A Stockton student was handcuffed with zip ties on his hands and feet, forced to go to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation and was charged with battery on a police officer.

 That student was 5 years old.

http://www.kcra.com/news/29847063/detail.html

This had to be the biggest 5 year old ever, or the smallest policeman ever! How is it possible that a 5 year old requires not only handcuffs (behind his back) but ankle cuffs to be controlled? Let me guess, the policeman left his taser at home that day.

As a “mean mom”, I believe in logical consequences for out of control behavior. But I’m trying hard to understand how the logical consequence of this behavior is to hogtie and throw the kid in the back of a squad car! Was this supposed to teach him something useful? Was this supposed to help him learn to control his behavior?

 As a teacher working with challenging kids, my students had a variety of individual issues.

Donny, 6, was emotionally disturbed and occasionally would suddenly throw his books onto the floor & grab at anything within his reach to throw as well. I managed to keep him and his fellow students safe without ever handcuffing him! He required a firm physical restraint in the form of a hug from behind and a quiet voice in his ear until he could calm down. This never took more than a few minutes. Other students did not lose valuable learning time.

Bobby, 9, had occasional outbursts but required a different strategy. This was a student who had been severely abused by his mother. He required a man to soothe him with a calm voice. He could not tolerate being touched at these times and we were able to calm him without cuffs!

In my opinion this school had no understanding of the needs of their student and no plan in place to address a possible outburst. And clearly, this policeman has no clue how to deal with a child and should never be allowed near one! Please tell me he doesn’t have any kids!

 So my questions are;

what is being done to punish the officer who man-handled a 5 year old child and what is being done by the school to finally address this student’s educational needs? Note, in the link to the original article, his mother has repeatedly asked for interventional strategies. This is what they came up with? So, is this officer on call to come charging into the classroom wielding his cuffs? Oh yes, the judge did drop the charges. Good move!