AIBU to think missing five lessons as a detention seems counterproductive?

I’d contact the school head of year op and find out exactly what the behaviour was, and check what their official behaviour policy is. It sounds like a day in isolation to me rather than a detention, and I’m surprised you haven’t been contacted by the school about it taking place. A day in isolation is pretty serious and our school would have spoken to a parent about this.

School has the behaviour policy on the website and it also gets sent out by email to parents at the start of each year. So it’s made really clear to parents as well as students which helps avoid any confusion. They also inform parents by email if the student gets a detention after school that day, as well as having everything on an app too, so we can see their whole behaviour record, any positive or negative behaviour points given and reasons why. Same for detentions or isolations, everything is recorded and easy for parents to view. Sounds like your school hasn’t made their behaviour policy very clear or accessible to parents?

I agree with you that a day in isolation seems extreme for making silly noises in class, unless it was the culmination of some previous strikes? Make sure you get the whole story from school about what’s happened, as well as a clear explanation of their behaviour policy. It could be a ladder type situation, so ours is a verbal warning for a first strike, second strike is a detention and also removal from that lesson depending on what the behaviour incident is. Third strike is a day in isolation, it used to be called reflection but I don’t think it was being taken very seriously so they changed it to isolation.

Does isolating them from lessons work? I guess for some kids it’ll work by giving them a shock, and feeling scared, mortified etc which could make them behave better afterwards, it’s meant to be a punishment that they learn from but certainly won’t work like that with some kids. Our school says that with isolation the student loses their right to be in lessons with the other students, that it’s a privilege to be in class learning. I don’t think many 15 year olds see it quite as a privilege though, almost certainly not the ones ending up in isolation, so it does seem a bit pointless in that regard.

On the other hand, I do feel it’s not fair on the other 30 odd students who are having their learning disrupted, and there needs to be behaviour management and consequences for bad behaviour and disruption. Dd has a class where a few of the boys are constantly a nightmare, the teacher can’t get through the lesson content she’s trying to teach, they’re running behind other classes, the other kids who want to crack on and learn are fed up, especially as it’s year 11 and their GCSE year. Splitting the boys up hasn’t worked, they just shout to each other across the room, they’ve had detentions and been removed from class, I expect isolation will be next. I’ll report back via dd on whether it works with them or not! Like you say there will be some kids who will just keep ending up in isolation and falling further behind by missing lessons, they then won’t engage or be able to understand the work the bad behaviour happens again, and round in circles we go. Here, if you reach a certain number of days spent in isolation you get a suspension, a few days or a week spent at home. Finally if things get really bad it’s a managed move to another school. A couple of kids in dd’s year were given managed moves to different schools in year 10. Our school is also quite open that if you don’t like the behaviour policy then you can find another school.

I get what you’re saying about a day in isolation and missing lessons seems counterintuitive, and you might be able to negotiate an alternative sanction, it really depends on exactly what happened and if you can suggest an appropriate alternative punishment, definitely speak to the head of year. I would also question why their behaviour policy isn’t made clearer and communicated directly to parents. Get all the facts in front of you and take it from there. I’d also want to try and get to the bottom of what’s happening with this particular teacher, strange how it’s just in one lesson and one specific teacher. I’d be proactive and try and work with school to address this, especially where it’s his GCSE year and as we’ve just been told, every lesson counts (plus statistics on how attendance percentages affect grades, so there’s a clear link to missing lessons being detrimental)

He needs to work on his bad behaviour. The schools detention policy isn’t the issue here

It may not be the "silly noise" your DS made, but some (usually boys) seem to think it's funny to make sexual moaning noises when their teachers back is turned. This is considered sexual harassment and is dealt with firmly.

More important are the children not messing around. Your DS’s behaviour is disrupting learning in their classes, that’s not fair. See it from that perspective and suddenly what is reasonable and unreasonable can look a little different

It’s well known that government agencies and other large institutions never do anything that doesn’t work. This is why they are always effective and have never had to change anything.

This 100%. It’s to give the rest of the community a respite from your son so they can have some learning time where their education is not disrupted. The relief students and a teacher feel when a disrupter is not in a lesson that day immense.

It’s utterly irrelevant whether your son sees being deprived of lessons as a treat or not. His thoughts on a detention/isolation/suspension/whatever are not a factor. We don’t put dangerous or unsafe people in prison depending on whether they like being in prison or not. We don’t even sanction people based on whether it’s a deterrent to them as an individual personally or not. It’s primarily to take them out of circulation so the rest of the population who do everything right can be safe and unaffected by their behaviour.

I have worked in two different schools; one where disruptive behaviour is taken seriously and another where it is ignored. In the one where it is taken seriously the rules are transparent. Pupils treat each other and staff with respect 99 percent of the time and consequently a lot of learning takes place. In the other it's chaos. Your son needs to behave

It works for the other 29 kids in the class who NEED to learn during a GCSE year. Why should your kid ruin their education? It's a wake up call for your son.

My DC's school uses this (internal exclusion) as a punishment, but only as an escalation for behaviour that is more serious. They would get a lunchtime or after school detention first.

So I think you may not be hearing the full story from your DS. I agree with @Legoreflexology that the "silly noise" your DS mentions might have been sexual sounds like moaning. This is an awful thing that some boys do to intimidate female teachers / pupils and if that's what was happening the school is absolutely right to treat it seriously.

It will work for most pupils because the disruptive pupil is not interfering with the lesson. it's about the greatest good of the greatest number.

Withdrawal of his phone if he has one, and other privileges, might be a good place to start.

This. As a teacher I agree he is missing lessons but think of the 29 others who can learn in a calmer environment.

Our local secondary does this as a punishment called reset. Kids are sent to reset where they sit in a room in silence for the whole day, not allowed out for breaks and they also eat lunch in there. In silence.

Reasons for being sent to reset include talking in the hallway while moving between lessons, having the wrong uniform, having hands under the desk (must be on the desk at all times), lifting their head during 'head down and work' time, and standing up in the lunch hall. Dds friends told her there were more kids in reset than in the classroom.

Im my opinion its horrible what they are doing to children in secondary. They are also not allowed to use the toilets when they want and many children have been in distress. If this was a workplace for adults it would be on Dispatches! At the same time behaviour in schools is out of control so I don't know what the answer is. I just feel so sad for the children that are being unfairly affected by this.

Ex teacher.

the normal name for missing all of his lessons for one day and being in a separate room is either internal exclusion, some schools also use reflection or internal isolation.

as you’ve said a detention is usually lunchtime or after school.

in most behaviour systems internal isolation is the step after detentions, so it is the consequence either of not going to a detention or of a more serious offence (swearing at a teacher, fighting, etc).

yes, for the majority of students this does work.

every school I have ever worked in (secondary) has this system

It’s fairly common in secondary schools here, if you mess around in lessons you’re sent to ‘reset’.
The ‘reset room is manned by a completely different teacher so they won’t be able to teach you your subject however students are able to access their class teachers lesson online via a camera link (as long as it isn’t p.e , music or technology) and then the work is set online.
The idea behind it is that there should be 0 disruption to lessons and if you can’t behave you don’t stay in the same space as the people you’re performing to and disrupting. If a student keeps doing it, they will spend more time in reset then in their own classrooms.
The school do after school detentions for not doing homework, so for many in reset they have a lot of lessons in there and then have to stay after school until the homework is completed,
It’s a policy that seems to work to be fair, my son says there isn’t a lot of disruption and the school gets really good results.

Dd's secondary improved so much after they adopted this system.

She was actually able to concentrate, and the little shits that just loved disrupting everyone else were removed. She said it was bliss.

My sons’ school also have internal suspensions for when behaviour becomes impossible to manage within the classroom. I strongly recommend making an appointment with the class tutor and/or head of year and asking them to explain the system to you and ask how you can work with the school to get your son’s behaviour back on track. Hopefully missing a day of lessons will be a short, sharp shock and he’ll realise that it’s better to be in class with his friends than being isolated for a whole day. My oldest son got one once and he was absolutely bored stupid for the day - he never got another internal suspension after that!

Put yourself in the teacher’s shoes. Can you imagine how bad your son’s behaviour must be for him to be put in isolation all day? This is the same teacher who is endlessly judged and scrutinised for the results her students get in GCSEs, despite working enormously long hours. Now ask the right question, not ‘isn’t it wrong that he’s missing 5 lessons’. We’ll have no teachers left soon at this rate.

‘If I was the parent, I’d be changing schools’.

This isn’t the threat you think it is.

At the moment, one student has missed 5 lessons. If your DS had pissed about in those lessons, 30 children would have missed those lessons.

Support the school and your son’s behaviour will improve, and he won’t miss any lessons.

They are just following the government line about how everything is always the parents fault 🙄 because things in school always make sense dont they? Skirt too short wrong type of shoes trousers dont fit home you go! Take a day off fine fine fine away threaten to put parents in prison and where are the kids going to go? Ahh into an oversubscribed care system also dysfunctional! we are getting school wrong and wierd punitive actions like isolation not doing much work is unhelpful how exactly is not educating a child going to help anyone? Its not is it

Anyway missing five lessons sounds stupid especially if they are not going to do any work related to the subjects there is plenty of online education they can do if you need to put them in isolation

Yes, it is a helpful intervention (to the other children who they have (rightly) prioritised).

Exactly. If OP’s son is messing around he is affecting students who DO want to learn and get their best grades. OP should be concentrating on that aspect - what is she doing (and the father) to support the necessary change in behaviour?

Has the school said that he behaves well in 4 out of the 5 lessons he has been excluded from , or is that DS's version of events? Ask the school to explain.

Yes it works for the vast majority. The kids in there all the time need something different and are supported differently. There are 3 of such students I can think of in our school of 1200. The majority of students who enter isolation serve 1-2 days ever.

They usually lose social time as well for the day.

Pulling kids out of specific lessons would be a logistical nightmare.

I'd be emailing to find out what he did. That's the part that you should be informed of.