Swedish classrooms messiest in Europe

Published 17 June 2024 at 16.55

Domestic. Problems with mess, noise and lack of study in the classroom are commonplace for many of Sweden's students and teachers. Statistics from the OECD show that Sweden is the country in Europe with the worst classroom discipline.

Share the article

TwittraDela

Swedish schools have major problems with both knowledge results, security and study peace. The teachers today have a tough working environment and in the last decade the number of notifications due to threats and violence at school has doubled, states the government.

An index presented by the OECD states that Sweden is the worst in Europe when it comes to classroom discipline. The index, called DISCLIMA, is based on data from the Pisa survey and is a measure of the disciplinary climate in schools.

This time, they measured the climate in mathematics lessons among 15-year-olds. Sweden is, together with New Zealand and Chile, one of the countries with the worst disciplinary climate. Among other things, over a third of the Swedish students answer that it is usually or always noisy and messy in the lessons. Around 30 percent state that they are distracted by other students using digital tools, for example mobile phones, in most or every lesson. Swedish schools, it is disappointing to see that we are in such a bad position. The government is taking steps to reverse this trend. All students should feel safe at school and have the opportunity to focus on learning things in lessons, says Education Minister Lotta Edholm (L) in a statement.

The figures from the OECD show that 37 percent of 15-year-olds students in Sweden think that lessons are usually or always noisy and messy. Students who answer that it is often or always noisy in class perform worse on average in the Pisa tests.

29 percent of 15-year-old students are distracted by other students using digital tools, for example mobile phones, on most or every lesson. Even students who are distracted by digital tools in class perform worse on average in the Pisa tests.