Recently, I’ve spoken with a number of teachers about boys roughly in the Year 6 to 9 bracket and their behaviour towards their female teachers. There’s clearly an observable national shift amongst these boys toward more disrespectful, misogynistic and aggressive behaviour that we should all be concerned about. No female teacher deserves to be…
One of the reasons I advocate for working restoratively in schools is because it works. Another is the rigour in the research behind it in fields like social psychology and affect theory. Put simply, I find it useful to look for answers about the way young people, and old ones, are built. When I’ve…
I was chatting with an exasperated teacher called Claire recently who has every right to feel fed up. Claire’s home room class is boisterous, diverse and unpredictable. Thankfully, Claire is also very open to reflection and feedback, so she wasn’t alarmed when I challenged her bemoaning of one student, “I mean, bloody hell, all…
Relentless pressure gently applied is a better way to ensure behavioural compliance than a singular and direct request. Kids across the ages have known this too well and manipulated their parents with it. They’re well aware that the first request for an ice-cream will likely result in a “No,” but that the 37th request…
A hat tip this week to Dr Christopher Hudson for this LinkedIn post and also to my dear friend Tracey Ezard for pointing me towards it. The key message of this blog is that you should never forget that your school is part of a nation. Even more so, that your school is building…
Student behaviour always seems to become particularly problematic round the Term 3 mark, doesn’t it? It seems to be an annual occurrence now that Term 3 is when student behaviour becomes particularly problematic. For many teachers and school leaders, the situation is verging on unbearable. One of the more, frankly, dysfunctional ways that…
One of the most common fears I hear about using circle architecture is that it takes too long to get the students into a circle and then back to individual work. For this reason, I was delighted to hear from our partners at West Wallsend Public School about mastering the art of swift transition.…
Just one of the aspects of Restorative Practices that I’m a fan of is that it embodies a very old truism about teachers – that the best ones are both Firm and Fair. Think about the best teacher you ever had and it’s likely that they didn’t sacrifice firmness for fairness or vice versa.…
Before he became a high-profile Sydney-based radio personality, I remember watching Ben Fordham cut his teeth on current affairs programs like … well … A Current Affair. The way I saw it, Fordham’s job description was to hide in the bushes and dive out with a lighting, sound and camera technician to catch a…
Raph was in Year 7 and living with Tourette’s Syndrome. His version was low impulse control and swearing tics when placed under any social pressure. Adam (that’s me) was the Assistant Principal in charge of behaviour. You’d be right in thinking that Raph and I were in regular contact. One day, I tired…