AD ALTA
JOURNAL OF INTERDISCIPLINARY RESEARCH
CURRENT STATE OF RISK AND PROBLEM BEHAVIOUR OF PUPILS AND ITS REFLECTION IN
SCHOOL PLANS OF PREVENTION
a
INGRID EMMEROVÁ,
b
TOMÁŠ JABLONSKÝ
Faculty of Education, Department of Pedagogy and Special
Pedagogy, Hrabovská cesta 1, 034 01 Ružomberok, Slovakia
email:
a
ingrid.emmerova@ku.sk,
b
tomas.jablonsky@ku.sk
_____________________________________________________________________
Abstract: The study theoretically presents the current state of problem or risk
behaviour of pupils at elementary and high schools, as well as school prevention in
Slovakia. It presents the results of content analysis of school documents, specifically
of school plans of preventive activities, or work plans of prevention coordinators, with
special focus on the reflection of the current state of risk and problem behaviour of the
pupils in these plans. The results show that the plans take only minimal account of the
current state and trends of risk and problem behaviour of pupils.
Keywords: problem behaviour of pupils, risk behaviour of pupils, prevention, school
prevention, school prevention plans, coordinator of prevention
____________________________________________________
1 The Current State of Problem or Risk Behaviour of
Elementary and High School Pupils
Elementary and high school teachers often, many of them daily,
face inappropriate behaviour of their pupils. It covers wide scale
of behaviour: starting from small misdeeds, through violation of
the school order, up to serious socio-pathological phenomena,
that should be differentiated from the point of view of prevention
and subsequent solution.
Risk behaviour is the more frequently used term in school
prevention, as can be seen in the strategic documents, guidelines
and other materials (e.g. Pedagogical-organisational instructions
for the school year 2018/2019). The term “risk behaviour”
should according to several authors (Miovský et al., 2010, Bělík,
Hoferková, 2016) mitigate the stigmatization of pupils with
problem behaviour of different character.
Pupils of elementary and high schools show various kinds of
inappropriate – problem behaviour, that doesn't necessarily have
to be included among behavioural disorders or socio-
pathological phenomena. From the point of view of pedagogical
and vocational training employees, inappropriate, provocative,
aggressive or undisciplined behaviour of pupils should be
adequately referred to as problem behaviour of pupils. In the
context of problem behaviour, M. Lipnická (2014) states that it
most often has these negative features that dominate on the long-
term basis, are often repeated and have negative effect on others:
intransigence, inattention, maladjustment, disobedience,
moodiness, unpredictability, restlessness. Problem behaviour
could also be a symptom of disability or social disadvantage of
a child, or his/her talent.
Act No. 245/2008 Coll. on Upbringing and Education (the
School Act), in § 144, section 4 regulates the obligations of
elementary and high school pupils, so teachers have legal
support, e.g. to respect the instructions of school employees
(general regulation of prevention of undisciplined behaviour),
not to restrict other people's rights by your actions in the process
of education (bullying prevention), to protect the property of
school or school facility used for education against damage
(vandalism prevention), to regularly participate on education and
to study properly (truancy prevention), etc.
The increase in socio-pathological phenomena among adults in
Slovakia has been manifested also in the increase of problem
behaviour of elementary and high school pupils. We talk about
wide scale of unacceptable behaviour of various gravity. First
problems with behaviour occur among still younger pupils.
Despite the fact, that several data indicate a decrease of problem
behaviour of pupils (e.g. Criminality statistics SR, European
School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs – ESPAD),
we cannot consider the situation as positive. Pedagogical and
vocational training employees of common schools point out the
occurrence of problem behaviour. The kinds of risk, or problem
behaviour vary, e.g. in connection with ICT. However, besides
the new risks, some kinds of problem behaviour still persist.
The current situation is illustrated also by negative changes
concerning the sex of pupils: balancing between sexes occurs, in
some cases girls outperform boys. R. Tomšik, M. Dolejš, M.
Čerešník, J., Suchá and O. Skopal (2017), based on their
empirical findings state, that risk behaviour does not concern just
boys, but is similarly extent in both sexes and the breaking age
of sharp increase of this behaviour is between the 14
th
and 16
th
year of age.
Effective preventive activities require prognosis of the
probability of occurrence of a given phenomenon and to think
over the choice of methods and forms of action, in the area of
primary and secondary prevention in the school environment.
The reality of school practice is illustrated by the results of
researches carried out among teacher and prevention workers.
The necessity of systemic and effective prevention is proved also
by the results of the screening carried out in 2013. Teachers from
all Slovak counties (except Bratislava county) noted pupils they
recommend to the care of educational counselling and
prevention facility, because their problem behaviour cannot be
handled by common pedagogical measures at school. On the
basis of the most significant findings we can state (2014):
teachers from the researched schools would recommend
18,10% of pupils to counselling care,
compared to the previous periods, the number of
problematic girls increased,
all demonstrations of problem behaviour (including
truancy, contact with drugs, criminal activities) does not
concern the second-grade pupils only, compared to the past
we registered a significant increase of problem behaviour
among first-grade pupils. The necessity of implementation
of risk behaviour prevention among first-graders is pointed
out also by
M. Procházka, M. Vítečková and K. Špačková
(2017).
J. Skopalová and K. Janiš (2017) carried out a research at
elementary schools among teachers, headmasters and prevention
workers in 2017. They surveyed the occurrence of risk behaviour
of pupils. Among the most wide-spread ones the respondents
stated the following: aggressiveness, relationship problems,
cyberbullying and rough behaviour (relatively broadly conceived
type of risk behaviour), smoking (despite the decreasing trend of
the number of smokers, it is still a wide-spread form of risk
behaviour among pupils), vulgar language, truancy and hidden
truancy, frauds and failure to fulfil their school duties (cheat
sheets, writing off, falsifying a signature, etc.), thefts. The fact,
that some types of risk behaviour did not occur does not mean
they do not exist among pupils. The authors asked for the most
frequent types of risk behaviour.
In 2017 we carried out a research among prevention coordinators
(15) and police preventists (5). All respondents, prevention
coordinators and police preventists alike, consider the situation
of problem behaviour occurrence as negative – they all point to
the increase in the problem behaviour of pupils. They
emphasized especially the increase in aggressive behaviour and
risk behaviour connected with ICT.
The scale of problem or risk behaviour is broad and it is
constantly changing. Besides the phenomena that occur for years
among children and youth (truancy, experiments with drugs,
committing criminal offences, etc.), new trends in the occurrence
of problem behaviour of pupils appear, such as binge drinking
with the goal to get drunk as soon as possible, and especially
new risks connected with ICT and online environment.
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