Negotiating – The Frustration

OK, a famous Paul story. It’s 7:00 p.m., in the second week of Paul’s 7th grade year. I get a phone call from Paul’s math teacher:

“Mr. Cantrell, your son and I made a deal this afternoon, and afterwards, I thought ‘I shouldn’t have done that without talking with his parents!’” The deal was that Paul would sit in the back, listen in on 7th grade algebra, but mostly work in the eighth grade book. And in spite of the teacher’s concerns, I felt like that was exactly what she should have done: She took my kid seriously when he came to her with a problem, treated him like a person who could think and plan and take care of himself. That brief negotiation made a huge difference over the next six years, as the effects reverberated: Paul’s entire schedule became more flexible, less regular, more in his control as a result of the disruption of the sequence in a core subject.

Where’s the frustration in that? That it’s so darned hard to convince most kids to try to negotiate something with a teacher, or even to imagine that they could negotiate. For most kids, the idea seems completely foreign – it’s not so much that they’re unwilling to try, as that they can’t encompass the idea that such a thing is possible.

Negotiating – What’s Possible?

My partners, Tom and Francis, wisely ask: Can kids negotiate with teachers? Maybe the reason kids can’t get my idea is because they know in their hearts it won’t work out. Talking with my partners, we agree, of course, that not every assignment can be negotiated. We feel pretty sure some teachers will be more willing than others. But can a kid negotiate a better deal for herself at school a high enough percentage of the time that it’s worth trying?

On the one hand, with all the talk of teaching executive skills, of empowering kids, it seems like opportunities to negotiate would be part of every curriculum. On the other hand, with the workload most teachers are carrying right now, it’s hard to imagine anyone offering to take on yet another exception, another addition to the overall load.

Notice, however, Paul’s negotiation: He offered to do two courses while others were doing one, and promised the teacher he wouldn’t ask too much of her. She offered her time generously, but that wasn’t one of his conditions, it was her generosity.

Any readers have stories about successful negotiations or failed attempts to negotiate?

Negotiating – A Continuum

Talking with a ninth grader last week, I had an idea. Here are three possible points on a continuum of negotiation possibilities:

1. Your child has an IEP, an Individual Educational Plan. This gives you clout to say to a teacher, “According to our IEP … so I’m hoping you’ll agree to ….”

2. A classic negotiation with a teacher – child carrying on the negotiation solo, parent and child partnering, or parent talking alone with the teacher. This is the one I have so much trouble communicating to kids.

3. A “negotiation” of the student with himself. Last week a ninth grader had an assignment she hated, and was planning to blow off – take the zero. We talked about it, and found a version of the assignment we both thought was super cool – fun instead of work. The best part? There was nothing to negotiate. So far as we could tell, the change was within the limits of the instructions, so there was no need to check with the teacher. (But is this a negotiation? Consider the definition of “to negotiate,” as in “to negotiate the rapids.")