Classroom Management

Classroom management, in my opinion, is ranked right up there with motivation that we studied last week.  Being able to control the reigns of my class  is going to be my biggest challenge hands down.  I know that I am an easy-going person and I love to have a good time but right now I have no clue on how to best manage a class.  I'm so easy-going in fact that sometimes I feel like I'm a "door mat."  Controlling my class is something that I will need to really focus on if I'm going to have any success.  I rarely gave my teachers trouble in school because I knew if I caused problems, my mother would be waiting at home to give me a good tongue lashing and punish me.  I remember plenty of people in high school that gave the teachers the hardest time and my heart sinks just thinking about in those situations that WILL happen to me.

For my future classroom, I would first set the tone by the way I first present myself to the class.  I believe if you first present the rules of the class and the consequences if you do not follow the rules, then they will know you, as the teacher, do not let things slide.  If you let students kind of get away with no consequences then you're just setting yourself up for a bad time.  Last year when I was interviewed for the teacher education program, I answered one of their questions with "respect is key and it goes both ways."  Establishing and maintaining productive teacher-student relationships is one of the most, if not the most, important aspects of classroom management.  Some students may have had teachers in the past who don't care much about them and, as a result, that student may not think that I care about him/her.  Ormrod brings up an excellent point, "Regularly communicate caring and respect for students as people." (Ormrod 462).  This applies to me because I will be dealing with high school age students, yes they will be rowdy sure, but they are also young adults.  Keeping a line of communication open to these kids is critical because some might not be as fortunate and have a rough home life.  Think about it for a minute, our students will be looking up to us in the future.  They spend 8 hours a day with us and we act as their role model.  No matter how rough their home life may be, we MUST show them that we care because we are the only other adult figures in their lives.  Never give up.  Work hard to create a friendly and open classroom environment.

I found a useful link that adds on to topics presented in our textbook, Seven Strategies for Building Positive Classrooms, by Carol Gerber Allred, that showcases useful ways to build a great classroom environment.  I hope people will take the time to read through them all.

So clearly I am keen on three big topics for classroom management and creating a learning environment (I love keeping things in threes, it's easier that way):

1. Establishing rules of the class and the consequences
2. Establishing and maintaining productive teacher-student relationships
3. Creating a positive classroom climate - one that is welcoming and friendly to all

High School Case Study

For the CLE from our CSEL guidelines, I chose to examine the high school case study, as this clearly applies to me.  

You have started to dread your fifth period history class. It is made up entirely of seniors who are counting the days until graduation and seem to care very little about learning. Most of the students are obviously members of one clique or another. Whenever they think your back is turned, they start passing notes and text messaging. Worse, three boys have started disrupting those engaged in learning. No matter what you say, they laugh at the students who present their group projects to the class. Yesterday, Tony, Jeff, and Morris started roughhousing; then all three of them refused to sit down and follow the class procedures that the classroom community agreed upon at the beginning of the year. Although you have been using a set approach to handling infractions of rules, you decide it is time to change these procedures.

First, since these are high school age kids, I would start off by cueing them to their misbehavior.  When a teacher stops a lesson to correct a bunch of rowdy kids, it distracts every one else as well.  By taking time to pause and give them a stern look this ideally would get them to stop, and probably feel awkward in front of their peers as well.  They know this behavior is bad and should stop unless they want to cause more problems.  The three boys need to realize that school isn't over yet, but it's also my job to push them to the finish line.

Second, if the misbehavior continues then I would pull all three boys aside after class for a private talk.  A private after class talk is much better than openly calling attention to them because of two things: it takes them away from everyone else so they don't feel like they're getting away with it.  Two, as an educator, I don't want to flat out embarrass them or make them feel unwelcome.  This would also give me a chance to reinforce my classroom rules and consequences for disobeying those rules.  But there's still a big question about this case: How do you get the kids to care and pay attention even though they are so close to graduating?  They do not see a reason to.  I hope to answer questions like this in EDPY 401.

Last, if they continue to be a problem and it is obvious that they still don't care about my class, I will call in the cavalry (the parents).    As I mentioned near the beginning of the blog, communication is vital in both teacher-student and teacher-parent relationships.  If you communicate with parents to show that you care about their kids instead of constantly punishing them, then that will hopefully lead to the parents disciplining them at home.

These are perfect scenario responses to the case study.  Who knows what to expect in the real world classroom.  Sometimes classroom rules don't matter to some kids and that requires adapting to on the teacher's part.