There were 264 reported incidents of physical violence against teachers or school leaders in ACT public schools last year alone, a one-year rise of 26 per cent.

Australian Education Union ACT secretary Glenn Fowler said the figures were "stark" and showed occupational violence needed to be looked at, with no level of violence acceptable.

"While public schools are statistically very safe places to be, we cannot be complacent, and we cannot see the unacceptable as acceptable," he said.

"We will be working with the Minister and the directorate urgently to ensure that we get assurances around the health and wellbeing of our members."

Education Minister Shane Rattenbury said on Friday he would continue to consult with the AEU and other stakeholders to ensure the government was doing all it could to make schools safe workplaces.

"I am concerned about the apparent rise in assaults on teaching staff, noting that these figures may be a reflection of a positive shift in reporting culture," he said.

An Education Directorate spokesman said the directorate had moved from a paper system to an electronic health and safety accident/incident reporting system in May last year.

The physical violence rises far exceeded the increase in the student population, with the numbers of kindergarten to Year 12 students in public schools up 3.5 per cent last year and 11.3 per cent since 2011.

Insurers accepted 63 of the 69 workers' compensation claims by teachers based on physical or verbal abuse between January, 2011, and July 31 this year.

Physical violence is defined as any intentional physical contact made either directly by a person or indirectly (such as where the worker is hit by an object deliberately thrown at them), the spokesman said.

Only a small proportion of the incidents reported resulted in lost time from the workplace.

A range of systems and processes were in place to review assaults and address the "difficulties", case-manage behavioural support to students and provide support to those affected by the violence, he said.

This included the Team Teach program, available to all schools, which taught teachers to respond to critical situations in a calm and safe manner to assist a student to "recalibrate and manage their behaviour".

ACT Principals Association executive committee member Jason Borton said the figures were a surprise and showed there was some work to be done.

He said there was a heightened awareness of the value in reporting and the online system had made it easier, but he had not heard of any recent discussions among principals to suggest student violence had escalated.

Mr Fowler did not dispute the new system had improved reporting, but said the union was concerned expectations varied across schools and under-reporting remained.

The small number of verbal violence incidents reported reflected teachers' high threshold, he said.

Private schools do not provide the directorate with equivalent figures on physical and verbal abuse or suspensions, and will for the first time report the far narrower category of "critical incidents" by September 30.

Last week the directorate released to Fairfax Media its public school suspension figures, which showed a 9 per cent rise in students suspended last year but a 19 per cent fall since 2011. Overall suspensions for physical misconduct – not limited to violence against teachers – slightly fell last year.

The maximum number of suspension incidents per year for an individual student has ranged from 13 to 16 since 2011.