If your child gets a detention at school, do you punish at home too?

I'd say if it's behaviour that affects someone else ie messing about, bullying, then home sanction could be appropriate. If it really doesn't affect anyone else learning and isn't that important like top button done up or shirt tucked in or missing a pencil or ruler then frankly I can't see the need to add to school punishment.

Mine would know I mean business. I would not let him off the hook. Either he works with me to deal with DS’s poor behaviour or he will deal with school from now on.

Technology withdrawn is the most effective.

First detention, 1 night gone.
Second detention, 2 nights gone.........and so on.

It will give him pause when the consequences are so clear.

No anger, just firm enforcement of consequences.

And what if he says, “Yeah, okay”? Will you then feel the problem is solved? Or just that it’s not your problem?

I never have but my kids have only ever had detentions for technical rule infringements eg skirt too short. If they were in trouble for something more concerning I’d also be addressing it at home- not necessarily through a punishment though. Depends on the circs.

I would put £100 on a trifecta that:

The hug was executed after students had been told to move on
The tie situation was not the first uniform infringement
The water spillage was accompanied by some sort of drama

And no, I don't know the circumstances, the people concerned or the school, but I do know that giving and recording detentions is a massive ball ache for teachers so won't be done lightly.

Yes, I'd punish at home as well. Rarely are low-level detentions given for a minor incident itself - they tend to be given for the student's response to that minor incident being addressed. "What?" "I AAAAm" sauntering off whilst being addressed "My mum'll call in" etc etc etc etc etc etc... I'd be really pissed off if my DC had responded to a teacher like that, and they'd lose the phone for the night like a PP has said.

I would discuss it and make sure I’m supporting the school by reinforcing rules at home.

DS has only had them for forgetting things sometimes and he finds that upsetting enough (and I don't agree with detentions for that anyway). If he'd damaged something deliberately or physically hurt/ bullied someone (fortunately very unlikely) there would be consequences at home on grounds of the action.

That made me laugh - and brought a damp Mr Darcy to mind, which is always welcome 😁

I couldn't really get my knickers in a twist over someone squirting some water from a bottle, it's not harmful, just annoying.

I don't really believe a detention is much of a punishment really. It's only losing some of your lunchtime or staying a bit later at the end of the school day. Most kids would barely notice nor care - just a bit annoying for them really.

Depending on the reason, I'd probably impose my own punishments. Not for irrelevancies like forgetting a pen or protractor, or undoing their tie etc. But certainly if it was something more serious like fighting, truancy, etc there would be sanctions at home without a doubt.

I remember my own school days where it was always the same kids who got detentions for misbehaving, wrong uniform, etc - it really didn't bother them, even weekly, it was water off a duck's back, just something else to hate school for!

Squirting water bottles in corridors is still not great though, although technically not disrupting lessons.

I can be a tough parent and I’d be inclined to give him one more warning and if there’s another incident he has no water bottle at school and he can go thirsty. We had no water bottles decades ago, after all. I’d tell him it’s a privilege and if he dicks around with it he loses it.

No because I find the school gives detention for the most nonsensical reasons. I tell mine unfortunately you have to follow the silly rules while you're there but I'm certainly not punishing again at home.

DDs last few detentions were for hugging her friend in the corridor, not replacing tie after PE and accidently spilling her water in class.

A bit of a clown?
Irritating then

I took DS's phone off him for a month when he got a detention for getting involved in an organised boxing match at school - I was furious about that.

The second one he got was for using the lift at school when pupils aren't allowed to. DD said a detention was harsh because that's usually 'just' a behaviour point. I suspect he got a harsher than usual punishment because the teacher that caught them, actually needed to use the lift because she'd recently had surgery. The last thing she needed was to discover she couldn't use it because of a bunch of Y11's messing about. We had a lengthy discussion about it, but I didn't impose any further sanctions - I still backed the school up completely though.

I only have half an answer for you.

Sounds like he needs 2 things, and whether punishment at home fits into them is up to you: 1) motivation to be someone who isn't getting sanctioned at school, 2) tools to avoid the behaviour that ends up in sanctions.

I don't know your son well enough to say what those 2 are - hopefully you can think of something there. Really sounds like he is seeking either approval from friends or some kind of stimulation, but I don't know your boy.

I agree
ive nothing against kids being kids, but not when it impacts others
my DS2 wouldn’t even go to the loo at school because of the ‘silliness’ and ladish behaviour. He would be bursting when he got home 😂
I have tried to increase his resilience, but it is REALLY annoying for the kids who are more introverted and not in to clownish banter, or lads being ladish.

however your son isn’t doing it in lessons, which is positive. I think it is hugely disrespectful and selfish, and my DS1 was the sort of kid to do it! He got punished for that, you have to learn to think about other people. DS2 and 3 would often say revision sessions were a waste of time because of all the disruption and showing off. The teacher couldn’t teach, entitled selfish behaviour by kids that has to be challenged

uniform breeches

Is he going to school in the 19th century?

If my kids get a detention, I confiscate phones until a ‘star student’ is awarded. They can be weeks without their phones

How old is he? Our school tries to take a fairly no-tolerance approach to this stuff in Year 7 in an attempt to set standards going forward. it doesn't sound like a massively draconian system overall and generally I'm of the opinion that behaviour like this at school is dealt with at school.

However, the problem is that the detentions are not working. so the behaviur is not changing. Unfortunately, the school is unlikely to do anything about that except give him more detentions and, from experience, this can then lead to more draconian punishment. which also doesn't work.

So you have to consider what you can do about that.

It might be that he just doesn't care enough about detentions so some sort of punishment or consequence at home might help.

It might be that there's actually something else going on. DS went from 150 demerits a term (and detention every week) to a total of about 20 for the school year this year and no detentions..... because a) he's now medicated for inattentive adhd and b) he's got a bit older and does not want to waste his time in detention when he can be at the gym with his friends or whatever.

Good on you for taking his phone off him and good on him for tucking his shirt in. Now that he knows you will take his phone off of him i bet he behaves. You are a sensible Mum and your son will be better behaved for it.

Oh that’s on the level of my problem for sure. My daughter has plenty of this sort of kid at school and finds it really distressing. Regularly gets squirted by water bottles when just trying to get to class - they aren’t targeting her, they’re just making it annoying to walk through the halls. I’d come down hard on this nonsense for sure.

My son got a lot last year (yr 7) - some for talking etc in lessons as well as messing about at break and 'play fighting' with friends etc. Didn't punish at home to begin with as hoped he'd improve himself but didn't (and seemed to think all a bit of a joke!) so after a bit, we implemented detentions at school = no phone or gaming at home. So double punishment and up to him to decide how to behave and if he wanted gaming etc st home. Also spoke to school as we were concerned about no. of detentions which was v helpful and also showed the school we were taking it seriously which I think helped teachers try and help him stay on track.

Now year above he still gets them sometimes but far fewer and way less for not settling down in lessons which is good...have eased up on punishments at home. if detentions for minor stuff (like forgotten blazer, being 1 min late etc) tend to let him off home punishments, just for more serious stuff or if he gets a spate of them.

Not as a general rule. My boy got detentions all the time. He had additional needs that were not being addressed, so the same situations kept arising and he would often get a detention from one teacher scheduled at exactly the same time as another one, and would then end up with a double detention because he missed one (can't be in two places at once). At one point he owed them 10 hours of detention.

I didn't get involved, I could see it was a shit-show of the schools own making and eventually the situation imploded of its own accord - and he got extra support as a result!

I would discuss with him why he got a detention, what he could have done differently etc., but he blatantly wasn't coping in secondary school for all the reasons I had highlighted to them in advance, none of it was a surprise to me and home was his safe space, I wasn't going to change that.