Poor pupil behaviour is now a bigger concern for primary school teachers than workload, according to a new Teacher Tapp survey.
Some 48 per cent of 3,419 teachers questioned by Teacher Tapp in February this year selected poor behaviour as a top-three issue facing their school, up from 36 per cent of 2,534 teachers questioned in February 2023.
Workload was seen as a top-three issue by 43 per cent of primary teachers - representing a marked drop from 57 per cent in 2023.
Funding is still the top concern, cited by 65 per cent of primary teachers in both 2025 and 2023. This was followed by the social, emotional and mental health (SEMH) needs of pupils - seen as a top-three concern by 61 per cent, compared with 55 per cent two years ago.
Behaviour was next, followed by workload.
Teachers worry about behaviour
The findings on behaviour align with reports from across the schools sector since the pandemic.
Schools have reported increasing challenges with behaviour. More than three-quarters of teachers said pupil misbehaviour had stopped or interrupted teaching last year, according to government data.
Exclusion and suspension rates have risen since the pandemic, and increased by a third in the autumn term of 2023-24.
A separate Teacher Tapp survey of 9,000 teachers in England revealed that nearly one in five had been hit by a pupil last year. A greater proportion of primary and secondary teachers reported pupils fighting, pushing and shoving compared with two years ago.
SEMH a rising concern
Some 61 per cent of teachers questioned in the latest poll cited SEMH as one of their biggest worries. The latest figures from the Department for Education for 2022-23 show 2.8 per cent of primary school pupils were identified as having SEMH needs.
SEMH needs are now the second most common category of special educational needs and disabilties, relating to more than one in six of the total number of pupils with SEND, according to the DfE.
Academics say the social and emotional skills of young people suffered as a result of the Covid lockdowns.
In a survey of parents living in England with children aged between 4 and 16 in early 2021, at the end of the country’s third national lockdown, 47 per cent reported that their child’s social and emotional skills had worsened during the first year of the pandemic.
Parents of children aged 4 to 7 were 10 percentage points more likely to report that their children had seen their social and emotional development worsen than those of 12- to 15-year-olds (52 per cent versus 42 per cent).
Just one in six parents reported that their child’s social and emotional development had improved over this period, according to the poll by the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) and UCL Institute of Education.
The IFS stated that, while “much of the focus post-pandemic has been on children’s academic skills and how best to support children to catch up on ‘lost learning’”, the impact on children’s socioemotional skills and wellbeing “have received much less attention”.
Dr Amelia Roberts, an associate professor at UCL Institute of Education, said it was likely that the rise in SEHM concerns and behavioural issues was a legacy of Covid because children missed out on key socialising skills and likely witnessed stress and emotional issues within their families.
She said problems were exacerbated by long waits for child and adolescent mental health services and money for SEND being diverted to service local authority SEND funding deficits, which had created “a perfect storm”.
“If you look at latest figures for London children alone, a third are living in poverty; that means missing one meal per day and going for three days without fresh fruit or veg. If you are hungry or stressed, you might wriggle about or find it difficult to concentrate in school, so that will cause behavioural issues,” she said.
The Department for Education has been approached for comment.
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