Sadism or not ? McGonagall and her punishments

[a_svirn]

No: HPFGUIDX 186652

> Shaun:
> I've been reading the great Sadism debate with interest. <snip> 
> First of all where am I coming from? Simply put, I am a school teacher and I 
> am also an educational theorist. 

a_svirn:
I'd like to make a disclaimer that I am not a teacher and obviously don't have your experience and expertise. I've done tutoring but that's a different setting. Still I cannot resist answering some of your points from my amateurish perspective. 



> a_svirn:
> 
> > Here is a pretty girl exited and full of anticipation waiting for
> > international delegations to arrive. And McGonagall snaps at her so
> > that everyone would hear 'Miss Patil, take that ridiculous thing out
> > of your hair.' I am not saying it's super cruel, but this is exactly > the 
> > sort of pettiness we are invited to dislike in Snape.
> 
> Shaun:
> 
> Yes, it is, to an extent, you're right - and I think it's just as wrong to 
> criticise Snape for doing it as I do to criticise McGonagall in this 
> instance. Parvarti is doing the wrong thing. She's reprimanded for it. I'm 
> sure she didn't enjoy it, but she's not meant to enjoy it. It's an adverse 
> stimulus intended to correct an inappropriate behaviour. It's basic 
> behavioural theory.

a_svirn:
I would agree with your every word if I found Parvati behaviour objectionable. Since I don't, it is McGonagall's behaviour I am objecting to. 


> 
> a_svirn:
> 
> > Certainly, she didn't *have* to do it. Snape used Neville
> > squeamishness to bully him with horned frogs? McGonagall did the same > 
> > with Lavender and mice. And Lavender had lived though the trauma of
> > loosing a pet bunny. (Ok, a bunny is not quite the same as a mouse,
> > but still probably close enough to make an impressionable person
> > uncomfortable. And Ron used to have a pet rat, which *is* pretty
> > close.) And while Snape threw "idiot boy" at Neville, she called
> > Lavender silly girl for being squeamish. I suppose `idiot' is
> > somewhat worse than `silly', but that's a kind of difference without
> > much distinction, really. (It may even be a gender thing: Snape calls
> > Hermione silly, rather than idiot.) Does she *have* to pick on
> > Parvati? Does she *have* to denigrate her students' mental abilities?
> > Does she *have* to make Neville suffer for something that is so
> > obviously out of his control - bad memory? Quite the contrary - she
> > has to absolutely make sure that certain adjustments are made to make
> > things easier for him. Instead, she goes out of her way to make life > 
> > difficult for him and misses no opportunity to draw everyone's
> > attention to his condition. Oh, and by the way, if she had done her
> > duty the situation with the stolen passwords wouldn't have occurred.
> > So not only her punishment was abusive, she was actually scapegoating
> > Neville.
> 
> Shaun:
> 
> OK - now I'm going to start talking about the thing I said I'd get to later. 
> In particular, I'm going to discuss what I believe Neville's learning 
> problems are and how they should be appropriately dealt with by teachers. I 
> am, for the record, special education trained and have, at times, worked as 
> a support teacher for children with learning disabilities.
> 
> Let me just tease out what small section of what I've just quoted.
> 
> "Does she *have* to make Neville suffer for something that is so obviously 
> out of his control - bad memory? Quite the contrary - she has to absolutely 
> make sure that certain adjustments are made to make things easier for him."
> 
> This is your opinion - and you're entitled to it. But speaking, myself, as a 
> teacher, I don't entirely agree with it.
> 
> The second part - I don't have that much problem with that, although I would 
> phrase it differently. A teacher has a duty to provide accomodations for a 
> child with learning disabilities to ensure they can overcome or circumvent 
> those difficulties to the extent possible. This does *not* necessarily 
> involve making things easier for the child. In fact, sometimes it involves 
> making things harder.


a_svirn:
Fair enough. I should have said "make sure certain adjustments are made to help Neville to overcome his disability" or something to that effect. The point is still valid though that such adjustments were *not* made. Now, I understand that not all teachers have enough time ability or inclination to deal with children with disabilities. However, from my unprofessional point of view if a teacher can't be bothered to make an effort on such students' behalf, the least he or she can do is to try to avoid embarrassing them unnecessarily. Let alone punishing them for something that isn't their fault. 


> Shaun: 
> As for McGonagall and the passwords, Neville's memory issues make it harder 
> for him to remember passwords. It doesn't make it impossible (if it did, he 
> also wouldn't be able to remember people's names, and similar). Now, yes, it 
> would be nice if somebody sat down with Neville and taught him some of the 
> strategies CAPD people can use in this situation, but the bottom line is, he 
> has to overcome this problem and he is capable of doing so.
> 
> And remember - he's not being punished because he can't remember the 
> password. He's being punished because he wrote them down and he wasn't 
> supposed to. That's not the same thing. His difficulty in remembering is not 
> his fault. Choosing to write them down however is a deliberate choice.


a_svirn:
Choosing to write them down was his only resort. Neville had difficulties under normal circumstances, in this instance, however, even students without any learning disabilities were having trouble remembering those frequently changing, crazy multisyllabic passwords. Neville had realistically no chance of pulling it of. McGonagall, who, in my unprofessional view, had moral if not contractual obligation to help him out (especially, since it was a security issue and there was a very real danger out there) had done nothing. What was Neville to do? He hit upon the only sensible option – wrote them down. And when McGonagall's neglect backfired he was the one who got punished. Seems to me he *was* punished for something he couldn't help. And for McGonagall's professional shortcomings of course. 

> 
> a_svirn:
> 
> > Yeah, that one punishment that lasted for nearly half the term. And
> > which he didn't really deserve in the first place, since she was the > one 
> > at fault. How about that time when she pointed out - with a
> > theatrical sigh and before the entire class - that his grandmother
> > had sent her the permission form because she didn't trust Neville's
> > memory? She didn't *have* to it this way, did she? But why miss a
> > good opportunity to embarrass a student?
> 
> Shaun:
> 
> Because it's hard for a child to overcome learning difficulties. It's 
> *really* hard in a lot of cases. And the only way it can really happen in 
> most cases is for the child to *want* to do it.


a_svirn:
Does basic behavioural theory teach that embarrassing students by attracting a class's attention to their disabilities make them want to overcome said disabilities? I must say my own random observations tend to point into the opposite direction. So do the Potter Books. Neville did not excel either in Potions or Transfiguration. However, with teachers who did not find it necessary to bully their students he achieved adequate to excellent results. Those who are strong and able enough might regard adverse stimuli as a challenge, but for those who are already challenged? From what I've seen, usually such stimuli have an adverse effect.