Allison? and his Parents
- Author:
Behnice Leland, B.S.,
Man School, Detroit Teachers’ College, Detroit, Mich.
The observation has been made that the education of a child properly begins with a more or less remote ancestor, and Allison proves to be no exception. The one who would befriend this boy in his educational extremity is confronted by the parents’ profound ignorance of the reactions, especially the emotional responses, of childhood; their senseless bickerings about the proper management of an only child; their attitude of contempt for schools and teachers in general and the unreasonable temper of the father. Such an “entangling alliance” challenges the best diplomatic effort of any teacher.
These people are recently well-to-do. The father “too smart” to require the advantages of school after a very tender age, is a foreman in a large automobile factory. He drives a high-priced car, has recently purchased a home in a desirable section, and considers himself a citizen of first order. It is quite inconceivable to either of the pair that any criticism of them can justly be raised by anyone. “It don’t make no difference if he is behind in school,” remarked his mother, “because we don’t know as we’ll raise him anyway. He’s always been frail, and we don’t know as he’ll live to take an education.”
The subject of this amazing observation is Allison?straight, well-built, and eight 3rears old. He stood a few feet away idly picking at some blocks and glancing now and then with contempt at the speaker. He wore an expensive sailor suit of serge, patent leather shoes, and his hair was carefully parted in the middle. After a long day in school, he was hopelessly clean, but otherwise there was nothing about him to suggest the end so lugubriously prophesied by his parent.
In spite of a perfectly adequate intelligence, his daily output in school was practically nil. He read with barely second grade proficiency, and his numbers amounted to an unready knowledge of a few combinations. Straight through a school session, he would sit staring ahead, making no effort to complete an assignment, often failing to start it. He never ventured to get a book or other material for himself, although other children all about him, were going about their tasks freely, helping each other and engaging in quiet conversation.
One noticeable reaction was his emphatic avoidance of the rugs upon which the children sat at story time or played at free moments. Neither would he approach the playground. Instead, he stood idly staring about near one corner of the garden, dumbly oblivious to the cheerful invitations of would-be companions and the teacher’s coaxing efforts to lure him away from the shelter of the fence. The play impulse seemed dead and buried with it were the compelling interests and desires which drive a boy into the customary activities of childhood.
“What would you like to do today?” he was asked. “Don’t know.”
“Well, now do whatever you want to until recess time?whatever you feel like doing.” Recess time, an hour later, found him glued to his chair, his chronic passivity as baffling to the children as to the teacher. “He don’t concentrate,” diagnosed the mother, glibly relegating the problem to the scrap heap of non-essentials.
But Allison did concentrate, for long periods of time and upon class activities in which, however, he took no part. For many weeks he viewed his environment, thus protected, he may have felt, by this armor of dull, disinterested behavior. Judgments quite new to him must have formed within the chaos of his mind for presently he began to respond to a sympathetic atmosphere by asking questions, by greeting us when he arrived and by a pitiful expression of satisfaction when commended. His listless blue eyes took on the light of favorable appraisal. He was beginning to approve of us, and his faint stir of desire within him was the point of departure for remedy. No true effort of his passed without comment. His assignments were prepared with the utmost care as to length and as to difficulty. Very specific observations, day after day, of how nearly he approached a maximum effort made it possible for the teacher to present tasks of increasing difficulty and to know the situations which stimulated him to that effort. The children recognized their part in the training of Allison and their faithful attention to what they conceived to be their duties played as prominent a part in his regeneration as anything the teacher did. He gradually came to the point of defending himself and his work to the group. They were ruthless but just and he soon found how much more comfortable was their approbation than their adverse criticism. The dreary waste between him and his companions ahead in the race, began to lessen and points of interest began to appear?the paper doll representing Allison in Spelling on the top step by “next Friday;” another red block, in the pile which is to-day’s Arithmetic record, “by Wednesday;” items accepted by the “editor” for the school magazine with the privilege of printing them oneself; a letter stating how strong a boy he is because he has completed his task; a favorable comment written unexpectedly on the board; the privilege of attractive materials when the assignment was completed.
Such ideas and many of them were purposely thrust into his experience in as stimulating a manner as could be conceived. The response was a show of initiative and self-direction, feeble at first but growing and gathering momentum to the point where, a year later, a classmate remarked casually, “He is a regular boy now?runs and everything.” He came alone on an interurban car, occasionally, met his mother in the shopping district after school, and acquired grime with considerable abandon, too.
The emphatic gain which he made in the control and direction of energy is indicated by his scores, 0 and 19, six months apart, on the Haggerty Achievement Test, Sigma I. His initial failure was not due to a lack of comprehension nor to any difficulty of vocabulary or of understanding. It represents merely a negative attitude toward the situation.
To explain Allison’s many abnormal reactions, a necessity before remedy is undertaken, one must know his history. He was beset by the threats and beatings of father with an ungovernable temper, who “hates a dirty sassy kid” and who forbade him to play upon the floor at home and at school. Likewise he forbade Allison to defend himself in any way, to satisfy his curiosity about things in general, or to have anything to do with other children. He was, of course, misunderstood and heartlessly teased by his schoolmates as a result.
The nagging derision of his mother was forever in his ears. She refused to let him dress himself, assuring him he was unequal to the task. She brushed his shoes, pushed him into his coat, adjusted his hat (a large black Milan!) and blocked every effort he made to manipulate things for himself, by rude and scornful criticism of his childish effort.
On the other hand, a complete rehearsal of Allison’s refinement, his virtue, in the face of adversity and his complete martyrdom at the hands of teacher and pupils alike, followed the several escapades in which he was chased home, purple in the face and ready to drop with exhaustion at the feet of his mother, by a howling band of young pirates who gleefully noted his unwillingness to take his own part. Virtue at home proved to be the reverse at school. It was a topsy-turvy world, for his teacher refused to wait upon him and he was subjected to most distressing experiences on the playground, and what is most important, without in the least understanding why. With such violent modification imposed upon the instinctive and emotional expression of energy, he was totally unable to adjust himself to the contradictions of scores of situations. Consequently, he took refuge in a series of “negative adaptations” and ensured himself some degree of peace and satisfaction by avoiding positive behavior. Hence, his perpetual state of approximate coma. When the energy lacking proper direction and control burst its bounds, he clenched his fists, bit his nails, beat his knees together, grated his teeth and tore school material with tense fingers.
There is one way, more sure than any other, to bring about the complete and lasting transformation which is desirable, namely, to remove Allison from his parents. This cannot be done at present although the father has suggested a nearby private school as the best solution.
Their “cooperation,” and they believe themselves above criticism in this regard as in every other respect, is blind conformity to the admonitions of the teacher who enlists their confidence and who is sincere enough and aggressive enough to maintain her line of action regardless of their protests or abuse. She must be able to justify every demand she makes, because she believes absolutely in the justice of her demand, and she must prove the value of her diagnosis and of her remedy by showing results. She will find that her best weapon is the approbation or adverse criticism of the group in which Allison works. It has been proven by a year of successful experience with him that the war can be won by the above tactics, but as Allison comes under the dominion of new teachers the battle will be “on” over and over again.
If they stand by their guns, the victory will be won in spite of the damaging experiences to which he has been subjected in the past. Sincere interest in Allison’s future welfare leads one to hope that through their efforts such experiences may never get the strangle hold again.
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