To ask teachers about disruptive behaviour in secondary schools?

[mimblewimble]

I hear of so many teachers leaving the profession, or describing how they work in extremely stressful conditions, with student behaviour being awful and seemingly getting worse.

My kids report so much disruption in class at their school, which is apparently one of the best local state schools.

As I write this I'm thinking I'm probably BU just for asking teachers anything as I'm sure you don't have loads of spare time and mental energy!

But I'm interested in what teachers would like to see done to tackle behaviour in secondary schools - are there changes that you think would help?

Or do you work in a school where the behaviour is good, and if so why do you think that is?

There is something seriously wrong with society. So many parents do not have any common sense and everyone is in it for themselves, I blame the internet and our instant gratification at the tap of a finger culture. People do no longer have the patience and skills to actually deal with real life, with real people and real issues. It's all about them, their personal advantage and instant gratification. Look at how people behave out and about, how they drive, how even kids from caring, good aspirational homes go a bit crazy doing pretty outrageous things.
I blame digital technology and living in a consumerist society where what we buy and show off online matters more than community and actual happiness health and wellbeing.

@C4tintherug i completely agree. The internal truancy is a scandal. It's (for the most part) open defiance and not an unmet need. It's a "fuck you" to the adults around them they have no respect for. They've realised school can't put any meaningful consequences in place because of the need to keep exclusions low.

Ditto fidget toys, and the 40% of y7 who now need a doodle book, but couldn't possibly write the date and a title in the first 5 minutes.

I also find it bizzare that people talk like this is a new thing I left school years ago, so started secondary school 22 years ago and there was always the group of strudents that really misbehaved. Fights / bullying / smoking/ disrespect/ bad attendance etc and teen pregnancy was at a all time high 🤣
knife crime among teens in London was super bad as well.
we were class of 2007. We also didn’t come from a “ rough “ area of London 🤷

This is such a bug bare of ours at the moment. The children,always the same group in my daughter's year 8 classes are awful. Even worse when it's a supply teacher. And god forbid it's a teacher not from the UK. We don't know how to address it with the school. It's causing major anxiety for her 😔

Therein the problem lies. I do not expect my pupils to « earn » my respect. I give them respect and treat them with kindness as they are children, and human beings. I treat them respectfully from our first meeting. When then should I ,as an adult, have to earn respect ? Why not teach your kids to automatically respect people, whoever they are?

"petty meaness" is a ridiculous way of describing school rules.
If basic standards of behaviour are seen as schools going out of their way to antagonise students and parenst then it goes a long way to explain the discipline issues school has to deal with.
The other issue is that teachers used to just teach, now they have to act as Social Workers and so much more BEFORE they can even consider actually teaching and yet if they don't get the required results then they are blamed.

My DD goes to quite a strict state school. She has to get buses to get there because there's no way we would send her to the local school which is often in lockdown for weapon carrying etc. The school my DD attends has become quite self-selecting, because the parents who think their child can do no wrong and don't support sanctions now go elsewhere. Long may it last.

I've also been a secondary school teacher for 20 years this year. Behaviour is like nothing I've even seen before.

I have good behaviour in the majority of classes as I can enforce it in most, but there are some students who really are uncontrollable. I can follow the behaviour policies, but some of them seem to be “protected” by senior team and this is usually because slt either like them because they’re not trying to get a gcse out of them, or because the parents will kick off that much that staff aren’t willing to fight. It can take a couple of students - sometimes only one - to derail a lesson for 30 other students,

Please can you describe how behaviour differs now. It's important people actually talk about it.

Do you understand that schools have rules in order to safely organise over a thousand pupils through the course of a day? We can't get on with our 'educational mission' if we can't arrange for kids to get to their lessons, move safely between lessons, and expect to do as they are told.

You might wonder where uniform comes into this but a majority of parents in the UK support schools having uniforms. And if a school has a uniform, then of course it should be enforced, otherwise it ends up not having a uniform at all.

A huge amount of energy in schools is spent getting kids to do the work. We need to create a culture in which this happens. If a parent wades into this and complains about things that they think are pointless, then perhaps they should instead take a step back, think about the bigger picture, and let the school get on with it instead.

My thoughts are:

• Mobile phones - low attention span, inappropriate content, less time outdoors, in nature/communicating with others
• Human rights - teachers aren't allowed to discipline like they did when I was at school 70s/80s) - one teacher used to throw a board rubber at you if you talked so we were scared of her
• Sense of entitlement - children made to feel special
• Manners not valued or taught, thinking of others, treating others as you want to be treated (previously this naturally arise from Xhristian teaching)
• No consequences in adult world of not working at school - in countries without benefits systems like China or more limited ones (most of the world) if you don't work at school and get a job you starve. Here you can get a reasonable amount for whole life without ever putting anything in.

I could write all day, but for me, one of the main difference is the negotiation that constantly occurs. If a child misbehaves enough to stop 31 others from learning, I should be able to use the behaviour policy to sanction them. But if I do that too often with students, it will be deemed that I need 'support' because I'm not managing behaviour adequately in my classroom. Behaviour data is monitored, and staff who use the behaviour system too much are considered a problem. And so staff use it less, by lowering their expectations and tolerating more and more and trying so hard to build relationships, no matter if you're being told to fuck off or not to touch their exercise book or that you're weird etc etc etc. It's a cycle that makes education less effective for everyone else in the room.

Similarly, every single day I see students telling senior leaders to fuck off in the corridor, refusing to go to lessons and just wandering around all day. No consequence works for them, so SLT constantly negotiate and pander. Other kids see this and think, well, if they can do that and nothing happens, my low level disruption is nothing at all! Poor behaviour which goes largely unchallenged is pervasive, and the behaviour of the vast majority is pulled down by witnessing it.

Killertomato7
You often post on these threads complaining about schools and teachers being petty. Teachers want kids to learn. They want to move them on. They want them to be kind and considerate. They want them to look after the schools resources and to value being equipped for the lesson. They want them to be polite to others and to be on time for class. It isn't about being petty. But you are clearly the type to complain that it is petty to be sanctioned for turning up to class empty handed or petty to give a sanction for talking over the teacher or throwing stuff across the room. In fact you are part of the problem.

Changes in behaviour since I started teaching in 1993:

1. Mobile phone addiction= shorter attention spans.
2. The idea that teachers have to « earn respect » -often backed up by parents.
3. Parents arguing with sanctions and believing the improbable lies of their offspring.
4. Internal truancy-a huge issue with gangs of kids roaming the corridors refusing to go to lessons and defying senior staff.
5. Lack of resilience -giving up as soon as a task isn’t easily achievable.
6. Pupils believing their wishes and rights trump those of everyone else-princesses and little emperors.
7. Demands for concessions like toilet passes (obviously some are medically necessary), timeout passes, leave lessons early passes.
8. Very sexualised uniform in some schools for girls-including visible thong underwear, visible sanitary protection, Nike pro shorts in summer, bright coloured bras under white shirts, false nails so long they can’t write, false eyelashes and fake tan all year round. This includes the youngest girls who are 11 and 12. Any criticism will beget the response « you shouldn’t be looking. »
9. Casual vandalism-destruction of school equipment.
10. Refusal to do PE.
11. Sense of entitlement.

Edited to say that 80% of kids are lovely.

I work in a private school, and behaviour is very good indeed. Not perfect, but the worst I see on a day to day basis is pupils chatting in class when they should be working, or pupils not having their shirts tucked in. On the whole, they're lovely kids. I think it's because they know they will be asked to leave the school if they can't toe the line. Also we have a system where we can send an email if we have an issue and a member of SLT will immediately come and remove the child from our classroom. I've never actually had to use that system but it is reassuring to know that it is there.

I have worked in a city state school and the behaviour there drove me into private. The issue there was that there were no consequences. The parents didn't care, and would refuse to have their kids attend detentions etc. There's very little you can do without parental support if the child is refusing to comply with the rules. I do realise that these two schools are probably fairly extreme examples and that most are somewhere in between (I hope!).

If parents valued education more then children would behave better in class. You get people on here saying ‘my child doesn’t do anything bad, just low level stuff’ and that infuriates me because they are the children who actually are the most disruptive. It is actually quite easy to deal with someone who chucks a chair and calls you a cunt. They get taken out of your lesson. It is the constant low level stuff from about 15members of the class that slows down the lessons and reduces the content to the lowest common denominator.

I haven't RTFT because people made so many valid points on the first page alone.

However, I'll add my twopennorth as a secondary teacher of 14 years who left the profession around 18 months ago. One of the drivers in my decision to leave was behaviour in the classroom (although certainly not the only driver) and one thing I will say, after a long period of reflection, is that the school system itself isn't fit for purpose. We expect young people to understand and accept that they must sit still and listen for long periods each day, whenever we tell them to, despite the fact that this is developmentally inappropriate. We sanction them for questioning authority - even if they do so politely. As a society, we have accepted unquestioningly that keeping children and young people indoors for many hours a day, forcing them to learn what we tell them they must learn, regardless of their interests, aptitudes and ambitions, telling them they must all conform to the same rules and regulations regardless of their personality types etc etc, is an ok thing to do. Their individuality, their right to an input in their education, to choice about what they learn, is suppressed. We do this because, in order for society to function, parents must work and so children must be occupied elsewhere in large groups. As a result, conformity and uniformity is the only viable approach. Schools as we know them now would struggle to contain children without these things. That doesn't make them ok.

Before I get jumped on, I completely agree that respect has been eroded, gentle parenting carried out ineffectually and the institutionalisation of children from being babies in nurseries have caused problems. Socially, there has been a perfect storm of conditions which have led to the behaviour we currently see in schools.

But some of it is also young people rebelling against a system that isn't fit for purpose, a system that doesn't respect them as individuals, so why should they respect it?

For so many reasons, only some of which I've touched on here (let's not forget the erosion of music, arts and drama, the curtailing of activities other than those related to the curriculum in case grades should fall, the pressure placed on children to meet certain arbitrary standards at certain arbitrary times, overworked, stressed and unappreciated adults doing their best to fill too many roles for too many people and leaving in their droves due to stress, and so much more) schools are broken places full of unhappy children and unhappy adults. I don't doubt that there are exceptions to this - school suits some children and some schools appear to be managing well - but I really don't believe that this accounts for the majority of children and young people. A sad state of affairs. The system itself needs radical overhaul but this would take years to achieve and would need people in high places both to understand exactly what is happening in schools and why and to have the courage to act for change.

Visible?

Oh for goodness sake! Talk about undermining your staff. If the idiots had shocked themselves we all know who would be hauled across the coals. If my kids were in trouble with the teacher, firstly I would believe it and get them to explain themselves. Then I would make them apologise and agree a suitable consequence. Funnily enough despite having SEN both of our kids were "sensible" and the teachers rarely had problems with them.

This is too far outside our society's comfort zone to even be contemplated.

I'm not from the UK originally, but I find it interesting how completely powerless contemporary UK parents seem to feel. There's a weird sort of shruggy "Well what can I do about it?" attitude around their children's behaviour. I have two different friends who let their young teens away with all sorts because they "just can't face a battle about it" or similar. I think a combination of both parents working FT, weaker family structures (much more relationship break up, much smaller more fragmented families, people living far away from grandparents etc), weaker communities, the internet and social change mean parents are worn down and isolated.

Well, anecdotally, those of us who have tended to put our kids in childcare tend to have kids who are generally invested in doing well in school- largely because they can see the long term benefits. Behaving in school tends to go along with that.

There are, as many have said, myriad reasons for poor behaviour. I suspect the poster had a bit of an agenda to push there. Often, kids with poor behaviour come from chaotic households, where they may not have been sent to nursery at a young age, but will have been pretty much ignored at home, even though, technically, they had a parent or carer there. Or there are the kid who. Don't think they need to do any work 'cos my dad didn't get any qualifications and he earns loads.'

Don't forget the "I don't need to work because my Dad owns the company, and I'm gonna work for him" child.

I've actually read most of the thread, and loads of valid points have been made, particularly regarding parental attitudes. I left teaching in the summer due to a combination of deteriorating behaviour and workload. I agree with all PPs that the majority is either weak or neglectful parenting. We hear so often in MN that children's feelings must all be acknowledged and validated and that four year olds can't possibly be expected to follow instructions. For a significant number of children now, the rot has set in by the time they start school. I have two friends who work in lower primary who don't think they can last the year due to disruption and, often, violence. We should be expecting NT young children to, essentially, do as they are told, the first time of asking. If this hasn't happened, there will be problems at school. A reception teacher with 30 students needs them to line up for assembly, or a fire evacuation, without having to negotiate/ discuss/ explain.

I also agree with those who have issues with the overcrowded curriculum that is completely unsuitable for a significant proportion of students from an early age. I taught a subject that was set and even then we had a huge range of ability in each class. Trying to teach students expecting grades from 1 to 9 in one class results in both ends being failed. The one size fits all curriculum doesn't work.

And yes, all children need a pen, every day.

Sense of entitlement - children made to feel special
Manners not valued or taught, thinking of others, treating others as you want to be treated
Did you read the thread about the mother who insisted on going ahead with her expensive birthday party, even though her daughter had D&V (diarrhea and vomiting)? She didn’t cancel, exposing many other families to the illness, because the girl would have been sad if the party had been called off. This type of parenting results in teenagers who are spoiled and self-centered, showing little regard for others.

(previously this naturally arise from Xhristian teaching)
3 words: archbishop of canterbury

Human rights - teachers aren't allowed to discipline like they did when I was at school 70s/80s) - one teacher used to throw a board rubber at you if you talked so we were scared of her

The human right in question is the right to education, not the right to avoid discipline. Corporal punishment was outlawed in state schools in 1886 and extended to private schools in England and Wales in 1998—12 years later. This is not about human rights; it reflects British law, which is in line with the Convention on the Rights of the Child. One key article related to this is:

"States Parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social, and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s), or any other person who has the care of the child."

I went to school in the 80s, and teachers didn’t throw anything at us or slam the table. I had three female teachers who were absolutely sadistic, but they expressed this through humiliation, not physical force. I think we can all agree that abusive teachers do exist, and it's important to have checks and balances in place.

There are many reasons why behavior in schools is challenging today. Students struggle with concentration and have developed a need for instant gratification from watching YouTube, TikTok, and playing extreme video games since early childhood. To be honest, many adults aren’t much better in some ways. Not sure what anyone can do about it other than try and keep their kids offline where possible, send them to scouts, guides help them learn skills and develop resilience.