Schools can help end conflict

Schools can help end conflict

Simon Marcus Gower
Jakarta

It is truly sad that the youth of Jakarta seems so often to be
engaged in violent conflict. Adolescents in their school uniforms
may still be seen running amok on the streets of Jakarta as they
enter into, what appears to be, nothing short of gang warfare.
Even college students engage in street battles, as evidenced by
the problems experienced in the Salemba district of the city.

Why is this happening? Does it not suggest that something is
going wrong with the education system when adolescents end their
school or college day with violent conflicts? Perhaps there
really is something wrong here. Perhaps these adolescents are not
getting lessons in conflict resolution and peaceful problem
solving.

Evidence from some quarters might suggest that this is indeed
the case because sometimes efforts from teachers with regards
conflict resolution are nothing short of conflict instigators and
creators. For example, in one school recently two rule-breakers
were dealt with in a, frankly, disturbing manner.

Their teacher instructed them to stand at the front of the
classroom and then their classmates were required to, one-by-one,
slap them both across the face. Offensive physical punishment was
being made worse by having the classmates effectively humiliate
the transgressors.

Such actions are not going to solve problems but are far more
likely to suppress or deepen them and engender new hatreds. As
the great British philosopher Bertrand Russell observed, "To hate
other human beings can only do harm, and it is monstrous that
education should instill such hatred."

But education that does not constructively teach of how to
deal with conflict and give examples to students of how to
peacefully resolve problems between each other is liable to
become a source of 'instilling hatred'; particularly when it
resorts to physical punishments.

It would be naive to suppose that we can live entirely free
from hatred entering into our lives at some point or indeed to
think that we can grow up without experiencing hatred. But we can
certainly learn how to better deal with and dissipate hatred.

Some research has been done to try to detect at what age a
child may first show signs of hate. The results have suggested
that a child is essentially incapable of hate until about three
years of age. It has also been suggested that hate is something
that is acquired and learned; which might be taken to mean that
it can be unlearned as well. But perhaps this is too idealistic.
Once hate has entered into the panoply of our thoughts it is
probably there to stay. What we must do is equip to reduce its
effects.

The Swiss researcher into children's thought and development
Jean Piaget identified what he considered to be the various
stages of children's cognitive development. He suggested that the
ages of two to seven years old were the ages at which a child has
become egocentric in thought and action. But the child progresses
on to have logical and systematic thinking by the ages of seven
to 11 and from 12 to 15 a child is capable of abstract and
logical thought.

Along with this development of thought comes the ability, by
those early teenage years if not before, to enter into problem-
solving including hypothetical problems. It is, then, clear that
school age children are well capable of learning and responding
positively to lessons in conflict resolution. But are they
getting such lessons and are they learning the skills needed to
facilitate positive and peaceful solutions?

Simple steps can and should be taken in schools to allow these
skills to be practiced. Some basic examples illustrate how this
may be achieved:

o Setting and getting agreement on rules helps build
cooperation, participation and a sense of ownership and
responsibility to abide by rules;

o Teachers starting constructive discussions and even role-
plays that anticipate problems and conflicts and allow students
to think of how they might or should react if such things
actually do happen;

o Democratically identifying needs, interests, concerns and
fears;

o Encouraging conflicting parties to stop and listen to each
other;

o Understanding and describing the viewpoints of others;

o Creatively solving problems in a results orientated way;

o Building relationships through communication and
understanding;

o Encouraging genuine listening, listening and yes more
listening.

Simple steps such as the above can quite easily be taken but
sometimes teachers excessively impose their control in a
classroom that creates a condition in which students are coerced
into behaving as the teacher desires rather than cooperatively
responding and participating in the life of the classroom.

Teachers need, therefore, to have skills in conflict
management. Among the things that they should be able to do is
coolly handle conflict and turn it into something constructively.
Conflict is often inevitable because different people have
different needs, interests, concerns and fears. Teachers have to
accept and anticipate this and so use conflicts to creatively
develop and improve relationships.

Early intervention helps to prevent the conflict escalating
out of control, so teachers need to be aware and observant. But
when conflict does occur it is important that the focus is more
on the problem than on the people. Focus should be on the
underlying needs rather than the immediate demands that may be
made in the heat of the moment.

Conflict, well managed, can help to build on a student's
experience rather than being destructive of relationships or
property. Again, naively should not make us blind to the
possibility -- even likelihood -- that conflicts will arise but
they should be reasonably well anticipated and, effectively,
integrated into our learning. In this way they can become one of
life's lessons; never necessarily pleasurable but not necessarily
painful or violently damaging.

A key factor, too, that should not elude teachers is that they
provide a critical model for behavior and responses from the
students. It is therefore essential that teachers keep their
tempers under control and most certainly do not resort to
physical violence to punish a student. The loss of temper and the
use of violence will send particularly undesirable messages to
students; and the danger of them reproducing such behavior is
perhaps evidenced by school and college students literally
running riot on the streets of the capital.

As we approach a new year perhaps we can hope and plan for
this year, and following years, to be more successful in guiding
students towards conflict management and so diffusing the
tensions that often erupt upon the streets of Jakarta.

The writer is an education consultant.