Academy of Ideas's video: Warm-Strict Schools: saving pupils or another brick in the wall

This was an event hosted by the Academy of Ideas Education Forum on Wednesday 26 April: https://academyofideas.org.uk/event/warm-strict-schools-saving-pupils-or-another-brick-in-the-wall/ A growing number of schools are adopting very strict approaches to managing pupils’ behaviour. These include silent corridors, zero-tolerance of school uniform infractions and sanctions for turning up to class without pen or paper. Teachers must be addressed as ‘sir’ or ‘miss’ every time. In class, students must ‘SLANT’: sit up straight with arms folded, listen carefully, ask and answer lots of questions, never interrupt and track the teacher with their eyes. Pupils who don’t do so can be sent to isolation rooms, perhaps for a whole day – or even excluded. Meet the ‘warm-strict’ behaviourist theory, inspired by the American educationalist Doug Lemov, author of Teach Like a Champion. In the UK, it has been deployed with most notable effect at Michaela Community School in London. Warm-strict exponents say that it is not only about being strict. It is also intended to foster mutual respect and reassure pupils that their welfare and education are taken seriously by a caring staff. The rules are there to help teachers teach and pupils learn and that’s why they must be obeyed faultlessly. Critics, however, argue that a blanket approach does not work for all children. Disadvantaged pupils or those suffering trauma, for example, require a more nuanced policy. Conformist regimes exclude creativity and self-expression, they argue. The response of parents has been mixed. Great Yarmouth Academy made headlines after parents mounted a social media campaign accusing its warm-strict code of harming their children. Similar opposition arose at the Abbey School in Faversham after pupils were made to attend ‘discipline assemblies’ and chant phrases about good behaviour. Ofsted downgraded the school to ‘Inadequate’, reportedly because pupils felt unhappy and unsafe under the new behaviour rules. Yet many schools employing warm-strict reforms have claimed impressive exam results and a decrease in disruption. These schools are often based in working-class communities. Does this raise the possibility of a two-tier behaviour model, one for the affluent and another for the poor? What role should behaviourist theories play in the life of a school? How do they relate to broader educational philosophies and aspirations? Should we welcome stricter schools as a renaissance of adult authority, or are they another brick in the wall of conformism and control? SPEAKERS: - Dr Yasmin Finch chair, St Ivo Parents Forum - Julie Harmieson director of education and national strategy, Trauma Informed Schools - Barry Smith freelance education consultant - Mark Taylor headteacher CHAIR Dr Alex Standish associate professor of geography education, UCL