Not impressed with the daily chanting. Do other secondary schools do this?

[ReanimatedSGB]

DS is in Year 8 and he has told me that, at the start of every lesson, they all have to stand up and chant together, something along the lines of 'we promise to be good and work hard' (OK that's NOT the wording, don';t want to give exact wording in case it outs us).

Every lesson FFS. This strikes me as a waste of time (DS told me that the class took to dragging it out as much as possible in lessons no one likes) and... well. a bit creepy and cultish. AIBU?

So everything at every school must be tolerated or ... find another school?

If something is not to your taste, but is actually broadly acceptable, then you can find another school.

Like I said upthread, this school is not trying to establish a cult, but a culture of learning.

Look at all the top schools and the types of stuff people say about them. 'Culture of discipline, learning, teamwork, values, pride in their school'. Now at the top schools, kids will often turn up already with those cultures embedded - from their families, from team sports, from places like Beavers. And private schools also cultivate them - school uniforms, school mottos, cheering on teams in competitions, successful ex-pupils coming back to give motivational speeches.

Other schools do not necessarily have an full intake where hard work is valued, good behaviour automatic, skills of co-operative working with others embedded. They don't necessarily take pride in their school, and the message from others may also be negative. For a school to be successful, that culture of hard work, discipline and positive values needs to be deliberately established and embedded in a more overt way. Not all pupils will need it, and those parents are likely to be the ones rolling their eyes, but for the school as a whole to work effectively, the message needs to be consistent and constant.

I would imagine that most of us are constantly telling our children to work hard and be kind to others, by what we say to them, the activities we choose for them and the interactions that we model for them. Is that brainwashing? Probably. But with good intentions.

If one school does chanting which you don't like, other options are available

So everyone who doesn't like it (which is probably everyone) should just change their kids school? Is that a serious suggestion? Can't be, can it, no-one is that ridiculous.

There is a really easy way to fix this.Just go back to the not chanting that was fine before, and works for pretty much all other schools. Easy.

I think you are wildly overestimating how many parents would give a toss, let alone consider moving schools over this.

If one school does chanting which you don't like, other options are available

Because everybody has a choice of local schools which all, miraculously, happen to have spare places.

I worked very hard to get dd into local secondary which was well run under a confident headteacher and getting very reassuring Ofsted reports. She did very well there.

A few years later, when ds was at the school, capable HT left and the place was taken over by a new HT who went into a wild spin of "pulling ourselves up" and using all kinds of "we are strict on discipline here" signals. What it did of course signal to his pupils was that he wasn't very confident about his discipline. Behaviour went right downhill. School is now in special measures.

That is why I disapprove of motivational chants in secondaries. You might as well stick up a big placard saying "we're terrified of
losing our grip on you". Very unwise to tell that to teenagers.

cory there is no law that says you have to use state education at all. It is worth considering how much you actually care about chanting.

Poor behaviour is a reasonable thing to be concerned about. Chanting that you’re going to try your best, not so much. Complaints that it’s the slippery slope to North Korea would be rightly laughed at. Concerns that it’s having no impact while taking up increasing amounts of lesson time would be fair.

No school is ever going to be absolutely perfect and do everything entirely to your satisfaction. That’s why you should be circumspect when choosing which hill you’re willing to die on and make sure it’s really worth it.

The thing is giraffe, you are the only one making comparisons to North Korea.

You can be unhappy about something and feel it’s not quite cricket without feeling it’s a slippery slope to franco’s spain.

The thing is giraffe, you are the only one making comparisons to North Korea

No she isn't. Some posters upthread, at the very start, likened it to NK and Nazism.

noblegiraffe Sat 13-Jan-18 18:05:10

"cory there is no law that says you have to use state education at all. It is worth considering how much you actually care about chanting."

Most of the population don't actually earn enough to afford either private school or for one parent to home educate. So for many of us, there is no choice.

And my concern was not that I disagree with discipline, but that I recognise a discipline killer when I see one. Displaying signs of weakness to teenagers is basically a bad, bad idea. Don't give them anything to snigger about should be the first rule here.

I guess you missed the Hitler Youth comment, and the one about autocratic regimes?

You can be unhappy about something to do with schools and not kick up a big stink about it/accept that while it’s not great it’s ok/decide to see how it goes/think maybe there’s a reasoning behind it that you’re not aware of.

Fair enough but the people she is now directly responding to did not :)

The fact it’s a waste of time would be my biggest

I think my classes would be more chaotic tbh.

It’s the same with the ‘make them line up outside.’ Yes, wonderful, give them an extra five minutes to push each other and shove crisps in and trip up Year 7s when they could be in and working!

What happens when our young people leave school to go to university or work and we haven’t encouraged independent, critical thinking? Do we really want the next generation to merely be unthinking, unquestioning automatons? I agree with some of the PPs, that could feasibly be he start of the slippery slope into complying with questionable or unethical activities. It’s not such a huge leap to draw parallels to examples of autocratic regimes from history.

Don’t confuse ‘it doesn’t/wouldn’t work for me’ with ‘it doesn’t work’.

I’ve seen getting kids to line up outside before entry used to great effect. Getting them settled and ready with instructions on what to do before they come in the classroom can be fantastic.

A group chant has me cringing, but I can see how a routine like that at the start of the lesson could be a positive thing.

Yes, so trust teachers to decide how they start their lessons.

Versus routine and consistency, mars.

Neither way is absolutely right or absolutely wrong. It’s your preference.

Giraffe, the point is, if a teacher wants to start a lesson with a weird chant, ok.

But I don’t think it’s helpful to make it a policy.

Look at all the top schools and the types of stuff people say about them. 'Culture of discipline, learning, teamwork, values, pride in their school'. Now at the top schools, kids will often turn up already with those cultures embedded - from their families, from team sports, from places like Beavers. And private schools also cultivate them - school uniforms, school mottos, cheering on teams in competitions, successful ex-pupils coming back to give motivational speeches.

Other schools do not necessarily have an full intake where hard work is valued, good behaviour automatic, skills of co-operative working with others embedded. They don't necessarily take pride in their school, and the message from others may also be negative. For a school to be successful, that culture of hard work, discipline and positive values needs to bedeliberatelyestablished and embedded in a more overt way. Not all pupils will need it, and those parents are likely to be the ones rolling their eyes, but for the school as a whole to work effectively, the message needs to be consistent and constant.
I agree entirely.
The chants seem silly to me. It's not what I would do, but the way people are acting on thsi thread seems silly to me as if somehow challenging a daft chant in a school is going to stick one up at 'the man' and going along with it is like north korea or nazi germany.

A group chant has me cringing, but I can see how a routine like that at the start of the lesson could be a positive thing
Same.
Yes, so trust teachers to decide how they start their lessons
Works fine in schools where behaviour and attitude is good.
Doesn't work if you're in a school where students play home against school and try to play staff against staff, where behaviour and attitude are long term problems.

Then you get what I had for a term: why do you make us line up and do a bell task? Mr so and so lets us...
I wanted them lined up & calm before entering so I can give one simple instruction and they could come in and get on. Much nicer climate than sir's class where they bounce around negotiating where they'll sit. With relentless consistency students did it & behaved brilliantly on the whole. It got to the point where the only real issues i had were the oneswith parents who had school sized chips on their shoulder.
School brought in school wide routines and it annoyed me because my class was working. But it's the whole picture. All staff singing from the same hymn sheet made it better for other staff and for the school to improve.

if a teacher wants to start a lesson with a weird chant, ok

You missed the part about consistency. Schools have to have school-wide policies for certain things and they have to be implemented consistently by every teacher to work properly.

If it has been decided that what is needed is a consistent start to lessons and to build a school culture where students are constantly reminded that they are expected to work hard and be nice, then that's school policy and every teacher should do it. It's like any other behaviour management system, if teachers go off-piste and do their own thing, then it makes it harder for other teachers to stick to what has been agreed as policy and it means it doesn't work as well as it might.

If your school doesn't have a school-wide policy for chants and every teacher does their own thing and lessons starts are calm and orderly anyway then that's fine. But that doesn't mean that a school that does have one is wrong.

If a school doesn't generally have calm and orderly starts to lessons then a school-wide policy on lesson-starts should certainly be considered.

bfgdreamtree

The "slippery slope" argument does not work here

but it exactly the argument that the OP is using

It's like any other behaviour management system, if teachers go off-piste and do their own thing, then it makes it harder for other teachers to stick to what has been agreed as policyandit means it doesn't work as well as it might.
This is so true.
In my early days I didn't get it and used to be annoyed at being told how to start my lessons but would go along with it and raise any issues privately.
Now, I realise that it's not about if pupils behave for me. I'm one tiny part of a whole system and any member of staff choses to ignore policy, they become the weak link which opens inconsistency.

At my school, I can start my lessons how I like but we have other basic expectations. I follow them and do judge those staff who go on with the kids like 'yeah it's stupid so i don't do it'.

but it exactly the argument that the OP is using

No it isn't.

That's another thing - all these 'good schools' that go in for expensive uniform, 'respect' and discipline'... and are regarded as 'good' because EXAM RESULTS. These places are often riddled with bullying, very quick to exclude any pupil with SEN or EAL: if they are state schools and therefore not allowed to select the cleverest kids, they make sure there are enough factors to put off the poor families. They are not 'good' schools.

There's a fair bit of exaggeration in this article, but a lot of sense. People shouldn't unquestioningly accept the idea that 'strict' schools, fancy uniforms, inane rituals etc are a good idea.

bfgdreamtree

According to the OP this will lead us to an Orwellian diplopia. So slippery slope.

Yes the private schools with fancy uniforms are known for good exam results. I can't think off the top of my head any state schools with terrible discipline who are also known for good exam results.

State schools adorning themselves with the trappings of private schools in terms of the fancy uniforms may well be cargo-cult science, but I'm not convinced that attempting to instil state kids with values and discipline in terms of chasing better results is such a silly idea.