Of all the issues connected with the education system, the one that causes most concern for educators and parents alike, and the one about which most doubts exist, is the effectiveness of school discipline. Are schools worse off today as regards discipline than they were, say, 20 years ago? Have children become more difficult to handle and teach? Is the school environment peaceful enough to allow teachers to teach and students to learn? What, exactly, does discipline imply?

The New Oxford Dictionary of English defines discipline as "the practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behaviour, using punishment to correct disobedience". School and classroom discipline is both preventive and remedial and schools make use of their sticks and carrots to create a safe and orderly atmosphere in which children can learn and interact with each other. It would be wrong to identify discipline with sanctions and punishment only, and ignore the positive aspect of training, encouragement and praise for good behaviour.

Guidance and support

To help schools create an atmosphere conducive to learning, generally referred to as the school ethos, the Ministry of Education has published an official document called Good Behaviour and Discipline Policy for Schools. The aim of this document is to serve as a guide that would enable schools to develop their own Code of Behaviour and Discipline according to their own particular needs and circumstances.

This document talks about standards of students' behaviour, encouragement, affirmation, rewards, sanctions, and desired parent behaviour. As a result, many of our schools today have their own Code of Discipline, which was drawn up in collaboration with teachers, parents and, in several cases, the children themselves, thus ensuring that they are owned by the whole school community and that they are generally accepted and adhered to.

An offshoot of this document is the National Board for School Behaviour, which is made up of representatives of the Education Division, the Education School Social Work Unit, the Church Secretariat for Catholic Education, and the parents. Its main function is to deal with cases referred by heads of schools of students whose behaviour remains extreme in spite of sanctions applied by the school. It does so by holding case-conferences on the referred cases and determines remedial action. This may include emergency therapy, involvement of psychologists and social workers, change of school, or expulsion.

The main aim of the board remains rehabilitation and it is only rarely that drastic action, such as expulsion, is recommended. The fact that children are made to appear before the board often has the effect of making them change their attitude towards the school. It is also a clear signal to the parents that things need to change.

General school discipline

In the reality of school life, there is one discipline of the classroom, which concerns the teachers, and there is another discipline of the school generally, which concerns the head of school. The head's responsibility is to see that law and order prevail. He or she must maintain the rule of law so that all may work in peace.

There will be pockets of misbehaviour in individual classrooms because not all teachers are good disciplinarians but overall there must be good order stemming from the head. He or she must actively discourage and make war on wrongdoing.

In the introduction to the Good Behaviour and Discipline Policy for Schools, the Education Minister expressed this principle thus: "The management style of the head of school is a crucial factor in encouraging a sense of individual responsibility among staff and a sense of commitment to the school among pupils and their parents. A head of school can create the right climate within which individuals in the school community fulfil their individual and collective responsibilities."

Research on well-disciplined schools indicates that a student-centred environment, incorporating teacher-student problem solving activities, as well as activities to promote student self-esteem and belongingness, is more effective in reducing behaviour problems than punishment.

Schools using preventive discipline to promote good behaviour are characterised by commitment by all the staff to establish and maintain appropriate student behaviour; high expectations for appropriate student behaviour; clear and broad-based rules, developed with input from students and made known to everybody in the school; warm school climate, characterised by a concern for students as individuals; a visible, supportive head, managing by walking about; delegation of discipline authority to teachers to help effective classroom management; and close ties with the communities they serve.

Yet, even in schools where the environment is disciplined and ordered, behaviour problems arise and they have to be addressed. Research has found that punishment can be an effective method of correcting individual misbehaviour if it is proportionate to the offence, perceived by the student to be punishment, and delivered with support.

Counselling is also a valuable tool as it helps students understand their own behaviour and what is causing it, and how to explore methods of dealing with it.

Other measures for serious offences, listed in our Behaviour Policy, include: suspension from the rest of the day's lessons; temporary change of class; suspension for a few days after the parents have been informed; and expulsion, to be resorted to in very extreme cases and only after the case has been referred to the National Board for School Behaviour.

Classroom discipline

Contrary to what many people think, the chief source of misbehaviour in the classroom is not rioting or physical violence, but noisy chatter. Ted Wragg, writing in The Times Educational Supplement (1999), refers to an observation analysis of disruptive behaviour in over 1,000 lessons: noisy chatter tops the list, followed, in that order, by illicit movement, inappropriate use of material and equipment, and defiance of a teacher's command. Physical violence towards another student or insulting the teacher occur in less that two per cent of disruptions observed.

As an effective way of maintaining orderly classrooms, he suggests three Rs - relationships, rules and readiness. Where good relationships are formed between the teacher and the students early on in the year, the class settles into a routine of orderly, productive work for the rest of the year. Classroom rules are very important and they have a greater chance of succeeding if the children themselves are involved in drawing them up. With rules, there must be consistency if children are to know what is expected of them at all times. Readiness refers to the teacher's ability to anticipate problems, being always prepared, and differentiating according to individual needs.

As pointed out earlier, following the publication of the Good Behaviour and Discipline Policy for Schools, many schools produced their own code of discipline. This extract from one of the codes sums up the whole philosophy behind school discipline which all schools should strive to emulate: "We regard discipline, not as an end in itself, but as a prerequisite for establishing a healthy learning environment. The discipline structure exists in order to provide students and teachers with a safe environment to allow for student development and academic progress, and for teachers to e able to carry out their professional function". This is the way forward.

Mr Muscat is chairman of the National Board for School Behaviour