On 03/06/2012 13:24, ARWadsworth wrote:

Poking someone who is messing on their phone instead of learning is not
assault.

Is smashing them over the head with a baseball bat assault?
Is throwing a duster (board wiper)at them assualt?
Is smacking their knuckles with a ruler assualt?
It seems, to me, to be a question of line drawing and in this case that
line appears to have been drawn at physical contact. In this particular
case there seems to be a "grow up" element to it but the student WAS
assaulted, if indedd the line had been drawn at physical contact.