Teacher Conceptions and Preferences for Student Discipline Instruments in South African Schools: A Narrative Study

Abstract

This study investigated the teachers' understanding of the context of alternative methods to maintain discipline in South African schools. A narrative approach was use in conducting semi-structured interviews with 10 primary school teachers (females = 80%). Data were analysed using the voice-centred relational technique (Mauthner and Doucet, 2003). Results showed that teachers' understanding of student discipline to be influenced by own parental upbringing, knowledge of common disciplinary procedures used in their communities or social beliefs about the right ways of bringing up children. Most preferred alternative disciplinary measures were detention and/or isolation to a corner of a classroom, making learners clean, verbal reprimand and reporting learners to their parents.