Blackboard jungle
NEW Zealand school rooms, and playgrounds, have become increasingly dangerous, a trend blamed on a breakdown in discipline in recent years.
An international study showed Kiwi schoolkids were among the naughtiest in the developed world.
And a Fairfax poll has revealed 71 per cent of those surveyed consider discipline is lacking in our schools.
Respondents to the Fairfax readers poll thought the schoolkids were playing up because of poor discipline at home and a lack of respect among younger people.
Statistics New Zealand figures show 567 cases of common assault in schools or other educational institutions were reported to police last year.
The number of serious assaults resulting in injury rose from 50 to 81 between 2001 and 2011, and the number of sexual assaults more than trebled from 33 to 116.
The Post-primary Teachers’ Association recently advised members to report assaults on teachers to police.
Although the restorative justice approach to discipline has been widely adopted in schools, questions are being raised on whether a tougher stance is needed.
Secondary Principals’ Association president Patrick Walsh said: ‘‘The public and parents are becoming less tolerant with that [restorative justice] approach and want schools to get tough on those serious offenders.’’
Many of
the
worst-behaved students come to school with violence or sexual deviance learned at home.
Rehabilitating students while ensuring the safety of their schoolmates was a difficult balancing act, Walsh said.
An OECD report, covering 2000-2009 but published last year, looked at how long it took for teachers to control unruly children in class.
New Zealand disappointing 50th countries.
The United States ranked 22nd and the United Kingdom was 32nd.
Students in Asian countries ranked out of a 65 were among the least disruptive.
A teacher who has taught in both Asia and Auckland said there would always be a certain number of unruly students in any given classroom.
But the teacher, who did not want to be named, said there was a different cultural approach to education in New Zealand.
‘‘In Asia, a teacher is immediately seen as the main authority in the classroom, and automatically has the respect of the students, not to mention the wider community.
‘‘This is different in New Zealand, where it seems the first thing teachers have to do in the classroom is prove themselves to students.’’
PPTA president Robin Duff said student behaviour had deteriorated over the past 30 years, but this trend has followed the pattern of wider society.
Supporters of corporal punishment had warned of catastrophe in the classroom when the cane was banned in 1990, Duff said.
‘‘That hasn’t happened.’’