Students Get Jump on Learning to ‘Fight Fair’

Fights at Moorpark’s Flory elementary school usually involve name-calling and a few shoves in the lunchroom line--nothing like the brawls that can break out among high school kids.

But Flory teachers and administrators have started a program to teach their pupils how to defuse fights before they begin, hoping that by showing younger students ways to resolve conflict, they will prevent more serious fighting later on.

The program, called Flory Peacemakers, teaches 9- and 10-year-olds to control their anger and see conflicts through the eyes of others.

“With those kids who have a lot of anger, maybe if we do this now, it will give them some tools and some confidence,” said Susan Canfield, who teaches fourth grade.

The idea is not unique to Flory. Moorpark’s Chaparral Middle School started a similar program in September. Countywide, 12 schools, including Chaparral, Flory and Matilija Junior High School in Ojai, received state grants in June for programs that teach conflict-resolution skills and reduce violence on campus.

Flory teacher Robert Bemis said the program makes particular sense at his school given the ethnic diversity of its students. He teaches students who are Latino, African American and white--even immigrants from Russia and Poland.

“Those kids need to learn to get along,” he said.

Flory Principal Teri Williams created her school’s Peacemakers program in January, after hearing about a similar program in Florida. All 581 Flory students receive Peacemaker training throughout the year. Teachers begin by trying to create a sense of community within each classroom, then they teach students how to handle disagreements without hurling insults or fists.

Much of the work hinges on teaching children to understand other people’s perspectives--no easy task considering the young age of Flory students. The program relies heavily on role-playing, forcing students to see arguments from the other side.

“You put them in a situation and ask, ‘How do you feel about it?’ ” Williams said. “ ‘Now, if you’re this other person, how would you feel?’ ”

Teachers encourage the young peacemakers to be assertive and to discuss problems with other students, rather than resorting to pushing or hitting.

“It’s their gut-level reaction to push,” Williams said.

Canfield constantly refers her students to a poster on their homeroom wall that spells out the ways to “fight fair”: Identify the conflict. Attack problems, not people.

Adrienne Wolfson, 9, said the Peacemakers program also emphasizes giving emotional support to other students when they need it. She recently found herself trying to encourage a student whom others had called fat.

“If someone’s said a bad word to someone else, you go to the person and say, ‘That may be what they think about you, but that’s not what you are,’ ” she said.

Canfield sees the program as a way a way to train students for problems they will face, again and again, throughout their years in school.

“You don’t go into a sport without practice,” she noted. “That’s just what this is--practice.”