Is it acceptable for school counselors to punish children by making them clean the <span title="cafeteria-clean,sweep&mop?">cafeteria-clean,sweep&mop...</span>

Question

Is it acceptable for an elementary counselor to punish children by putting them to clean all the tables in the cafeteria, sweep all the cafeteria and mop as well?

Answer 1

Why not?  Unless they&#039;re being made to work with OSHA-restricted chemicals, there&#039;s nothing wrong with making them take care of their environment.  20-30 minutes of wiping, sweeping, and mopping isn&#039;t going to damage a child - and hopefully it will teach them to think twice before they act up again.

Answer 2

I personally feel that every student should be doing those things, not as punishment but as a lesson that everyone should work together to make the world a better place. It&#039;s meaningful and many schools do this to create a sense of ownership and community. cleaning the cafeteria, picking up litter outside, etc.

For punishment, they should be doing something completely worthless and a waste of time. Like filling in endless worksheets...oh wait, they do that in school anyway!



You&#039;re in the homeschool section BTW.

Answer 3

I think it&#039;s brilliant!  By working, the &quot;offenders&quot; are humbled and actually doing something of value for the school community, rather than writing sentences or sitting in detention daydreaming.  Perfect!  

Especially effective if the &quot;crime&quot; was to make more work for the custodial staff!

Makes a statement to the children that there will be a consequence for acting up.

Answer 4

I would think it would be according to what the child did and how the counselor presented the punishment.

I work in a public high school.   We sometimes have students on custodial duty to &quot;pay&quot; for damages of school property by giving  free labor.  This labor is done before or after school.  Our ISS ( in school suspension) class puts chairs on tables for the cafeteria ladies to sweep.    Our teachers who are on lunch room duty have students pick up trash for various offenses.   The most effective use of this is that teachers take away ball caps if students wear them into the cafeteria.   To &#039;earn&#039; their cap back the students pick up trash after their individual lunch period. (We have 4 lunch periods.)

All of these punishments are administered in a very light and nonthreatening way.   We, the cafeteria staff, always thank the students as if they were doing the duty as a kindness to us because it is very helpful.

I know that elementary students are not at maturity level of a high school level.   This is just an example of how our school uses manual labor as a punishment.   It may help you to gauge the severity of the punishment to the incident that you are questioning.

Answer 5

Well... if they made the mess then they should clean it...

Answer 6

The university I worked at before made students clean up facility for few hours. But I disagree, they should leave them alone to study for mathematics/biology/chemistry examinations rather than clean.

Answer 7

duh. bad behavior needs consequences. perhaps they will think twice next time.

Answer 8

It depends.

I would say it is eminently reasonable to have kids who instigated a food fight help clean up so they can really understand what the damage is and why they shouldn&#039;t do it again. But even then, care should be taken to ensure the *amount* of work isn&#039;t unreasonable given the age and abilities of the children as well as how many children are doing the work.

And, perhaps, it would make sense as a standard punishment (rather than detention) for any given transgression, especially if it was spelled out in the school&#039;s code of conduct that all misbehaviors are to be dealt with in this fashion.

On the other hand, it would be a ridiculous punishment for something like tardiness. Most tardiness is caused by the parents (most elementary school kids don&#039;t like being late and standing out from their peers), so punishing the child, especially in an unrelated way, seems odd. A more appropriate response would be to talk to the parent and/or keep the child after school to make up what he or she missed.

Also, the way you phrased the question implies that there was a really substantial amount of work. I am having a hard time thinking of a transgression that would warrant that amount of punishment for a very young child, so that is a concern. It is possible for the type of punishment to be fine but the severity to be inappropriate.

Answer 9

yes it is,why would it be a problem if a kid has to clean,it is not going to hurt them and it well give them time to think about what they did

Answer 10

absolutely...  Why wouldn&#039;t it be???  When my children act up at home I usually find a nasty chore for them to do, it will make them think twice about repeating the given behavior.

Answer 11

yes it is it teaches children they cant get away with things when they are away from mommy

Answer 12

Absolutely

Answer 13

Yes, they need to have some way to discipline students... and virtually every other method has been taken away.  Schools have even been taken to court over suspensions and told by parents that their kids are not to be kept after school... what else is the school supposed to do?

Answer 14

Why not? In some schools, it&#039;s actually a PRIVILEGE to be able to clean up or they take turns being responsible for cleaning.

Of course, I&#039;d say it depends on the &quot;crime committed&quot;. If the child has been rowdy in the cafeteria and caused a mess, definitely. You made a mess--you get to clean it up. Logical consequence. If it&#039;s something totally unrelated, it&#039;d better to find a more logical consequence, but there&#039;s nothing wrong in itself to be cleaning, sweeping and mopping a floor.

Answer 15

Of course.  That&#039;s what they do at my school.  I think this is a good punishment.  The kid is obviously not going to like it, and it gets a job done.  It&#039;s much more productive than giving the kid a lecture, and they&#039;ll definatly remember to not mis-behave.  School counselors don&#039;t deal out such harsh punishments for petty offenses.  They&#039;re not out to get your kid.