Detention

[PinkChampange]

Not a massive thread.

I was just interested to hear your views on detention and what Jane your experiences been with your kids with it.

Sorry that's supposed to say what your views are on it not Jane lol

I think it is one a number of sanctions that teachers need to have in their armoury.

What do you think OP?

At my DD's school they did lunchtime detention which seemed to work well. Immediate for most as they only had one lesson after lunch.

After school detention was for more serious things and if they got one of those the head of their house had to ring the parent.

My view in it is that it's quite a good deterrent but like any reward or punishment it's all about how it's used.

They are necessary for teachers to have any control

Thank you for your replies. I only ask as I never got one at school. But many of my friends did and it never changed their behaviour and as my son gets older I don't know whether to support them or not

My DC school give 10-15 min ones first. Enough to be a pain for them. They'll not forget stuff / be late next time

I think it depends on what it’s for. My oldest has had few after school detentions and to be honest it puts me out more than him. Schools work differently now from when I was in school and it’s took me a while grasp how his school system works.
Sometimes it doesn’t make sense and if I think the school are being unreasonable then I tell them.
One teacher tried to give him an after school detention for refusing to take his coat off but a few months earlier there had been an incident in PE and my oldest did hit another child but wasn’t given any detention at all so doesn’t make much sense really.

My son's school don't do detention as such, they have something called reflection which is basically going through their behaviour and how it impacts on other people and the class as a whole in an age appropriate manner. It's treated as a learning experience rather than an arbitrary 'go sit in a room' type deal. It works really well I think.

Surely you support the school's behaviour management to your son whether or not you internally agree with it? You point out that if he did as expected he wouldn't get detentions. If they don't have the desired impact you can withdraw something he values more at home.

What do you mean by support them or not?

If you're reasonably happy with the school then of course you support their behaviour management. If you're not, find another school.

When I was at school the naughty kids used to love detention because their friends were all there every day after school, then when it finished they would all go into town together laughing and joking. It wasn't the punishment teachers thought it was, these were the kids whose parents weren't home much and they mostly wanted attention. The kids who only got detention a few times were bullied mercilessly by the naughty kids after detention finished for invading their little club.

But many of my friends did and it never changed their behaviour and as my son gets older I don't know whether to support them or not

You don't know what it did to your friends. Maybe they would have behaved even more badly.

Could you think of a different punishment for the following two instances that my own daughter has received a detention for?

1. She was late.

(Everyone who is late gets a lunchtime detention on the day.)

1. She was messing around in the toilets with her friends and she wouldn't come out when she was asked to.

My DD's school used to do detention on a Friday after school. Almost impossible to be excused from. Everyone got a piece of work to do in silence. I do think it actually worked. The new head stopped it though....

Ds has had one detention for not doing his homework. He hasn’t not don’t his homework since so it worked

4 DC , eldest had 2 DT, 2nd child had a few class detention, 3rd only lunchtime 4th has had so many I can't count. He does have sen but this is no excuse. The problem is he doesn't do his homework and were told not to force him that's up to the school. So he ends up with lunch detention, he often forgets these so ends up with after school, he only goes if his friends are going, so then ends up with head teacher detention for 3 hours, he gets collected and taken to these but because he has adhd the head struggles with him for 3 hours. They have tried isolation but he has autism and anxiety so needs to be monitored and they don't have the extra staff as most ta don't cope with him. He also has touretts so can come across as disruptive which I agree with. The school won't apply for a echp as academically and socially he's flying but in all honesty they would benefit. The school want him medicated for his adhd but he doesn't want to take tablets as they can make anxiety, tics and autism appear worse and he manages to hold most of his ways in at school, so just seems like a little shit. This academic year we're doing homework club 3 nights a week and they agreed to add it on to his days or he can do it in tutor. He's not behind in any work and mainly in top sets

At my son's school if the student keeps getting detention or isolation then pastoral get involved to try to resolve the reason behind the detentions. Yes it is a punishment for something but why are they behaving in a particular manner that earns them that punishment? I think that is a really good way of dealing with it.

Detentions are issued automatically for lateness and for other behaviour in class it goes through verbal then written warnings before detention/isolation. It tends to never get to the point where they are physically removed from class by SLT. There is a lot of intervention work to help those children.

I agree that unacceptable behaviour should be punished. The rules are available online for parents and children to look at, parents and children are told about them on the welcome evening and the students are told again when they start year 7 and know what is expected of them.

School have the right to put your child in detention. You support the school because that is the right thing to do. Neither of my children have had detention because neither of them broke the rules.

I've often seen the argument that some kids get detention all the time and it doesn't make any difference to their behaviour. However, alongside this you need to bear in mind that there are probably a whole load of kids who rarely get a detention, because the threat of it is enough to encourage them to behave. So it may have been effective - just not for all kids.

It’s not optional. When you send the child to school you agree to their policies which includes behaviour. You support them or don’t send your child to the school. They aren’t asking for consent. They inform you.

The prize for most supportive parent goes to the one I met who, knowing her son had a detention and was likely to "forget", turned up at the school gates to send him back in again!

I did not allow my trio to have detentions. Too inconvenient when they had sports programs right after school.

What's the evidence they have any "deterrent" effect? Or that any harm caused in the process is acceptable?

It's quite sad if people believe the only reason a child might behave well is out of fear of punishment.

The same arguments that have been put forward in this thread to support detentions also used to be made in favour of teachers being allowed to beat children.

I suppose if you don't 'support' them you could home educate. Or you could ensure he doesn't get them by behaving. When you put your child into school the behaviour policy is usually clear. If you don't want to accept the sanctions either don't misbehave or go elsewhere. Good luck finding a school with no sanctions or good luck getting GCSEs in schools where there are no consequences.

My dd was part of a whole class detention for not telling the teacher who was reasonable for something. The fact that most of the kids didn’t know appeared to be of no concern to the teacher. It was supposed to be an after school one however I refused for her to stay late as she would have been the only one walking home in the dark. I helpfully suggested that either an adult at the school could walk her safely home or she could do it at lunchtime one day, despite not having done anything wrong.
Funnily enough it was dropped.
No surprise that all the kids hated that teacher

I agree that it would be sad if punishments were the only thing that persuaded children to do things.

However, with the best will in the world, if you don't feel like doing your homework, you're rather more likely to do it if there's a consequence if you don't.