I. Before you read the passage, talk about these questions

1. What do you know about positive discipline?

2. Do people engaging in positive discipline ignore problems?

3. Does positive discipline include a number of different techniques?

Positive Discipline (or PD) is a discipline model used by schools that focuses on the positive points of behavior, based on the idea that there are no bad children, just good and bad behaviors. You can teach and reinforce the good behaviors while weaning the bad behaviors without hurting the child verbally or physically. People engaging in positive discipline are not ignoring problems. Rather, they are actively involved in helping their child learn how to handle situations more appropriately while remaining calm, friendly and respectful to the children themselves. Positive discipline includes a number of different techniques that, used in combination, can lead to a more effective way to manage groups of students.

Part of using positive discipline is preventing situations in which negative behaviors can arise. There are different techniques that teachers can use to prevent bad behaviors:

Students who "misbehave" are actually demonstrating "mistaken" behavior. There are many reasons why a student may exhibit mistaken behavior, i.e. lack of knowing appropriate behavior to feeling unwanted or unaccepted. For students who simply do not know what appropriate behavior they should be exhibiting, the teacher can teach the appropriate behavior. For example, the young child who grabs toys from others can be stopped from grabbing a toy and then shown how to ask for a turn. For students who are feeling unwanted or unaccepted, a positive relationship needs to develop between the teacher and student before ANY form of discipline will work.

The sanctions that are listed at the end of the article would be less needed if students have a strong connection with the adult in charge and knew that the teacher respected him/her. Teachers need to know how to build these relationships. Simply telling them to demonstrate respect and connection with students is not enough for some of them, because they may also lack knowledge on how to do this.

Teachers need to view each child as an account; they must deposit positive experiences in the student before they make a withdraw from the child when discipline takes place. Teachers can make deposits through praise, special activities, fun classroom jobs, smiles and appropriate pats on the backs. Some children have never experienced positive attention. Children long for attention; if they are not receiving positive attention they will exhibit behavior that will elicit negative attention.