Is The Wall Appropriate Punishment?

Hm. Seems to me like there are some parents for whom there is NO acceptable way to punish their little darling. It’s not supposed to be fun, is it? I never realized it was normal for parents to determine the disciplinary tactics employed at school. I suppose teachers and principals are supposed to keep a spreadsheet of Mrs X’s preference, and Mrs Y’s, and also Mr Y’s, because he actually disagrees with his wife, etc etc. I love that she encouraged her son to go to school and refuse a punishment; “he needed to tell the teacher or the principal that his mother said it wasn’t an option”. He’s surely not an spoiled brat, though.

Ali please tell me I’m just not picking up your sarcasm. At first glance it seemed like you were saying that looking at a wall, as oppposed to watching kids play, during recess was sensory deprivation akin to being blindfolded, hooded, etc.

Being excluded from playtime seems like a perfectly legitimate punishment for not fulfilling your responsibilities, for fifth and sixth grade students. Having the punished kids face the playing kids has all sorts of issues, like the friends of the punished kids doing things to alleviate the punishment by cheering up their friend, and enemies of the punished kids doing things to annoy them and goad them into reacting and getting into more trouble.

TMC - when I taught 1st grade, we did just that. We had a checkmark system and for each infraction the kid would get one minute that they’d have to sit out from recess. The first week we implemented it (after going over the rules and giving the kids some time to learn them), we’d get a bunch of kids sitting for a while, then fewer and fewer each week until there were very few kids. This worked, I believe, because kids knew that there was a consequence for misbehavior, they were reminded of the consequence when I gave them a check, and it was painful later in to sit and watch their friends play. Since they sat on the playground benches, where other kids who were just resting or reading also sat, it didn’t attract undue attention and I don’t think it was humiliating. But it got the point across PDQ and it definitely worked (AND it meant I never resorted to yelling at my studenyts, something my fellow teachers sometimes did). Most importantly, I never made anyone sit out for the entire recess - too cruel for my taste, and besides the ones who acted up in class were usually the ones who needed to run the most! And each minute was a lot shorter than 60 seconds, so although it was perceived by the kids as a interminable amount of time they actually got back on the playground fairly quickly. I think being forced to face a wall is a completely unnecessary addition to the time out already being enforced, and all it is going to do is make the child resentful of the teacher.

It doesn’t seem unreasonable. At my son’s school, they walk the “green mile” during recess for punishment. While it gives them more exercise than the wall, it would still be humiliating to be singled out. Sounds like pretty good incentive to me to not do something wrong. All those who have a problem with it are causing our kids to think there are no consequences for their actions. Our children will grow up to think Mommy and Daddy will get them out of everything. Not my kids. They will learn there are consequences to their actions. How is that a bad thing?

It seems like “acceptable” punishments are becoming few and far between. Kids misbehave in school all the time, and there is very little a teacher can do to motivate the student to behave. When I was a teacher, I once took away a cell phone that a student REFUSED to put away in class. I told him he could have it back at the end of the day. His mom called the school and was trying to get me to pay a pro-rated amount of the cell phone bill for the amount of time I had the phone in my possession (locked in a file cabinet drawer). Parents will object to anything when they believe their little angels are above the law.

This is new? Not hardly. And my guess is the kid missed multiple assignments. I think we had to sit and face the wall…I am pretty certain it only happened once and I NEVER wanted that again.

The Wall was a punishment when I was in middle school in the Jerz during the early 90’s. Although, we had to lean against the wall and face the action that we were missing instead of facing the wall. It was definitely effective, and not at all inappropriate. I’m shocked at the disservice parents do to their children by protecting them from every life lesson and punishment. I wonder if they’ll be shocked when their dear, sweet angels don’t bother moving out or getting jobs because its just SO HARD.

This is not new, it’s been going on since I was in elementary school, and it works. It sucks, but it’s far from torture.

I agree that “the wall” is not an appropriate punishment for not handing in homework. If the kid had done something *on the playground* or maybe even disrupted the classroom, then, maybe. But, isn’t not doing your homework punishment in and of itself, in that you won’t get credit for that assignment, thereby affecting your grade? Not doing homework isn’t really a *disciplinary* matter, in my opinion. His mom is a little bit of a fluffhead, though. She should make sure her son is doing his homework, and she should be the one to take the issue up with the school if she doesn’t like their rules.

Oh, please. Schools are hardly known for their sound judgment when punishment is concerned. I don’t think any punishment should be inflicted for not turning in homework. The punishment is the lower grade. And if the teacher wants to, she can tell the parents so they can make their own decision.

I don’t see the problem with this. For those who say the lower grade is punishment in and of itself, maybe the teachers would rather get the idea in the kid’s head that homework is important, possibly preventing a bad grade. It seems to me that it is more responsible to do this than to just say “oh well, another bad grade, what do I care.”

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