Post your own letter to the editor below. The recent posts on the Texas Teachers Net Chatboard regarding corporal punishment have made me reflect back to what the Brain Compatible gurus say about threat in the classroom. I have seen students that are already so angry in the classroom only become more out of control when they are threatened by the teacher. I think part of classroom management is controlling the situation and defusing the problem before it escalates. Continuing to be confrontational with a student only makes matters worse.
Teachers often get in power struggles with students for useless reasons.
The teacher's temper increases because the student becomes antagonistic. Just as the logic of gender domination is out of date, it is also barbaric for educators to extend the same attitude towards the students in the classroom. The threat that is imposed on students causes learning to be impaired. Neurological research not only shows that our hearts beat irregularly and chemicals become imbalanced when threatened, but our brain's ability for higher order thinking skills and memory becomes affected. Our bodies and brains are built for fight or flight survival techniques.