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A review by paperbacksandpines
Better Than Carrots or Sticks: Restorative Practices for Positive Classroom Management by Dominique Smith, Nancy Frey, Douglas Fisher
3.0
If you are looking for either an introduction to restorative practices or a refresher course on best practices, this is the book for you. If you are looking for more intermediate fare, look elsewhere.
The authors made so many great points, I wanted to take this book to work, hold it up while shaking it, and shout, "See? Offering rewards all of the time is not helping our kids!" We are entering a new era in the classroom and today's students are not the same learners we were. Teachers are having to scramble to rework their entire approach to teaching, including adding character education which was formerly taught by parents at home (and still taught by some).
The authors make great points. Although this book is geared toward K-12 students, I felt that several of these techniques could not be accomplished at the elementary level, particularly in the primary grades. The success of these techniques are also heavily influenced the school, location, and parent involvement as well.
I agreed with most of the points made in the book. There were, however, a few points I either disagreed with or didn't see how they could work in my workplace. One of the assertions made by the authors was that the classroom teacher shouldn't be facilitating the peacemaking circle but rather another adult trained in the practices should. I don't know where these authors work but I've never worked in a school that had extra staff members that are on-call waiting to lead a class discussion on appropriately interacting with others. Another declaration that the authors continually made was that schools shouldn't be punitive but restorative. I don't disagree with that in theory but there are so many instances of students destroying items or hurting others in ways that can't be restored. I can't think of any logical solutions to righting these wrongs and the authors don't touch on this at all (if they did, they would offer solutions for high schoolers which would be useless for elementary schoolers).
Overall, I found many helpful tips in this book.
The authors made so many great points, I wanted to take this book to work, hold it up while shaking it, and shout, "See? Offering rewards all of the time is not helping our kids!" We are entering a new era in the classroom and today's students are not the same learners we were. Teachers are having to scramble to rework their entire approach to teaching, including adding character education which was formerly taught by parents at home (and still taught by some).
The authors make great points. Although this book is geared toward K-12 students, I felt that several of these techniques could not be accomplished at the elementary level, particularly in the primary grades. The success of these techniques are also heavily influenced the school, location, and parent involvement as well.
I agreed with most of the points made in the book. There were, however, a few points I either disagreed with or didn't see how they could work in my workplace. One of the assertions made by the authors was that the classroom teacher shouldn't be facilitating the peacemaking circle but rather another adult trained in the practices should. I don't know where these authors work but I've never worked in a school that had extra staff members that are on-call waiting to lead a class discussion on appropriately interacting with others. Another declaration that the authors continually made was that schools shouldn't be punitive but restorative. I don't disagree with that in theory but there are so many instances of students destroying items or hurting others in ways that can't be restored. I can't think of any logical solutions to righting these wrongs and the authors don't touch on this at all (if they did, they would offer solutions for high schoolers which would be useless for elementary schoolers).
Overall, I found many helpful tips in this book.