William Glasser
Choice Theory and The Quality School
Overview of Glasser's Model
People, including school children, have four basic needs. Freedom,
Power/Achievement, Fun, and Love/Belonging. If all these needs are
not met on a daily basis, people begin to feel out-of-sync. They
are unable to make the best possible choices for their situations.
Glasser also believes that quality curriculum, quality learning, and quality
teaching are essential elements in classroom discipline. He encourages
teachers to address their students’ basic needs through their curricular
activities.
Assumptions
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At any given moment, people are doing the best that they can do
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Teachers can connect / bond with all their students
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Students can control their own behavior
Instructional Implications
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Students perform useful work
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Students are asked to do the best that they can
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Students use SIR, (self-evaluation, improvement, and repetition)
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Students’ basic needs are satisfied in the classroom through the
curriculum.
Teacher's Role
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Plan curriculum to meet students’ basic needs
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Stress student responsibility in making good choices
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Do not accept any excuses
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Require students to make value judgments about their misbehavior
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Suggest alternatives to inappropriate behavior
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Enforce reasonable consequences
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Be persistent
Strengths
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Teaches students decision-making as a life skill
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Encourages students to do their best
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Provides for consistent enforcement of rules and consequences
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Prevents discipline problems
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Stimulates a desire to learn
Possible Weaknesses
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Teachers must plan curriculum in order to meet students basic needs
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Teachers must present curriculum to students in a way that they can identify
with the subject matter
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Assumes teacher has control over curriculum decisions
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Does not address severe mental, physical, or emotional disorders and exceptionalities
References
Handout from April Jeffers, Martha Knight, and Elizabeth Mautz from
presentation given in CUI 650 on William Glasser. (2001).
Charles, C. M. (1991). William Glasser’s Noncoercive Discipline.
In Building Classroom Discipline (pp. 180-195). New York :
Longman.
Glasser, W. (1969). Schools Without Failure. New York:
Harper & Row.
Glasser, W. (2001). The William Glasser Institute homepage.
[Online].
Available http://www.wglasserinst.com
[2001].
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