Classroom Behaviour: A Practical Guide To Effective Teaching, Behaviour Management And Colleague Support

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Two students who are supposed to be working silently are chatting. When you instruct them to work silently they respond by complaining, stating that they are not the only ones talking. Ignore their statement, restate your instruction and move away.

This avoids the horrific teacher domineering – “come here Boy!” nonsense. Simply, “Michael…(pause to gain attention)… come up here a sec please.” Then deliberately look away… talk to someone else. Michael will come. He just will. In his own time. It works – try it. It also works in the corridor. “John, come over here for sec please… then walk away to a private area, away from peers. John will follow– and not lose face.” You can then have a quiet word about the behaviour without the show-down. Two students are fiddling with the window blinds during whole-class teaching time. The teacher stops talking to the class. She briefly and tactically pauses to allow cognitive take-up. “Jayson… Adam… you’re fiddling with the window blinds” (a brief descriptive cue to raise awareness). “Leave the blinds, thanks, and facing this way” (the directional cue). Contrast this with “Why are you fiddling with the blinds?” or “Don’t fiddle with the blinds.” 2. Directed choices I notice you’re playing football in the infant area.” This descriptive cue raises the students’ behaviour awareness.

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Be an Assertive teacher: This teacher expects compliance but refuses to rely on power or role status to gain respect. The teacher plans for discipline, uses clear, firm direction and correction, but acts respectfully, keeping the aims of discipline clearly in mind. One of his books, The Art and Science of Teaching, focuses on the balance of science and art to create sound behaviour management strategies. It is stated by the Marzano Institute Australia (2014) that "though classroom instructional strategies should clearly be based on sound science and research, knowing when to use them, and with whom, is more of an art." It is through this rationale that Marzano presents a framework that ensures quality teaching that balances the necessity of research-based data with the need to understand strengths and weaknesses of individual students. Marzano presents this framework in the form of 10 questions to assist planning of a successful instructional design (Marzano Institute Australia, 2014).

Hopefully, of course, beginning teachers won’t be given particularly difficult classes to start with, let’s hope there’s a reasonable balance there. It sometimes can happen that beginning teachers might be given the more difficult students, which is unfair. If they think that’s been happening to them, again it’s really important to make their case to their leadership team to ask for that support to help them to deal with that situation. That's it Fred, I warned you and you've kept on disrupting Tom. Come to the front of the class so that you can work without distraction for 15 minutes.' In this Third Edition of his bestselling book, Bill Rogers looks at the issues facing teachers working in today's classrooms. Describing real situations and dilemmas, he offers advice on dealing with the challenges of the job, and how building up a rapport with both students and colleagues can support good practice. Classroom Behaviour develops the readers knowledge on key points that are paramount to the development of classroom and behaviour management like the "establishment phase." Rogers states as one of the fundamental things for a teacher to do at the "establishment phase" (the beginning of the year, the day before the students return) is ask yourself: "What can I do (and what can we do as a collegial team) to minimise, and prevent (where possible), unnecessary hassles or problems in establishing positive behaviours in our classes and a cooperative learning culture?" (Rogers, 2015). The answers that you will produce will focus on the necessary procedures, routines and rules that enable the smooth running of a complex community of people. Included in this chapter, Rogers refers to the opening procedures a teacher can take that a student might expect to set up that initial meeting to run with ease. Some of the points Rogers highlights as things that a teacher might clarify include:

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Do you want to come and take the lesson?” (This to a group of chatty girls in the instructional phase of the lesson.) So, those routines are essential and the other area that’s crucial is to establish an agreement with the students – a student behaviour agreement, an understanding about the way that we behave in this learning space. Most teachers cover three crucial areas: the right to feel safe, not just physically but psychologically safe, and what that means; the right to fundamental respect and fair treatment of one another; and obviously the right to learn without undue and unreasonable distraction from other students, so what a learning community ought to feel like. Most teachers call that something like a ‘student behaviour agreement’ or ‘rights and responsibilities’ or even ‘positive classroom rules’, but the terms cover those understandings of safety, respect and learning. When a teacher establishes these arrangements and understandings, within about three to four weeks most teachers have got a reasonably expectant group of students and certainly by halfway through Term 1 there is that sense of emerging cohesion that’s been built and established by the teacher’s conscious planning in those critical first few weeks. In his book, Classroom Behaviour: A Practical Guide to Effective Teaching, Behaviour management and Colleague Support, Bill Rogers discussed everything from the dynamics of students behaviour and how both teacher and student behaviours effect each other; to how teacher can support each other in the school with issues such as the hard-to-manage class to stress and coping.

In framing this book, Bill Rogers discusses `what changes' and `what stays the same' in teacher leadership and behaviour. Original chapters from well-known writers and practitioners set out current approaches in behaviour leadership, in terms of practical concerns about behaviour management and discipline. The emphasis on teacher leadership is intentional, as the authors believe that the kind of teacher leadership in a school significantly affects the effectiveness and humanity of discipline and management. But, in terms of who sits with whom, it probably is not helpful unless you’ve got a very cooperative class and you know that beforehand to simply let the students sit where they want. If a teacher says on their first day ‘hi guys, sit where you want’, what can happen is that the kids who think they’re particularly cool, the more narcissistically-inclined kids, will probably want to sit with their best friends and that can often ease out or exclude the less confident students. So, you get a group of cool kids sitting together that may not be the best arrangement for the actual learning of those kids just because they’re sitting with their best friends. JE: Finally then, and then we’ll let you go because you’re a busy man! Do you have any words of encouragement for educators as they head into this new school year – I’m thinking particularly for those that are just starting out in the profession, they’ve just graduated, and they might be a little bit concerned about this aspect of the role?If we are going to use questions as part of our overall discipline, we’re better off using questions that are liable to enable students’ behaviour awareness (Rogers, 2011) i.e. make them think a bit; even transitionally. 4. Using direct questions Are you talking ...?” (to students clearly talking, while the teacher is conducting whole-class teaching). BR: Yes, I think it’s really, really important for teachers, particularly beginning teachers, to be willing to ask questions and seek the support of their colleagues. Most teachers are very willing, based on their own experiences of being a beginning teacher, to give that colleague support – both the moral support that we all need and that professional support, that discussion where we sit down and chew things over and start to share our concerns. And also maybe even some visitation into one another’s classrooms to see a range of practice, hopefully good practice, from their colleagues. It is crucial for colleagues to reflect on and discuss how to calmly and firmly cue very challenging students (see Rogers, 2011 Op. Cit). It is also crucial that time-out be used calmly as well as decisively when needed. Time-out should not be a de-facto reward or used as intentional punishment.