Be careful what you wish for

I'm not quite sure what to think. I still can't get over it. I've raised my voice more over the last two days than I have in my entire Canadian career. If I'd yelled this much at my students back home, they'd all be crying AND I'd likely lose my job. If I don't yell more than this in England, I likely will lose my job.
My behaviour management techniques do not work here... the kids have been completely desensitized. In Canada, when a child is not on task, first you move closer to them, then you use proximity and a gentle touch on the shoulder, then you try proximity, touch and quietly using their name, and then you get more serious. Here, teachers jump straight to laying into a child, going up one side and down the other, at the top of their lungs. Publicly humiliating a child in Canada would make a Canadian teacher recoil in horror by the way. It's at the top of the "Do not, ever, do" list.
My morning was a disaster... we got almost nothing done, and the class was completely out of control. Why? Because I was gentle with them for the first 5 minutes. It didn't matter what I did after that. At lunch I was seriously reconsidering wanting anything to do with the British school system. Maybe I still should.
In the afternoon, I had a different class. I barked at them like a drill sergeant as soon as I went to retrieve them from recess. "FACE FORWARD", "Be QUIET!". And I had no issues with them all afternoon, on a Friday. We got through the assigned work, and I could even do a couple quick activities with them at the end of the day (I had some walrus teeth that I'd picked up in Skagway this summer, and some Canadian coins... their 5 pence looks identical to our dime from the back.)
Another anecdote: I went to get the class from the playground after recess today. It was like walking onto a frozen movie set. The kids were all over the place, in the middle of doing whatever action or game they were up to when the bell rang, but not even twitching. It was dead silent. The only sound was a lady pacing around, berating [loudly, of course] and threatening them if they dared to move. It was the strangest scene I had ever witnessed. Then, a whistle was blown, and all the children rushed into their line-ups. Or almost all of the children. The kids who had done something wrong that morning were still in the "shapes", where they are expected to stand at attention all recess. They remain there, facing the whole school, until you collect them as you march past them into class.
I can't help but wonder how this year is going to change me. Can I take the good and leave the... mayhaps I shouldn't call it bad, but techniques that don't agree with my current teaching philosophy? Will they agree with me by the end of the year? The adults seem friendly and well-adjusted (the relaxed, smiling teachers you see in the staff room do not line-up with the hard, scary teachers you see interacting with their pupils in the hallways). But the kids are treated so... differently to what I'm used to. And here I am, coming from a system where I complain that there are no consequence, and that children are allowed to call too many of the shots.