I agree with Alex that children need discipline and there must be predictable consequences if they behave in a disruptive manner or otherwise try to destroy the learning process classrooms are there for. However, I don't think the sort of policies he rightly condemns stem from misguided leftism, political correctness or anything like that. I think they stem from radical individualism which in turn is derived from free market ideology.

Think about it. If you have a free market system where anything goes in order to gain personal wealth and feel good about yourself, why should you give a stuff about fellow students, your teachers and anyone else for that matter? If Thatcher (supposedly) once said "there is no society", aren't people (no matter how young) going to take that seriously? Of course they are. They are just following what is regarded as normal or fashionable.

Once you destroy collectivity, radical individualism and a lack of responsibility regarding your own actions (let alone other people's welfare) follows as a logical consequence. So thank you, free market ideologues, for giving us a society where people sue at a drop of a hat because a teacher threw their child out of class or sack workers to rake in greater profits or cheat shareholders out of their savings. Thanks for a society where "I" am the most important in the world.

Man, I love swearing. Obviously if it's over used it loses it's effectiveness, but that's about the only problem I have with swearing. It rules! I'd be swearing all the time on this forum if I could!

Yes, duh, of course children need discipline, but swearing is really unimportant compared to violent behaviour and..I dunno, stealing, racism, failing to eat vegetables, whatever it is kids do. Swearing really doesn't matter at all in comparison to these things.

If I ever were to be a parent, for a start, what happened to me, but secondly, I would have my priorities straight about what was silly bad behaviour and what was actual bad behaviour. It seems parents get all huffy about naughty words mainly because it makes them uncomfortable. Sounds like the parents problem more than anything.

Teach a child that naughty words are that and ONLY that, but also that they should not use them when in the company of those who may be offended. Yes, that includes the classroom. So yes, the main point of the article, that the five strikes rule is bullsh...is stupid, I agree.

I just wanted to express my feelings on how much swearing rules. Hooray for swear words!

Too late Alex. In the early 80's and into the 90's, sons of migrants whose ranks are swollen with misogynists were swearing at female teachers in Arabic. The very PC teachers' union told its members not to rock the boat because we had to 'adjust' to these new arrivals. The sisterhood, normally using its very best stentorian voice to denounce anything resembling female bashing, turned its attention to rape in war and other causes. Can't have one group of the cognoscenti at odds with others in the group. By not speaking out at the time the teachers have themselves to blame.

Also happening in the period I mentioned was the new approach to spelling and sentence construction. A friend of mine was teaching in the Newcastle area and he had the District Inspector sitting in his class reviewing his teaching. My friend corrected a young student who had made an error in sentence construction. The DI later told my friend that he shouldn't make such corrections because 'students will learn to communicate in different ways'.

If teachers have no respect for themselves why should they expect students to respect them?

I love swearing too, spendocrat. It is rich, dynamic and expressive. It is also clear and often funny and a great antidote to the bland, corporate speak of so much of today's acceptable language.
The author of this rather prissy article calls himself naive a number of times, I would have to agree.
Adolescents have always tried to shock, in a way, that is their job. Our job, as sensible adults, teachers, parents, whatever, is not to be shocked. Otherwise we prove we have failed to grow up and give them the upper hand. We can disapprove and point out why we think behaviour -like inappropriate swearing - is foolish, but if we freak out, faint and froth at the mouth at mere words....we've lost.
I taught my kids that swearing with their peers is fine, if that is the teenage patois, swearing when they stub their toe or something is probably also an acceptable release of tension, but swearing at someone, or calling anyone names (swearwords or not) was never acceptable. Indeed, it ain't the words that worry me so much, it is the intention behind them. You can do much more harm calling someone an idiot or a retard or a loser, than telling them you think what they're saying is bulls...t. maybe teachers in schools should punish name calling and verbal abuse much more severely than swearing. And maybe some of them should think carefully about their own language in class, particularly if they have a tendency to call kids names.

Indeed, enaj. I used to try and get around my mum's ban on swear words by saying "oh FROG!". She firmly pointed out to me that it is the INTENTION, rather than the WORD that is the issue.

I really think that the main issue is not that teachers do not want to impose discipline, but they are hampered at every step by parents who are utterly convinced that THEIR little darling can do no wrong, and it must be someone else's fault.

A good example of this happened in my cousin's school trip to central Australia- two kids were caught (underage) drinking alcohol, and were sent home early from the camp in disgrace, at great cost to the parents. The parents, however, did not ground these kids for the rest of the two weeks that their peers were away, no, they felt they had been unjustly punished, and took them shopping to stop them getting bored while their friends were away!

There are of course many many other examples of this- when teachers are up against parents yelling at them for everything (eg "you gave my child detention! I dont care they threatened another child with scissors! My child wouldn't do that! You have a vendetta against my child!") then you can see that really, swearing is so far down the list of dramas that they are trying to deal with, and they know they are not going to get any backup from home, that it dosn't seem worth the trouble.

The problem with the approach being taken by the school in the UK is that it puts an arbitrary limit on the relative naughtiness of something. In this kind of environment, for the ease of all participants, either something is okay or it isn't. However, I disagree with the point being made by the author that this is a result of nannyism...I have to agree with other post-ers that schools run a really fine line with what they can and can't enforce, and some of this comes down to consistency. If a school can't expect to have the support of the broader community in enforcing, say, a swearing ban, then maybe it's an inappropriate thing to do. Plus for goodness sake, let's stop expecting teachers to do all our parenting for us!

And swearing can enhance our meaning! It can be a rich and "colourful" (hence the euphemism) and sometimes explain things in a way that no other words can. Doesn't mean I'd roll out an observation about how 'f---ing awesome the New Testament is' in church. Because, as post-ers have commented, sometimes it's appropriate and sometimes it isn't.

My partner and I have made quite an effort to cut down on our swearing in front of the two-year-old, mainly because he was starting to repeat those words prior to his understanding of "good/bad", he's just used to us being impressed he can repeat words that we can say.

I also agree that the motivation is often the important factor: my parents also banned "swear word substitutes" (I seem to recall 'fruit tingles' was what they were opposed to) in our house. I'd rather he hear, for example, an exclamation of 's---!' in response to a stubbed toe than for him to think that his parents calling each other "fat cow" or the like was appropriate. Just because something doesn't contain a swear word, doesn't make it more acceptable.