Government Behaviour Hub pushing zero tolerance in schools

[Usedtodance]

I've just been reading how the Behaviour Hub set up by the government has been pushing this idea of very strict behaviour policies and zero tolerance in schools. The sort rolled out by many of the academy chains. Does anyone know what the evidence base is for this?

The policies in many of these schools are highly restrictive - short lunch breaks, limited access to toilet breaks, consequences for minor mistakes. Many adults would find it stressful to be in an environment like this. I wonder if anyone has looked at the cost of these measures to the children in terms of their mental health, fostering independence and social skills etc.

Any insight, thoughts or links to research on this would be great.

I grew up in Belgium and it was much like the previous poster in the Netherlands. But possibly a bit harsher in the sense that every single test and bit of homework was part of your final grade. Didn't do it, zero for you. Spelling mistakes on your biology paper, lose points, forgot an accent in French, lose half a mark, forgot your hair tie during chemistry, lose a mark for that. Didn't use the school headed paper for a test/homework lose marks for that.
And you can definitely still repeat years in Belgium.
I also don't understand the idea that if I child has forgotten a pen they either need a detention or the teacher has to fuss about it. Surely you just ask your friend to borrow one or you take no notes and suffer the natural consequences. No teacher I ever encountered would have done anything about you not having a pen. For PE kit you just borrowed manky stuff from lost and found, did it in your clothes or sat out and got zero. A missing book meant sharing with a friend (we had to buy all our books so were bringing them in and out of school).
My secondary school wasn't particularly strict, I barely remember anyone getting detention or any other form of punishment that wasn't a natural consequence of not doing the work.
It does massively help that schools aren't compared to each other officially, there are no league tables and no external exams.

The Dutch and Belgian systems do sound interesting.

I have to ask: what is the parental attitude to this. Because my experience in the U.K. is that parents would see this as draconian. They expect us to provide pens, accept rudeness and accept students doing nothing. But then kick up a huge fuss if that child is failing a subject.

@Boudicasbeard as in any country there is socioeconomic inequality in the Netherlands and in Belgium - but it is far less extreme than it is in the UK. In the Netherlands you have people labelled as 'asocialen', which loosely correlates to the British 'chav' and no, as a group they do not engage with education - but the numbers are much smaller and so in any school as parents they will be the minority. If they kick up in the way British disengaged parents do, they are laughed at and not taken seriously. It also helps that there's no class system left in the Netherlands and in Belgium and yes, there is a culture of personal responsibility alongside a recognition that some people will always need extra help.

The majority of my fellow students worked their backsides off to avoid being left behind, it was a huge stigma for that to happen. Definitely motivated people.

When I was at school, we were expected to provide everything except books - those were on loan from the school and you had to look after them or pay for any damage (always small amounts). It was just how things were. And yes, we did lend each other pens and sheets of paper as needed.

I got detention once, for a whole class rebellion against a supply teacher who was both incompetent and unjust. The entire class got the detention and it was fine. So I got home late, told my mum (who was a secondary teacher) what had happened and it was fine.

Someone explain the tracking bit of SLANT please. Does the child have to literally stare at the teacher at all times and move their eyes / head if the teacher moves? That's not normal human behaviour, surely?!

I was talking to my friend about this today and she's told me about a petition that's been set up about the behaviour hubs and zero tolerance - might be worth a look for anyone interested. I don't know if it quotes any research about it all though.

No, its worse than that, each child is required to turn around and stare at any other child who is speaking to the class - it is stupid, and intimidating, and of course, used as a an excuse to pull faces at the speaker, I hate it and forbid it totally, even when teaching in SLANT schools, where technically you should issue a warning or detention if it is not done

What worries me is that the UK system seems to be an outlier in introducing this kind of thing, so what is it that is makinr UK kids so much more difficult and dangerous than kids in other countries? I mean, the obsession with every nitpicky detail of uniform is just weird.

no, we are not really, other countries have similar problems, and resolutions

@Nimbostratus100 could you point me in the direction of some examples, please?

What is wrong with teaching kids that it is polite to look at the person who is speaking?

Maybe the speaker doesn't want to be looked at. Speaking in class was terrifying enough as it was.

SLANT sounds like it's designed for extroverts and to hell with everyone else.

Well, if the class is set out in rows, it would mean people constantly having to turn round in their seats, which wouldn't feel creepy at all to anyone speaking, especially an introvert.

Even the man who invented SLANT has now modified it because he admits it wasn't fit for purpose.

How do people who don't like to be looked at cope with work meetings? Tell co-workers, managers etc not to look at them?

Being able to speak confidently in front of an audience of people looking at you is an important life skill. School is the place where kids are supposed to learn life skills.

@Florenz there are ways of instilling this that aren't about forcing creepy constant tracking on people. Being attentive in class is a completely different thing from speaking in front of an audience. Generations of children all over the world have managed to behave, pay attention and learn without SLANT. It's just another educational fad, and one that is damaging to a subset of students.

A lot of these concepts are cultish and bear no resemblance to life in the real world. I don’t turn and stare at my colleagues in meetings, sometimes I write notes, i doodle, I may even look out the window. No one puts me on a disciplinary if my top button isn’t done up or my coat isn’t black or I ask to go to the loo. I think a lot of teachers have no clue what “real world” is like because they’ve spent their whole adult lives working in schools. Most the teachers I know can barely log into Facebook so how on earth they can be expected to understand how kids interact with social media I really don’t know. Schools aren’t there to churn out robots or young people riddled with anxiety but they are doing a great job of trying to achieve this.

What do you all imagine schools are supposed to be doing to prepare kids for the working world?

Excluding them immediately for violence, threatening behaviour or bullying would be a good start.

DS goes to an academy school like this.

I completely agree with discipline for disruptive behaviours, rudeness, fighting etc.

But DS was given a negative behaviour point because his socks weren't totally black, they had the day of the week written in red along the sole and he had forgotten he had drama so would need to take his shoes off. My friends son was given a negative point because his blazer fell off the back of his chair twice in one lesson. Absolutely ridiculous! And it's gotten worse since these incidents because they now follow 'SLANT' and other such strategies.

@Florenz I have no problem with same day detentions for disruptive behaviour in class. I have no problem with exclusions for bullying and violence. I do have a problem with the endless petty nonsense about uniform infractions. Just get rid of it already. Hosts of countries across the North Sea manage to maintain achievement and good behaviour without it - because not faffing about with a student's socks or tie means you can focus on tackling behaviour and bullying. All these new draconian rules over petty things are just papering over the cracks of a system that is failing for far more fundamental reasons.

Why is it ridiculous? A negative behaviour point seems perfectly reasonable. Nothing will happen if they don't keep getting negative behaviour points.

Do you not think that some kids will deliberately wear the wrong uniform or "accidentally" knock their blazer off their chair to cause disruption/get attention?

@Florenz and the solution there is to not have uniform, and to have standard sanctions for disruptive behaviour which are fairly and predictably applied. If you don't make kids wear blazers but instead have somewhere that coats can be placed, you avoid the problem altogether.

So the solution to kids not wearing proper uniform is to not have uniform at all, so they can't get in trouble for not wearing it?

No the solution is not to get your knickers in a twist about whether someone has the wrong socks on or not. It’s ridiculous and petty and sanctioning a kid for that kind of thing just undermines respect for teachers not strengthens it, because both parents and children think the teacher is a dick for enforcing it!

Yes, exactly. Like they do in many countries which have better educational outcomes than the UK. I don't see why people don't understand this.

You don't need uniform to have good educational outcomes. You don't need it to prevent bullying - you tackle the bullying itself directly. You don't need it to prepare for the world of work (as evidenced by all the countries where there is no uniform and yet young people manage to move into the world of work perfectly well).

Focus on behaviour. Don't preventively assume all students are bad, act when they bisbehave and do it thoroughly. It really isn't rocket science and I don't understand why British schools can't manage it.

Why doesn't a school do away with uniform, sore up the league tables and set an example with other schools for to follow?