Discipline Answers

QUESTION: I find that sometimes my high school students resent me asking them their level. At first I was giving them lots of essays and self-diagnostic referrals from the back of the book, but I understand that you don’t really recommend that either. Can you help me better understand how I should deal with difficult [...]

QUESTION: We use DWS at our school–a high-poverty, high-needs school, with many angry, disruptive, disrespectful students. As the social worker, I really like the philosophy that DWS espouses, but I do notice one problem. Students often see the “essay” as a punishment. It can become a power-struggle with some teachers. Do you have any suggestions [...]

QUESTION: I once had a grade 8 student who said, “It doesn’t matter what level I say I’m on, you’re always going to find a way to tell me that I’m on an unacceptable level.” I’m wondering what a teacher might say in response to something like that? A response from Tammy Shared on the [...]

Just like people, book characters often operate on more than one level! Very often, the author has at least one character learn something about the discouraging outcomes of operating at the lower levels. In many cases, the character is transformed in some way during the course of the story. Whenever I read such a book [...]

QUESTION: What do you do if you have a problem with a child on the second day of school, before you’ve introduced the Hierarchy levels? RESPONSE: Don’t forget that Step One of the Teaching Model is Classroom Management. By proactively teaching specific procedures for everything you want your students to do, you will be able [...]

QUESTION: Dr. Marshall says that we should teach students that in this system of discipline, operation on Levels A and B “automatically invites the use of authority” by the teacher. My students understand that continued operation on the lower levels will result in the use of authority. They see this as a good reason for [...]