36. Feelings

 #66Challenge

In our faculty meeting, we were taught about "affective speech." It means that when a child misbehaves, we explain to them how their actions make us feel, and then tell them what we expect from them.

Here is an example how this goes...

Brian enters the classroom, slapping his hand on the door frame and shouting some nonsense.

I request he return and re-enter, this time like a gentleman.

His response:  "What if I'm not a gentleman."

And I'm supposed to say:

I feel hurt you won't take direction. I feel sad you don't care about yourself.

Like he cares ONE BIT about my feelings!

I have tried this approach before. The feelings, the reaching for them to care about how they represent themselves in the world, the framing in the larger context.

I wouldn't be having to do it EVERY SINGLE DAY if it worked. I would have reached them by now.

Am I wrong?