Behaviour management: how strict is too strict?

Are school behaviour management policies as well draconian? Photograph: Alamy

Tim Clark, principal of Skinners’ Academy in Hackney, London, has had his method to behaviour management scrutinised in this week’s Training Guardian. His mantra? “If you have an environment that is structured, and has clear tips, pupils will be satisfied and will find out.”

Although it is challenging to argue with that, draconian discipline in schools has raised a couple of eyebrows of late. In October, there was a mass stroll out of Milford Haven college in west Wales soon after 14-year-old Rhys Johnson was taught in isolation for turning up to school with a shaved head. Although the lack of substantial follicles contravened school uniform policy, the youthful pupil had undertaken this kind of misdemeanour in the identify of charity, raising £700 for Macmillan.

When asked to comment, a college spokesman mentioned: “The pupil in query and his mom were informed of the consequences of breaking the uniform and visual appeal principles prior to doing so. When the principles had been broken, an suitable sanction was enforced, namely supervised study.”

At Tim Clark’s academy, the uniform principles are as exacting as they are unapologetic: “All pupils will search immaculate in their uniform… failure to search sensible at all occasions will end result in automatic detention, isolation or becoming sent property – there will be no warnings, you know what is anticipated.”

Even though there is no doubt that consistency is definitely important when it comes to discipline, it feels unattainable that such unwavering guidelines can be applied consistently for each little one, in every single predicament and each contravention. When there’s no area for employees – on the frontline or in senior leadership teams – to use professional discretion, you chance not only student happiness, but in some cases parental assistance and engagement with the school.

So we want to know what you consider about the behaviour management policy in your school – and far more typically. What’s a lot more essential, consistency or making certain that the punishment fits the crime? Do you find your self quietly bending the guidelines on event due to the fact they look ridiculous? Or do you just accept that for the sake of consistency, there will be unintended victims on occasion? How have the behaviour management policies changed amongst colleges that you have taught in?

Join our discussion on how rigid is too stringent in the remarks thread beneath, or alternatively, tweet us @GuardianTeach.

Behaviour management: how strict is too strict?

The behaviour management balance: authority, systems and support

Tom Sherrington says that the perfect behaviour management technique balances instructor authority, college systems and a supportive culture. Photograph: Herbert Pfarrhofer/EPA

In my experience, there are 3 primary substances to securing exceptional behaviour across a college: teachers’ capacity to assert their authority in the classroom, developing relationships with their college students the school programs and the extent to which they support teachers to increase behaviour the school culture that permeates the classrooms and corridors, modelled and reinforced by teachers and older students.

Difficulties come up when there are main breakdowns amongst these factors. However robust and supportive the school systems are, you need to have teachers who can hold their own to a large degree. It is a core element of a teacher’s talent set that they have the presence and assertiveness needed to command consideration and insist on compliance with their expectations. At the identical time, if the systems are inconsistent, unwieldy, as well harsh or too lenient, teachers can be undermined, no matter how great they are. If the school culture is stringent and no-nonsense or, alternatively, laid-back and über-tolerant, it is difficult for teachers with the opposite disposition to thrive. It truly is a central element of forming a coherent school ethos to examine these troubles openly. What are the expectations, boundaries and values everybody can agree on?

Inside any behaviour management program, teachers at the frontline want to use the programs as resources to secure enhanced behaviour rather than concerning them basically as a back-up for providing sanctions. For example, a good teacher will create the climate in which students successfully decide on their sanctions: “I’ve warned you, you know the program, if you continue, then the consequence will be a removal/detention…” This gives the student the option not to misbehave any a lot more. A weaker instructor is a lot more most likely to dish out the sanctions without ever making it a clear choice for the pupil concerned they are just punishments provided retrospectively.

For this technique to perform, the school program must supply a consequence that is sufficiently tough that students never want to be a repeat offender. Any sense that the sanctions are tame undermines the total thing. There is a need for consistency and stick to-up if students never attend detentions or get serial punishments with out enhancing their behaviour.

College leaders have a massive role to play in getting these issues correct. I’ve identified a college exactly where the huge energy-home deputy head set the tone with confrontational hard-speak that frightened the college students stiff – when he was about. Meanwhile each and every other teacher was regarded as meek in comparison – disaster. I have identified another school in which the behaviour method launched with excellent fanfare withered away right after a few months since there were not enough senior large-hitters to make the sanctions bite with any force or consistency.

For me, the most crucial region for schools to perform on is teacher confidence and competence with handling behaviour in the classroom. I truly feel that in common there is far also much sink or swim about this we basically never invest enough time operating on the expertise necessary, straight and explicitly addressing a teacher’s places of difficulty with a protected atmosphere to practice. If I had to break it down to essentials, I’d say there are 3 issues each teacher should be ready to do:

• Obtain and sustain attention from a entire class. There are numerous tactics for undertaking this it calls for great vocal management, bodily presence and scanning for eye speak to.

• Give verbal admonishments in an assertive parental method. Excellent teachers normally have the capability to sound cross but not angry. They can model a extreme tone that suggests: “No, do not ever do that in my lessons” at the same time as conveying, “You know I care about you and want you to attain.”

• Choose-up and challenge low-degree problems, even though managing the understanding. A weaker instructor frequently will not observe the noise level or the messing about or finds it as well difficult to handle whilst pondering about questions, duties and lesson timing.

It is only when these issues are ineffective that wider systems come into play. When do you get the chance to practise these skills in an environment in which it is risk-free to make errors? It truly is too rare. Repairing that is our challenge.

The behaviour management balance: authority, systems and support