A Synopsis

Soft-cover, 6” X 9”, 247 pages, 2006, Educational Dynamics Publications

“At-Risk Students: Feeling Their Pain, Understanding Their Plight, and Accepting Their Defensive Ploys” is a groundbreaking book written for educators, especially for regular classroom teachers. It reveals a hidden or rarely acknowledged source of classroom discipline problems—students defending against being humiliated. Virtually every waking moment, at-risk students live in fear of their ‘stupidity” being exposed. Statistically, three of every twenty-four students are at-risk of failure. As failures, students take a defensive stance. They assume a defeatist attitude and can create serious interruptions and distractions for classmates and the teacher. Teachers, do their best to maintain classroom discipline and control in the midst of their protective ploys of disengagement, recalcitrance, misbehavior, and interference.

Compelled to attend class as failures, these students live in unrelenting fear of continued failure, embarrassment, marginalization, boredom, being thought “dumb” and perhaps worst of all, fear that they may actually “be dumb”. Most are not yet aware of their dismal prospects of an impoverished future as school drop-outs..

“At Risk Students” offers 30 stories, articles, and vignettes from the author’s six-year research program with “troublemakers” at all grade levels, and more than thirty years of research implementation. Bill Page explores at-risk students’ apathy, disrespect and misbehavior as defenses against having their incompetence exposed, being embarrassed, frustrated, and disengaged. Well-meaning teachers, who themselves were successful in school, struggle with the symptoms of the misbehavior problem rather than its causes. They focus on maintaining class control by punishing and embarrassing the offending students.

Bill Page’s book helps classroom teachers to feel, understand, accept, and experience just what the subtitle suggests—the pain, plight and defensive ploys of students attempting to cover their fear, embarrassment and suffering. As teachers begin to understand where these students “are coming from”, and accept their misbehavior as defensive mechanisms, they can learn to deal more effectively with the problems created by students, teachers, and school policies.

When one student fails and is retained for the year, it is a personal tragedy, an embarrassing family stigma, and a life-altering travesty for them all; but when millions of students fail the year, itis a statistic—an impersonal, inevitable calamity expected, accepted, and perpetuated. And the calamitous conditions will persist as long as schools blame the struggling victims. This book is informative and helpful for thinking about failure from the students’ perspective. And, it is a reminder of the responsibility classroom that teachers have to take the initiative in salvaging the lives of students who cannot save themselves.

“At-Risk Students” available for $19.95 including shipping and handling. Satisfaction is unconditionally guaranteed and may be ordered on-line: http://www.teacherteacher.com/ or email billpage@bellsouth.net for information.