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?

I agree. But it demonstrates there was a need. We cannot possibly have been the only school with kids who needed that help. I suspect kids just weren’t given it. But it was more acceptable for kids to drop off the radar. They could get out at 16 and start a trade. It was more acceptable to do fewer GCSEs instead of ‘everyone must do 9 and if that’s unrealistic-tough.’

I'm glad someone has mentioned lack of proper breaks and physical activity as a contributing factor to poor behaviour

This is a massive issue

My 12 year old gets about 30 minutes lunch break and that includes eating lunch

He finds it painfully difficult to focus and he is not naturally disobedient or rude. But he just struggles to concentrate

We then expect children...many of whom will be naturally high energy teenagers...to sit and really focus on a range of sedentary based learning tasks .

It's unrealistic and bad for their ability to work properly

Just a question - why warn a child first? If they do something bad enough for me to have to intervene, they're out as far as I am concerned.

Because I would say that sending someone out of the class for talking when you are talking is too harsh a sanction. But if they are given a second chance and don't take it, then out they go.

Sending out of the lesson in my school would result in a day in isolation btw.

Parents tend to hate this sort of thing though 'I don't understand why they are so strict about uniform/homework/equipment' - because that's setting the culture where the kids actually do what they are told which feeds into everything else.

I’ve got sympathy with that as find it bloody annoying if I was at work and people were inflexible about something minor - imagine being in the office and being to put your blazer on in the middle of summer!

I’d be really interested in how these Uber strict environments set people up for adult life. Great if this actually creates an environment in which children can learn, however in adult life we want give and take, initiative and discretionary effort in a modern work place.

Isn't that a double punishment? Or do you mean the rest of that day?

Our school now operates a system somewhat in between the two you have described. But we still have RJ mush to everyone's chagrin.

I'm lucky . I have well behaved classes anyway (touch wood) but, even when I had some rogues, I somehow managed to circumvent the tyranny of the spreadsheet and logging warnings etc. Probably because my classroom is far away from the axis of power.

Yeah, but what this has led to in our school is teachers being told (or assuming) they should have warned little Ian first for calling Violet a dreadful name , or spitting , or hitting Jonty.

Also, I wouldn't count your example as needing to log a warning. I'd just tell them in no uncertain terms to fermez their bouches and get on with teaching.

I don't have time to faff about with my laptop to log a warning.

Then you get parents moaning at the school about how little Johnny is being picked on for wearing trainers or little Sally for wearing leggings and all it does is undermine the school when the parents joins in with their kid in moaning about how unfair it all is, (Or worse, a Daily Mail sad face article).

If the school uniform is shoes or trousers, then don't be surprised if the school tries to enforce shoes or trousers. And just tell your kid 'those are the rules so stop wearing your leggings to school and put on these trousers I've bought you'.

We don't log warnings on the computer, just write their name on the board, so warnings aren't recorded anywhere.

So in your case, you've said that you've intervened to improve their behaviour, but there is no follow-up if they don't improve their behaviour? You can only send them out of the lesson if they do something bad enough to warrant it in a one-off incident rather than persistently low-level disruption?

Management/HT/SLT need to remember that they have a duty of care to their employees not just to the pupils.
HTs need to remember that just because a teacher disagrees with their plan it is not an excuse to get rid of them.
HTS ned to remember that experienced teachers and long term members of staff are needed in schools and shouldn't be forced out because they are expensive.

In our local, Ofstec outstanding secondary school, a bit more than 50% of pupils have been excluded at least once in the last year…

I totally agree-but in my previous school we had to reduce lunch time to 30 mins because of the amount of vandalism, bullying and feral behaviour from a sizeable minority of pupils. It’s just awful ».

A very wise HOY said to me yesterday 'when SLT say short lunches improve behaviour, what they actually mean is it halves the incidents'...

Disagree with this. When the kids are queuing up in the canteen to eat their lunch there are behaviour expectations and they are supervised. It's when they've finished eating their lunch and are bored and looking for mischief that things really start to kick off. Shortening lunch gets rid of the really unstructured bit of unstructured time.

Surveys show that kids also don't want the longer lunches (at secondary) because they get bored, there's nowhere to go and they aren't allowed on their phones.

No that's not what I'm saying. What I am saying is the system is interpreted as meaning that they need to be warned first, even for serious misdemeanour. Really they shouldn't pass go.

I would argue with your system , the writing on the board can become a competition. Also, if that's not formally logged how do behaviour staff know which kids ae picking up loads of one off warnings?

There is no perfect system but, personally, I am extremely adverse to one that involves letting them do something shit as if everyone is allowed to. Just don't do the shot thing in the first place!

Having taught for a loooooong time, I would say the skills of many new entrants in terms of bossing their own classrooms are not what they once were.

It takes ours the whole of lunchtime to get their food and the supervision of the queue is inadequate tbf so there is running, pushing in, shouting for the whole lunch period. They also wander the corridors with their food. We have no plates or cutlery.

The HOY was speaking form experience. He said in meetings the SLT say behaviour at lunch is good because they literally count the reported incidents up. . It isn't.

Oh, and ours are allowed on their phones at lunch! How is that overseen??

So , ours get to lesson 5 having queued for 28 minutes (if they didn't charge down the corridor to be first in the queue) rammed fried food down their gullets in about 30 seconds flat , midway through a game or some online beef on their phones. There is no down time at all for anyone.

I always see the comment 'oh but kids will want their name on the board as a matter of pride' but I have never had an issue with that.

A warning is for low-level disruption. It is perfectly allowed to send the kid straight to isolation for a serious incident, which is logged differently.

I agree that if we write names on the board and don't log them then behaviour staff don't know who is getting loads of warnings but generally if they are getting loads of warnings, they are also being sent out of lessons, because sending a kid out of your lesson is easy. We know who the disruptive kids are.

I've not been teaching as long as you, Piggy, but long enough to have used quite a few different behaviour systems, and this one has definitely made the most improvement in class behaviour.

Haven't RTFT but I'd like to add the sheer number of pupils who are unable to enter a classroom because they "feel uncomfortable" or need to sit next their BF because otherwise they aren't able to attend, or the ones who have such poor bladder control that they can't sit through a 60 minute lesson without a toilet break. The complete lack of basic manners and absolutely vile way kids speak to each other and sometimes to me. The idea that all of their problems are mine to solve. The complete absence of a filter, so no awareness that their every thought isn't worth sharing.

I couldn't agree more! I get told to fuck off at least once a week and no matter how thick your skin is it does start to grate.

Parents often refuse to hear that their child isn't the Angel they think their child is and more and more are expecting school to teach manners and life skills that are, in fact, their job.

Not a teacher but I sit on an exclusion panel for a local comp and I echo whats been said about parenting, 9 times out of 10 when we are dealing with really really awful behaviour and incidents the parent who attends (if they turn up) bleats on about how it can't possibly be their childs fault.

You are part of the problem then. You clearly have no idea what it is like managing a class of 30 pupils.