Butchart, Ronald E. and McEwan, Barbara (Editors). (1998).
Classroom Discipline in American Schools: Problems and
Possibilities for Democratic Education. Albany, NY: State
University of New York Press
Pp. 287
$59.50 ISBN 0-7914-3617-9 (Cloth)
$19.95 ISBN 0-7914-3618-7 (Paper)
Reviewed by David J. Flinders
Indiana University
August 16, 1999
The motives for creating this volume stem from what its
editors view as an erosion of critical dialogue on issues of
classroom management. Butchart and McEwan attribute this erosion
to experts who currently "huckster books, seminars, videotapes,
programs, packages, and even computer software, with confident
claims of educational peace and tranquility" (p. 1). Eschewing
fads and gimmicks, Classroom Discipline in American Schools seeks
to promote a dialogue that cherishes doubt and contributes to
inquiry. In particular, the book pursues three stated aims: 1)
to suggest lines of research that will inform this dialogue, 2)
to build a case against mainstream, behaviorist practices (those
based on rewards, punishment, manipulation, or control), and 3)
to propose democratic alternatives.
Supporting this agenda, Butchart's introduction underscores
the tendency for discipline issues to receive less scholarly
attention than most other aspects of schooling. Compared with
curriculum or methods of teaching, for example, discipline is
something of a poor relation; acknowledged as a family member
but rarely talked about. This neglect may be surprising given
that the primary concerns of classroom discipline--attitudes,
behaviors, and ways of interacting with others--are a
significant part of what schools teach. Dewey (1938/1967)
referred to these non-academic lessons as "collateral learning"
which, he argued, "may be and often is more important than the
spelling lesson or lesson in geography or history that is
learned" (p. 48). Discipline understood as central to this not-
so-hidden curriculum is an intellectually powerful theme. It
provides a compelling rationale both for the book and for the
study of classroom discipline as a field at large.
The following review is divided into three parts. First, I
will briefly describe the contents of the book in order to
suggest its scope, organization, and main ideas. The second part
of the review identifies a concern that cuts across many of the
chapters, thus representing a possible limitation for the book as
a whole. Finally, I will suggest a type of analysis that the
book overlooks, but which may be useful in guiding future studies
of classroom discipline.
Butchart and McEwan have grouped the nine chapters of their
book into three sections. The first section, "Historical and
Political Perspectives on Classroom Management," includes a
chapter by Butchart and one by Beyer. The aim of this section is
to introduce "the larger context" that gives classroom discipline
its significance across time and place (p. 17). Butchart's
chapter examines the historical dimensions of this context.
Beginning at the end of the colonial period and galloping (albeit
gracefully) through more than two centuries, Butchart outlines
the rise of bureaucratic and developmental means of keeping order
in early American schoolhouses, trends that were followed during
the progressive era by mixing bureaucratic discipline with a
faith in the principles of modern psychology. In surveying these
trends, the chapter debunks a common assumption that discipline's
own history is captured largely, if not solely by the decline of
corporal punishment. Beyer's companion chapter is billed as
addressing the political dimensions of classroom discipline. It
does so by critiquing behaviorist approaches as a way to realign
discipline with an alternative conception of professionalism
based on social justice, cultural understanding, and egalitarian
ideals.
The second section of the book groups four chapters under
the title, "Ethnographic and Personal Perspectives on Classroom
Management." These chapters focus largely on the particulars of
classroom discipline, and as a result, they unavoidably end up
struggling with its familiar tensions. Blount's chapter, which
opens the section, vividly illustrates the personal challenges
that teachers face as they navigate between the individual needs
of students and the collective needs of a class. The next
chapter is a case study in which McCadden raises several
contradictions embodied in the complicated work of a kindergarten
teacher. In many ways, this teacher is a traditional
disciplinarian, strict in her style of classroom management, but
she is equally caring toward her students and highly respected
throughout the school. McEwan's chapter raises paradoxes as
well, including a curious yet common dissonance between the
values that teachers embrace and some of their discipline
practices. In the final chapter of this section, Henry and
Abowitz report a study that focuses on how a particular approach
to discipline, Glasser's Control Theory, is used in one school.
By examining practice, these authors find themselves in an
intellectual struggle over different ways to conceptualize the
aims of education and the needs of students.
The final section of the book, "Toward a Curriculum of
Democratic Civility," is devoted to exploring critical
alternatives to mainstream approaches. In particular, two
chapters focus on "Judicious Discipline." Gathercoal's chapter
explains how this approach draws on basic constitutional rights
and legal principles. "Justice," he writes, "is concerned
primarily with due process and deals with basic governmental
fairness" (p. 199). Questions of implementation are taken up in
a separate chapter where Nimmo recounts the successful use of
Judicious Discipline in several Minnesota schools. This chapter
offers examples of what various components of the framework look
like in the context of school policy and day-to-day classroom
teaching. In the book's final chapter, Stanley shifts the focus
by making a general plea for educators to acknowledge the human
dimensions of classroom discipline. In reviewing styles of
discipline at large, she also questions the narrowly cognitive
and legalistic basis for Judicious Discipline in particular,
recommending instead the ethical principles of professional
caring and empathy. Although brief, Stanley's critique begins to
characterize the type of critical dialogue that the book sets out
to achieve.
In the spirit of that dialogue, I want to suggest one
limitation that stands out across several chapters. This
limitation is the tendency to simplify or ignore the diversity of
perspectives represented in the recent "mainstream" scholarship
on classroom discipline. Many of the contributing authors do not
refer to this literature at all, and those who do consistently
overgeneralize its behaviorist orientation. Beyer's chapter, for
example, presents a well-developed and articulate case against
behaviorist approaches, citing Assertive Discipline in particular
"as expressing the conventional wisdom concerning classroom
discipline" (p. 63). To some degree, Assertive Discipline may
represent conventional wisdom. However, Beyer moves from
examples to what he terms "the nearly wholesale embrace of
behavioral psychology as a basis for mainstream approaches to
classroom discipline" (p 73). While this statement gives the
impression that all mainstream approaches are cut from the same
cloth, a survey of the field suggests otherwise. Charles' (1999)
book, for example, a source that Beyer cites in one of its
earlier editions, reviews twelve distinct models of classroom
discipline, plus the work of Barbara Coloroso and Alfie Kohn.
Besides representing a wide range of perspectives, and thus
contentious debates within the field, only a small minority of
these models can trace their roots to behavioral psychology.
A tendency to dismiss the diversity of recent scholarship,
however, does not prevent the book from breaking new ground, or
at least pointing to areas in which the field now seems poised
for innovative research. Specifically, several authors (e.g.,
Stanley, Blount, and Beyer) suggest approaching classroom
discipline as a form of moral and ethical practice. Given this
premise, scholars of classroom discipline may find a valuable
source of guidance in the formal study of ethics and the various
ethical systems proposed by philosophers such as Jeremy Bentham,
John Stuart Mill, or Immanuel Kant. Many of the concerns raised
in Butchart and McEwan's book seem to represent tensions between
the type of ethical systems identified by these renowned figures.
One agenda of the book, for example, can be viewed as an effort
to move away from utilitarian ethics (those based on the
consequences of an action) toward either deontological ethics
(those based on principles such as fairness and justice) or, in
Stanley's case, relational ethics (those based on regard for
others). Not all issues conform to this type of analysis, but
understanding alternative ethical systems may help educators see
beyond the immediate practice of classroom discipline to the
values and principles on which it is grounded.
References
Charles, C. M. (1999). Building classroom discipline. (Sixth Edition)
New York: Longman.
Dewey, J. (1938/1967).Experience and education. New York:
Collier Books.
About the Authors
Ronald E. Butchart is Professor and Program Director of the Education
Program at the University of Washington, Tacoma. He is the author of
Northern Schools, Southern Blacks, and Reconstruction: Freedmen's
Education, 1862-1875 and Local Schools: Exploring Their History.
Barbara McEwan is Coordinator of Elementary Education at Oregon State
University. She is the author of Practicing Judicious Discipline and
On Being the Boss.
About the Reviewer
David J. Flinders is a faculty member of the School of Education at
Indiana University. He teaches courses in qualitative research methods,
curriculum theory, and models of teaching.
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