Day- dreaming at parent/teacher conferences

My mind has lately been wandering on the topic of human behaviour, particularly the ways we try to get children to behave.
How do we get humans to behave in a certain way , or to follow certain guidelines or norms pecular to a society and its customs? Has anyone come up with effective strategies for developing rational and appropriate behaviour patterns? Maybe the issue is who decides and how is it decided what is rational and appropriate behaviour.

The fact that there is so much punishment on all levels in most societies seems to indicate that humans have not reached that level of functioning. But sometimes I think that it could be that only the "punishable" is highlighted. It is likened to the request by some people for a newspaper reporting only 'good news'. Where are all the reports of rational, enlightening and encouraging behaviour?

One thing I have noticed is that many people think that they can -:
embarrass
humiliate
frustrate
frighten or even
anger someone into a particular behaviour. And even though for centuries, under many circumstances, this has not work, yet the practice continues.

Take the example of schools- year after year teachers complain about the students who display delinquent, disruptive, dysfunctional, aggressive behaviour or who are not performing up to academic standard. Parents are called in and given a lecture by the principal and/or teachers. The list of mis-behaviours is read out and the parent is spoken to harshly, almost like they are being reprimanded for being a bad parent. They are then threatened with suspension or expulsion of the child, reversal of some privilege such as sitting the final exams, or taking part in graduation,etc. Then the parent is severly warned and sent away.

The parent leaves feeling more discouraged, helpless, hopeless than when he entered the school. It is hard for that parent to think through the despair and to figure out how to help the child and how to turn around things. Heck! They have not even been supported to find the root of the problem in order to address it effectively. If the parent knew what to do he/she would have done it already. In short time the child repeats the mis-behaviour,parent is called again and the cycle continues.

As a parent I have sat through several of these "Parent/Teacher Days". And every one of them has been about listening to all the problems that the school is having with some of the students, and the school trying to shame the parents into being better parents. For me to get through the barrage I have to keep a mental list and sigh a relief every time that 'my child is not one of the guilty ones'. It helps to keep me from sinking into the hopelessness with the other parents. It is either that or go numb, shut down my thinking and feeling for a while - kinda like the students staring out the window or day-dreaming in class sometimes when they can't handle what is going on at the head of the class.

In the near future, (very near future) I would like to see programmes, efforts, workshops geared towards helping adults (especially those working with children on a regular basis) understand human behaviour and how behavioural patterns are installed and develop; and therefore how to effectively break them and eliminate them, i.e. how to really change behaviour. I'd like to see parents and teachers moving towards fully understanding the factors operating in the child's life and not only the short-term effects of these factors so that they can address the issues proactively with useful and reasonable strategies.

Perhaps we have to first decide what is reasonable behaviour to expect of any child.