I promised I would update on how things went this past week with one of my young people after needing to discipline him firmly the week before. That occurred toward the latter part of class and, at the time, he responded by being very quiet. I was curious as to how he would behave the following week.
I’d have to say I saw progress tempered by the fact that this young person is who he is and won’t change overnight just because I intervened.
For the most part, he was his usual gregarious self which I was glad to see. I’d hate to have seen him moping. Whenever he ventured close to his previous behavior, however, he saw my eye catching his eye, and he would immediately stop. I never verbally had to get his attention but needed to do so with my eye on a few occasions. I can live with that because as long as I don’t have to interrupt the session, I’m happy. We look for growth, not perfection.
My guess is that the further away we get from the session when I disciplined him verbally, the more likely it is that he will push the envelope with his behavior. We’ll just have to wait and see!
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