What Really Matters: The Centrality of Moral Authority in Students' Perspectives on Classroom Management

• In Event: 51.078 - MTCC Roundtable Session 21
  In Roundtable Session: 51.078-13 - The Role of Student Perspectives and the Student/Teacher Relationship in Classroom Management and How It Translates Into Practice in the Classroom

Abstract

This ethnographic study centers students’ perspectives on classroom management. My student participants attended a no-excuses charter school, which utilized strict behavior management practices reinforced by systems of rewards and punishments. Students were highly critical of this system, describing it as nonsensical and unfair. In contrast, they valued behavioral boundaries that supported worthwhile aims including respect and learning, and wanted teachers to correct their behavior in ways that were supportive rather than punitive. Their responses challenge the perceived effectiveness of approaches to classroom management based in behaviorism, common in all schools but particularly pervasive in schools serving low-income youth of color. They suggest that instead, teachers must possess moral authority: authority based on student buy-in and commitment to broader ethical purposes.

Author

• Eliot Graham, University of Montana - Missoula