Expert: Evelyn Petersen - 9/21/2006

Question
My 6 year old is in Kindergarten and is a wonderful student. Just the other day she was sitting on the carpet for calendar time and a student behind her kept poking her.  She told them to stop and the teacher heard her talking and gave her a warning.  The child poked her again and my daughter told them to quit.  The teacher put her name on the "yellow light" ( the students all start out on green for the day and after a warning they get moved to the yellow and if that doesn't work they get moved to the red and they miss a recess.)  My husband and I told my daughter she should have told the teacher first to avoid getting in trouble.  My husband now wants to punish my daughter big time (ground her or something like that)He is angry because she waited two days to tell us.  How should we handle this situation?

Answer
Dear Jodi,
The strange thing is that I got a similar letter about this type of public humiliation discipline (with the names on the board with the colors) this past year.  I wonder if they are in the same school.

In my other answer I stated and still believe that this is a poor way to discipline a child in any case.  It is public and humiliating and unnecessary.  In fact it is sort of a lazy way for an adult to manage a classroom.  There are many ways to give a child positive reinforcment for sitting still or doing their work or helping others, etc etc and THESE are the best ways to discipline children.  Children repeat behaviors for which they are praised.  

But what to do?  If it were me I would talk to the school principal about this negative form of classroom manangement or find a new school that practiced postive and successful ways to manage children.  This type of thing should never be done with young children.  In addition, recess should not be a punishment since children need activity and exercise breaks when they sit for long periods.  They need it, just as adults would, for health.  Also it makes their blood circulate and go to their brains, instead of their seats.

Your husband should NOT punish your child, it was not her fault; he should be on your child's side and yours.  You must make an appointment with the teacher and principal.  Go together and tell them that your child is shy about tattling on someone else but that the other child was poking her and he was the one who needed a reprimand, not her.  Then ask why the teacher did not notice what had really happened.  

Then ask what types of positive reinforcment she uses in classroom management.  Tell her that you feel that the colors and name on the board method is a type of public humilitation that is inappropriate for young children.    I also wonder what other parents really think of this idea.  It would be interesting to find out.

Let me know what happens.  Evelyn   www.askevelyn.com