Why do schools reward terrible behaviour?

[Sauvignonblancandcrisps]

Just that really. My child's high school had an award ceremony today. A boy who has been reported to the school on several occasions for bullying, including homophobic and racist, won an award. I'm just wondering how schools justify this? Any teachers out there who can shed some light on the thought process?

It's based on the empathy and trauma aware 'Nurture' approach in education. To promote resilience and self esteem by encouraging good choices etc. Unfortunately the traumatised, neglected or abused children don't have resilience and act out unhappiness by hurting others as they are fearful. Prisons are full of these types. The idea is that by addressing the gaps in their well-being and building them up, some core coping strategies will be developed and this will go through life. It's been extremely successful when done properly. Awards in front of peers are to increase liklihood of friends being made, child feeling proud. All others who are doing the right thing will be getting their good choices reinforced constantly in class, in school. Parents are witness to very little, hence gripes about schools supporting vulnerable children and not their child. Parents know very little about the reality of school life.

Equity rather than equality.

A great lesson for everyone to learn.

Thanks for taking the time to give such a full answer.

@NurseCranesRolodex . Thank you... I found your post very informative.

I agree this is the ideal. I just can't imagine how schools can possibly achieve this? So you have traumatised children, traumatising children - it seems completely unwinnable (is that a word).

When i was at school many years ago the 'naughty kids' had a trip to Thorpe Park for trying hard paid for by the school.
They also had monthly trips to the local bowling alley.
( my db was included he hated school and played up all the time)

All us others who also tried hard but were well behaved got 1 trip to Chessington. Parents paid for.

Db always said about how he got to have so many fun trips and i was being a ' swot'

That just because you are a victim of one person, does not mean that they are not a bigger victim of another. Particularly relevant for children.

My eldest DS and several other boys were assaulted by this one boy on the bus. Really bad stuff. Stamped on one boys neck. It was terrifying. We were all up in arms, this hideous bully needed kicking out of the school because our children weren't safe. The school put a chaperone on the bus which helped in some respects, but some mothers were still baying for blood. One, let's call her "Jane" went to confront the mother, we all knew he lived at very the top of the road the bus dropped off on. Jane lagged 50yds behind the boy, following him. As she got closer, she heard "oy you c*nt" and saw the mother hanging out of the upstairs window. It was then she realised the mother hadn't even seen her, and that she was shouting at her own son. The abusive language continued. Jane, horrified, called the school and let's just say, that was the tip of the iceberg of what this boy was going through. He wasn't a bully he was acting the only way he knew how to survive.

My thoughts on children who seriously bully have changed somewhat since. I would be thrilled to see that boy win an award. Despite what he did. As the boys are older, a lot of them got to know about the situation, and whilst they weren't necessarily suddenly wanting to become this boy's best friend, they certainly showed a lot of compassion and tried to help where they could.

As a teacher we are always taught (and led by policy) that positive reinforcement is the way to go to encourage good behaviour. My class this year struggles with basic behaviours for learning. I'm primary and mine are only year two but every year two teacher I know is convinced they missed the essential basics for classroom behaviour in nursery and reception due to covid. I have half my class who consistently behave beautifully and the other half need positive praise for the smallest thing. It's at the point where I'm giving out dojo points because a child has gone a minute without interrupting. Obviously I don't say have a dojo for not interrupting. I say you're sitting so nicely and listening one dojo. It's the only way to encourage that positive behaviour. These children will start calling out, rolling around and making noises if they don't get attention for a minute. They don't care if it's bad attention.

The point I'm trying to make is it's likely this kid has shown some evidence of doing the right thing once. Teachers have to jump on that and praise it. Psychologists will tell you that negative reinforcement teaches people quicker but given teachers can't give instantaneous negative reinforcement (ie something that hurt the child right away like hitting them as opposed to something in the future like no reward time on Friday afternoon)- and nor should we be able to hurt them of course- means we rely on praising the smallest glimpse of good.

I recognise it's frustrating for the children and their parents who behave well. But ultimately the kids we're talking about have shit lives. The good children's reward will come with the success they'll get from their instrinsic motivation making them have a half decent life in the future. Even at seven years old a lot of my class recognise that Jimmy gets a lot of praise because he needs more help to do the right thing. That said I try so hard to praise the "always" children.

So another poster told me to go and Google and I tried. But there are such mixed messages about rewards for behaviour management and even for learning. Some research seems to show that it can improve self esteem but others seem to suggest that it has the opposite effect 🤯.

@TwinsAndTiramisu

Great reminder to try to be compassionate x

Your kids are lucky to have a teacher who considers them all so thoughtfully. Thanks for sharing your experiences.

I used to think like that. I was an overachieving, gifted and talented, mousey academic type. I thought it totally unfair that I get a certificate, and the rowdy kids also get a certificate, when I did ‘so much more/better’.

But fate loves to laugh at us, and I ended up raising a dyslexic suspected-ADHD DD who hates school. I now see how hard it is just for her to get in the building because all of it is such a struggle for her. How just being there is work. Sitting and not talking or running or jumping like she would want to. I used to sigh and roll my eyes and think ‘that’s the bare minimum, why should they be rewarded?’

And now I see how hard it is for her to do ‘the bare minimum’. So if it’s hard enough to do that- gosh, it must be overwhelming for her to do that every day. To see how easy it is for everyone else and not for her. And to try anyway. To keep on trying.

I completely get it now. And yes little academic me needed the motivation of a certificate because school was the only thing I was good at. But DD deserves hers for facing it over and over when it isn’t what she’s good at. I’m prouder of her ‘improvement’ awards than I ever was of my ‘achievement’ awards.

@TwinsAndTiramisu

In the situation you describe, did it take you a while to change your thoughts towards the boy, once you’d heard more about his home life, because of what he’d done to your son?

There was a boy in DD’s class who was volatile and angry all the time. He ended up on a reduced timetable. Parents would complain that he was sometimes ‘rewarded’ for what they perceived to be a naughty boy. The reality was he was volatile because that was what his parents did to him and he thought this was what happened. He was angry because his home life was shit. So if he played well instead of getting angry the school absolutely rewarded him for doing so. You don’t know what’s going on at home, you don’t know the child. Not what the reward was for but there’s usually a good reason. The school praised him when no one else did.

My original post wasn't referring to children who struggle with the requirements of school, but active and consistent targeting of other children. It sounds like your daughter is amazing and you should be proud of her resilience.

I'm so encouraged by reading this thread. Too often the voices baying for punishment dominate threads like this, but it's clear lots of people here have an understanding of ACEs and trauma and how that leads to the behaviours we see from those children in school.

It's about giving children what they need, not what they 'deserve'.

Dealing with poor behaviour with 'rewards' can be done well and it can be done poorly.

When it's done poorly, it's clocked pretty quickly as unfair by the other children who behave well. One of my children told me in Year 3 that it was easy to be 'star of the week' ... he said you just had to behave badly for a week, then really well the following week, and bam, star of the week. That was a school that did it poorly.

Not all victims of bullies have a good home life.

True. I do have some concerns with the assumption that all children who bully have terrible home lives and all children who behave well have secure and happy home lives. It's often not as simple this. And where I understand now that lots of schools have a trauma informed approach, I am confused about they balance the needs of the bullying child against the needs of the child traumatised by bullying.

At my god daughter's school, the kid they chose as head boy had been suspended in year 9 for a very serious matter, and was frequently in detentions etc. He was also extremely misogynistic towards my god daughter on multiple occasions, which she frequently complained about to the teachers etc, and he was still awarded head boy.
I told her it was a good lesson to learn as that tends to be how most of life works out unfortunately.

I've been really encouraged too. Although I wonder if there is something else that is neither punishment or reward to help support both the bullying child and the bullied child.

@Chattycathydoll same here. I was one of the well behaved but not that bright children at school so I never won anything. The really clever kids got awards for achievement (and a £5 hmv voucher ). The ones with behaviour problems got to go to somewhere that was probably like a half way house between mainstream and a pru that some pupils went to 1 day a week. There were all sorts of rumours that it was just a fun day out though. The ones with SEN got to go to the room with the comfy sofas and free biscuits and they got to do the more "fun subjects" for GCSE and give up french. Then there were some kids who just got away with anything and if a teacher told them off, the rest of the class would shout "you can't tell him off miss, he's got problems" .

20 odd years later and my ds is one of those children who seems from the outside to be rewarded for bad behaviour. As I grew up I understood that there must be a reason for some children getting treats for odd reasons but I couldn't work out what. From the outside it looks like ds gets lots of treats and last week he got a house point for not sliding down the banisters. But the reality is that ds is working really hard doing things that most children his age do automatically. He is a young carer. He doesn't get enough sleep. He struggles to sit still. Like most children he gets less funding than he needs so has to make do with limited resources. He doesn't really understand friendships but he desperately wants to have friends. Things are hard for him and he tries really hard.

I wouldn't say it took a while for opinions to change. It was almost an instant "oh, Jesus, no wonder" when we realised what was happening behind closed doors.

I wouldn't say I felt overwhelmingly guilty for initially thinking badly of him, because there is still the element of what he was doing to others, was indeed terrible...but there's a difference between a child who is nasty and a child who knows nothing else than to repeat what they are subjected too.

My childrens secondary make a point of rewarding good behaviour only. Lots of reward trips.

Why won't you mention what the reward was for?