What’s wrong with these kids?

You’re a teacher, not a therapist. You teach French or Physics- you’re not trained to deal with the emotional or mental health conditions of students, all you’ve done on your teacher training is a day on pastoral care. And now you’re in the classroom and meeting a LOT of antagonistic, disruptive and destructive behaviour from many of your students. Most of your time is taken up dealing with ‘issues’ and you’re barely getting through all the content you need to teach. You are not alone.

A recurrent narrative amongst staff, particularly in mainstream environments, is to bemoan these students, to criticise them and their behaviour and – sometimes, understandably – even get upset by the way they have behaved. Staff are trying to cope with a torrent of emotions being dumped on them- it’s a lot. This can lead to you feeling pretty rubbish at the end of most days because you’re dealing with so much stuff. You’re on the receiving end of hundreds of students’ projected anger and shame and feelings of failure and if you’re taking all of that on, then you are going to get weighed down. Stress, chronic fatigue, anxiety, depression can all, very easily, set in…

Many of the most challenging students you meet are going to be dealing with a hell of a lot of issues in the background. The ones who respond to you and your colleagues with anger and distrust are most likely dealing with insecure attachment, resulting in difficulties with relationships and security issues. You can’t change their home life or what’s happened in their past, BUT YOU CAN CHANGE THEIR EXPERIENCE IN THE CLASSROOM. They are going to need to feel safe and secure BEFORE they are ever going to be able to settle down and do any learning. If you want reach a point where you can teach the subject content you need your students to feel more content first.

Before you can get ANYWHERE with these more challenging students you need to be able to contain your own emotions, before you can possibly deal with theirs. But you’re not really trained to do that and you’re tired and over-worked and stressed. So, what often happens is you REACT to the way they speak to you rudely, or when they won’t take out their chewing gum or barge through the door twenty minutes late. And arguments, confrontations and dramas ensue. For your most challenging students (those most likely to be dealing with attachment issues) that results in them being sent out or removed from lessons and – in many cases – ultimately excluded from school.

The narrative goes- these kids are out of control, their behaviour can’t be tolerated and you [the teachers, the Head, the school] need to send a message to the rest of the students that what they have done is unacceptable. Most educators would agree that school is the best place for young people and a 2017 study by the Institute for Public Policy Research states, “Excluded children are the most vulnerable: twice as likely to be in the care of the state, four times more likely to have grown up in poverty, seven times more likely to have a special educational need and 10 times more likely to suffer recognised mental health problems.”

It’s the kids with the biggest issues who are being excluded from schools. Because they already feel excluded so push the limits, boundaries and adults (who are there to support them) away. They are testing the adults to see if it’s safe to become ‘attached’ and take the risks associated with learning. And then these kids are being proved right- and are further excluded.

These kids need the support and help of the grown-ups working with them, WITHOUT creating extra workload.

How is this possible? How can you RESPOND better without creating more pressure or workload for yourself? Mindfulness, yoga and mindset all help build new neural pathways to self-regulate thoughts and emotions, allowing you to respond to situations with greater calm, in a less-reactive way. Learning how to contain your own emotions in this way can improve your stress, anxiety and energy levels AND help support the students who need it most. It can mean you are more likely to avoid the cycle of disruptive behaviour from students, improving their chances of learning success while feeling happier and more content in yourself. It’s a win, win.

(For a more detailed discussion of how Attachment Theory can be applied in schools we got the inspiration for this post from: Attachment in the Classroom, Heather Geddes, 2006)