Wrong Kind of Education
May 28th, 2008Writing in the Chicago Tribune about this story, Julie Deardorff is critical of the teacher responsible for the bullying of a kindergarten student who has been revealed to be autistic, but she argues that we should wait to hear the teacher’s side of the story. Generally speaking, it is wise to wait for all details to emerge on any given subject but I wonder if there is anything that can be said in defense of this:
Barton and Port St. Lucie Police Department officials said teacher Wendy Portillo made Alex stand in front of the room while his classmates told him what bothered them about him. Because the class was studying tallies and vote-taking, Portillo then led a class vote as to whether Alex should be allowed to stay in the class. Alex was voted out, by a 14 to 2 margin. He spent the rest of the day in the nurse’s office and was upset when Barton picked him up after school. Alex hasn’t been back to the school since Wednesday, when the vote occurred.”He’s doing a little better,” said Barton on Tuesday.
Barton said Tuesday morning Alex was officially diagnosed with an autism-spectrum disorder and attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. He is not in school, but he misses the one friend he made in the classroom since he moved to the school in January, she said. And the class vote didn’t just affect Alex. His friend and classmate Spencer Clawson has been upset by what happened, Spencer’s mother Stacie Clawson said. Clawson said she talked with her 6-year-old son after she heard about the incident. She said she asked him to close his eyes and imagine how he would feel if this happened to him. As he did, his face changed, Clawson said.
“He said, ‘That was mean,’” Clawson said.
This is beyond inappropriate for a kindergarten class and a kindergarten teacher. Apparently, the teacher did not know that the child was autistic but even if she was unaware of that there is still no reason for a teacher to hold a class vote to decide whether or not a child deserves to be kicked out of class. If the boy was behaving badly, which is certainly possible, then he should have been removed, but not so publicly and cruelly at the hands of his classmates. I don’t support ending her career in education unless she genuinely does not understand that she did wrong and ought to apologize for it. I do think she should be reprimanded, and should be trained to deal with young students with a greater understanding of children and their circumstances before she scars someone else for life.