Is behaviour out of control in a lot of schools?

[Sophie12319]

Not sure whether to move DD (10) to another school. Everyday she's coming home saying she can't learn as there are a group of boys who throw stuff about the classroom, shout out when the teacher is talking, walk about the classroom in lesson. She has said teacher has sent them to headteacher in the past but it carries on.

This is not a teacher bashing thread btw (in fact, I have the upmost respect for DD's teacher as I have seen the boys behaviour at the school gate and I don't know how she does a whole day), maybe more of a parent bashing of why some parents let their kids behave like this?

Anyway, back to the point of thread, I spoke to my sister about moving her to which she said there's no point as he DS' school is the same.
Feel a bit hopeless as I feel DD's education is being ruined! I've emailed the school before about their behaviour but I feel at a loss!

I went to an all girls school. We had it all - low level disruption, high level disruption, fights, swearing at teachers, glue sniffing in the toilets etc etc Far, far worse than anything my kids have ever witnessed at their mixed-sex secondary.

Home-schooling is voluntary, schools cannot just tell parents that they have to do it. Also thinking about the students I work with who are most likely to face Permanent Exclusion due to their behaviour, the majority of their parents would either be unable to home-educate due to their own difficulties, or would have absolutely no interest in doing so as they don't currently have any involvement or engagement with their child's education.

Are you really trying to compare private and state? You don’t seem to acknowledge what a huge advantage the kids at private schools have.

Who is going to do that? Where? Also you can't just take children away from their families because you think they're problematic. They have to be removed by a court based on a great deal of evidence. And if you did get them "away" from their families who will look after them? There is a massive shortage of foster carers and residential placements for children in the UK, people aren't exactly queuing up to take in teenagers whose behaviour is so challenging they've been permanently excluded from education. Or is this non-existant setting where they're taught "something useful" by non-existant Teachers going to be residential too? How will it be funded when the Government won't even fund schools and other essential services?

There is a reason that permanent exclusion is known as "the pipeline to prison".

Is the need not for pupil referral unis? Not home schooling, not mainstream schooling or any form of boarding school but a school for those who are too disruptive for mainstream schooling to be appropriate?

I remember season 4 of The Wire (about the crisis in education in American schools) they did that. They put the disruptive kids all in one class and they were more productive and it helped some of them, but the point is the ones who just wanted to learn weren't having their lessons ruined.

Of course, all social problems in America end up here within a generation and here we are.

It's mostly as a deterrent but change the law if necessary. In the meantime put the disruptive kids in one class.

Most kids will respect discipline if it's genuinely enforced. When it isn't (or they know it's weak) they'll take advantage.

My own workplace has 3 strikes and you're out (verbal/written warning) and everyone behaves.

Time to realise that 'no child left behind' more often than not means 'all children left behind'.

Yup. The amount of learning time wasted dealing with poor behaviour is staggering. And the ones who suffer most from that are the non-disruptive vulnerable or disadvantaged students, for whom school should be a lifeline and a path to a better future, not the mc children with supportive parents, cultural capital and safe, happy homes.

Disruptive kids should be routinely removed from classrooms, whatever the reason for their disruptive behaviour. That doesn't mean they shouldn't be helped and supported if they have reasons they need help and support. But they shpuld not be allowed to ruin other children's education on a daily basis, which is what is happening.

I’m dealing with trouble from a 7 year old . 7 months of picking on my child who is lovely with friends and a want to learn .
This kid was straight out the heads office and straight into the class to start on her again.
The parent works at the school and makes sure I know she’s watching me every time I am there ( like it’s my kids fault) also letting a door slam in my child’s face and saying stuff to her when walking past here.

Im at a very high point of putting the home Ed application form in next week.

Very good point

@UsernameAlreadyTaken101

You keep saying “consider the reason why the child behaves in the way they do”. I’ll rephrase that for you….. some kids choose to be incredibly violent towards other kids because they have shit lives. Some other kids (who also have really shit lives) choose to not be violent at school and are actually quite vulnerable in a way that makes them targets. The whole ‘hug a hoodie’ mentality ship sailed …. Quite a long time ago.

I suspect you’re an over enabling teacher of such behaviour. We had one girl who was the daughter of a heroin addict who absolutely battered another girl in the school corridor because she ‘looked at her funny’. We had to ring an ambulance as the girl was unconscious and her head was the size of a fucking balloon due to being stamped on.

In the meeting after this incident I was actually sick to my stomach about all the sympathy for the girl who actually did it. ‘She just missed out on her GCSEs, she was SO nearly there’ and on and on it went. Absolutely sickening the other girl was just an after thought. I sat there feeling like I was on some sort of parallel universe. An innocent student got her head stamped on because some twat of a student made the wrong choice, heroin addicted mother or not. At nearly 16 you’re not a kid either. What can I say, it’s totally fucked and you haven’t got a clue. If you did, you would know that ‘trauma’ isn’t an excuse. Also not all behaviours are down to SEN or trauma, what a narrow and idealistic view.

Most kids will respect discipline if it's genuinely enforced. When it isn't (or they know it's weak) they'll take advantage.

What do you mean by genuinely enforced discipline? Many students do not respect school behaviour policies, however rigorously they are implemented. You can follow the policy to the letter, but if students refuse to turn up to detentions, you can't physically force them to.

As for the 3 strikes policy and saying 'Change the law' - how?! You can't make the government implement these things. Schools have very little power to enforce serious sanctions on students, or to permanently exclude them. Even if you do manage to permanently exclude one, they just end up at another school causing similar problems!

Behaviour is worse, yes, and there are multiple elements contributing to this, both at home and at school.

The narrative around behaviour has changed significantly over the last decade and a half. The message of "All behaviour is communication," and some of the principles behind the "restorative/relational" approaches to behaviour management are, in part, to blame for this.

Some of these approaches (such as the Paul Dix approach) are popular with SLT because they shift the responsibility for behaviour away from the child and onto the staff. Senior leaders no longer have to acknowledge or deal with a behaviour problem in school. Instead, it's a problem with a teacher and everything would be fine if the teachers just changed. Children are only made to acknowledge the effects of their behaviour in low-impact and often meaningless ways that do not promote real change nor deter poor choices in the future.

These approaches also have one core flaw: they assume that, all things being equal, every child (actually every person) would choose to do the legally and morally right thing every single time without fail. That's why a poor behaviour choice has to be because something is wrong at home, in class or with their mental health. That simply isn't true. People make the "wrong" choices for a wide variety of reasons, including sometimes just because they want to or can. Equally, even if the poor behaviour stems from a genuine issue, we shouldn't excuse it nor negate its effect on others. We would never say that an assault was understandable and dismissed because you felt frustrated or that stealing a car because you couldn't afford one would be solved with a chat around how the thief and victim felt about the theft.

The lessons that you learn in school about self-regulation, consequences, personal responsibility, your social impact, etc. are the things that help create the law-abiding, morally good adults that we want in our society. If those lessons vanish, what happens?

This is going nowhere. Unless you teach children and deal with these behaviours every day you'll never get it. I am far from an over enabler (whatever that is) as I've mentioned several times we don't have major behavioural problems in my school. I have just finished for the year and received so many cards from parents thanking me for my work and stating how much their child has progressed this year, from the quietest child in the class to the most challenging behaviourally. I'll take their opinion over some randoms online any day. Enjoy your summer.

@UsernameAlreadyTaken101

Lol so you have the audacity to come on here on this thread with your wet views when your school doesn’t have a behaviour problem. You’re ONE teacher in ONE school and you’re preaching at us to “look behind the behaviours”. I presume you’re primary too? Whilst I don’t doubt the problems in primary I was referring to very violent behaviours currently the norm in secondary from “kids” who are 6 foot and have threatened to bring weapons in.

Good god, get a grip and come back when you actually know what you’re talking about.

You don’t know what over enabling means but apparently you teach every day? Erm, right.

Genuinely enforced discipline means you have to be prepared to work towards exclusion as punishment and then enforce it.

If a kid is excluded from multiple schools then so be it. In most cases proper discipline will nip the bad behaviour in the bud. In the cases that doesn't then the necessary punishments need to be met.

Namby pamby approach isn't working. Same with the police and the courts. The country has gone soft and whether it's kids or criminals take advantage.

1. We don't have a behavioural problem NOW. It has taken a huge amount of work and dedication to deal with this issue. It doesn't come easily and takes everyone to work together rationally and professionally.
2. I have worked in both sectors and I'm highly qualified to "know what I'm talking about" unlike you, who appears to have a fixed view based on personal not professional experience. I'm assuming you're not a teacher and have no understanding of child development past your own child/children. People with such nasty attitudes towards any child, regardless of their actions should not be allowed to work in schools. They certainly shouldn't be discussing their actions or comments made in a confidential meeting on social media which could be outing and grounds for dismissal.
3. Citing an extreme horrific incident is most definitely not typical of daily behaviour in schools. You and I and everyone reading know that so please get a grip yourself.

Absolutely this! I'm a TA in primary. The rudeness and attitude that children come into school with is unbelievable - mostly coming from not getting their own way, never having been told "no" and their never being any consequences at home. I could give numerous examples of parents who back their child hitting another, fighting, swearing at staff etc. and actually say we are in the wrong (in front of the child)!

@UsernameAlreadyTaken101

Ive taught for years. You are naive and living in your own box. I suspect you’re in some leafy area (primary) I doubt very much you moved from secondary to primary. So many inconsistencies in your posts. The fact you have noted your third point as being rare tells me all I need to know about you and your school experience to be honest.

Meanwhile in the real world….

I shouted at a child for throwing a chair across the room when I asked him to sit down. I had already spent an hour talking to him about his behaviour nicely and how he has such potential bla bla bla. He was a complete brat, bright and no SEN. I told him to get out of my classroom and shouted at him in the corridor, not in front of the class. What was the outcome? The STS teacher who was working with the school completed a yellow whistle blowing form as an official complaint. Because I dared to shout at a child who had thrown a chair across a classroom. That is why behaviour is bad. Teachers can do nothing and have no power. Same goes for SLT. What do people suggest - I’m genuinely open to ideas.

Why on earth would it be tongue in cheek? Lot's of other people on this thread, including quite a few teachers by the looks of it, are saying fairly much the same thing.

I have a lot of sympathy for kids who are having a hard time of it and have had shit things happen to them, right up until the point where trying (and usually failing) to help them massively negatively impacts everyone else around them. At some point we have to admit that life can be rubbish, you can't help everyone no matter how much that person may deserve it and making everyone else suffer is neither fair to the other 29 children in the classroom or any kind of solution.

Of course taxing the 1% and putting some of that money into helping these kids would and should be the answer, but let's not kid ourselves - that's never going to happen is it.

@thegreenlight

Do what @UsernameAlreadyTaken101 does (see points above). She clearly has all the answers in her school and gets cards from parents. Lol, I’m all ears.

@DontSetYourselfOnFireToKeepOthersWarm

Absolutely. I’ve known kids with backgrounds that would make your toes curl. Some of them have been the most respectful, intuitive, wonderful young people that I’ve ever met. They know what it’s like to be abused and so they have an astute sense of self awareness and empathy not to repeat such behaviours.

Yes I am comparing. Because as I said, private schools have money and resources. And that may well be a factor in better behaviour.

However people have also said there are issues at private schools too. Some Private schools use unqualified teachers. So it’s not a perfect system.

But yes it’s a hugely privileged system. Which still seems to be functioning overall right now. But that won’t last when recruitment really falls off.