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Saying Sorry
A restorative approach leads each party to a point where they can take responsibility for their own behaviour and its consequences. It must not be, however, a prelude to a forced apology.
CCTV, behaviour and a bit of politics
The British have always had a penchant for using force to win their battles. Now we are engaged in a war with a generation of lost souls where force is simply paraffin to the flames. Battles like this are not won in a day. What is needed is more sophisticated than laser guided missiles or the latest set of behaviour management ‘tricks’. We need to break the ‘them and us’ culture between students and teachers that is the cancer of British state education.
Legislation on restraint, confiscation, stop-and-search in schools, CCTV and detention of students are symptoms of political desperation, a lack of control even. Teachers are regularly being told to avoid all physical contact with students (yes, all) while on the other hand given training to meet aggression with physical restraint. Many schools have more security than a small airport. Hawk-eye CCTV cameras, metal detectors, ID swipe cards, a dedicated security team and cavity search booths, ‘Darren you’re next on the arse-o-scope’. (Ok that last one is not true, but watch this space). The children look on and see the traditional boundaries crumbling before their eyes. It must look as if the adults have given up. The sad truth is that so many have.
We manage the symptoms of an increasingly violent youth in schools. The root causes lie elsewhere. Thatcher’s mantra of ‘there is no community, only individuals’, has had a profound and lasting effect on society. A sense of community left some time ago and a selfish pursuit of ‘stuff’ moved in shortly afterwards. Apart from isolated pockets, the British live insular lives with surveys showing that children play closer to their homes that ever before and few people knowing the names of the people living next door. Childhood has become an indoor pursuit. As waves of media paranoia about youth crime erode any sense that the adult world is in control children are falsely protected and medicated with screens. (Children in the UK watch more TV than anyone else in Western Europe). As TV and video games dry the empathy from our children we attempt to replace it with educational programmes led by teachers who are themselves struggling to remain calm through the crisis.
There is still no compulsory behaviour management training in initial teacher training programmes. There are behaviour management strategies that are proven, skills that can be taught and are techniques that are flexible enough to be taken into diverse settings. SEAL (Social and Emotional Aspects of Learning) is the latest sticking plaster to be presented to secondary educators. Whilst no one would argue against students becoming more emotionally literate, they learn so much more by the example of the adults around them. While we attempt to teach emotional literacy programmes we are still not training our teachers to practice emotional restraint. Without effective training for teachers the scheme will reinforce the rules for us, rules for them mentality. ‘You! Sit down, shut up and do your emotional literacy worksheet!’ may be an inevitable consequence.
The British media likes to teach us that intervening with challenging behaviour on the streets gets you killed. It is strangely obsessed with it in fact. Those who agree that the ship is sinking buy into this paranoia enthusiastically and cross the street to avoid conversations with young people. The truth is that our sense of fear is mis-directed. We have far much more to lose if we stand by and watch. So it goes in schools.
What works in the best schools working with the most challenging children is the relentless commitment of the teachers to train together, agree a plan together, stand together and intervene together. To make this consistency palpable in language, environment and classroom practice. To put aside idiosyncrasies and yes, at times, individual teaching styles and give to the collegiate effort.
Good teachers in the UK and in Canada know that the best rewards are relational not material (we have got to stop lying to our children that the one who ends up with the most stuff is the winner.. ‘Dust your coffin with diamonds sir?’), that relationships based on mutual trust are hard fought, that emotionless responses to challenging behaviour work and that agreed cues in language drip feed consistent messages. To break the ‘them and us’ culture we don’t need more of the siege mentality but a relentless pursuit of a more caring approach. Schools can wait for society to repair itself or set an example of how an inclusive community can turn ‘them and us’ to ‘we’.
© Paul Dix 2010
Behaviour starting to get you down?
If you are new to teaching or have just moved jobs behaviour management can be difficult. Without any relationships with staff or students it can be a lonely and frustrating few months. Regardless of how many people tell you that challenging behaviour is not personal it still feels very personal. You have probably spent a great deal of time creating fantastically engaging lessons and are wondering why no one seems interested in them. Students who have never met you treat you with disdain. Before you reach for the bottle take a step back.
OFSTED Attack Teachers
So as we gear up for huge cuts across Education OFSTED decide it would be timely to attack teachers and in turn attack the most vulnerable children:
‘Thousands of pupils are being wrongly labelled as having special educational needs’ Ofsted says.
Well done OFSTED. Marvelous. The government will be pleased to have the ammunition as they continue to cut services for children and schools. The public enjoy a bit of teacher bashing and patronsing (“teachers are well intentioned”…etc) the profession makes the inspectorate appear to have status. Brilliant. Credits all round. No doubt we will be soon hearing calls for all teaching assistants to be sacked as they clearly have nothing to do.
Trouble is the sample size for this survey was 345 children and the figures in the media have been scaled up from this. Hardly world class research. In fact I would ask any of my students presenting work with such a small sample group to go away and do some more work. Quite apart from the flawed research the way that OFSTED makes these pronouncements directly to the media makes them appear shifty and ‘politically motivated’. If the inspectorate wants to engage in a meaningful dialogue with teachers to improve education we are ready to talk. Without the front-page headlines and TV appearances. It is almost as if they enjoy the attention.
Not to worry anyway as OFSTED have the solution to this problem, ‘They just need better teaching’. Thank goodness for the inspectorate. OFSTED have seen what we have all missed. Where would we be without them.? Actually Mr Gove, when you are looking for savings there might be another quango that you could throw onto the bonfire. A quango that no teacher would miss. This would leave the inspectors free to go back to the classroom and demonstrate to us all how easy it is to give support to children with additional needs in classes of 30/35.
Paul Dix
Rights and Responsibilities
I have, as I am sure many people have, been following the story in the press of the Pastor in America who is considering holding a "burn a Koran day". One interesting thread that this story has highlighted is the area of rights and responsibilities. We can enter into a challenging debate about the rights that we all have. However, along with rights come responsibilities.