Low level disobedience at school

[Dad22DDs]

Hello,

my daughter is 12 and in year 7. Year 7 has been a rollercoaster, started ok, then got rough with friendships, then declared she is trans, a few incidences of self harm, but now things have settled, she has a good friendship group and seems happier.

however we have been plagued with an ongoing refusal to stick to rules at school, nothing major, just continual. Using phone when she shouldn’t, wearing in on school uniform, speaking back to teachers, etc. This week she was chewing gum in one class and the next day she did the exact same thing with the same teacher, effectively she was sticking two fingers up to the teacher.

she’s also been very casual about homework, does it most of the time but puts in very little effort which frustrates the teachers because in class she is generally very engaged.

I was very firm with her last night, told her she needed to toe the line and get with the programme, that this was her future she was doing this for, so she needed to grow up and knuckle down.

I have to confess I am at a loss to know what to do, all I can see is more and more penalties, taking away her pocket money, her tech, stopping her seeing friends at weekends, etc. I don’t want to do that but I don’t know how to get through to her.

any serious advice welcomed.

thanks

Using phone when shouldn’t. Go without phone for a day?
Check homework yourself. No tech until it’s done properly each night.
Surely school will use a monitoring report though?

Is there a member of staff she likes and will engage with ?
If she’s using her phone when she shouldn’t then she gets her phone taken off her.
How did she get the gum ? If she bought it, stop giving her money.
She needs to learn that actions have consequences.

You take the phone away. Each repeated offence and it goes for longer. Four offences = no phone at school. Rude behaviour = grounded and remove pocket money. You spend some time with your child and remind them of expectations.

Ask nicely the first time and make consequences clear. Phone use, repeat gun chewing and talking back aren’t really low level. Year 7 students with these behaviours tend to escalate. If it doesn’t improve I would be looking at a move to a new school for a fresh start.

I know it’s a bit of a quick thing to jump to… but could you get some counselling for her? Sounds like she’s struggling with who she is and maybe also a confidence problem. The low level misbehaviour being a front for actually not being very confident. I know I’m projecting, but my clowning around and being quite loud at school was down to low self confidence. I see the same now in one of my three SDCs.

Behaviour is communication- something is not right for her at the moment, and you need to work out what the problem is (are) and try to sort that out.
I think I would go with a two pronged approach, appropriate and relevant sanctions for poor behaviour but also trying to build a more positive and supportive relationship with her with lots of positive time spent together, and praise and relevant (small) rewards for good behaviour.
I would also be in close contact with the school and arranging for her to spend some time with the ELSA. She needs someone in school who cares about just her and not her behaviour.

As an ex teacher I would be very worried if my child was like this in year 7. I’ve seen this happen and parents back up teachers eg using phone in school so phone is removed for 24 hrs by parents. Mentoring in school, some times a positive report can be really useful. If you and the school work together then things can be turned around but also I’ve seen it ignore by parents and it goes down the wrong track.

We are in the process of trying to get counselling but so difficult to find anyone with experience of children with any availability, NHS route is impossible, got told would be September even despite the self harming.

The phone thing has been resolved because I have an app that locks the phone during the day but she can use her Chromebook on the school account because they use it for school.

The answering back happened only once and we came down on her like a tonne of bricks for that one, so hasn’t happened again.

It is all just stupid little things, nothing disruptive in class, just doing things she knew she shouldn’t.

My instinct is to be draconian and take away things and make life more difficult but I’m being careful because I know that my natural inclination and want to be sure it’s the right thing to do rather than just because it’s my default position.

What was she like at primary?

what is her behaviour like at home?

This is part of the problem.

she is naturally very closed down, doesn’t open up. We had to take away WhatsApp because she sent an expletive filled message which to be fair is out of character for her. We have an app which picks up all this stuff. We have worked with her to say that the only way she gets back onto WhatsApp is when we can trust that she will tell us when things go wrong and right now we can’t, she keeps it to herself. We are hoping counselling will help with that.

the school have been brilliant, she has a mentor and their pastoral support has been helping too.

we are talking through homework with her on a regular basis and we spend time at weekend together as a family.

it feels like we are doing a lot of the right things but it’s just this persistence in not following the rules which seems to be the problem.

She was a good kid in primary. The school had some friendship issues in her class over a number of years but that was across a whole group of girls and the school had to work hard over many years to sort that out.

To be fair she is still a good kid, her teachers are generally positive about her and say she really engages in class.

At home she is up and down. Hitting puberty hit her hard, she had a huge growth spurt, she is now 5’8 and she really hates what has happened to her body, we think that is what has prompted the trans thing, like boys have it easier. Thing is she goes to an all girls school so doesn’t see the other side.

She can be quite sullen and grumpy at times but then at others she is upbeat and happy.

she sent an expletive filled message which to be fair is out of character for her.

who to?

It's puberty - she's had a massive growth spurt and some girls get hit very badly, and have difficulty with adjustments. It's reportedly fairly common in girls' schools to have such students then say they are trans.
The school seem to be monitoring her and if she has a mentor that's good. You're being a good parent with the phone business - that can get really toxic.
She's finding it bumpy, but keep the lines of communication open. I can't guarantee it, but I'm going to say that it's going to settle down.

Not to anyone, it was in her status

Remove phone and withhold privileges until homework is done. Other things, like chewing gum, i'd let slide. Let teachers deal with it.

Is she trying to fit in with a certain group by changing how she behaves?
she answered back once? You’ve done well to get to Y7 and only ever once had backchat!!
Trouble with being draconian is it leaves you nowhere to go. If she’s grounded for a month for chewing gum what do you do if she does something worse? Plus teens tend to react badly to OTT punishment. They think if they’re already being punished they might as well do what they want! Much better to reward for good behaviour. Plus small consequences for small misbehaviours.

Year seven is the worst time school wise (in my opinion)
Maybe just try to nurture her as it sounds like there's a lot going on! That's all I will say, best of luck!

The trans thing is super common in high schools for the vast majority of students it's the new emo / goth/ punk, /mod / rocker phase. But it often comes from exposure from online particularly on tiktok, she may not be accessing it at home but on a friend's phone.

She could have gotten involved with the wrong crowd or trying to impress them. Maybe get her involved in something where discipline is important she's almost old enough to join cadets, air, army, navy, police and fire service which might help, it'll keep her busy and I have seen a real difference in student who were struggling with their behaviour after joining these organisations.

She sounds like a good kid that's struggling. The behaviour is a symptom so rather than punishing the symptoms it's got to be a question of being open and welcoming to her so she can open up and talk about how she's feeling. This won't happen overnight especially if she's been getting a hard time and lots of punishments, I'm not saying that's wrong by the way, but the key to this is communication and relationship building. Draconian might not be the best way to achieve that unfortunately.