Teen Misbehaving at School

[edmel]

DS is 15 years old. He's friendly and independent, got himself a paper round at 13, found himself a better job at 14, has worked consistently, is respectful (most of the time), kind, and has a girlfriend he treats well.

Basically, he's a good kid.

But over the past year he has started behaving in SUCH an immature way - belching, farting, messing around constantly.

I could put up with it at home but it has spilled over into school. His school gives 'sanctions' for bad/silly behaviour and he's now getting these regularly.

Before the end of term, I threatened to ground him for a week if he got another sanction. He got one and I grounded him, although I relented a couple of days later as he was so upset about it and sorry. I warned him that another sanction would mean being grounded for a week again.

Today was the first day back at school after the break.

Within an hour he'd got a sanction for messing around again - holding a door shut so his friend couldn't get out of the classroom (nothing malicious - they are good friends - just messing around).

He's just at lunch and messaged me to tell me about it - full of apologies and devastated at the idea of being grounded for a week.

He says all he did was hold a door shut as a joke, and that the sanction - and my grounding him - are harsh.

But I feel I need to stick to my guns to stop this constantly silly behaviour.

Am I being too harsh?

No, you're not being harsh. Seems a silly thing to get a sanction for, unless there was something else going on, but you've told him what will happen, and you need to stick to it. Actions have consequences.

No, you’re not. Silly behaviour can degenerate into more dangerous or challenging behaviour and, in any case, the silly and quite low level stuff is what is particularly annoying to teaching staff. It interrupts lessons and irritates everyone.

Don't back down. He's being a twat and he needs to deal with the consequences. It's not hard to not do daft things.

You've already been too soft, IMO. He's not learning, is he? He knows already that you're prone to giving up on your own sanctions.

A lot of boys are like this at 15.

They spend their time out if lessons being silly and cranking each other and it often spills over into lessons.

Tends to impact academic performance as well as they are thinking about socialising with their friends not the lesson.

He will be upset but you do need to come down hard on it. It gets tedious very fast in a school.

Low level disruptive behaviour in schools is difficult for teachers to deal with without the backing of the parents. Lots of "messing" means less time for working. Lots of things that can be described as.....we were only.. .
What if the other 28 kids in the class did it.
Stick to your guns
You let him off last time
He didn't learn

Stick to your guns, but explain why. He needs to understand why these incidents matter. But yes hold the boundary tight.

He's behaving like a twat, and will be negatively impacting students who do want to learn and don't appreciate pathetic behaviour like this. And why on earth are you putting up with him belching, farting and acting up at home? How can you bear such juvenile behaviour?

My mate had a similar situation with his Son in Y10 or Y11.
He ended up surprising his Son at school with his tutor at the end of lunch break...threatening to sit in the classroom with him if he couldn't behave.
The Son caved & behaved out of fear of embarrassment.
I doubt the school could let him join the lesson from a Safeguarding perspective but it did the trick for him!

And why on earth are you putting up with him belching, farting and acting up at home? How can you bear such juvenile behaviour?

Agreed. You're sanctioning this at home, why wouldn't he act like a fool in class? He needs to be taught manners and self-control and that he will suffer the consequences if he chooses to misbehave.

You are not being harsh. This kind of behaviour in schools is infuriating and it is right that the school deal with it.
I wonder if he is finding things more difficult academically so is trying to hide this by being daft. I used to see this all the time in teaching. Anything to distract from having to admit that a bit of help might be needed. Talk to him to understand why the silly behaviour and hopefully you’ll get to the root of it.

You should have stuck to the first grounding for a week, but you can’t undo that. You need to be firm though, tbh he doesn’t sound like a nice young lad if he’s acting like that nor does he sound sorry!

Thanks, he is indeed behaving like a twat, but - as a single parent - the moral support is nice.

Brilliant tactic!

He's doing OK academically so it's not this and he always tells me if he's struggling with anything. But I totally understand it must be infuriating for the teachers - he knows I'm on their side every time!

OP, of course he’s ’devastated at the idea of being grounded for a week’. So stick to your guns, and make sure that next time he’s tempted, the thought of another grounding will stop him acting like a twat in the first place.

Sanctions are useless if they’re not enforced - and if they know how likely you are to cave in.

Love this and it will be step 2 if grounding him doesn't work!

Well, I decided to give him a chance (first time he's been grounded). Obviously, it didn't work so that won't happen again.
But actually, he IS a nice lad, or I don't think I'd have this dilemma. He's acting like a twat - yes - but he's thoughtful, caring, and hard-working. He even volunteers to cook for the family a couple of days a week, when I've worked long hours. It makes it tougher to come down hard when I need to, which is why I came here for the moral support.

If you don’t come down hard, what will happen is that his mates will laugh and egg him on, so he’ll do more of the nonsense stuff to get the attention and before you know where you are, there’ll be a day in isolation, followed by a fixed term exclusion, as it gets sillier.

Many many years in teaching has shown me this.

He phoned you to let you know what had happened?
Could this be getting his version of events in first? How often have I talked to parents who found the full story enlightening (if not edifying) when they got the complete picture, rather than the "edited highlights".
"All I did was..........." in this case, hold a door shut.........yeah, and the rest.
Would a busy teacher really be pulling a pupil up for just jokily holding a door shut?
I think your son may have reached the "Sunshine Moment", as in, a teacher takes a pupil to one side in the face of escalating nonsense, and the dialogue begins with, "Now look here, sunshine......"
He is a good-hearted lad, who still cares about your sanctions; follow through before he stops caring.

You have to follow through regardless now .. he got the first time you backed down .. now you have to follow through .

i agree with pp there is often the highlighted version of events

I don't think it's the worst behaviour! But, if he's getting trouble at school this will be problematic so I think based on that, you're right to back it up. You sound like a decent mum so won't go over the top ranting and raving. The action itself sounds enough. Definitely don't back down.