Classroom Management

Michael Cresswell Toyo S.H.S. 福岡県

Contents

What is Classroom Management?

Physical Presence

Voice

Classroom Language

Marking the Stages of a Lesson

Seating Plans

Student Groupings

What If?

Evaluation

Contact: milkandcookies@hotmail.co.jp

What is Classroom Management? Welcome. The end of your first year teaching in a Japanese high school is almost at an end. You’re settling into life here, and starting to feel like part of your school community. You’re beginning to understand its culture, the codes of behavior that tell you how you should dress, how you should address your colleagues, how you and your students should work together. You are becoming a teacher, and naturally you want to do a good job. As teaching assistants, we’re in a privileged position. We share few of the additional responsibilities of our over-worked, under-paid colleagues. Our job is simple: to plan and teach lessons. Our workplace is the classroom, and how we manage that classroom is the most important factor governing our success as teachers. So, what is ‘Classroom Management’? Activity 1 Take a minute to think about the term ‘Classroom Management’. What does it mean to you?

Physical Presence Your physical presence in the classroom plays a large part in your ability to manage a it effectively. The way you move, how and where you stand, how physically demonstrative you are – all these have an effect on the way you are perceived.

Like anyone else, you have your own physical characteristics and habits, and you take these into the classroom with you. But there are a number of issues to consider which are not idiosyncratic to you and which have a direct bearing on your success as a classroom manager.

Proximity Some students will be uncomfortable if you are physically very close to them. Others may interpret distance as a sign of coldness. Be receptive to your students’ own ideas of physical space, which may be quite different from those you are accustomed to in your home country. Watch how they react and respond accordingly. Appropriacy Deciding how closely you should work with students is a question of appropriacy. So too is the general way in which you sit or stand in the classroom. Try to avoid hovering over students – if you are working closely with students engaged in pairwork, for example, try crouching down so that you are below their eye level. Most students will find you less threatening this way, but be aware that others may find the informality uncomfortable at first.

All the positions you take in the classroom – standing to one side of the blackboard, standing behind the lectern, sitting on the edge of a desk – make strong statements about you. It is important that we consider our physical behavior and body language so that we can behave in a way that is appropriate with regard to the teachers we work with, the students we teach and the relationships we want to create with them.

Movement Some teachers spend most of their time in the classroom in one place – at the front of the class, for example, or off to one side. Others spend a great deal of time walking from side to side, or striding up and down the aisles. Although this is largely a matter of personal preference, it is worth remembering that motionless teachers can bore students, whilst teachers constantly on the move can turn them into tennis-match spectators. Most successful teachers move around the class to some extent. It allows us to maintain our students’ interests, focus in on students who need our help, and discourage disruption, among other things. Contact Much of what we’ve discussed above is to do with the issue of contact. Maintaining contact with your students is key to your ability to manage the classroom effectively.

To maintain contact, you need to be aware of what the students are doing and how they are feeling. This means watching and listening just as carefully as teaching. It means making eye contact with them, listening to what they say and responding appropriately. Activity 2 Try to complete the table below with situations/activities that might be appropriate for the behavior described. If you cannot put anything in the column, explain why not.

teacher behavior

appropriate situations

The teacher shouts.

The teacher is at the back of the class.

The teacher is at the front of the class.

The teacher is ‘sitting’ on a table around which four students are working.

The teacher is sitting on the floor.

Voice We’ve looked at how our physical presence has an effect on classroom management. Now let’s look at perhaps the most important tool at our disposal – our voices. Activity 3 W rite down three qualities a good speaker possesses.

Activity 4 Now write down three things that distract you from what a speaker is saying, or make it difficult for you to listen, or hard to understand.

How many of these things are relevant to you and the way you use your voice? When considering the use of the voice in classroom management, there are some central issues to think about. Let’s look at these in detail:

Audibility If your students can’t hear you, you’re wasting your breath. Literally. Breathing properly is essential to being heard without shouting - you don’t have to shout to be heard! If you feel your throat muscles becoming tired when you are teaching, it’s because you’re doing the work there instead of with your breath.

Try to strike the right balance between audibility and volume. You can practice this by whispering, to see how far away you can be heard (you’ll be surprised), and by calling to objects at varying distances from yourself. Variety It is important for students that we vary the quality of our voices too - as well as the volume we speak at – depending on the type of speaking we are doing. For example, the voice we use to give instructions for an activity should not be the same as the one we use to give informal feedback, or to talk to a student on a one-to-one basis. Using a range of different voices will help give your lessons structure. We should also try to vary the pitch, pause, stress and intonation patterns we employ. To capture your listeners’ attentions, try pitching your voice within its whole range. Use pause for effect, not just to give you a chance to catch your breath. Stress and intonation are particularly important, as Japanese is not a stress-based language like English (most languages aren’t). In particular, try to avoid upward intonation on instructions – students are likely to interpret this as a question. Bad Habits Don’t get obsessed with whether you’re twitching or err-ing, but do be aware of what you’re saying and how you’re saying it.

Classroom Language Now we’ve looked at the way we say things, let’s think about what we say. As a new teacher, monitoring the language you use will probably take a lot of time and effort. As important as it is to be heard, if the students can’t understand the classroom language we use we might as well be speaking double-dutch. Learner Language Level Comprehensibility of input is not only essential to your ability to manage learning effectively, but also to the success of your teaching as a whole. In planning our lessons we pay careful attention to matching the level of the language items to be taught to the level of the learners themselves. The English we use to teach those language items should be no different. Think before you speak – give clear, competent responses to questions, give unambiguous feedback when correcting and praising learners, and be aware of processing load. Obviously, the better you know your students the easier you will find it to get the level right but even with a class you’ve never taught before, by decoding the inter-language they use, and tuning into signals of non-comprehension you will soon be able to get an idea of where to pitch the level of your own language. Quality & Quantity of Instructions The most important time for you to be understood is when you are giving instructions. In the language of instruction, less is definitely more – your instructions should be as clear and concise as possible. The best way to explain activities is to model them as you relay the instructions to your students. Non-verbal Communication

Make sure you’re students are familiar with the gestures and other non-verbal communication you may use in class, and monitor these just as carefully as you do your language. While some cultures and some people are very expressive in terms of hand gestures, facial expressions, etc., Japanese generally are not and may find them confusing. Imagine you have a heavy book in each hand. Any gestures you do make will be deliberate and clear. It may be a good idea to spend time teaching some of the gestures and expressions you commonly use. Activity 5 Imagine you are planning a lesson for a class of 40 elementary-level students. Write a set of instructions for one of these well-known party games.

Hide-and-Seek Hot Potato Memory Musical Chairs Pass-the-Parcel

Marking the Stages of a Lesson An active and entertaining lesson will almost always involve several distinct stages. At the very least, there will be a beginning and an end. To create the kind of structured classroom environment that will support your students’ learning, you need to mark these stages effectively. Opening the Lesson The first stage of a lesson will often involve introducing students to the language function or structure they are about to learn, or discussing with them what you hope to have achieved by the end of the class. You may wish, of course, to deliberately withhold such information in order to add an element of surprise. However, just as any play opens with the raising of a curtain, and any visit to the doctor begins with the words, ‘Now then, what seems to be the problem?’ your lessons should have a clear beginning. Starting & Stopping Activities At each subsequent stage of the lesson - when an activity is about to begin or about to end, when you want to signal a change of direction, or if you need to regain the initiative and re-focus students on the task in hand - you will need firstly to get their attention. This can be difficult, when drawing speaking activities to a close, or when students are working in groups, for example.

Don’t let games and activities drag on for too long – set time limits, and use theatrical elements like bells, whistles, buzzers and countdowns to start and stop activities. You can use background music, too, pausing it when you want students to change partners, for example. Closing the Lesson You may occasionally find yourself running out of time at the end of the lesson, but it’s important to provide some sort of closure to every lesson that you teach. A summary of the main points of the lesson is a good way of drawing it to a conclusion, and is an opportunity for useful feedback. Alternatively, you may wish to forecast what the next lesson will involve. Attention usually wanes by the end, however, so if you plan to give homework or to ask the students to prepare something for the next class, give forewarning and instructions first and a final reminder at the end.

Activity 6 Write down three good ways of starting any lesson.

Activity 7 Rate the effectiveness of the following ways of regaining the initiative in a noisy classroom (1 = most effective, 10 least effective). =

The teacher blows a whistle.

The teacher claps his or her hands. The teacher raises a hand, and waits for students to do the same.

The teacher shouts at students to be quiet. The teacher speaks quietly and waits for students to listen.

The teacher rings a bell. The teacher stands at the front of the class with arms folded.

The teacher counts down loudly from 5 to 1. The teacher pauses the background music that was playing.

The teacher holds up a STOP sign. Activity 8 Write down three good ways of ending any lesson.

Seating Plans In a typical Japanese classroom, students sit in orderly rows. They may have a desk in front of them, or a writing palette fixed to one arm of their chair. Other classrooms you use might have several tables around which groups of students can work together, or media consoles at which a pair of students is seated.

Whatever the classroom looks like before the lesson, you can usually play around with the layout to some extent, in order to suit your needs. Let’s look in detail at the four seating plans most often used in TESOL classrooms.

Orderly Rows There are obvious advantages to students sitting in orderly rows. You have a clear view of every student in the class, as do they you, meaning you can make eye contact with the people you are talking to. You can move easily up and down the aisles, allowing for more personal contact with individual students.

Orderly rows imply teachers working with the whole class, and some activities are especially suited to this seating plan: teaching from the board, using an OHP, or watching a video, for example.

When teaching in this kind of classroom, it is vitally important to maintain contact with all of the students, and to avoid predictability. For example, when asking students direct questions, don’t elicit answers in a predictable order, student after student. Choose students at random - keep them on their toes.

In classes of 40 students or more, orderly rows may be the best option. Circles & Horseshoes

In smaller classes, you might consider using a circle or horseshoe plan. A classroom arranged in a circle makes a strong statement about the kind of teacher you are – the implication is one of equality, so if your aim is to lower the boundaries between you and the students, you may wish to use one or other of these seating plans. In a horseshoe, you can place yourself at the open end of the arrangement, giving you access to the board and other teaching aids you may want to use. Another key advantage of circles and horseshoes is that all the students can see each other. This encourages them to use eye contact, gesture and facial expression, facilitating more authentic interaction. Separate Tables The other seating plan commonly seen in TESOL classrooms has students seated in small groups around separate tables. This arrangement encourages students to take more responsibility for their own learning, giving you the freedom to monitor from a distance, and to spend more time working closely with individual students or groups. As with circles and horseshoes, students can see each other’s faces, but with closer contact and less potential for embarrassment than in front of the whole class, with well-chosen activities this arrangement is even more likely to generate real communication. On the downside, students may not always want to cooperate with the other members of their group, and careful planning may be required to avoid conflict. It can make whole-class teaching more difficult, since the students’ focus of attention is more diffuse, and it may be hard to maintain discipline in a class where students are

t used to sharing responsibility for their learning. no Activity 9 Read the following statements. Do you agree or disagree? Why?

a. Classes where students sit in straight rows are easier to control.

b. Sitting in straight rows is old-fashioned and stops people learning.

c. Having students sit in straight rows is the best way to teach a large class.

d. It is important for students to face the teacher. e. Students participate more fully in a class when they

sit in straight rows. Activity 10 What is the best seating plan for each of the following situations? Why?

a. You want to have a game in teams with a class of forty students.

b. In a class of fifteen students you want to discuss a topic with them.

c. You want your class of thirty students to work in pairs.

d. You have some reading tasks in a class of ten students. e. Students are designing an advert in groups. f. The students are going to listen to a tape.

Student Groupings Whatever seating plan you use, the students themselves can be organized in different ways: they can work as a whole class, in pairs or groups, or alone. Whole Class As we have already discovered, there are many times when teaching students as a whole class is the best type of classroom organization. This doesn’t necessarily imply that students should sit in orderly rows, however. Whatever the arrangement, you can have students focus on you and on the task in hand. Groupwork & Pairwork

Groupwork is a cooperative activity: five students, perhaps, discussing a topic or solving a problem. In groups, students are more able, and more likely, to experiment and use English than in a whole class setting. Pairwork has many of the same advantages, and both give learners chances for greater independence. You must relinquish some of the control you have when teaching a whole class. In return, students must share some of the responsibility for their own learning. When setting up a pairwork or groupwork system, always follow a similar procedure, so that students know what to expect. Plan ahead to avoid problems setting up the activity, and be sure to assign roles clearly. Check that students have understood by asking, for example, all the A’s to raise their hands. It’s a good idea to model the activity too, with one pair or group. Only let students start when they are all clear about what to do, and after they have started, quickly circulate to check that everyone is getting on OK. Watch out for dominant students forcing out those who are less confident, and discourage peer-correction. Groupwork may cause students to be more disruptive than they would be in a whole-class setting, and remember that they are likely to revert to L1 usage when your focus is elsewhere – you will have to develop your own strategies for promoting use of the target language, by fostering a need to communicate in English. Solowork The other alternative to whole class teaching is solowork. Working alone lets students move at their own speed and gives them time to think. They can relax their public faces and consider their own needs and progress. Less outgoing students in particular will benefit from solowork, and they deserve just as much consideration as their more extroverted classmates. How often you use these seating plans depends largely on your students. Do they enjoy pairwork? What do they get out of it? Do the advantages of groupwork – cooperation, involvement, autonomy – outweigh those of whole-class teaching – clarity, dramatic potential, teacher control? Do students work conscientiously during solowork?

Good teachers use different student groupings for different activities, and monitor the success of these

tivities, always seeking to be more effective. ac Activity 11 What is the best student grouping for these activities? Put W = Whole Class, P = Pairwork, G = Groupwork, or S = olowork in the boxes. S

Students face an imaginary moral dilemma. Students design a poster for a school event. Students listen to a tape recording of a conversation. Students prepare a talk on a subject of their choosing. Students repeat words to make sure they can say them correctly.

Students work out the answers to a reading comprehension.

Students write a dialogue between a traveler and an immigration officer.

Students write a paragraph about themselves. Activity 12 List some of the advantages and disadvantages of groupwork and pairwork.

Advantages

Disadvantages

What If? Even experienced teachers face problems from time to time. The real test of your ability to manage a classroom effectively is not how well you can plan and teach a class under ideal conditions, but how you respond when things don’t go according to plan. Establishing a Rapport Having a good rapport with your students not only makes it easier to deal with any problems that do arise, it also means those problems are less likely to occur in the first place. Establishing a rapport can be difficult, especially when teaching adolescents. It is important to appear confident, and to be seen to be taking an interest in the students as individuals, which is helped by learning their names. Your first aim should be to get control of the group. Once you have that, you can start to relax and get to know students on a more informal basis. Try it the other way round and you will find it hard to exercise authority when you really need to. Teaching Large Classes Teaching a class of forty or fifty students is no easy task. It can be very daunting, and maintaining contact with students at the back and sides of the classroom may be difficult. Using worksheets for work you might otherwise do with the whole class will keep everyone involved. Pairwork and groupwork will help to maximize student participation. You can use the size of the class to your advantage too, though. Super-size your teaching: in a big class, funny is funnier, drama is more dramatic and a good vibe feels even better. Discipline Problems There are many reasons why discipline problems occur – students may find the work too easy or too hard, they may be tired or overexcited, they may not be engaged by the

topic or the lesson may suddenly lose its momentum. Whatever the reason, try to be receptive to the students’ needs. When students misbehave they’re usually trying to tell you something, and if you can identify the cause of the problem you are more likely to be able to find a solution. However you respond, don’t lose your cool!

Here are some common problems, and suggestions for how to respond:

Students don't want to talk. In the host culture, a quiet classroom is considered a good thing. Not only are students not used to talking in class, many will also be afraid of making mistakes in front of you and in front of their peers. They need to know that making mistakes is a necessary part of learning any language. Through controlled practice, like reading aloud, pairwork activities and role-play, they can gently be encouraged to express themselves in English.

Students don’t want to listen. Ironically, once you’ve got them talking, you may find it hard to get them to stop. We have already looked at ways to get the attention of the whole class, but sometimes one or two students will continue talking. If they’re using English, no problem! If not, make contact as soon as you can. Move closer and interrupt them with your physical presence, make eye contact, ask them a question - try to bring them back into the class. If these strategies fail you can of course separate them in future lessons but think first - maybe it was you who was doing too much talking. Overloading students processing capacity with too much classroom language will naturally cause them to zone out – think about how many times a day you turn off to the spoken Japanese around you.

Students keep using Japanese. Foster a sense of the need to communicate in English by speaking English as much as possible yourself. Only respond to English use, but make sure that students have the basic language items they need to function in the classroom first – you can teach these in a lesson or two. Remind them that this is their opportunity to practice, and praise students for using the target language, rather than nagging those who don’t.

Students refuse to cooperate. Sometimes, no matter how hard we try to make our lessons interesting, we find ourselves faced with a student who is deliberately uncooperative. Lack of cooperation can take many forms – constant chatter in class, failure to do homework, blunt refusal to participate in activities, constant lateness or bad manners. As an assistant, where possible it’s best to let your teaching partner deal with the situation. At the very least, you should consult with your colleagues before taking any kind of remedial action. But don’t avoid the issue – they are still your student and you have a responsibility to teach them. Talking to them outside class may help - if you can find out what they are interested in perhaps you can design activities they will find engaging.

Evaluation In order to develop our classroom management skills, we need to evaluate the success of our lessons, and the activities and techniques we use in them. Evaluation Methods One benefit of team-teaching is that there is always another teacher on hand to assess your lessons. Asking your T.T. partner for advice is perhaps the easiest way to get a second opinion on the success or failure of a technique or activity. Videoing your lessons is also a good way to evaluate your teaching. If you want to monitor your speech, you could make an audio recording instead. Another way to get feedback is to ask students directly. Did they enjoy a particular activity? Was it useful? Not all students will discuss topics like this openly, however. It might be better for them to write their answers down and hand them in. Encouraging students to talk about lessons will make it easier to plan and manage more effectively in future. You will need to actively check their progress too, by setting homework assignments, for example, by giving them speaking activities in which they are scored for

rticipation, or by having frequent vocabulary tests. pa Activity 13 Imagine you have invited a colleague to observe and evaluate your lesson. Write a list of questions for them to answer.