On the second day of school, I watched a second-grader call a card game stupid. It was a game in which students read the words on their cards and created a story using the—mostly one-syllable—words. “This is so stupid,” Jasmine yelled. “I want to do something fun.”
We were in an after-school program, and her mentor tried again and again to get her to participate with the group.
“This is stupid!” the child repeated. She spun around in her chair, so that her back was to her group.
For me, this was a code. As a child, I thought a lot of school activities were stupid. Because I was academically ahead of most of my peers, I’d grit my teeth through an activity I thought was “stupid” so I could go back to doing whatever I wanted to do. But I recognized as a student—and now as a teacher—that this dramatic behavior often indicates someone doesn’t get it. The person is calling the activity stupid instead of calling themselves stupid.
I went over to my colleague and asked, “Is it okay if Jasmine works with me?”
She nodded. After asking Jasmine for her permission also, we walked to a separate part of the room. I crouched next to her and said, “You have a choice, Jasmine. You read your cards with me, or go back to your group and participate with everyone else, or you take a break. Do you need a break?”
She shook her head. “No, it’s just these cards are stupid!”
“If these cards are so stupid, it shouldn’t take you long to read them and tell me a short story about them, right?” I held up one of the cards. “What does this one say?”
“I don’t know!”
Bingo. (Though I hated I’d had to press her for this response.)
“Oh, that’s okay. I’m not worried about what you don’t know.” As a program, we emphasize positive feedback whenever we can. “How about what you do know? What’s this first letter?”
“B.”
“And the second one?”
“E. This is so stupid!”
I ignored her comment, since now I was certain it was verbalized frustration. “B-E. I know that makes a word. Can you help me sound it out?”
While working with Jasmine on the other cards though, I realized she didn’t know the sounds most of the words made or sounds certain letters make when they’re together, such as “th” and “sh” and “ght.”
This exchange made Jasmine’s outbursts crystal clear to me. She’d made it to second grade without learning to read—much less read the 60 words per minute that she needed to be at a proficient first-grade reading level. School, I imagine, must be torturous for her—hours upon hours of being given worksheets and textbooks she doesn’t understand. Academics in after school must only compound her feelings of frustration.
In my program, we have the chance to work in small groups, to help students get up to grade level, to learn where their strengths and weaknesses are and design teaching methods that build their confidence. We also talk with the parents or siblings who pick up the children to learn what’s going on in the home—to understand our students as people with challenges they face when they leave school. Not all educators have this time and access, but even knowing what to look for can help with interpreting behavior.
Jasmine’s behavior was her way of telling us that she wasn’t getting what she needed. In her case, it was help with basic academic skills. Not participating was code for, “I don’t want to expose my knowledge deficits.”
Once we recognize disruptive behaviors as codes, we can help prevent them. Kids who aggress against others may be throwing the first punch because making others fearful is the only way they achieve status at school. Kids who act out when it is time to leave for the day may be in need of an adult to ask what’s going on in the home. Adopting this lens of “reading behind the behavior” opens up a whole world of possible interventions that can make life more successful—academically and emotionally—for kids like Jasmine and those who share their classrooms.
Clift is a writer and a substitute teacher with a focus on youth labeled with behavioral issues. She also develops and delivers programs for seventh- to 12th-graders in nontraditional settings.
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