Teachers are often put into the unfortunate position of choosing whether to break up a fight between students or worry about the legal repercussions and avoid the fight. There are consequences no matter which choice teachers make in this situation, but generally, the consequences are heavier if they choose not to break up the fight.
Teachers should break up fights between students; otherwise, they put the students involved at risk. However, teachers also risk facing legal repercussions in some situations. To break up a student fight, teachers should use verbal commands and avoid getting physically involved.
Read on to discover why teachers should typically step in to break up student fights. I’ll discuss the best ways for a teacher to handle a fight between students, the legal repercussions, and more. Let’s get started.
How Teachers Should Handle Fights Between Students
If you have been put in the unfortunate position of breaking up a fight between two or more students, it can be challenging to decide what to do. Should you get closer or keep your distance? Should you only use verbal commands? If not, when is it appropriate to step in physically?
Fights may seem inevitable in a school setting. With so many personalities bubbling together in the school cauldron, it’s no surprise that fights break out. One of many factors that contribute to fights occurring is that some students aren’t taught how to interact with other people before entering school.
As such, elementary school tends to be an expected period for school fights. The children in elementary aren’t as socially developed to know how to handle the strong opinions of the other students surrounding them. Therefore, school can feel overwhelming for students, even as they get older.
With the stress of being thrown together with so many new faces, fights can be a frequent occurrence for elementary teachers.
So, how should you, as a teacher, handle a fight? The answer is slightly complicated because how you handle it depends on the fight. However, there are some general rules that you can follow. I’ll discuss these below.
End the Fight Before It Begins
Ideally, you should end a fight before it starts.
A fight generally starts with a conversation. The conversation will turn heated and eventually escalate into a fight. If you pay close attention, you’ll notice the conversation becoming bitter and the students unable to hide their displeasure. Young children often begin using phrases like the following:
- “That’s not fair!”
- “No, it’s not!”
- “That’s mine!”
- “Stop!”
While these specific words aren’t always used, the student’s tone and body language will convey the same annoyance or anger. With time, these verbal disagreements generally escalate into a fight. Let’s look at some of the most common reasons that students start fights with each other:
- The situation seems to be unfair to one or both of the children.
- The children are trying to assert their rights.
- One or both children feel like their perspective isn’t being considered.
- They have opposing viewpoints.
- One child is being teased by the other.
While fights occur for other reasons, most often, it’s due to one of the situations described above.
As a teacher, you are responsible for paying attention to statements and situations like these. If you can catch the signs of an impending fight, you can intervene and end it before it even happens.
To end the fight, you might do different things, such as separating the students into different areas, speaking to one child alone, or issuing a verbal warning to both (which I’ll discuss in the following section).
It doesn’t matter how you choose to end the escalating conversation. The primary objective is to get the children into a different headspace by separating them from each other or engaging them with another activity. This is called pattern interrupt, and it’s enormously helpful in transitioning focus when a person is distressed.
Use Verbal Commands First
It’s ideal to break up a fight before it begins; however, this isn’t always possible. So, what do you do in these situations?
As a teacher, the best option would be to break up the fight with verbal commands. When used in the proper setting, verbal commands can break up a fight fairly quickly. One reason is that they often act as a pattern interrupt, as discussed above.
However, sometimes giving verbal commands will backfire. If students hear their teacher shouting in the middle of a fight, they may push their behavior further to do as much damage as possible. This is because they know they have limited time before consequences are enforced.
Usually, in situations like this, the student has already fully accepted that consequences are coming, and they are relieved to accept them as long as they’ve done enough damage.
You won’t typically encounter students behaving to this degree in elementary school. Usually, this behavior isn’t manifested until middle school and is most prominent in high school fights.
When using verbal commands, there are three things you’ll want to keep in mind:
- Tone of voice
- Body language
- The words spoken
While you might believe that verbal commands are only related to what is spoken, there’s a lot more that goes into communicating the right message. You must speak with authority to break up a fight, but you also don’t want to speak in a high voice that quickly turns screechy. This indicates panic and amplifies the problem.
When giving verbal commands, your voice should be firm and authoritative. You should speak calmly and clearly, without hesitation. Your voice should not sound high-pitched or angry. You are the adult in this situation, and there shouldn’t be any doubts about this.
Additionally, your body language should indicate that you mean business, but you also don’t want to come across as too aggressive, especially because you are breaking up a fight between two young children. How you present yourself physically will vary widely from situation to situation, but there are a few things to remember:
- Stand up straight. This will show the students that this is not just a casual stroll and that you take breaking up this fight seriously.
- Hold your face firm but not angry. Students need to know that while you are breaking up their fight, you are still a safe place for them.
- Walk quickly, but don’t run. Running is another indicator of panic and should be avoided unless there really is an emergency. Instead, walk with purpose toward your students to calmly stop the fight.
Remember, the words you use also matter in addition to your tone of voice and body language. When giving commands, you’ll want to say things like:
- “Okay, break it up.”
- “Security is on the way.”
- “Stop what you are doing. Now.”
You can say whatever gets the message across without demeaning the students. The statements I listed here are just some examples. Remember that the objective is to break up the fight without any physical intervention.
Call for Security if Need Be
School security teams are there specifically for these types of issues. They know that fights break out at school, and while unpleasant to deal with, this is what the security team is trained for.
Even if the fight ends at a verbal command, it’s usually best to go ahead and have security personnel intervene. You never know if and when things may escalate again.
Should Teachers Become Physically Involved in a Fight?
Whether teachers should become physically involved in a fight has long been debated. Some feel that it’s necessary at times. Others feel that stepping in is crossing boundaries and that you should stay back and allow the security team to deal with things.
However, whether or not you become physically involved depends on the fight. While you should first give verbal commands, there are times when this doesn’t help. Therefore, when a student is in extreme danger, it’s crucial to step in as quickly as possible, even if that means getting involved physically.
Getting involved physically certainly doesn’t mean you should start hitting a student or pushing them. As a teacher, you must maintain composure and use physical involvement as a last resort. The best thing to do is walk between the students while giving verbal commands. Most students will not want to hit a teacher; they know this will have far more repercussions than hitting another student.
Therefore, most of the time, walking in between the fight will stop it. There are also times when you may need to extend your hands outward or physically restrain another student.
Legal Repercussions for Becoming Involved in a Fight
If you choose to break up fights between students, you must be aware of the potential legal repercussions you may face.
Parents can often become aggressive when acting in defense of their children. When a child comes home and tells them a teacher got involved in their fight, sometimes it falls back negatively on the teacher.
For this reason, I suggest using physical involvement as a last resort, especially if the fight can be controlled with verbal commands alone.
Here’s a YouTube video by Ryan Capoferri, who goes into some of the legal consequences substitute teachers might face when breaking up a school fight:
Final Thoughts
Teachers should break up fights in school to protect students from further injury. However, teachers shouldn’t become physically involved in the fight unless absolutely necessary, as they can face legal consequences.
To break up fights between students, teachers should:
- Try to resolve any issues between students before a fight starts
- Use verbal commands without demeaning students
- Contact security when needed
