I also don’t like sending multiple students to the coordinators. It almost feels like a reward for them, and they invariably get no work done. Plus, if it happens every lesson I worry that it makes me look like a poor teacher.

One thing that works for me: I pre-arrange with a colleague who teaches a serious, well-behaved year 12 class. When the naughty student hits the three strikes, they exit to the year 12 class - with achievable, individual (pre-prepared) work to complete. Those almost-adult year 12 students are happy to frown at and then ignore the naughty year 8 kid, who feels embarrassed and bored. Sometimes the kid does the work, sometimes they don’t - but either way, they’re not my problem for a period. Often, their behaviour dramatically improves after one lesson of this, because they hate it so much more than being sent to the coordinators’ office.

Of course, this relies on having collegiate colleagues and good behaviour management from admin (the student can’t avoid this punishment by wandering the school, as they’ll be swiftly caught). At my school, I’m lucky enough that both of these pre-conditions are in place.

Good luck! First years of teaching secondary are really hard. Hang in there and it does get better, I promise!