Signs of Stress: Is school policy hurting kids?

Are there connections between school policies and children’s stress symptoms or is it just peer relationships that cause anxiety? Anne Hartley posted an article about the expansion of Rocketship Charter Schools in California. A physician responded to the article by citing the medical problems the children he sees from another Rocketship school. What is it about this school that contributes to the problems these children are experiencing?

The test driven curriculum can create stress in any school. It may be, however, that no nonsense discipline problems may escalate the stress reactions. Some children simply leave these schools.

Edushyster posted some examples of how teachers are coached to maintain control of everything a child does in school. What is curious is that the teachers are controlled in the same way. In this article, a teacher describes the training. It is unreal. Trainers sat in the back of the class and told her what to say and how to respond to children. She had an earphone, and they used walkie talkies.

This is worth taking some time to read. Variations of this no nonsense approach are used by many charter schools e.g. KIPP and Success charters. This approach goes way beyond the ‘Do what I say or face punishment’ approach to teaching and learning. This teacher had to say to herself “I am not Tom Brady”. Read the article to find out why.

Posted in Uncategorized.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.