How do you handle profanity in the classroom?I just got through talking to a student about his use of sexual profanity. The young man is one of our better students. He's in my Advanced Placement class and is otherwise a good young man, if immature. He was chanting some lyrics during some class "down time" which involved sex, particularly boasting about having sex with someone else's mother. I had him stay after class during which I gave him "the sermon" about how he speaks about women, particularly mothers, and if he would appreciate someone talking about his mother in those words. Then I sent him home for the weekend.
Our students use profanity the way I used slang when I was their age. I have tried to fight it. Students can get points taken from their "Good Conduct Grade" or even detention, but nothing I do seems to help.
Let me know how you respond to students to use obscenities.
2 comments:
Thanks, Mr. Green, for bringing up this topic and offering an example to discuss. It is an ever-present issue in our classrooms, so it deserves our attention on this blog. I don't have answers, but I want to share my thoughts and hear from others on this urgent topic.
As with most behavioral infractions, I choose my battles with profanity. Usually, if I have a well-developed rapport with the given class where a particularly offensive bit of profanity or obscenity is offered, I can reprimand the student in a friendly way that gets him or her to think about what he or she has done. Something like "what did you say?" in a disgusted and/or disappointed voice often works well, brings a few chuckles from the room, and gets the pottymouth to do a double take, apologize, or deny having said anything--any of which serves the purpose (of correcting the behavior/prompting thought).
If the offender seems proud of having his or her filthy utterance recognized by the authority in the room (to the degree that the filth is repeated again, seeking more attention), then there is another problem at hand--not just one of absent-mindedly regurgitating the nastiness of the world he or she may inhabit away from my classroom.
In the case you mention here, Mr. Green, with "Mr. incestuous song lyric," it sounds as though this student could either have been (sub-) mentally regurgitating (absent-mindedly spitting back up whatever his mind has been filled with), or making an intentional public display for the purpose of breaking taboo (for the same thrill that one gets from listening to such lyrics, I imagine, so the answer is probably both).
In my view, that the problem stems from confusion about or the adolescent testing of time/place/etiquette questions is more likely than an actual case of genuine moral depravity, and this is something about which the student very much needs to begin learning or could use a serious reminder. The language and subject matter that society has decided is appropriate for late-night cable or comedy at the improv or at a music concert is not the same as has been decided acceptable in schools, courts, doctor's offices, and government hearings. The main problem is probably that the student doesn't realize that when he is in school, he is in public in the "We The People In A Government For The Greater Good" sense.
As an aside (this is NOT a serious suggestion) just think--if teachers wore black robes, like judges, or if teachers wore uniforms and badges like policemen, then our students might be more inclined to see us as the government officials we are. Because we don't wear such vestments (and there are good reasons why we don't), it is up to us to sometimes remind our students that we are society's first-line attempt to teach them how and when to control themselves.
Many of our students mistake being in school for being in private because they are in school among the same friends that they hang out with in private. It is up to us, the teachers, to continue to remind them that there are very different expectations and consequences for public behavior than there are for private behavior. T.V is not real life. School is not home. These are differences all of our students can and do understand, but some of them really need that difference to be pointed out, reinforced and connected to responsibility and behavior expectations.
Regardless of the degree of volition behind the behavior, it is a serious transgression which certainly deserves the attention you gave it, as you well know. The "hall-talk" I would have with this student (hypothetical, as I wasn't actually there to hear just how this filth was delivered, which matters) would begin with a tone of
"Are you ok? Do you understand what incest is? Do you understand how public displays of sexuality are damaging to yourself and hurtful to the people around you? (in American public and professional culture, the common perception of open descriptions of sex or sexuality in an inappropriate context is that the person is either mentally ill or needs to be controlled or have his or her rights taken away to preserve public safety!! Yes, such an outburst in some public contexts can actually get a person arrested or put under medical observation--we all know this, despite what we may see or find entertaining on TV or in movies!!) Do you need help, or did you make an unfortunate decision to be very silly in a way that you didn't realize hurts people?"
Furthermore, I would totally ignore any comments or excuses he would offer about the fact it was lyrics or from a song (I honestly don't care if you heard it on "Good Morning America," I want you to realize just how dangerous a symptom you have revealed through your language in class), and I would just focus on the utterance as though it were a possible sign of needing intervention from a mental health professional (which, if it were genuine, it just might be!). Then, if the student came around to realizing such verbal actions are taken seriously by society, I would challenge him, in a supportive way, to reconsider how his language choices have a major impact on other's perceptions of him as a person, and let him know that he is always being evaluated for the quality of his thoughts based on the language and topics he chooses to speak about.
If this "hall-talk" produced no resulting behavior changes, i.e., he's still spouting filth in my classroom, then what he's trying to communicate to me is that he wants or needs more hall talks. In other words, he needs more individual attention than I can afford to offer while I manage a lesson for a whole classroom, and he needs to spend some time with an administrator or counselor or at home to get the attention he needs. Sometimes, if said student is an athlete, I have found that contacting the student's coach(es) to get a community of concern built up around said student, can be very effective. Of course, in my hypothetical example, the student's reactions or behaviors along the way could turn this into a different situation very quickly, easily requiring a change of the tactics or a focused emphasis on any given aspect of the approach I detail above.
If he quickly recants or apologizes, then he is learning or, at least, pretending to learn (often the first step towards real learning), and I give him a reprieve and second chance. If he gets over-excited, denies, objects, refuses to acknowledge, then my tone gets softer, pace slower, encouraging the student to calm down and think carefully about his or her next step. If he or she closes up and becomes thoughtful, then I give him or her a chance to think, and I consider that a small success. If the student becomes in any way combative, then the student needs to talk to someone else and be somewhere else for a little while. Either way, Mr. Green, I think you certainly did the right thing to call out this behavior and work to nip it in the bud, so to speak.
What I haven't found effective is being punitive about profanity or obscenity unless it is a directed, pointed insult--which smacks of violence against another. Now, I admit, I may be somewhat permissive about some casual profanity and a little less permissive about casual obscenity. As you know, Mr. Green, our language is changing, as it has always changed, and as freedom of expression continues to develop the logic of its principle, there is more and more opportunity for change in any given word's semantic connotation and linguistic circulation. So, I "don't hear" some things, to the degree that those things do not directly interfere with the peace and productivity of my classroom or offend my civic or cultural sensibilities. To be more to the point, I heard Coach Campbell put it succinctly once. He said something to the effect, "if my kid stubs his toe in class and mumbles "s&*t" in pain, I'm not going to bust him on that." Again, as Coach Campbell does, I choose my battles.
Furthermore, I have discovered, as I am sure many teachers have, that when I am having a hall talk with a student, sometimes another teacher or coach who has a more (or previously) developed relationship of respect with said student will join in and add some support to my attempt to get the student to rethink his or her behavior. This is immensely effective in most cases, especially when the "help" involves joining in on the hall talk, relating it to a previous understanding that teacher had reached with that student, and encouraging him or her that we all know he or she is "smarter than that" or "smart enough to do this."
This double-team tactic serves so many good reinforcements to correct behavior while building for the student a more solid mental map of school as a supportive, corrective place to learn that I would like to encourage any teacher, coach, or counselor who sees me having a conversation with a student in the hall, especially during class time, to feel free to join in, especially if we can work together to encourage the student to "think like an adult" and "make wise choices" together.
I'm getting long-winded, here, but I want to add that I feel issues of offensive language or actions in a classroom often boil down to an issue of respect. A student who respects the classroom, his peers, his teacher, and himself, would not say such things in class, period. Respect is a tricky thing for those who are not familiar with it, as I suspect some of our students may not be. Being able to recognize and reciprocate respect is a skill very similar to being able to nurture healthy interpersonal relationships at almost any level--from formal/public to intimate/family. Respect is not something anyone can force--even if their intentions are the best. Respect is something a teacher can nurture, encourage, model, offer, give, ask about, talk about, prepare, and think about with the care and concern with which a gardener tills and fertilizes and prepares soil. Most seeds, even seeds that start off behind the rest of the crops, eventually do well in well-prepared soil.
Metaphorically and Long-Windedly Yours,
JC
I don't really know how high school classrooms function, but back when I was working with juvenile offenders in a residential program, I used to hear a fair amount of sex talk up to and including things like, "Did you get any last night?" directed at me. I learned that what seemed to work best was to say immediately and without emotion "inappropriate" and move on, even if I was in the middle of a sentence when I inserted my response. I wouldn't refer to what the boy had said or add any editorial comment or usually even look at him. Just "inappropriate" in a flat voice without even directing it to the speaker by name. Everybody knew who I was talking to, including the one crossing the line. One might almost miss it if one wasn't listening. If they followed up their first statement with another, I said "inappropriate" again with no more fanfare than before. I don't remember ever having to say it more than three times before they stopped, at least partly, I suppose, because we were generally in some process or other at the time and they simply lost interest.
I'm not sure, but it seemed as if the boys I was working with (12 to 17) were just trying to get attention, get a rise out of me, or stretch their pubescent sexual muscles in some way. When I gave them no special attention and didn't get up into it (which would have been a payoff), they dropped it and moved on to something else.
I realize this was a different type of situation and I'm a woman, which added its own dynamic, but it's all I know.
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