Swearing in schools and community

September 3, 2025

While I agree with Samantha Helps that teachers punishing children for swearing puts the teacher in a different space to the community from which the children come, what she seems to miss is that there are multiple levels of swearing. One is when the swearing is aimed at the teacher or another pupil. This is where the teacher has a responsibility to stop this behaviour.

It is clear that swearing is now endemic in our communication to add emphasis or to express emotions such as when you hit your thumb with a hammer. Such swearing is now on TV and film and in books and other literature – in fact, I find it a bit twee when punctuation is inserted in swear words in written communication (such as the article in question).

So I do believe that teachers (and parents) have a role to moderate swearing and not allow it to be used as a weapon.