The "Why" of Restorative Practices in Spokane Public Schools Part2

Well what we're learning is that kids don't know how to do that for real and I have to do some coaching with them, helping them identify what the conflict is, identify how they really feel and then identify what they need to have this resolved. And I've had really good success with that, sometimes there are such deep hurts happening that kids really do need to have a conference with each other and with me in order to have that happen. The other thing is that we'll have class meetings that are a little different than the community circles and that's where we actually do some problem-solving together as a class. So I'll say this is a problem that we're having generally in the class let's think about what the causes of the problem are and then let's see if we can brainstorm some ideas, select a solution that we're gonna try and then come back and see how it's worked.
The kids really need to feel like they can trust me and that they can trust each other, and this is how we get that done. It takes a lot of time but you can come in any time and you'll notice that because we've taken that time they're kinder to each other, they're more understanding, you can come back and see the kids in action working together collaboratively. And they're able to do that because they've built trust.
Children are remarkably sensitive and when they've been harmed or have harmed somebody else, they need to learn that mistakes have consequences in relationship versus mistakes have consequences that take me out of relationship. When we suspend students it doesn't necessarily mean that they're being held accountable. For some students that means a free day out in our community and so to actually have a response that requires students to stay accountable to the behavior and make up for their wrongdoing is I think a step in a positive direction. It's not just a matter of serving your amount of time and now you're ready to go and everything's fixed. That doesn't repair any of the harm, that doesn't connect them back to the community.
What happened what really works is having them sit down and think about how they affected people and how do they fix the problem. A lot of times when we get kids they are way up here and we need to get them down. When you cause them to think it causes their brain to slow down and then you follow it up with a series of questions which talks about how can I help make this better? What can we do to get you past this and get you into a better place? And when when you go in that direction kids start thinking like "Wow well they're really into my health and welfare" and that's an important piece.
It's a pretty powerful process so the first thing that everyone has to agree to come in voluntarily. That's the first part. The second part is we have to agree to common courtesy- which means no name-calling or yelling. We don't want to make the situation worse.
The third thing is they have to agree to have an open mind, which means they'll actually listen to the other person. And the fourth thing is that we don't have to agree on all the facts of the situation. We're gonna talk about each person's perspective on the conflict they've had, but we do agree that there's a problem and we need to solve it. Oftentimes students don't have the tools to process their feelings and emotions and so it's our job to kind of work with them and give them some of those tools to help cope and process and communicate.