School Detention - Fair?

[WhiteLily1]

My DS age 11 (y7) was in a lesson last week where one pupil was answering the teacher back and two other boys were chatting. The teacher gave the whole class a break time detention for Monday of the following week. DS had not done anything - he said he had been totally silent during the lesson but everyone had the detention.
My DS forgot to go to the detention- it wasn’t on his mind 4 days later, he just totally forgot. He went to apologise to the teacher In question and she gave him a hall lunch time detention for the next day. That involves being escorted to the hall at the start of lunch and sitting on a chair staring at nothing - not allowed to do anything except eat a packed lunch until the end of lunch break.
Unfortunately this was also the day of lunchtime football club which is pretty much all DS looks forward to at school.
For background, DS doesn’t get in trouble at school - his parents evening was good, behaves in class, participates etc. He has had 1 lunch detention before as he forgot his school diary. But that’s it.
I just feel it’s really unfair to give the whole class a collective punishment. Then to double down on that and for DS to miss a whole lunch doing nothing except stare at a wall when the one thing he is passionate about is on. He is really down about it.
AIBU?

If the culprits are known, unfair.

Retired teacher here. Whole class punishments are awful. The well behaved kids have already had their lesson spoilt/disrupted because of the behaviour of a few others.in my experience this type of sanction is often used when the teacher has lost control of the class, says something like 'you are all staying in' and doesn't reassess when he/she has calmed down
I would tell your son you are going to complain to the teacher because he wasn't in any way involved. Watch his reaction..if he says that's good or similar he probably wasn't involved. If he says just leave it that's more problematical. Could be he was more involved than he's saying ...not main trouble maker but on the original ...or he might just not want you going in to complain. If you do go in I would ask in what way your son was involved because he doesn't believe he was involved at all ...rather than staying categorically he was not involved..You weren't there and that way it doesn't look like you have made up your mind before talking to her. Take your son with you. Tell him you are going to listen to her view as well. 💐

Does your school do whole class detentions?
I didn't know schools did that any more.

This isn't a new thing though. We were given detentions/litter duty when I was at school 30 years ago for forgetting books. I once forgot my hymn book and got a break time litter duty. I'd never forgotten before in 3 years. And never did again. It was genuinely an accident. So yes maybe they could have let me off, but the issue is is that it wasn't students like me that caused the rule in the first place. I'm sure the school don't really mind if a generally good student forgets a hymn book or a diary or whatever. The problem is the type of student who NEVER remembers them. We had boys like it at school. "Can't write the homework down sir I don't have a pen/ my diary". Teacher gives them pen and bit of paper. Next day "lost the bit of paper sir so haven't done the homework". And this on repeat almost every day. And you can't only give the "bad" students detention and let off the "good" students. It has to be the same punishment.
We also had collective class detentions for talking. Again, I never was the one talking. Did I think it was unfair? Yes. Did I complain to my parents? Yes. They kindly agreed that it was unfair but unfortunately sometimes things aren't fair and while annoying it was only missing a break time occasionally so i was pretty much told to suck it up. I'm now in my 40s and survived the odd collective class punishment without too many scars!

Peripheral ...not original. 😁

I would never support a whole class detention unless literally every child had done something worthy of a detention.

Collective punishments are specifically prohibited under the Geneva Convention.
Subsequently, it's literally a human rights breach.

It must be well over by now and will soon be forgotten. School is like that sometimes, unfortunately.

Speak to the head of year. My son got stupid detentions like this and the head of year removed them and spoke to the teacher, as any normal human being can see its unfair. The teacher must be stressed but that's not your child's fault.

Are you sure it WAS a whole class detention? I am always having children tell their parents this - I never set them. There are times though, when three quarters of the class or more might be kept in at break or lunch time, if each individual there deserves to be! but they will often tell their parents it was the whole class.

if it was a whole class detention, then contact the school and get it cancelled.

YANBU. Collective punishments really are the mark of weak teaching.

There are also very very rare - OP needs to be sure of her facts

It could be worth a polite inquiry about whether collective punishments like this are school policy as it is generally accepted to be poor disciplinary practice.

Not sure tbh cos both kids out at the minute.

If the school did decide to do a whole class detention, I'd presume there were a few mouthy kids and then the rest of the class were egging them on or laughing or whatever.

The only time I would keep a whole class back is for a bag search, if something had been stolen, or similar - these have to be carried out with three adults in the room, so can take a while to get started.

you are talking about less then once every three years I think. The last time was a stanley knife had been taken from the prep room, and all the classes on that floor were kept in and all bags searched until the culprit was found. He was then expelled

Because as explained further up, behaviour can very quickly ripple and the majority are then joining in. It's then very hard in the moment to just pick out they key players. Or as I suggested, others were further encouraging the behaviour by laughing.

I think unless you have actually been stood in front of a class of 30 young people, whose learning you are directly held responsible for (and could face losing your own job if you fail to get them target) and tried crowd control, it can be hard to understand. As a parent I didn't get it either - when I then started working in a school as a second career, then I understood why.

It's also worth noting that the teacher may well have had to give up part of their own lunchtime to facilitate this kind of whole class detention. It's not done lightly.

Collective punishments are lazy and often cause trouble amongst the pupils in the class.

But your son knew he had a detention and it didn't need to 'be on his mind' because that's what his planner is for.

That I do disagree with.

You are adamant your DS did nothing wrong but I would encourage you to talk to the teacher and hear it from their perspective. Things may not be as they seem. If the teacher does admit your DS did nothing wrong you could then challenge the detention.

It is true the majority of the class can be involved, egging on bad behaviour, laughing, and generally supporting the main actors - normally though, it isn't the WHOLE class, and there will be a small number who you don't see being involved - and so even if 26 or 27 students ARE in detention, you can make a point of not issuing a detention to the few who didn't join in.

However, not all students would be aware that it was not a whole class detention, and some might be aware, but still claim it was.

, telling both of them they have to miss TV 4 days later and then the one who didn’t do anything forgets
But what would have been your response to him forgetting. You gave a clear instruction but it was ignored/forgotten. What would you have done? Ignored it, in which case why did you tell him to forgo his TV in the first place, or reinforce your position that if you tell him to do something you expect him to do it? One is lazy parenting, the other is discipline and expectations imho.

Why is this really much of your business?
Let the school do its work in its way- the fact that he "forgot" to attend shows he wasn't that bothered. And if that led to the lunchtime sitting and staring at the wall so be it.

I was once one of the 4 picked out not to be in detention.

Actually I was totally embarrassed and would rather have been lumped with the rest. I hated being singled out for any reason.

well anyone not issues with a detention who wanted one, sorry, I can't be bothered with you, no sympathy.

I am a primary school teacher.
I keep the whole class for 2 to 3 minutes at break if over 75% of the class have not been making the right choices.
I then go around and quietly let the children who I know were making the right choices go within the first 30 seconds.
I don't actually believe there are children who are always good, as both parents and teachers we have to accept that even the best behaved child can occasionally swept up in group nonsense.

My DD was not in a class one day (had been at dentist or something) but was still expected to attend a whole class detention handed out for behaviour whilst she was away! Would also mean she missed a club she enjoyed.
She protested and was told whole class includes her, even though she wasn’t there!
I did send a note in about that one, and they did agree it was unfair and she could miss it, but why they told her she had to do it in the first place was never understood.