Not in my classroom

The issues which plague the school system seem to be everywhere.  Not enough money, not enough teachers, and kids that are just down right obnoxious.  No matter where I teach there are a few kids who seem to have escaped the oppressive hands of a disciplinarian for a parent.

Today I received a few odd looks over such a child.

I waiting for my class to come in for their drama lesson today and the teacher enters the auditorium with her class as usual  only today it is obvious she is having problems with one child in particular.  The teacher asks him to take a seat, he says "NEVER".

She asks him to calm down and keep his hands to himself, again he responds "NEVER".

She continues to ask him to behave which his only response is to yell at her.  She asks him for about the tenth time to stop doing something disruptive, mind you I have yet to start class because this child is acting up the way he is, and this time instead of yelling at the teacher he kicks her.

Yes, that's right he kicks the teacher in the leg.

I waited for her to say something, I was appalled.  She responded by again asking him to stop his behavior and his response as you can guess was...."NEVER" and he kicks her again.

I could no longer handle seeing this and thought to myself, heck no this will not happen in my theatre!  So I knelt down beside his teacher looked the child square in the eyes and in a firm tone told him, " Look, (insert child's name here) you will not act this way in my classroom.  You are disrespecting your teacher and I will not have that.  We do not kick people. We do not yell at people and if you are going to continue to do so you will be removed from my classroom.  You will not be mean".

The kid looked a little wide eyed at me but he stopped right away.

But it was not his expression I worried about it was the other teacher's.  She looked a little wide eyed as well but then responds to my comment to the child with, "Oh he's autistic".

"um ok", I responded .

I think she expected me to some how excuse his behavior because he was autistic.  Somehow having this disability excuses his poor behavior.

Now, I have a child with Asperge'rs syndrome (a form of autism) so I am familiar with the behavior traits of kids within the autism spectrum.  I get it, I really do.  But I also know for a fact, without a doubt my child never kicked a teacher.  And I have taught many children with autism and none of them have ever kicked a teacher either...kicking someone is not a function of his autism it was a function of his parenting.

This child was capable of understanding rules and consequences. When I was firm with him he stopped.  So why did the teacher give me such a look?  I think she thinks I was too hard on the child.  But children need boundaries and even though I was not the one he was kicking I felt I had no choice but to show him those boundaries.  

I run a tight ship.  My classroom is fun but there are rules.  Be aware that no teacher will be mistreated in the confines of my auditorium.  I am a firm believer there is no excuse for bad behavior but children need to be taught.  And yes all children can be taught how to behave.

It would have made more sense for the teacher to look at me and say, " Oh his parents, they don't make him follow rules".