Classroom management is an area that remains consistently on top of every student teacher’s and administrator’s list of things that are likely to create professional challenges. I was proud of myself this week for putting out a potential fire early on in the internship process.
My clinical faculty left the room to retrieve something from the teacher workroom and left me to watch the students while they did independent desk work. This happened to be the class that has the most frequent instances of off-task behavior. As soon as she left, one particularly energetic boy got up and jumped across the room and climbed on top of his friend’s desk, while another boy started throwing paper balls at a classmate, and a pair in the middle of the room began talking loudly over everyone else. I assessed the situation and decided to deal with each situation in that order: I sternly said the first boy’s name and pointed him to his seat; he said “yes ma’am” and sat back down. I turned to the boy throwing paper balls and told him he needed to be more sneaky if he wanted to do that and get away with it—so he needs to stop; he said “yes ma’am” and returned to his work. Finally, to the two talkers, I informed them it was time to use inside voices, and they, too, said “yes ma’am” and quieted down. Upon sharing this story with a movie-buff friend, she commented that the kids had been watching too many '80s movies a la Breakfast Club and Ferris Bueler's Day Off. In the space of five minutes the teacher had returned to a relatively calm and quiet classroom. I felt that my efforts to build rapport and show the students who I am as a teacher had begun to work since I was successful this early on in returning the classroom to order. My hope is that this will stick next week when I begin to teach my own lesson plans pretty much on my own!
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AuthorTrue stories about teaching and learning in Hampton Roads, VA Archives
May 2016
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