Detentions as a punishment

[SweatyLama]

I didn't grow up in the UK, but my children were born here. This year, my DS started secondary school for the first time, and I discovered that they have a system of punishments in place. Is this a common practice in all state schools in Britain? I really don't like this system ( I mean punishments) and find it degrading and outdated.

Ah there's a few I met two both were art teachers which is driving me mad. One is absolutely baffled why her darling who shouldn't have to follow rules is now a guest of his majesty.

The other has two sons, who keep getting picked on by their employer. Both 30+ and can't understand not follow a bloody rule

You contacted the school over a warning?! I’d be careful if I were you, OP. You’re going to get a reputation if you’re being petty like that and wont be taken seriously when there actually is something worth complaining about.

You don't understand. I am for rules in school and society and for people to follow them. I am against punishing children in school. You are associating rules with punishments. But school is a place where children can gain knowledge, and not be judged and punished for mistakes: being late, forgetful, and other things. I don't mean breaking laws: bullying, stealing.

150 years ago in UK, the ordinary man in Britain might have said something similar about women's rights...

And how in your world do you sanction bad behaviour, because you seem to not understand that punishment is the consequence of bad behaviour.

OP I think you fundamentally misunderstand the British education system, which is there to educate children whether they want to be educated or not. This is the key bit. We don’t say “well, you turned up late so you won’t know how to do algebra”, we say “you have to learn algebra so you have to be here on time”. Which means failure to cooperate in the learning process is classed as bad behaviour. And there are sanctions for bad behaviour. Otherwise a small but persistent cohort of children would ruin not only their own education but everyone else’s too, because they are, in some cases, deliberately disruptive. It’s difficult to believe if you are at a cosy little primary school, but teenagers are a different breed.

I am a parent, OP, and I can assure you I see the problems, but I'm a teacher too and it is absolutely not possible to keep thousands of teenagers pointing in the same direction 5 days a week without some kind of sanction system.

That applies to workplaces too, but people choose to work in particular ones and and are selected, not just sent there.

I mean, there are countries (Japan springs to mind) that are much more socially, racially and culturally homogeneous than the UK (especially London) so no doubt individual bad behaviour is less common there, but there absolutely will be sanctions for anyone stepping noticeably out of line especially in a way that disrupts others.

I think you are maybe mistaking outward conformity for personal freedom.

If I wanted to get political, I might say that the need for a sanction system shows that UK teenagers have a considerable amount of freedom regarding how they behave, even if the consequences aren't very nice!
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When I was a teenager in the 1980s there were invariably older people - strangers even - ready to tut at you if you transgressed by dropping a sweet wrapper in the street or being rude - and parents always, always agreed with teachers.

Not so much nowadays.

In my world, adults look for the causes of bad behavior and rule breaking (such as being late and forgetful) and help children cope with these causes.

Ah are we getting somewhere @SweatyLama ?

So being late and being forgetful (not sure as a classroom teacher I ever gave a child a dt for either of these; certainly not for forgetting things) are OK, but bullying and stealing are not. Hmm.

So where do we stand on swearing at teachers, refusing to work, constantly talking over the teacher and assault of teachers and other pupils? Are these OK or do they need a sanction?

This isn't an adult world . It's hundreds of hormonal teens that if order isn't maintained will fail to deliver an education.

As I stated before people get fired for being late. They get fired for not meeting deadlines, yes it happens.

It’s an illusion to think you can make someone study if they don’t want to. You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.

But good teachers can create conditions in which children/teens will want to learn.

OP, do you acknowledge that messing around and disrupting other people can be fun? More fun than learning tough stuff not of your choice?

You mentioned the suffragettes. They had a serious political purpose and some of them, at least, were on that axis where you'd call them freedom fighters when they won; terrorists if it was your shop window they were smashing.

Some of them were treated dreadfully.

But I am pretty sure at least some of them felt utter glee at the opportunity to break out of restrictions, smash stuff and make a noise! I would have; bloody hell.

Revolution is fun, potentially.

Learning GCSE Maths is not.

It depends on the state of the child, doesn't it? Even with the best teacher in the world who isn't distracted with a billion other things not directly relevant to teaching that lesson (and making a generous assumption they are a specialist in that subject):

In any classroom you will have:
Some who had breakfast and some who didn't
Some who have period pain and some who don't
Some who are on the spectrum and some who aren't
Some who are living in a hostile environment at home and some who aren't
Some who went to bed at a reasonable hour and some who didn't
Some who would have chosen the subject and some who wouldn't with a genuinely free choice (yes even at A-level)
Some who have the necessary reading age and some who don't

Etc.

For a kid with eg ADHD being on time or remembering stuff is hard, and they need help with strategies, not detentions.

However for others it is 'can't be botheredness' where you need to make doing the right thing a favourable choice over not. Hence detentions.

Also, my disorganised dyspraxic DD never forgot her phone or to charge it...Priorities.

Well actually I agree about the horse and the water.

But we go in every day and TRY. If you've lost your optimism that today might be the day the horse will say, "you know, today I might grudgingly drink a bit,"..time to quit!

@TeenToTwenties that's true, and when students reach a "behaviour threshold" (certain number of points) and you can see they're all for forgetting stuff, that's pretty helpful evidence to put strategies in place. With the best will in the world, teachers need those students who can organise themselves; to do so. Can't mark work you haven't got.

Hi OP,
I've worked in secondary schools for decades. They aren't prisons and detentions don't create negativity in teenagers. I don't think you have yourself worked in a secondary school. You might find it easier to understand that detentions can happily exist inside a wider behaviour system that includes rewards, if you had worked in one or two.
My school has a very happy atmosphere, people comment on it when they visit. A group of visiting psychiatrists once told us that having our classroom doors open was a wonderful thing to do! We don't even have an official policy about this we just do it, it feels friendly.
We also have detentions for a small number of students. Some students have so many they have built up a lovely relationship with the lady who does the administration of them, it's like she is their aunty.
You are allowed to question and campaign against your child's school rules. You may even take the school to the highest court in England. We are a democracy that is your right. But you can not just dictate what you want. Unless you set up your own school of course, which you can, we being a democracy.

I think you are making some interesting and important points, OP, especially as you have seen a punishment-free system work elsewhere.
Maybe you should join or start a movement to change how disruptive behaviour is dealt with in UK schools nationally and/or in your child's school, via the PTA or whatever.
Meanwhile though your child goes to the school he goes to, and will need some help from you in adjusting and managing his own challenges in order to learn and thrive in the system as it is. If he has serious problems concentrating and focusing on lessons there may be techniques that can help him with this and with strategies like immediately making a note of anything he needs to bring to school so that you can help him pack his bag in the morning . You could ask for a SEN assessment if you think that outside help would be beneficial. You could also help him how to work out how not to be late for lessons.
Hope it goes well.

So by your logic, any teacher that experiences poor behaviour is a bad teacher?
Do you seriously think that teenagers can put their disruptive and damaging home lives aside for an hour to concentrate on their maths lesson if it is well-planned?
I'd like to meet that teacher and shake their hand.

In my world, adults look for the causes of bad behavior and rule breaking (such as being late and forgetful) and help children cope with these causes.

My DS, ages about 14 wasn't doing his maths homework. He was able at Maths and enjoyed it. His teacher phoned me at home and gently asked if there was any reason DS wasn't doing his homework, and if everything was OK at home. There wasn't any reason- DS just couldn't be bothered and knew the teacher wouldn't come down hard on him. I told the teacher that remind DS to do his homework and would support any sanctions he chose to put in place. I'm all for natural consequences at home - I'm not the punishing kind of parent, but I can't let my children's lack of education be a natural consequence of them choosing to spend lots of time doing sport over studying.

Yes, the conditions in which all children are ABLE to learn include no disruption and everyone turning up on time. And the others who don’t want to learn will probably find that just by being there they learn SOMETHING.

I think you are making some interesting and important points, OP, especially as you have seen a punishment-free system work elsewhere.

But she hasn't. A quarter of the kids at school were receiving no education. That's not an education system that is working.

@clary
So where do we stand on swearing at teachers, refusing to work, constantly talking over the teacher and assault of teachers and other pupils? Are these OK or do they need a sanction?
As I understand it, "assault of teachers and other pupils "is against the law and should be punishable by law.
But let’s consider some reasons for this kind of behavior. For example, if a teenager is dealing with problems outside of school that make them anxious or angry, getting sanction them will only make things worse. The teenager might start blatantly breaking the rules or doing so in ways that are hard to catch on camera, making it difficult to prove their misconduct .

Another reason could be that the teenager is reacting to hidden aggression from the teacher or other students. In this case, getting sanctions will also only escalate the situation. What can help resolve this? The only solution would be if someone at school took the time to understand the situation and help the teenager.

This applies to each situation. I don’t see how punishments can help; instead, they often make things worse.

Education is not children's job. Education is a privilege, not a punishment.

It's a childs job to engage yes it is a privilege even more reason to not tolerate those disrupting their learning.