Essay (15)

Helping Kids Behave Better

If one opens the door to an elementary school classroom, one hopes to find the children quietly working or intently listening to the teacher. This is not the case in todays society. Walking into a second grade classroom, for example, is like walking into a zoo. There are children chasing eachother around the classroom and other children shouting insults at one another because they felt like it. All the while the poor, helpless teacher is trying unsuccessfuly to get their attention.

This happens because of the lack of discipline children recieve in the home. In the article “Your Child Was Out of Line,” Kathleen Deveny addresses the issue of disciplining someone elses child. Many believe that discipling someone elses child is a big no-no. However, other people should discipline otber peoples children because children today need to see discipline has not gone away, other people disciplining them will teach them respect, and because parents want to be their childs friend instead of parent.

Other people should discipline other peoples children because children need to see that their bad behavior will not be tolerrated. Kids today are of the mindset that they can do whatever they like when mom and dad aren’t around. This thinking needs to stop. Surley, if someone saw a child push his friend into the street an adult would immediately take action. So why is it that other parents don’t take action when they see or hear a child do something they know is wrong? The answer is, according to Dr. Wendy Migel, that “if somone criticiszs your child, it’s like they’ve criticized your whole family, your whole life.” People need to get out of this mind set because it is not healthy for a childs development. If a child grows up without discipline, how are they going to function as an adult if they think there is no consequences for their actions?

Secondly, other people should discipline other peoples children because it teaches children respect. Going back to the second grade classroom for a moment, those children are acting like that because the simply do not have any respect for authority figures. At home when they don’t want to do something they usually don’t do it no matter how the parent protests. The parent ususally gives up in the end. This shows the child that they can get their way and not have to listen to authoritiy figures. One way to combat this laack of respect is to go back to where kids were raised to share the community’s values. As Professor Stephanie Coontz points out “kids were not raise to internalize their own family’s particular values, they were expected to share the community’s values.” If we go back to the mind set of community parenting our children will learn to respect other authority figures.

Finally, other people should discipline other people’s children because of a lack of parental discipline. In today’s society parents want to be their childs. When their child misbehaves the think a simple buddy to buddy chat will solve the problem. These little chats usually don’t solve the problem however. Paraents are also working longer hours in order to provide the best for their children. So when parents come home from a long days work they don’t want to deal with their children. A perfect example to illustrate my point is a family I babysit for. They have two daughters, ages 7 and 5. Mom is a second grade school teacher and dad is a sargent at the Arcata Police Department. They both have jobs that require them to work long hours and be an authority figure all day. So when they get home they give into their childrens every demand and reward their bad behavior because all they want to do is relax. As Mrs. Kathleen Deveny realizes, it all starts in the home.

In a time where there is more and more trouble for our children to get into we need all the help we can get. As a society that believes children are our future we need to make sure our future leaders have respect. This respect comes from discipline whether it comes from the parent or someone else. Help ensure our children have a bright future by disciplining them.

Essay 15: 4

This essay more “fully addresses the topic” than the simplistic thinking found in the 3 range. There is an understanding that not only is this a social problem that affects a broad range of people, including youth, teachers, and parents, but also that this problem has consequences that need addressing. Here, too, the detail is less abstract; thus, the paragraphs have examples and quotes from the prompt. There is some sentence variety here, although it’s accompanied by some clunkiness in phrasing. Overall, fairly well reasoned and developed.