We all have diverse students in our classroom and in my personal opinion we are seeing more and more students with labels and unique situations. If you live under a rock or have a perfect classroom I’m talking about emotionally disturbed students, special education students, autistic students, etc. I had a large number of classes on these disabilities but I don’t think anything can train you for the real life situations. I currently have an emotionally disturbed child but his meds keep him in control and I’ve been lucky so far this year but that doesn’t mean I haven’t restrained a child. I work in a school with six classrooms (only K and 1) so we find out pretty quick if a child is losing it and if back up is needed. In the last couple years we have had a large number of students with emotional problems that cause them to be physically dangerous to themselves or others. Our district did its part and provided free training on how to properly deal with these students. The first steps are to prevent blow ups and the last resort is physical restraints. You might think, great you should be set to go but sadly I feel far from trained. I can’t even remember what the official class was called or the exact procedures.
I have had to restrain two separate students and it was very interesting. Neither of them were my students but I was a backup in one situation and I was the one teacher right there who had to handle the student before they ran away. It was a very tiring process and we honestly did not have any other option although I can say those two situations have been the only two in the last two years. Sadly, this isn’t the case in Texas.
I read an article from The Texas Tribune that stated there were 18,000 restraints used last year in their schools. There have even been a number of situations where a student was injured and in one situation a student died of suffocation when a teacher was sitting on him to restrain him. The article includes pictures of one injured student. Many Texans are outraged over these statistics. I understand that these statistics are scary but many of these situations are very dangerous at times. In one situation in Texas a student was restrained after he stabbed his teacher, call me crazy but I think restraints were necessary here. Another example I have happened right here in ND. A first grade student was going belligerent and could not be controlled but restraints are very much not urged. The special education teachers were doing their best without restraints and he ended up kicking a window and breaking it. Do you think a restraint should have been used before a window was broken? Have you had to restrain students? What should be done? Some schools have hired professionals that are very educated to handle these students but many schools might not have this privilege. What are your thoughts?
Why restructure? Does it really do anything?
15 years ago
Were you at my school? Your examples sound very familiar. I think every school has had something of this sort happen. I think restraints are necessary in certain situations, but not all. I think prevention is the key. If teachers and paraprofessionals can learn what pushes a student to their breaking point and avoid that, it would help in the number of breakdowns a student would have. I remember having a para who didn't know when to stop and I was just waiting for the student to punch her because she pushed and pushed. I had to step in several times because she did not know when to stop and then didn't know how to handle the student when he was upset. As the teacher I did not have any training but knew how to handle him in a safe way. I think it is fantastic you have had training on restraining students. I think that is a very important key to dealing with all the issues in schools right now.
ReplyDeleteI believe that if the teacher acts in self-defence then that's clearly ok. If the teacher was restraining the child to bring him to the office that is likely not going to be considered acceptable. It's not acceptable to physically force a child to go somewhere or to do what the teacher wants. It's not acceptable for a teacher to cause a child to be confined in any way unless that's to prevent harm.
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