, teaches strategies, and yes also enforces some consequence if the behaviour is too much............our behaviour records have decreased dramatically since we started down the track of Values and FISH!
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Permalink Reply by Griff Wigley on
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Interesting approach, Vicki. At what point are there consequences, though? Are kids held back from recess or made to stay after school or given cleanup jobs, for example?
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Griff,
We have a stepped series of consequences depending on what the actual behaviour is, of course behaviour that might include physical danger is dealt with at a higher level than running in the corridors (or some similar behaviour). I think what FISH has done though is help teachers understand that the punitive stuff that was being dished out is totally unnecessary.
For example When I first arrived at Trafalgar we had about a million rules (some written some just punishable even though they werent written) one of these was the proximity to the High School Fence (which shares our boundary) and then that morphed into any behaviour near the fence. One day a young child (who had constantly been in trouble for climbing the fence etc) was once again on the fence. I watched though as one of the staff called her over she said " Taylor, you were climbing on the fence." Taylors response was " Caleb dobbed on me" the teacher said to Taylor " Oh Caleb wasn't dobbing on you he was very worried about you, Caleb knows that climbing on the fence can be dangerous and he didn't want you to hurt yourself. Taylor please dont climb on the fence because we love having you at our school and we wouldn't want you to hurt yourself" She (the teacher) then turned to Caleb (who in fact was dobbing on Taylor) and said to him "thanks Caleb for caring so much about Taylor we really wouldnt want her to hurt herself." Both children in that encounter learned about the Principles of FISH, learned about why we really did have the "rule" and had made a very personal connection with that teacher. The difference between that encounter and the many times that Taylor had simply been told to get off the fence or put in "time out" because she had been on the fence was palpable. I'm not saying that a miracle was performed and that Taylor will not climb the fence, but I am saying that using FISH principles we can educate our kids rather than always choosing to punish them.
LIke in a family when the punishment does come however, both the kids and their parents know that its serious. I hope that helps explain it a little
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Permalink Reply by Larry Drucker on -
The responses to this question by Vicki are my vision of what FISH! will create in schools. Students and teachers will understand their commitment to each other rather than the traditional power role of the teacher. FISH! creates an atmosphere of trust and caring where the students are free to correct themselves.
If a student "violates" a rule the teacher can talk to them, rather than correcting them. This is also seen as focusing on making things go right instead of correcting things going wrong. This can be done through teaching, listening, two way communication, building trust and relationships between each other, self-improvement, and at the heart of the matter being at peace with ourselves. If these qualifies are met then classroom management focuses on the mundane of passing papers in and taking roll.
The above ideals are only achievable through individual acceptance of change on a voluntary basis. FISH! cannot be a mandate that everyone is made to participate it. You must solicit a critical mass of individuals at your school who are willing to see another paradigm of student management/discipline. The FISH! type of discipline, if you can even call it discipline, is done by actions not reactions. The four FISH! practices are proactive commitments to create student confidence in themselves as caring people. This, in turn, manifests itself in the classroom in an environment were everyone in the room is facilitating the lesson objective. Everyone is responsible for everyone's learning.
Are a set of rules necessary? Absolutely! But...after using FISH! the teacher should notice themselves using the rules less to correct and more to teach, listen, and build relationships. And by the way...test scores go up! :)
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