Why do our schoolchildren behave so badly?

[somanyquestionz]

I see a lot of posts on here about schools/teaching and how behaviour in schools is getting worse. I started teaching English in France this year and was really worried about it because I know what British kids are like and expected the French to be no different. I've been pleasantly surprised though as they are really well behaved. I work with 15-18 year olds and they're all lovely. All really polite and get on with the work and come up with good ideas when we have group discussions. They can sometimes be a bit noisy but will be quiet if they are told. Meanwhile, I read so many horror stories online and hear awful things from teachers I know in real life. I remember being at school and the kids were horrible to the teachers, fights every single day, a pregnant teacher got punched in the stomach (baby survived luckily), someone smeared poo all over the wall in the toilets, doors and windows getting smashed every day. And that was before Covid and TikTok.
So why are our kids so bad? French kids are on social media too and use TikTok, they all went through the pandemic, some of them experience problems at home just like here. I know about 10 other people also teaching English and the behaviour is good in all schools. When I told the French English teachers (if that makes sense!) about what our schools are like, they were shocked.

Oh, and I forgot the appalling lack of support for students with SEN, MH problems, those in need of social services intervention. All left for classroom teachers to deal with, when they don't have the necessary skills.

YY @JemimaTiggywinkles.

I was a total little shit in secondary school and I knew I could be and get away with it as my parents were very anti-education, didn't like teachers and were very much of the opinion that, as a female, I was only ever going to do some minimum wage work until getting married then becoming a SAHM so school made no difference. They had no ambition so I had nothing to want to work towards if that makes sense? When I got into trouble they just laughed and when I made up stories about how it was the teachers fault, they believed me no question.

It took going out into the real world and realising that it is nothing like school to teach me some lessons about how to behave. I then went on to further education and have a very good job and I cringe so badly thinking about teenage me.

My children are taught to be respectful, how actions have consequences and how school is full of fun and opportunities if you give it your all.

My inlaws are secondary school teachers and the stories they tell me make me really worried about sending my DC when they are that age. It seems there are so many feral children and I can't help but wonder if they all have parents similar to mine.

Yes exactly that

It permeates throughout society

My daughter doesn't misbehave at school. She knows better and would get an absolute rollicking from me if she did. I'm a single Mum who works full time.. you can still parent if you work.

Because there is more disciplined parenting and expectations in other countries, children going out to dinner are expected to behave, not misbehave and screech the place down because they are just a little one...expectations around manners, respect of elders, etc. all things we basically don't. And kids know there is bugger all you can actually do to punish them, and don't care about punishment at home, if they get any, so you're basically 'teaching' kids who know you have nothing......

French children are well socialised from a young age. Observe them sitting in restaurants, cafes and at huge family meals. They sit on chairs and eat with a knife and fork and don’t climb over or crawl under the table during the meal.
They’re also taught that they’re not the centre of the universe that revolves around just them.
Might get some behavioural problems in city schools but the vast majority of French children are polite, happy, sociable.
A lot of British children and teens are fine, but the behaviour of a few is so unbelievably bad that it tarnishes all of them.

I agree with @SarahAndQuack and @JemimaTiggywinkles

90+ % of the students that I work with in a large, urban secondary in a deprived area behave impeccably at all times. The vast majority of those that don’t have a story. I don’t buy the whole “kids these days” narrative that has been around as long as moaning has.

We do have an incredible generational divide in this country, not helped by the eternal demonisation of the young.

Parents in the UK won't consider putting a baby into any sort of routine & the early years parenting is very child centric so you end up with exhausted parents.

Both parents working long hours & so tend to over compensate. They don't want conflict at home.

There's a lack of respect for authority across the board. There's many threads on here criticising teachers. Obviously this lack of respect for teachers feeds down to the children. Parents continually get involved in what is going on & tend to take their child's side over the teachers.

I don't think people take teachers seriously when they say it's an exhausting job. We just get accused of being flakey.

I agree wholeheartedly with what you have written.

I agree wholeheartedly with what you have written.

Exactly. I bet it isn't in the banlieue north of Paris.

This was my first thought too

Personally, I think it's that kids are too "hyped up" about everything. Not just at home, but also at school. They get mixed messages. On the one hand, they're encouraged to run and jump around, shout, etc. But then, almost at the touch of a switch, they're expected to sit in virtual silence.

You see it a lot on TV where there's a camera crew in a classroom and the kids are deliberately hyped up to cheer, jump, run around, etc for the slightest of things. Same with children's TV - nearly always hyping kids up.

Yes, of course they should have fun, no doubt about that, but there should be more emphasis on the time and place, i.e. "fun" in school playgrounds, playing fields, sports halls, etc., but back to study/quietness etc in classrooms.

Teachers need to stop the mixed messaging by encouraging fun and noise in the classroom one minute and then expecting calm and quiet the next. Kids can't switch on and off like that.

Same with parents who nowadays try to be their children's best friends rather than acting as responsible parents.

We really need to get back to boundaries.

And yet, there has been a trend for very strict schools in the last few years which hasn’t been popular on here either.

I agree with @SarahAndQuack

Ha bullshit

I work In A tourist attraction that has large teenage school groups from all nationalities and I can say in a heartbeat the French kids absolutely can not behave and are far worse than uk kids.

French worst
Spanish second

[Disclaimer: the following is part generalisation and partly reflects my personal experience of the French education model, so please don't flame me; France is a big place and the teaching obviously varies from place to place!]

I think French society in general is outwardly more formal and polite than the UK nowadays and schools reflect that cultural difference. Also there is culturally a greater emphasis on personal responsibility. This is a generalisation but French women in particular tend to be quite tough and there is a certain pride in French society on looking after yourself and taking life seriously.

Brits make the mistake of characterising French people as being relaxed and full of "joie de vivre" and they can be during their long holidays, but most of the time they are fairly conservative and rigid about following rules and paying attention to details. And they are a more traditional and insular society than the UK I would say.

The French school curriculum is quite old fashioned and rigid. There is a lot of learning by rote. And the way they treat pupils is quite negative I would say. No one gets marks for turning up and washing their hands or a prize for taking part! You have to earn your marks and as a student you get compared to a model of a "perfect" pupil and get marked down and criticised quite harshly if you don't fit in to that rigid model of academic perfection (although there are opportunities to follow a less academic route early on in secondary school).

Schools are there to provide an education, there isn't a lot of pastoral care, and if you as a pupil choose not to take advantage of the teaching on offer, then tough luck. I think that parents and teachers are generally stricter in France and the teaching style is certainly more rigid and negative than in the UK. And I agree that there is less misbehaviour in French secondary schools, but my goodness, give French children the opportunity to have some unsupervised down time, say at a party or during a free period, and they absolutely explode as a result of having to be so conformist the rest of the time, whereas British dc would perhaps be slightly more chilled given the same amount of liberty, as they would be more used to it.

Having said all of that, I think overall, French students have a better, more defined balance between work and play, as do their families, as they are forced to work really hard in the relatively short school terms but can chill out or focus on sports or the arts during the long holidays. So maybe their behaviour reflects that difference too?

I am glad you are enjoying your experience there op, hope it continues to be a positive experience for you!

I think the biggest part, in my experience at least, is a lack of support from leadership. When I was pregnant I had a boy and his friends make some awful comments about how I got pregnant and shouting that the boy was the father. Reported it to his head of house and SLT and nothing was done, they just told the boys to ‘stay away’ from me. Of course they didn’t and continued, a few other (male) members of staff I had told ended up getting involved and had a word with the boys which was the only thing that stopped them as these were teachers they actually had respect for.

There were only a select few members of leadership and the pastoral team I knew would back me up and deal with the extreme bad behaviour (sexual comments/aggressive behaviour), most of the time it wasn’t worth reporting, and a phone call home doesn’t do much either in a lot of cases. And the kids know this, so why bother behaving when a detention is the worst they’ll get.

That being said, I did find it was the minority of students behaving this way. By when they get away with it and nothing changes it gets very tough to put up with after a while.

It's because much parenting is crap. Children not taught respect or boundaries. Not taught basic manners, societal norms, not told to wait for attention. Not given good bedtime routines so arrive at school tired. Not taught to think responsibly.

Our nearby primary school (rated outstanding) has four teachers leaving at Christmas. I know one of them and she says all four are leaving because of poor pupil behaviour and aggressive unsupportive parents. The school have so far been unable to recruit replacements.

You can have two working parents and well behaved children.
It's more about the values you instil in your child. We both work and our child is well behaved and respectful - he'd get absolutely bollocked if he misbehaved in school or was disrespectful to his teachers. We frequently get told how well behaved and polite he is.

My cousin is a SAHM and her children are feral! We're too strict apparently 🫤

@Turgidsoul98

French visitors at work are the rudest and least patient by a country mile. They are so rude even the French employees I work with that live here in Uk joke about how rude they are.

<snort>

When do people think the era of terrible parenting arrived?

I work in a secondary school. All this behaviour is getting worse stuff is bollocks. A small minority misbehave, most are absolutely fine. Kids will never treat you worse than they have been treated themselves, that much I know to be true.

There’s some utter nonsense on here.

Teachers in France are called lazy, overpaid, useless. « Those who can’t, teach » is a saying in French as well. They’re accused of always being on holiday (16 weeks) as no one remembers their salary is paid for 10 months but split across 12. Parents turn up and defend their kids, even when there are witnesses.

So far this year I’ve split up a fight, with one boy threatening to hit me; we’ve excluded 2 girls for filming themselves engaging in sex acts in the toilets and sending it to others. Four parents in my form group complained about kids being horrible to each other. One boy posted on Snapchat making homophobic comments about another. One posted a picture of a teacher’s house with the message « now you know where to find her ». We have constantly increasing referrals to the educational psychologist, and increasing numbers of pupils admitted as psych in-patients.

French children are not all happy and well-behaved 🙄 I do not teach in the suburbs of Paris, I teach in a small town. I’ve also taught in a non-selective in an outer London borough, a grammar in an outer London borough, and a non-selective in Kent. The behaviour issues are comparable to the non-selective in Kent. Which is about right. I have friends who teach in Paris suburbs, Paris chic and Marseille, same behaviour variety as London. Others teach out in the sticks like me, same as UK.

Lycées are not selective, that’s not allowed, but there are different types of lycées. Some are offering professional training, and things like maritime lycées, agricultural lycées etc.

There is some absolute nonsense about French parenting on here.

Because their parents are knob heads.

They don't say no. They don't back or support the school or the rules, they get their angels out of well deserved sanctions and they then say their angel suffers with anxiety, and that's what makes them behave like a shit bag.

Work in a large secondary school. Staff are sick of bad behaviour (and from parents too).

Oh and we live in a tourist town the and the French kids are shits.