Response to Maribel's Blog: Lack of Interest, Lack of Education, or Just Plain Rude?

I completely understand Maribel's frustrations with people who act unnecessarily rude and obnoxious.  Although her post was categorized as more of a personal rant, I believe that it does address issues that we see everyday in school.  Who is responsible for teaching our young people how to conduct themselves in a respectful, professional manner?  Hopefully this is something being taught by families through dialogue and modeling, but it should also be reinforced in school.  Being courteous and respectful to others can open up a lot of doors in life.  Last Thursday, I was working with my cooperating teacher (let's call her Ms. X) and she had a difficult encounter with a student.  Ms. X stopped a student in the hallway to remind her to act respectfully to her co-teacher, Ms. Y.  Apparently this touched a nerve with the student, because she burst out yelling in the hallway.  Ms. X calmly and respectfully asked the student to please lower her voice and to allow her to finish talking.  Each time Ms. X would try and explain her thoughts to the student, the student would cut her off and continue yelling that she didn't do anything wrong.  Finally Ms. X asked the student to accompany her to the department office, where she asked the student to sit down and talk.  Instead of focusing on her behavior in the classroom, Ms. X addressed the behavior that she just experienced.  They had a long talk about respectful communication and how Ms. X was sincerely interested in what the student thought and what she had to say about the situation, but she couldn't engage in a constructive conversation with constant interruptions and yelling.  Ms. X talked about maintaining a calm tone, taking turns speaking, and maintaining eye contact during a discussion.  Ms. X explained that everyone should exhibit the amount of respect that they would like to receive in turn.  The student actually had some really good things to say about her interactions with the co-teacher Ms. Y and her thoughts on class, but we would have never known that if the conversation continued and evolved into a yelling match.  This just goes to show that a lot of what we teach in school won't necessarily be our content areas, but general life skills needed for success.