Year 8s driving me chuffing nuts - help

[Truckit]

Dear god.

Shouting out. Butting in with ‘hilarious’ jokes. Getting up and wandering (I was JUST getting a dictionary, oh my god don’t you want me to WORK.

I am exhausted and I have run out of ideas. Today was chaos. Called Home and set detentions and it’s made no difference. (One kid so disruptive in the detention that I ended up having to set another one!)

Help!

[noblegiraffe]

How long have you been teaching? (Just to know what level to peg the advice!)

[mamaduckbone]

Do you teach my son I wonder...he is year 8 and I can imagine him doing all of those things. Sorry, no helpful advice though...

[OhWhatFuckeryIsThisNow]

I feel your pain. Last years nightmare year seven have graduated to nightmare 8s. I'm cover so they already see me as a mug. Two lessons, no differentiated work for really struggling kids. Appalling behaviour from the rest. I'm sure others will be struggling with them too. Behaviour policy every single time. Eventually if enough people are doing it slt take notice. One stood over my desk when I was writing on his report, then when I gave him a u, yelled "oh my god, who do you think you are?" The person telling slt to check the cctv sunshine.

[Truckit]

Poor you fuckery

Fifteen years giraffe

[WeKnowFrogsGoShaLaLaLaLa]

As a HOY for Yr8, I, absolutely get you. 😂😂😂

[SagelyNodding]

I have my first yr8 class this year... They are a tough crowd! Immature and needy and incapable of keeping quiet...
I find them much more draining than my year 9 classes.
I will be having a major crackdown after half term I think, with phone calls home involvement from SLT and form tutors.
Sorry, no help, but lots and lots of sympathy!

[ps1991]

What is your schools behaviour policy. We have two warnings then sent to isolation. So if this was my class getting out of their chair would be a warning, talking out of turn would be a warning. Do it again and off they go. Our students then spend the rest of the lesson is isolation and the next lunchtime there too. But behaviour is very good at the secondary school I work at and I haven’t had to ‘send’ anyone all year yet. Have you spoken to your HOD? Mine would be happy to put students on subject report if they are being a pain in your lessons, which results in detentions with pastoral staff and after school detentions if their work ethic and behaviour doesn’t improve.

[Truckit]

Ha. I am the HOD!

We can send them to cool down but only for ten minutes which is more disruptive as then they don’t know what’s happening in the lesson and also they’ve been sharing their woes with other kids who’ve been sent out.

[Dinosaursdontgrowontrees]

No advise but I have lots of friend who are teachers they all without exception say the year 8s are the absolute worse!

[MissMarplesKnitting]

Oh god, my year 9 are bringing my gears too.

Some are struggling with SEan but have barriers to learning so high I can't get the to work even when I do half of it for them. The shouting out, the dramas because someone said their name, the general playing "whackamole" dealing with one interruption after another.

I'm at the end of my tether.

Today I rang home about two and have them on department monitoring report. Will see how that goes....

[Truckit]

Yup it’s whackamole. Miss, Miss, Miss, MISS. Not now, I’m soeaking. Oh-my-goooood I was askin’ about the WOOOOORK.

[elephantoverthehill]

With year 8s I find the let's line up and come in the room again, if any dare to interrupt during the register. It' a bit of a war of attrition but by the third or fourth time they are bored and quite calm. I know it's old fashioned but it seems to work.

[ps1991]

Arghh sending them to ‘cool down’ sounds awful and I can see how it would be more disruptive! Maybe get SMT involved? What set are they? I teach a set 2 and set 5(bottom) year 8 (maths) and find that set 5 are very needy but I have moaned that I don’t have TA support and now have one in almost all their lessons. This makes a huge difference to their behaviour because they have no reason not to be on task. Maybe establish a new set of expectations after half term. Do a new seating plan and accept no excuses. For a class that isn’t working I often do ‘you must get to question7 or you’ll be back at lunch’ then don’t stress about what they are/aren’t doing but stick to your word! I don’t often keep them back if I do this :)

[Scatteredthoughtss]

Don't they raise their hand to speak?

[calpop]

Having just been through a y8 child (now in y9) you have all my sympathy! They are unreasonable and irrational. I think the onky thing you can do at thatbstage is bribe them with stuff (but I am not an expert 😁)

[MissMarplesKnitting]

🤣🤣🤣🤣raise their hands to speak 🤣🤣🤣🤣

Nope. There are no doors between brain and mouth. All thoughts flow from the brain directly to the mouth, without any attempt at filtering them for appropriateness.

[easternedge]

What age are year 8s?

[Truckit]

Or shoot their hands up and shout out anyway. Then get arsey (oh my gooood my hand was up) when told to zip it

12/13 eastern

It’s a difficult age.

[FutureMrsTempah]

Don't they raise their hand to speak?

Ha ha ha ha, at my school they raise their hand and then start speaking, until I point out that I haven't actually invited them to speak! Some still look puzzled and say "but I had my hand up"
I dread to think what junior school classrooms are like

[FutureMrsTempah]

We either work in the same school @Truckit or it's a fairly universal issue

[Dermymc]

Oh gosh OP I hear you!

Policy over and over here. Also Talk quietly so they have to listen. I've also done minimal differentiation and focused on establishing rules. It's not chaos and it is better than the first 2 weeks, there is plenty of room for improvement however.

[mynameisnotmichaelcaine]

Are you in English? Just assumed because of dictionaries. I start every single KS3 lesson with ten minutes of silent reading. I find this dulls their excitability, and we start off in a quiet, purposeful mood which (touch wood), often then keeps going.

[Truckit]

It’s something I’ve considered but so many are reading resistant I don’t think it would work. No reading books and huddles round the bookshelf and squabbles over the Guinness book of world records ...

[noblegiraffe]

Hah, 15 years, I expect you know all the usual advice then!

If you can’t get silent reading at the start of a lesson, can you do some other silent settler like a wordsearch or anagrams? IME kids bloody love wordsearches but there’s not much call for them in maths. You could use keywords or something to make it relevant.

Wanderers - get them to hand out and collect in dictionaries?

Housepoints and fulsome praise to those not being insufferable arses?

The kid who was an arse in detention, can you park him somewhere else next lesson? Or can the detention escalate? Not really fair that you have to give up even more time to deal with him.

Keep chipping away at them. If even a couple of parents step up and confiscate their Xbox or something, then that’s a couple less to deal with.

[Teacherlikemisstrunchball]

OMG my year 8s last year were HIDEOUS. Rowdy, argumentative, late to lessons, refusing to stay on task etc etc. However at our school we introduced options at the end of yr 8 so now I don’t actually those who haven’t picked my subject in year 9. I covered a lesson last week with the worst offenders from last year and they were a delight. Friendly, chatty and actually admitted that they missed me now that I don’t teach them any more . So no advice just solidarity and understanding and virtual cake and gin. They will improve, year 8 is a really tough year behaviour wise IME. My year 10s were grim in year 8 and now they’re my favourite class by a long chalk.