How Often is Generational Dysfunction and Student Behavior Related ?
It has always disturbed and puzzled me how a dysfunction family could produce the same behavioral issues over and over again. I encountered many dysfunctional families while in law enforcement with several families criminal area of expertise known to last enforcement by their last name. The cycle of generation dysfunction exist and was very accurate unfortunately. A family's last name would be synonymous throughout the area for the criminal acts of their older relatives.The common example would be that the father would be in jail for burglary, his son would follow the same burglary method, a few years later and so would his son. I always believed that anyone can see the errors of someone's ways without having to live it, but generational dysfunction is much deeper than merely saying no. The lack of a strong support system or advocate against this learned behavior can be devastating on a entire generation. Upon entering my school a discussion began about behavioral issues and a extremely disruptive behavioral student was mentioned and the younger sibling would be entering the school with even worse behavioral issues. The dysfunction starts in the home, extends into the schools, and eventually reaches a community. A problem that we as educators must also be conscious of that beyond parents and maybe a few close relatives we may be the best advocates to help change and end this dysfunctional generational cycle.
I cannot tell you the number of young men that I encountered who had grandfather, father and brother all incarcerated at the same time. So, who is teaching the boys to be men? Who is telling them that being a father is more than the act of making the baby? I used to coordinate a father/daughter dance when I was in a pre-K/8 building and so many of my little girls did not have a daddy at home. Some of the male teachers, my husband and a few other men in the community would volunteer to be a surrogate fathers for the evening. An absent father from a little girl's life can be devastating and she often begins to look to fill that void in all the wrong ways. Some of these young girls are now young adults and many of them have children by young men who are mirror images of the fathers that were absent from their lives. Generation after generation, we can track the same behavior of grandma, mother and daughter. I once had a program called, Breaking the Cycle, which focused on this very subject. It's a tough cycle to break but can be done. Sometimes, it just takes the right educator, at the right time, with the right heart to care enough to show them something different.
ReplyDeleteI thought about this so often with my former clients. Another important piece is the lack of wisdom from life lived - even if elders are not incarcerated, often the number of generations and the age differences between generations are multiples of 15 years. I like to challenge the paradigm when people say "well these parents don't do anything" with a conversation about hypothetical ages. That 12 year old has a 25 year old mother and a 40 year old grandmother, who taught them how to be a parent and when? I believe some of our work will be helping parents grow just as we're helping students grow.
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