Brian Busch post

Prompt 1: Key Understandings

As a teacher leader, what are three key understandings you learned from the Payne text that you would deem appropriate for sharing with a colleague, administrator, and/or parent? Describe why these understandings were selected.

There were several key understandings that could be taken from the Payne text appropriate to share with my colleagues and administrators.  First, Payne clearly defined the differences in characteristics between the socioeconomic classes of poverty, middle class and wealth in the third chapter titled “Hidden Rules Among Classes”.  For example, Payne uses the subject of money to show how these three different classes are different.  People living in poverty view money as something that needs to be used and spent.  The middle class view money as something that needs to be managed.  The wealthy view money as something to be conserved and invested (Payne, 2005).  The distinction between the three classes would be nice to share with a colleague to teach how to identify students who possess the various socioeconomic levels.  Accordingly, this will help teachers become better prepared how to take action with students in the classroom.

The second key understanding allowing teachers get a better understanding of how to successfully approach building relationships with students living in poverty.  Far too often teachers will give up on students because they are ineffective in producing positive relationships with their students.  Payne reveals the path to maintaining a successful relationship “occurs when emotional deposits are made to the student, emotional withdrawals are avoided and students are respected” (Payne, p. 111, 2005).  Deposits are things like seeking to understand, keeping promises, being kind, clarifying expectations, and being open to feedback.  Making these types of deposits and showing students they are respected will go a long way in dealing with students living in poverty.   This key understanding would be important to share with administrators to make sure the school is offering ample opportunities to promote building relationships.    

The third key understanding the Payne text appropriate to share with a colleague is disciplining students living in poverty.  The behaviors exhibited by students living in poverty when being disciplined are almost always correlated how they cope discipline their home environment.  For example, students living in poverty may laugh when disciplined by a teacher because this is a way to “save face in matriarchal poverty” (Payne, p. 79).  Payne suggests the intervention that could help dealing with this learned behavior is to first understand why the student is laughing.  Then, the teacher should offer three or four other behaviors that would be more appropriate.  While this sounds really basic and easy, I bet many teachers, including myself, are guilty of saying something like “I just don’t understanding how to relate to these bad kids.”  So, I definitely think it would be appropriate to share all of the different interventions to use on students living in poverty.

Prompt 2: Impact on Professional Practice

What are some things that you will implement (or have already implemented) and/or do differently regarding your interactions with children and/or adults resulting from your understandings of Payne's framework?

After reading the Payne chapter about discipline, I am going to try to incorporate some of the interventions mentioned when dealing with students living in poverty.  Even though most of my students in Beavercreek would be considered to be middle class, I still see some characteristics of students living in poverty described by Payne.  Currently, I find myself far too often trying to discipline my students who misbehave in a way that is very negative and demeaning (yelling, calling parents, detention, demerits, administration, etc.).  Instead, I really like how Payne offers appropriate interventions for disciplining, such as having students who can’t follow directions to write the steps for completing a task on the top of their papers (Payne, 2005).  Thus, I believe I will take many of the interventions learned from reading and incorporate them into my classroom.

I trust reading this text will change my perspective on students and adults living in a different socioeconomic class than middle class.  I have lived my entire life in a middle class, which allows me to relate very well with the majority of students who I teach in Beavercreek.  However, I allow myself to get a comfort zone sometimes because the majority of my students are considered to be living in middle class.  This perspective is hindering my ability to understand and develop relationships of students and adults living in poverty or wealth.  Hence, I plan on being committed to learning more about poverty and wealth so that I can better establish healthy and positive relationships with people outside of my socioeconomic status.

Prompt 3: Questions for Dr. Payne

If you had the opportunity to visit with Dr. Payne over coffee, what are two open-ended questions you would likely ask her regarding the framework?

What are good ways to create relationships with students who are not considered to be living in middle class?

Do you discipline students from various socioeconomic classes differently? If so, do the students pick up on these inconsistencies? 

Reference

Payne, R.K. (2005). A framework for understanding poverty. (4th ed.) The Highlands, TX: aha!

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