May 13, 2019, Daily Mail: Schools' behaviour tsar says progressive 'child-centred' teaching methods has led to a rise in poor discipline as teachers fail to challenge pupils' low-level disruption in class https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7022181/Behaviour-tsar-says-progressive-child-centred-teaching-methods-led-rise-poor-discipline.html A government advisor on school behaviour has said 'child-centred' teaching methods have led to a rise in poor discipline. Tom Bennett said teachers are failing to challenge pupil's low-level disruption in class, following the implementation of so-called 'progressivism' teaching methods in classrooms. Mr Bennett, who was appointed by ministers to head up a task force into bad behaviour at schools has said the issue of poor behaviour has been 'swept under the carpet'. … 'I think that the failure of these methods to automatically create great behaviour has resulted in a lot of people in the education system pretending behaviour wasn't an issue.' Teaching methods such as 'direct instruction', where teachers stand in front of pupils, presenting information, drilling out information and memorisation, are all traditional techniques which have been gradually phased out. Now, teachers are in favour of more progressive 'child-centred' learning methods, where the emphasis is on keeping students engaged by allowing them to learn from each other – rather than just taking instructions from their teachers. … 'Some children come to school with loads of social skills, they've been taken to museums, taught how to shake someone's hand and say hello. Mr Bennett said some children don't know how to behave when they start school… This month, the Department for Education (DfE) implemented a new task force specifically aimed as tackling bad behaviour in schools. The move comes amid rising concerns about classroom disruption, with a third of state schools marked as having poor behaviour, an Ofsted inspection reports. One of the most common reasons for permanent exclusions in state schools is persistent disrupted behaviour, accounting for over a third of all permanent exclusions in 2016/17. Mr Bennett is leading a £10 million [$13M US dollars] crackdown, which will focus on teaching schools how to improve issues such as attendance and punctuality.
