Bullying and OST

[Christine Whitney Sanchez]

Hello Rose,

Thanks for your courageous, open inquiry and for sharing your learning  
with all of us.

A decade ago, I worked with a group of what we Arizonans call "middle  
school" students on a year-long project that was focused on building  
community capacity (a very abstract idea, even to most community  
leaders :).   What I remember about the first meetings was the  
tremendous developmental differences, especially between the awkward  
12 year-old boys and the 14 year-old girls who loved to flaunt their  
beauty and their social power.

The project was funded by the "get the kids to stop smoking" folks who  
were willing to experiment with a project design that focused on  
resilience rather than trying to stop bad behavior. Early on, the  
school principal saw the wisdom of having a self-selected design/ 
planning team that was made up of students, teachers, parents,  
administrators, community leaders, etc.

The principal had already recruited community leaders and had invited  
everyone in the school to come to the first planning meeting.  She was  
surprised and delighted at the number of students (around 30 as I  
recall) who showed up to be a part of this team.  The students  
outnumbered the adults three to one.  With such large numbers at the  
first meeting, the only thing to do was open the space for self- 
organized planning.  The students took the lead in many cases, perhaps  
because the adults were deliberately  stepping back or perhaps because  
it was clear that the students were the experts on middle school  
culture and what would work best to encourage the largest number of  
students to get actively involved in their project, which became an  
Appreciative Inquiry into community resilience.

I loved watching a very shy 12 year-old boy team up with a dynamic 14  
year-old girl to design the questions they would use for interviews  
with community leaders.

Warm wishes from a brilliant Phoenix morning,

Christine
Christine Whitney Sanchez
Collaborative Wisdom & Strategy
480.759.0262
www.christinewhitneysanchez.com
Skype: christinewhitneysanchez
http://www.facebook.com/ChristineWhitneySanchez

On Nov 4, 2009, at 4:50 PM, Rose Tassone wrote:

>
> Hello everyone. I’m wishing to share my experience of facilitating  
> OST for the first time. It was held in a primary school in Perth,  
> Western Australia. Surveys administered by the principal earlier in  
> the year had parents and students report that they were most  
> concerned about bullying at this school. The principal identified  
> the question “What do we need to do to respect each other and get  
> along?’ 73 students, ages 8 to 12, 6 educators and 3 parents  
> accepted the invitation.
>
> This is what I observed during the OS event: A student was pushed  
> out of her group when she went to the breakout space even though she  
> was the one who had initiated the topic; students were physically  
> fighting, pushing each other and name calling; students who were  
> being butterflies chose to run around, disrupt and tease those in  
> the groups even though there was a drawing activity available to  
> them; the groups tended to compete with each other on how many pages  
> they could fill with lists of dos and don’ts of how to treat each  
> other.  The energy of the morning was one of palpable violence and  
> two students were suspended.  Teachers who had been briefed by the  
> principal to allow chaos at the event, so that children could self  
> organise, finally had to intervene because of duty of care issues.
>
> Looking through the Book of Proceedings the students appear to have  
> all the knowledge of how to respect each other and get along, though  
> their behaviour during the event did not depict this. At the  
> debriefing the principal mentioned that the behaviours that were  
> shown are what normally occur every day in the schoolyard as they  
> self organise around individual survival.  So it appears that the  
> proverbial ‘Lucy’ is more than likely a 10 year old bully!
>
> I would really appreciate any comments and/or thoughts.
>
> Kindest regards
> Rose Tassone
>
>
> m:   (+61) 0408 944 072
> e:    rosetassone at iinet.net.au
> p:    po box 358 leederville wa 6903
>
>
>
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