Assessment 1: Why do young people misbehave in school?

According to Ball, Maguire & Braun (2012) student misbehaviour is fast becoming a concern for
teachers and educational bodies alike. In order to fully understand and evaluate the question of why
young people misbehave in school one must first discuss literature in regards to adolescent
development, behaviour and behaviour management. This essay will provide a literature synthesis,
clear description of interview process, synthesis of main interview findings, analyse these findings
and then implications for praxis.

Section One: Literature synthesis

Before investigating the topic of student misbehaviour, one must first define the key term. The term
student misbehaviour can be difficult to define by itself, as most peer referenced articles identify the
types of behaviours associated with it and examples of behaviours that teachers give. For example a
study conducted by Glock (2016) investigated what behaviours teachers perceived as disruptive and
whether or not the teacher would intervene. These behaviours include using a mobile phone, talking
out of turn, verbal aggression, getting out of seat, swinging the chair, calling out, snapping fingers,
physical aggression and destruction. Furthermore The Department of Education and Science (1989)
identified examples of student misbehaviour including verbal abuse towards other pupils, talking
out of turn, work avoidance or calculated idleness and hindering other pupils. Throughout each of
these studies teachers identified numerous reasons for student’s misbehaviour, which can be
categorised into educational, cognitive and/or social implications.

Sullivan, Johnson, Owens, & Conway (2014) argue that teachers could benefit from understanding
classroom environment and ecology influencing engagement and its impact on student behaviour,
rather than focusing on unproductive behaviour. Ecology has traditionally been defined as the
density and distribution of organisms (Sommer, 1967) but has more recently been defined as the
interaction between people and environment (Sussman, 2012) where the environment created in
schools and classrooms has a major effect on student’s ability to learn, when speaking in
educational terms. The study conducted by Sullivan et al (2014) found that teachers indicated all
categories of unproductive behaviour as present in the classroom (including disengaged behaviours,
low level disruptive behaviours, aggressive and anti-social behaviours) however the most frequent
is disengaged behaviours (for example avoiding doing schoolwork and being late for class) and low
level disruptive behaviours (such as talking out of turn and making disruptive noises).

In regards to educational implications as the result for student misbehaviour, Maguire et al (2010)
believed that disruptive behaviours from students related to the limitations of the curriculum,
“inappropriate pedagogy or the marginalisation of (some) young people rather than ‘poor’ or
ineffective discipline policies”. Another side to this educational factor is the fact that students may
finish work early and find the task too simple or too difficult. Once this occurs students can start to
disrupt the class. Students finishing work early and misbehaving can be correlated with teacher
expectations. This is evident from Demanet & Van Houtte (2012) who indicates that low
expectations and poor support from a teacher can negatively impact a student’s ability to learn or
achieve their highest potential. Unfortunately study has confirmed that teachers form an opinion of
their students’ academic ability before they even meet the student face to face (Jussim, 1986; Ball,
1981).

When reviewing multiple sources of literature in regards to student misbehaviour another key factor
became present. This is adolescent development, which is, in its first meanings a period in life of

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‘storm and stress’ (Hall, 1904). Arnett (1999) and various other scholars have tried to define storm
and stress. Throughout these sources there were three themes that became apparent including
conflict with parents, mood disruptions and risk behaviour. This begins to explain the role
adolescent development can have in a teaching and learning environment and the apparent negative
behaviours associated with it. This can be identified in Eccles (1993) paper through the discussion
of negative psychological changes associated with adolescent development and the “mismatch
between the needs of developing adolescents and the opportunities afforded them by their social
environments”. Eccles (1993) states that due to the decrease in decision making, a decrease in
intrinsic motivation and an increase in school misconduct occurs.

Section Two: Synthesis of main interview findings.

In order to appropriately gather opinions and allow participants to expand on their answers, an
interview process should be an open conversation with open questions and minimal prompting
(Partington, 2001). Therefore participants were informed before the interview to expand on their
responses. To allow participants to give truthful and open responses anonymity was also promised
before the interviews commenced and all participants were told that they would be granted access to
the research findings after completed. As the interviewer I tried to keep questions as open as
possible and tried to base my follow up questions on their previous answer that the participant gave.
This was effective as the conversation flowed smoothly with the participants leading. In order to
make interviews as efficient as possible, I practiced on my parent (not involved in the study as this
would be ineffective because they would already know the research topic and question) to keep a
neutral stance during the conversation while exploring leads and made mental/written note of any
key ideas or themes.

Interviewee Age Gender Occupation/relation

M1 57 Male Parent
M2 41 Male Teacher
M3 22 Male Pre-service teacher
M4 22 Male Pre-service teacher
F1 35 Female Teacher
F2 51 Female Non-teaching friends

A cross analysis approach was utilised to gather the appropriate themes for analysis. This method of
information analysis is appropriate and easy to utilise because key information can become
apparent. Each response from participants was correlated with other participant’s responses and
commonalities were noted. The following paragraphs explain the key themes and ideas that were
noted from the interviews. Note: each theme was mentioned at least twice by participants to be
deemed as important.

Key Theme 1 – Boredom/lack of cognitive ability

M1, M2, M4, F1 and F2 all suggested throughout their interviews that boredom or a lack of
cognitive ability during the lesson had an enormous impact on students misbehaving. For example
M1 and F1 (very similar quotes) stated that kids become very bored easily due to the nature of the
activity or the level. At this point (as the interviewer) I queried as to why this was, the response was
that students were not challenged enough. M2 also stated that “kids nay be struggling with
learning”.

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Key Theme 2 – Home environment
Similar to theme one a large proportion of the participants mentioned the influence of the home
environment. M1, M2, F2 and M4 all suggested that either the “home environment” or “parental
influences” at home had a significant affect when identifying the major cause of student
misbehaviour. Participant M1 for example stated that “kids muck up at home and get away with it
so they assume when they’re at school they can get away with it as well”.

Key Theme 3 – Maturity

F1 and M3 mentioned the terms adolescent development and lack of maturity. F1 (high school
teacher) suggested that “mood swings occur during the period of early high school and generally we
see more deviant behaviour from the years seven to ten compared with years eleven and twelve”.
Similarly M3 conveyed that students “may not be engaged in class by the work or the teacher,
issues with mental health or confidence or even development issues or immaturity”.

Key Theme 4 – Student teacher relationship

Student/teacher relationship and other social factors were mentioned by participants F1, F2, M3 and
M4. The pre-service teacher M4 stated that “teacher student relationships influence how students
act, if there is a bad relationship they will disrupt lessons and misbehave”. The other participants all
had similar ideas where they believed that the teacher should try and understand what level (socially
and emotionally) the students are on so that effective pedagogy and lesson building can be made.

Section Three: Synthesise findings

Due to the extra male there may be possibility for some bias however it was avoided through the
careful process of analysis (in the following sections). The age rangers were fairly consistent with
three in the 40 and above category and three below 40. The first key theme boredom/lack of
cognitive ability was mentioned by most of the participants (they believed that this was the leading
cause of misbehaviour) at least twice throughout their interview process. Contrasting with the
results from Maguire’s et al (2010) study and the participants answers, students may become bored
due to limitations in the curriculum (or that “activities were not challenging enough”). In most cases
Maguire et al (2010) suggested that instead of ineffective discipline strategies, it is inappropriate
pedagogy which causes students to misbehave.

Several articles from the literature review conducted similar interviews/questionnaires and found
that the home environment (including parental influence) was mentioned by almost all of their
participants who indicated that it had a significant impact on student’s behaviour in the classroom.
Literature (Sullivan et al, 2014) indicated that the classroom environment or more appropriately
‘ecology’ specifically influenced student’s level of engagement in an activity. Ineffective ecology
leads to student disengagement causing “disengaged behaviours”, “low level disruptive
behaviours”, “aggressive and anti-social behaviours” (Sullivan et al, 2014). When queried further
into this reason, the term SES surfaced from both the literature and participants. Specifically M4
who suggested that socio economic status (SES) played a part in determining the negative effect of
the home environment where “students model their behaviour/attitudes from what they see at home.
If parents come from a low SES background and value money more than education students will do
the same”. When investigating this response it should be considered that M4 is a pre-service teacher
who recently focussed his study in this area – hence the term SES becoming apparent.

Theme three consists of maturity and adolescent development. These key themes and terms were
discussed thoroughly in the literature review and mainly included conflict with parents, mood

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disruptions and risk behaviour (Arnett, 1999). In analysing participants answers both maturity/the
level of adolescent development and environment were paired (

Throughout these sources there were three themes that became apparent including conflict with
parents, mood disruptions and risk behaviour. This begins to explain the role adolescent
development can have in a teaching and learning environment and the apparent negative behaviours
associated with it. This can be identified in Eccles (1993) paper through the discussion of negative
psychological changes associated with adolescent development and the “mismatch between the
needs of developing adolescents and the opportunities afforded them by their social environments”.
Eccles (1993) states that due to the decrease in decision making, a decrease in intrinsic motivation
and an increase in school misconduct occurs.

Section Four: Provide implications for praxis including your personal awareness and teaching
practice. Consider the implications of your analysis for your own understanding of student
behaviour issues as well as any implications for improving teacher practice in relation to student
behaviours. 5 references. 425

PIR Guidance approach or control

References
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