School Violence

INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE ACADEMY OVERSEAS STUDY PREPARATION PROGRAMME

SCHOOL VIOLENCE IN HO CHI MINH CITY

TUTOR’S NAME STUDENT’S NAME COURSE

: : :

GLEN SUTTON LE QUOC CUONG INTERMEDIATE

HO CHI MINH CITY, APRIL 17, 2009 Report: SCHOOL VIOLENCE

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INTRODUCTION

The recent and rapid economic development in Viet Nam has improved living conditions for many people, especially people in Ho Chi Minh City. It is also resulting in very big changes to traditional society and family life. Teenagers are living through these changes which sharply affect teenager’s behavior. Moreover, Teenagers are experiencing a higher level of violence which results from negative benefits of these changes such as violence in Hollywood movies as well as computer games. Eventually, the aim of this report is to find out the reasons for the increasing occurrence of violence in school and to find some reasonable solutions may be discovered to deal with this alarming problem. I hope this survey will be helpful to schools, parents, and society to pay more attention on this problem in reducing occurrence violence in school. The report will be used by schools and parents to determine what exactly influence to their students as well as their children and thereby to raise right solutions contributed to decrease

the

problems. I anticipate the most the people who reply the survey will not have any clear solutions. I also expect many of them to realize that there are more problems of violence in schools.

Report: SCHOOL VIOLENCE

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METHODOLOGY

During the first two weeks of March 2009 at ILA ( the International Language Academy),we conducted a survey among seven foreign teachers, nine students, and four administration staff, who are between 18 and 55 years old. One third is married and has at least one child. The purpose of my study was to discover the views of a variety of people about teenagers’ lives and what teenagers are experiencing nowadays. At the start of my questionnaire is a “personal information” section, followed by seven multi choice questions. The first three questions concerned teenager’s behavior. The next three questions were related to the problem of violence in school; one question looked at the responsibility of schools and parents for the problem. The final question referred to finding reasonable solutions

Report: SCHOOL VIOLENCE

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STATISTIC

Chart 1: Favourite teenagers' activities

Percentage

50

41.9

40

32.3

30 12.9

20 6.5

10 0

Play gamesPlay sport

6.5 Watch Read books Meet movies friends

The chart illustrates what activities teenagers usually do in their free time. As can be seen from the results, the majority of respondents thought teenagers preferred playing computer/video games. Next meeting friends were the second teenager’s favorite’s activity with 32% followed by 13% watching movies and least popular their interest’s activities are 16% either read books or play sports.

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Chart 2: Influence to teenagers's attitude 28.6

Percentage

30 25 20

19 14.3

14.3

15 10

11.9

7.1

5

2.38

2.38

0

Family TV Classmates News/magazines

Internet Films Community Video/Computer Games

The graph shows the percentage of influence to teenager’s attitude. According to the chart, nearly a third of participant think internet is the most impactful to teenager’s character. Classmates were the second affect with 19%. Percentage of people who concern most about family was similar to films, with 14.3% followed by 7.1% TV. The lowest was community and News/Magazines, at 2.38%

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Chart 3: Reasons for school violence 11%

15%

Lack of Education 11%

26%

Weak Disciplline Psychological Problems Aggressive Attitudes

37%

No reason

The pie chart gives information about the different reason for violence in school. We can clearly see from the results, psychological problems were the main reason with 37%. Next was an aggressive attitude with 26%. Lack of education was the next reason with 15%. The smallest about of respondents chose No reason and weak discipline with 11%.

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Chart 4: Reasonable solutions for decreasingviolence in school 7% 41%

35%

17%

More cooperation between parents and schools More mental health education More attention fromparents, schools and society Strict discipline

The pie chart illustrates the capable solutions to reduce violence in school. Accoring to the graph, the most feasible solution is to should more cooperation between parents and schools, at 41%. More attention from parents, school and society is the next solution with 35%, followed 17% more mental health education. The last reasonable solution is need strict discipline with 7%.

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DISCUSSION

I expected that most people agreed that teenagers would be influenced by benefits of the recent economic development and the change in traditional family living. One of the reasons is teenagers are experiencing with a large of infiltration of foreign cultures, especially western cultures and they are not able to realize which positive things they should receive and which negative thing they shouldn’t. For example, it’s normal nowadays to have a computer with available internet connection so teenagers can easily approach huge information which will be very dangerous if there isn’t a direct from their parents. Moreover, there are more Hollywood films coming to Viet Nam. Most of them contain large of violent scenes which can badly influence to teen personalities. I also expected that people would not be aware how serious school violence school was. One of the possible reasons is the parents are busy at their business and are not concern so much about their children’s life except the their studying. Obviously, according to the results, major teenagers’ behaves are sharply affected by internet and classmates than traditional family life. Besides, schools also take their responsibility for the issue because they don’t pay much attention on their student’s life. For example, they should open many beneficial playgrounds such as academic clubs as well as sporty clubs where students can spent their free time outside the studying.

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Eventually, as a result of negative effects from the current life, teenagers recent have got many troubles in forming their proper personalities. Therefore, this is the main cause for the social problem – school violence at 63% of opinions (26% aggressive attitude and 37% psychological problems). This number is definitely a state of alarm which makes educators and parents and society as well recognize how critical the problem is and take care much more on teen’s life especially their behave. In my survey, besides finding out what are the main factors in the increase school’s violence, I also have raised some reasonable remedies. The majority of respondents in my survey thought we should had more mental health education and more attention from parents and school as well as society which are the most feasible solutions that I really expected through the results are mention above. With my research, I hope educators, society and especially parents pay more attention more on what exactly their student, their children are actually going through to help them form the proper character. Besides, from my statistics, they will find out feasible solutions to cure this social problem.

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CONCLUSION In summary, there is a lot of useful information for us to consider. In spite of youth nowadays are active, clever and independent, they are experiencing a big change in tradition, culture and family life. However, parents don’t clearly understand their children because of different ideas about life. On the other hand, teenagers also take some part of responsibility on forming their proper manner, behavior. Besides, educator must realize schools are not only a place which gives students knowledge, but also contribute to build students’ characteristic. If I did the survey again, I would include the question what was pressure teens were facing? What should government do to not only reduce violence in school, but also prevent the recent criminal problems in youth (murder, rape, sexual battery, robbery)? I hope that the statistics which were gained from my report will help parent understand their children deeply and school managers will improve the education system to train either proficient or well-behavior students. Additionally, I also hope the report will be useful document for psychological scientist’ researches

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Questionnaire: School Violence I am doing some research to find out about the increasing occurrence of fighting in schools in Ho Chi Minh among teenagers so that the reasonable solutions may be found. • • • • •

Personal Information Occupation:.................................................... Sex: Male Female Age: 12-18 19-24 25-35 36-50 Are you married : Yes No Do you have any children: Yes No How old are they? Under 12 19-25

over50

13-18 over 25

1. What do you think about teenagers nowadays? Active Clever Independent Naughty Lazy 2. What do teenagers usually do in their leisure? Play games Read books Take part in sports Meet friends Watch movies 3. What effects teenagers attitudes most? Family Classmates Internet Community TV News/magazines Films Video/computer games 4. What do teenagers do if they are in a competition / argument? Fight Tell the teacher Discuss the problems Nothing happens 5. Why do they choose violent ways instead of discussion? Lack of education Aggressive attitudes Weak discipline No reason Psychological problems 6. Who will take responsibility for violence in school? School Parents Society teenagers 7. What are the best solutions for decreasing violence in schools? More cooperation between parents and school More mental health education More attention from parents and school as well as society Strict discipline Thank you! Report: SCHOOL VIOLENCE

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