Curwin+Mendler+Mode

[|Discipline with Dignity has five goals] 1. Effective Communication 2. De-fusing Potentially Explosive Situations 3. Reducing Violence 4. Preparing Children For Their Future 5. Valuing and Protecting Opportunities For

Curwin and Mendler have twelve guidelines for effectively utilizing Discipline with Dignity in your classroom.

1. Let the students know what you expect. This means establishing and posting clear rules and consequences. 2. Provide instruction at levels that match student ability. In other words, where is the dignity in not being able to comprehend the material being learned in the classroom? Inability to understand will only lead to discipline problems. 3. Listen to what the students are thinking and feeling. Being able to identify with your students makes them feel important and understood. 4. Use humor. It de-fuses a potentially harmful situation without violence or accusation. Just make sure not to make students the butt of your jokes. 5. Vary your style of presentation. Doing the same activity for too long makes students restless and prone to outbursts of inappropriate behavior. 6. Offer choices. Make it seem like the student has some say in what happens. For example, "You can do your assignment now or during recess." 7. Refuse to accept excuses. This ensures that you treat students equally. If there are legitimate excuses for late homework, poor behavior, etc., they will need to be posted along with your expectations. 8. Legitimize behavior that you cannot stop. Generally, if you take something that is against the rules and make it acceptable, it ceases to be fun for the students. 9. Use hugs and touching to communicate with kids of all ages. Obviously, this must be used with caution because of sexual misunderstanding, abused students, etc. However, you want to communicate human warmth and caring, and kind words will only get you so far. 10. Be responsible for yourself and allow kids to take responsibility for themselves. 11. Realize and accept that you cannot reach every kid. Some of them choose to fail and this is not your decision. 12. Start fresh everyday. What happened yesterday is finished.

[|Curwin and Mendler] Curwin and Mendler suggest that a lot of student misbehavior occurs in classrooms where the academic expectations are lax. Teachers, they contend, are responsible for providing efficient instructional delivery, providing bell-to-bell schooling, and whole class interaction to minimize misbehavior (Curwin & Mendler, 1988). A high incidence of discipline problems could also be found in schools and classrooms that neglected adopting specific rules and, more importantly, consequences for breaking those rules. They recommend the Three-Dimensional Discipline Approach: The Discipline with Dignity model also stresses that teachers must offer choices to students as a result of their actions, use humor, and disregard excuses. Teachers, they say, are largely responsible for the behavior that students display in their classroom (Curwin & Mendler, 1988). Discipline with Dignity
 * Prevention: What can be done to minimize problems.
 * Action: What is to be done once problems occur.
 * Resolution: What can be done for the chronic misbehaver.

Pros: Cons:
 * Student-centered. More concern is displayed for student’s rights and dignity.
 * Focuses on preventative measures for student misbehavior.
 * Emphasizes better instruction techniques and sincere compassion for preventing discipline problems.
 * Encourages teachers to let the small stuff go. Focus only on the real problem behaviors.
 * Designed to help the behaviorally-at-risk student.
 * Emphasizes caring and empathy, rather than control and dispassion.
 * Places too much blame on the part of the school and teacher for misbehavior.
 * May have too much emphasis on student-control. Students may not always know what is best for themselves and need to have strong leadership on the part of the teacher to succeed.
 * Is not a simple, no-frills approach to classroom discipline. Requires more teacher planning and forethought than AD.