Do all secondary school do detentions

[user1495443009]

Forgive my ignorance but I would like to know if all secondary schools: private and state do detentions. I didn't grow up in the UK so this is something I never experienced.

I think it's pretty standard - some schools might exist that don't use them but I've not heard of any. What sanctions did your school use if not detentions?

Yep I think so, can't imagine a situation where an entire school would never give detentions for anything.

I can't speak for all schools, but DD's does.

I can't remember ever having a sanction but I was always well behave. I am trying to remember, may need to ask my siblings/friends. I do remember a fight broke in class between two girls while the teacher wasn't there. I don't know what happened as I got out of the classroom. I guess they called their parents. It seems to me some schools in the UK do detentions for every single thing.

Anyway whatever it was, the detention concept didn't exist where I grew up

Just asked my friends who still live there and they tell me they don't do it. My brother said they will put your discipline in red in the school report and youhave to go and do some work like picking up the rubbish

And suspension; you have to go home and catch up with the school work alone

DD just changed from state to private. Her state detentions could be lunchtime or evening depending on severity and parents had to accommodate the evening detention whatever. At her private school they do detentions at the end of leave/exeat weekends/end term so have to be collected after everyone else has left.

work like picking up the rubbish that would come under the umbrella term of a detention at dd's school. Sometimes it might be doing homework at lunchtime if the homework hadn't been done - but would also go on their record and x amount of detentions and letter to parents, y amount of detentions means an after school/Sat detention, different types of detention for different behaviours.

Some schools hand out more detentions than others.

DDs' school doesn't do detentions.

I also grew up outside the UK and detention wasn't a thing. We did not wear uniform (which removes a whole slew of petty infractions you might get a detention for in the UK), and if you misbehaved you would get some other punishment.

Lateness meant having to turn up 20 minutes early the next day to sign the late book, more than three lates per semester and your parents would be called. Misbehave in a lesson, get thrown out for that period, fill out a form, and get dressed down by the head of year in the next break (followed by whatever combination of apology/extra work/chores the HoY deemed appropriate). Other misbehaviour would also usually land you with chores - litter picking, scraping chewing gum off desks, that sort of thing. This would take place after school, so I guess a detention of sorts, but although it was usually the next day, could be rearranged if you had something else on already.

I went to a very naice school with generally good behaviour and only one person in my year managed to get excluded while I was there, for physically attacking the librarian. Which is fair enough, really. He was excluded for some time, then came back but was banned from the library. And school got him some help, as there were serious personal circumstances that had put the guy under extreme stress.

What sort of school is it Rasko?

A girls' grammar, a superselective I think it would be called. Very few rules, and little misbehaviour from what I hear. The girls are self- motivated, and in a weird sort of self-policing bubble.

Home is a different issue - both rules and rudeness abound! But homework gets done, and there's no drugs etc, and I always know where the girls are, so hope it's ok.

The private catholic school, state catholic school, state grammar and state comps i know of have them.

My DCs' school doesn't do detentions - they do mostly isolations to differing degree of severity (i.e. Lunchtime isolation for misbehaviour at break and lunch or as an extension for poor behaviour in class/ single lesson long isolation at a table outside the headteacher's office for mucking about in a class/full day or longer isolation for the worse acts) so they almost act as detentions I suppose.

I'm a teacher and they've been very heavily used in all the schools that I've ever taught in but when I was at school I never ever saw one given out. Maybe I was just in nice classes.

We give detentions but tbh, most of the kids never get one in the whole 5 years they're with us. The detentions I give it are generally for homework and they get to leave as soon as the homework is finished. Sometimes I'll give a detention if someone hasn't done enough work in class, or if they're messing around disturbing the others, but they're fairly rare. Some teachers seem to be constantly giving detentions, and I'm never quite sure whether I'm too lenient, other teachers genuinely have pupils behave worse than mine, or they are too quick to give detention rather than using some other behaviour strategy.

I think they are heavily used beginning of Year 7 - some are more constructive than others - one teacher took the time to explain to ds about the need for neat work and he found it quite useful.

Thank you. That's useful. I do feel some schools and teachers use them for every little thing

Do they work? Do you find them effective?

They work as a deterrent. Dd is quite lazy but does make sure she gets her homework done on time as she doesn't want one. She's been kept in at break for forgetting to get her planner signed (by me.) It wasn't a proper one as parents weren't notified and it didn't go on her records at all. It did work as she remembered the following week. It felt like they were quite hard to avoid in the first year or so in her comp but i helped her with remembering homework and equipment so she'd probably have had more. She does her bit by behaving herself.

For some kids they work. For others, you tell them they've got a detention and they get out their diary and say 'I can fit you in a week on Tuesday'.

At my friend’s school they don’t have them. They do restorative justice instead.

What does restorative justice look like in practice, Cauliflower?

Apparently it works really well. All based on positive relationships with teachers greeting students warmly every lesson etc.
The RJ sessions are for the student to speak to the teacher and re-set the relationship.

Honestly, I had my doubts too, but seemingly with no “punishment” and there just being a re-setting of the relationship there is nothing to “fight” against or feel vengeful or fearful about.

Everyone has to be on board though - not something you can do solo.