ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to depict a range of competing and complementary explanations of indiscipline in schools. It simply seeks to establish that by engaging with sociological accounts of disruption in schools, one open the possibility for a thorough reading of, and textured responses to, the ‘sedimented layers’ of the ‘symbolic language of indiscipline’. Positivist psychological theory of disruptive behaviour in school also embraces what is sometimes referred to as learning theory. Children’s unacceptable behaviour is learned behaviour and needs to be identified, monitored and redirected. The chapter provides a challenge to the dominant psychological discourse in discipline and classroom management literature, policies and practices. This discourse has constructed student disruption as a ‘personal’ problem. The provides a survey of major Australian policy developments over the past twenty years. It aims to determine the way in which issues are theorized, policies framed and the subsequent impact as implementation is pursued.
