The internet – if one eschews the trolls, haters, fake authorities, Oppression Olympic blogs, and TV doctor wannabees marketing their brand – offers real help for problems such as mine not well defined in mainstream sources.
An American Academy of Pediatrics study in 2006 of verbal abuse by teachers directed at students in Kindergarten through grade 6 found:
"Children who are relatively well adjusted are at low risk of becoming the target of verbal abuse by the teacher. If they do, however, these children are the most vulnerable to subsequent developmental difficulties....
"The vast majority of children (85 percent) have almost 0 risk of becoming a target of verbal abuse by the teacher over the course of elementary school. However, a small minority of children (15 percent) seems to be at relatively high risk of verbal abuse by the teacher in kindergarten, and this risk increases even further over the course of elementary school."
This study, however, linked being in that unfortunate 15 percent to having "high levels of early antisocial behavior and attention problems in kindergarten," things that do not at all describe young Mr. Denton.
Despite these AAP findings, Teaching Tolerance in its fall 2014 online issue reported that nationwide studies on abuse by teachers were unknown. "At present, 49 states have passed laws intended to address bullying.... A huge volume of resources and training programs has also emerged as a lucrative cottage industry in marketing 'bully-proof' curricula. Conspicuously absent from this literature, however, is an emphasis on how to address abuses of power by educators toward the students they serve."
And of course, count on Canada for social policy insights.
Particularly helpful to me are a few findings from a doctoral thesis in education at the University of Toronto titled, "Behind the Closed Door: Exploring Teacher Bullying and Abuse of Students, Characteristics of the Teacher, and Impact."
The thesis by Glynn W. B. Sharpe, which studied Canadian schools, defines "Spurning" as "verbal and nonverbal acts that reject or degrade the child such as shaming, degrading, rejecting, humiliating, and constantly singling out one child to criticize and punish."
Singling out. That was the very core of the abuse done to me by Miss Briggs.
Sharpe also said: "... (F)or a teacher to be considered a bully their negative behaviours must have been administered with the intention of causing harm to a student (Sharpe's emphasis). Conversely, for child abuse to occur the behaviour must be engaged in by an individual in a care giving role and/or engaged in against a child who is dependent upon or who trusts an individual."
The 2014 Teaching Tolerance piece also offered a sober challenge to the idea that today's climate of children speaking up has made the modern versions of Miss Briggs clean up their acts:
"When students are targeted by teachers, they often feel shamed and powerless. In many cases, they become unable to establish positive relationships within school.... Perhaps the most distressing aspect of bullying behavior in teachers is how easily it persists.... School officials may have reason to believe it is occurring, yet fail to act.
"Almost without exception, offending teachers mask their mistreatment of students as part of a legitimate role function, using the rhetoric of 'motivation' or 'discipline' to justify their actions. If accused, offenders may minimize or deny the conduct and claim it was a joke or a miscommunication."
There is another problem in classrooms, clearly far more prevalent than abuse by teachers, which can be confused for being a diametric: abuse of teachers by students. The Teachers Room dot com and No Bullying dot com describe this problem as an "epidemic" that is severely stressing educators.
My heart is with the teachers on that! Mom was in the profession and though thankfully she avoided violence, I recall that during the cynical '70s, increasingly arrogant attitudes displayed by some students caused her job frustration to rise.
Sound bite media like to wrongly capsulize matters as opposites, but the problems faced by teachers as a whole and the evidence of ongoing abuse with impunity by a few do not detract from each other.
In fact, Scott is still out there, and he needs our help.
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STOP THAT, MISS BRIGGS!
Non-FictionNot all abuse is physical. Some is the result of psychological warfare. For 42 years, I seemed to be receiving coded messages that something was wrong. They came from seemingly likable billboard ads, pop songs and TV comedy skits. The queasiness, t...
