This is extreme and awful. Of course the teacher should be charged criminally and lose her credential, if she has one. There is no excuse for that. She could have just removed the child who was being laughed at from the situation. That she thought it was OK to lay hands on a child is scary. It's not clear to me why she was coming for him.
Part of the problem is charter schools, IMO. Many are much worse than the public schools they replace. They hire young teachers, work them long hours, use corporate supervisory strategies, and basically dodge oversight. Key problem: A lot of their administrators are not educators. You hear these people saying things no regular educator would think of -- critical remarks about students, blaming them for problem behaviors.
There is a lot wrong with the culture of education, but there is some stuff right with it too. Blaming children for their problems is not a position real educators knee-jerk react to.
There are good ways to deal with serious behavior problems -- children who attack each other, children who bite themselves and bang their heads against the wall. They are positive. They involve teaching substitute behaviors. They work long term. There are padded rooms in some schools. There are teachers and aides educated in restraining kids, but they aren't used a lot. Most behavior management is positive.
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