The best part about my job is that the administration actively encourages us to do what’s best for our students — to recognize and prioritize kids’ humanity in all our professional decisions. To my mind, giving teachers that kind of power constitutes a radical experiment in American education.

This article by teacher Kelly Lagerwerff reminds me of what it’s like for most kids in private and public schools that prioritize order, compliance, and test scores over human dignity. Lagerwerff problematizes the disconnect between classroom management and instruction, noting that a student’s behavior and emotional needs are inextricable from their intellectual development.

Over and over, I have seen teachers ignore children’s natural curiosity and interest in learning about the world. For whatever reason, they are reluctant to let students’ experiences and feelings—the intensity of which is constricting their ability to move forward—become a door to learning. Instead, they use prizes to buy compliance. And, to be truthful, the kids love the prizes.

She also challenges us to think about the social-emotional “lessons” we’re inadvertently teaching our students through our approach to discipline.

“Worry about yourself” and “mind your own business” are refrains that I hear incessantly at my school. When kids are dragged off to the “break room,” the padded cell we have for children who become violent, the others are told to carry on with what they are doing. Human relationships, especially the way that teachers treat children, are inescapable lessons of every education. They occur regardless of whether or not they are written into the Common Core standards. Watching a classmate being carried kicking and crying to a padded room and being told to ignore it is a lesson.

I am free to place human relationships at the center of my classroom in response to my students’ needs; this article poses the question of what such a middle or high school English class would look like.