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Primary education

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Original poster

IS this unreasonable school punishment techinique?

45 replies

StickyFloor · 13/09/2012 16:47

Twins are in Y4 in a mixed class of 30 kids made up of Y3 and Y4.

One boy who has just come up into Y3 is really naughty, not SN or violent or bullying, just quite immature and silly, won't sit still, talks a lot, calls out etc.

Since they went back last week the entire class have had to miss some of their playtime, lunch play and free play every single day because the teacher is punishing the whole class for this one child's naughtiness. Genuinely it has been down to the same individual, and she makes it clear each time that if he is naughty again the whole class will suffer.

She warns him each time, then adds on another minute each time he does something else so it just escalates and they are missing several minutes a day.

I just genuinely don't understand what she is trying to achieve here. Does she want the other kids to gang up on him? He clearly isn't being deterred by this punishment and the other kids are all a bit baffled about they they are being punished for his bad behaviour, when there is nothing they can do to control him?

So do I have a word, or is this some sort of new approach to discpiline that I everyone else thinks is clever? Please let me know.....

OP posts:
scurryfunge · 13/09/2012 16:49

It's very lazy teaching.

ethelb · 13/09/2012 16:50

odd. This happened at secondary and didn't work. as it is obviously not working here. Have a word and ask if she thinks it is working, what evidence she has and what she is going to do in future.

LindyHemming · 13/09/2012 16:51

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

ReallyTired · 13/09/2012 16:51

That is utterly crap. Does she want to encourage bullying of this year 3 boy?

ihatethecold · 13/09/2012 16:52

I think if it happened once I would wonder why punish the whole class but to repeatedly do it is not on!
I would be sending an emailWink

Original poster
StickyFloor · 13/09/2012 16:59

Thanks for replying. I also think this is plain lazy of her.

I was planning on pointing out that a) it hasn't worked so far and b) isn't she worried about bullying (which is rife in the school anyway)

Mind you, in Y1 a different teacher made the entire class write letters of apology to the sports coach for misbehaving in PE. I asked why she didn't just get the actually naughty ones to do that and she looked at me as though I was insane and said "because that would be singling out just a few young children and that could be very damaging to their self-esteem". I was too stunned to actually say anything!

OP posts:
clam · 13/09/2012 18:32

There are a couple of other threads on here at the moment about whole-class puishments. I'll repeat my view (as a teacher of some very challenging classes over many, many years) - bad practice.

EBDTeacher · 13/09/2012 18:40

Bad bad bad. This relies on the new child having some sense of social responsibility towards his classmates. There is every chance he does not have this and as such inflicting a punishment on them will have no impact on his behavioural choices what so ever.

thefirstmrsrochester · 13/09/2012 18:48

A yr 3 child is what? 7/8 yrs old? Hardly very young within the school environment. In fact here (Scotland) they are not considered to be infants anymore. So
A - he is old enough to know better
B - he isn't very young in the scheme of things
C - regardless of age, he needs to learn to be responsible for his own actions
I would be very angry if I were you (assuming that it IS the case that the entire class were being punished for this one boys actions - not the class egging him on or inciting bad behaviour iyswim).

pointythings · 13/09/2012 18:49

This sort of punishment tells the well behaved children that there is no point in behaving well and so could backfire spectacularly. Very lazy and ineffective practice, I'd take it up with the teacher and if that does not help take it higher up.

Oh, and the Geneva Convention has a few things to say about collective punishment too. Smile

HeathRobinson · 13/09/2012 18:50

I thought whole-class punishments had finally gone out of favour. Obviously not! Isn't Ofsted against them?

I would have a word with the Head.

dikkertjedap · 13/09/2012 20:38

Bad teaching, bad practice. I would go and speak initially with the teacher and if no joy, take it up with the Head.

This approach will ultimately encourage bad behaviour in all children. 'Well behaved' children learn that it doesn't matter whether you behave well because you get punished anyway, so why bother doing as told? Bad, bad, bad ... hope the rest of this teacher's approach is better otherwise you may want to check if your son can change class if there is a multi form intake.

slipslider · 13/09/2012 21:53

I would comment that it is always just the 'naughty' ones fault - never the other kids! Sadly the children labelled as such get the blame all the time. As I know all too well any child can and will push boundaries in the first few weeks. I have had the "model class' (the best behaved in the school) today while a colleague has been out on training and let me tell you the whole class are not playing out tomorrow! Basically they went to get their going home things and decided to start a football chant in the cloakroom and when I went to speak to them they were encouraging a group of children to sing and dance on the benches! So sadly as this was already hometime and they had to be late out due to a talking to they will all be missing playtime! And I am sure I know which parent will be in to complain their darling child (who can do no wrong) was not part of it, she will have a shock when she gets told she was! She was clapping and cheering with the best of them....I await the message from the office she wants to speak to me (probably at 3.40pm)!!! Just saying what children tell parents is often exaggerated and they are hardly going to say they were involved now are they? They know if they do then they will be in trouble...

clam · 13/09/2012 22:26

If the vast majority of the class have misbehaved in the way you describe, then I would agree a whole class punishment is appropriate. It's asking for trouble to single out the odd child who might not have been involved to let them off (unless thy were clearly out of the room at the time or something).
But even then, I would allow them out for the last 5 minutes just to run around, let off steam, eat their snack and go to the loo.

slipslider · 13/09/2012 22:34

They will get loo time and they will get an 'aerobic' session for 5 mins to burn off the energy but not a chance they are going out! We have a rigid system in place with rewards likewise sanctions throughout the school and so they know what the outcomes are for different scenarios.

slipslider · 13/09/2012 22:39

I was just discussing this because I don't think for one minute that any child will go home and say 'we did this in the cloakroom at the end of school today and we got told off, i was on the benches swinging from the shoe rack'! The likely conversation would be 'X and Y were being naughty by jumping on the benches and singing while we got our coats'. (With X and Y guaranteed to be the ones most likely to be in trouble often). Thus shifting the blame onto the 'naughty' children and dissolving their participation. They also know parents will believe the tale as X and Y would likely do this kind of thing! If that makes sense?

simpson · 13/09/2012 22:53

I am a bit peed off today as DS's whole class has missed their PE lesson due to 2 kids larking around.

They have 2 PE lessons a week and one of them ( the one that has been missed today) is done by an external football coaching company and DS looks forward to it every week. He was gutted to miss it when he had not done anything Sad

I hate the policy of punishing the whole class tbh....

Although I admit I am taking DS's word for what happened....Maybe I don't know the full facts....

Ohhelpohnoitsa · 13/09/2012 23:26

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

Extrospektiv · 14/09/2012 00:13

Whole class punishments= archaic, oppressive and against all respectable educational theory. Simple.

slipslider · 14/09/2012 06:33

So we have a behaviour system that X happens if they do Y....all the class do Y so they all get X? Yeah it is drastic but if ALL the class were involved then ALL the class require punishment! They had had a fantastic day until then - motivated, engaged and we had lots of rewards going on....but if they decide to behave like a gang of football hooligans then they have to reap what they sow!

WofflingOn · 14/09/2012 07:06

Ask to see a copy of the school discipline policy so that you can check what the procedure should be. Then go in and ask why they are not following it.

WofflingOn · 14/09/2012 07:06

Ask the teacher for it, that will make her reflect on why.

EBDTeacher · 14/09/2012 07:24

I fail to believe that the whole class were equally involved in the incident slip. TBH you sound like you are just a bit embarrased that you lost control of a class you were covering, which is an understandable reaction, but are you punishing them so they don't do it again or so you feel better and have been seen to do something?

Should the consequence for that class not to be made to go into the cloakroom small group at a time, under supervision, in silence for the next week or so until they 'learn how to use the cloakroom properly'? It will mean they are slightly later out to play but clearly because they are having to re-learn appropriate cloakroom behavior (I know they already know- just to make the point to them), not just because you are getting your retribution.

stargirl1701 · 14/09/2012 07:30

I am amazed the SMT allow this to happen. Ask to see the school's behaviour management policy and see if it features. I highly doubt it. Then meet with the teacher to discuss the issue. If you get nowhere then go to SMT.

Shesparkles · 14/09/2012 08:39

Bloody ridiculous and lazy on the part of the teacher. I once ripped the deputy head of my dd's school a new one for keeping the entire class back AFTER SCHOOL to deal with 1 child's misdemeanour. She knew who the culprit was, there was no need to keep the class back, and I wasn't the only parent worried at the late return of my child from school (walks to and from school independently).