I need to learn what to do with students who want to misbehave

[CharlotteCollins]

I don't suppose the beginning of the summer holidays is the best time to start a thread... but I do need to come to with a new plan this summer to deal with the students that I've been fairly ineffectual with this year.

This year was my first year back in a comprehensive secondary after nearly 15 years out. I did 4 years at the beginning of my career, then moved into grammar, then at home with DCs.

I've had mainly low ability classes and some children with difficult home lives. I also have some where I am genuinely not sure if they are capable of keeping quiet when they have fallen out with someone else in the room, for example.

One constant problem I have had is insisting on silence when I'm talking. Three times in a lesson of taking while i am means a break time detention. This just seemed to encourage a lot of my year 7 boys to make silly comments and accept the consequences. They want to have demerits/detentions as a status symbol.

(There are also those who don't turn up, nor to the HOD's one, nor to the after school one... and it is not followed up beyond that - this can't be helping.)

It's so frustrating because it really slows the pace of the lesson down. I try to make the lessons interesting, but usually hear muttering of being bored from a few quarters.

Basically, there are a lot of kids who want to get in trouble. I teach maths and they're switched off before we even begin.

I had a reputation for being strict 15 years ago... What's gone wrong? Could it be that I came into this school as a TA, and that's how they still see me? That can't be true of the year 7s, though, who weren't at the school then!

Sorry for the mammoth post, which could be quite confusing to read. Hope someone can help me!

Are you actually going down to 2 days, or 0.4 across more days?

Being part time 0.6 across 5 days I've found it quite difficult in terms of setting detentions. I can't set a lunchtime detention if I'm not going to be in school at lunchtime. If you only work 2 days and they piss around last period of your 2nd day, then you can't set a detention for the next day, what will you do?

So you might need a system that doesn't rely on detentions being possible. A bollocking at the end of the lesson, a phonecall home, being sent out and bollocked in the corridor, being taken off a 'fun' activity and being given a worksheet of sums are options.

Praise praise praise for the good students too.

I work in a very challenging school. Most pupils don't bother bringing their planners or refuse to hand them over.

I don't use detentions much as a sanction. If I keep kids back, they mess and chat so I have to sit and watch them, so effectively I'm in detention. Plus I'm part time and the logistics don't always work.

I go straight to their parents - it's so important to get them onside. Phone calls, letters, get them in, for positive and negative reasons.

Part time spread over four days, so yes, a lot of chasing if they don't turn up when they're supposed to.

Don't you find, with parents of your more challenging kids, that they are pretty ineffectual? Or worse, they threaten "a hiding he won't forget" or the like?

I teach one child whose parent is known for being incapable of setting any boundaries. Children have been removed from the home, but for whatever reason not my student. Another student of mine has a temper which can flare up. One lesson it looked like he was going to storm out, but he engaged with the work enough to see he could do it and did some of the best work he'd done for weeks. I told him so at the end of the lesson. His reaction was to ask for a demerit and refuse to hand over his planner for a merit! It's possible there was still another student in the room, I can't remember.

That boy who didn't want a merit - I do feel I've got the beginnings of a good relationship with him, which I'm please about, particularly as the rest of the department talk about him as a naughty boy. A phone call home after a good lesson would be a good way to build on that.

And I'm pretty sure that getting in contact with and getting to know some of the parents of my really weak, rather strange kids will be helpful.

Can this thread be made sticky at the top of staffroom, it is full of cracking suggestions.m

I think what you are wearing can make a difference to students expectations and respect; I always wear a 'power' jacket at the beginning of the year to help establish who's boss.

Google-eyed poo stickers were a present from a mate in Malaysia, I'm afraid!

Some of them are even puffy & glittery.

Really effective suggestions - CamelHump you should sell yourself for INSETS!
I am a supply teacher in secondary - just finished first year - (and was my first year after qualifying) so have had to learn fast, and can heartily endorse these techniques - have used many of them effectively - the rest will be in the kit bag for next term - thanks!
Luckily I go back a lot to a few schools so get to know the DC and each time a few more of them behave better. The phoning home is not available to me, but I did use this effectively in my training year.
One other tip which is rarely known - keep your head completely still when you speak to a class. Bobbing it about suggests an empathetic conversation and is not authoritative.
This is one I learned (eventually!!) after wondering what it was about HTs that conveyed authority, and it was this.

And lol Raven at him not being the Messiah, just a very naughty boy

Shameless place marking, I will print this thread tomorrow

Love this thread.

On the theme of compliance one tactic I use is the thank you but to state in a way that it's already been done, so for example instead of saying "Charlie tuck your shirt in, thank you" I say "Thank you for tucking your shirt in Charlie" always gets them looking down and immediately doing it.

Instead of asking them to stop talking say "Thank you for sitting quietly", they hear the word quiet instead of the word talk so 9 times out of 10 follow that word. It takes a little while but the praise works better than the command I find.

Darn you, Jeffrey! I've lost half the advice on this thread because of you (I assume).

I haven't read the rest of the thread but want to add, and possibly repeat: get them out of your room as fast as poss. You have a behaviour policy: use it, and then present yourself as staff of the year for using it. Don't be suckered into thinking you are some kind of loser non-coper for using it.
Apply it rigorously to the career asshole. Get them out. Go through the policy from 1 to 10 in five minutes.

Give the rest of the kids in your class a chance to benefit from your teaching istead of suffering your teaching absence owing to dealing with the fuckwit determination to fail in the only way they know how.

I like that attitude, Lily. Actually, I was thinking earlier that in my first school, I was encouraged by a senior teacher to do just that. In my current school, there are sighs aplenty and attempts to accommodate the child(ren) I have thrown out and muttering about how we can't all chuck out the kids we don't want to teach...

Great suggestions :)

I find, when meeting a class for the first time/after the summer, a very quiet and 'starey' countenance is helpful. Clear instructions given in a slowish, even voice, and addressing students as 'ladies and gentleman' (and the aforementioned 'thank you') makes a class think you mean business. I teach music, which can be chaotic if you haven't got a handle on things :)

I agree with this wholeheartedly Wotsup. The most respected teacher of my schooldays entered the classroom and marched to her desk and put down her books before turning and looking at the class who were standing quietly beside their desks. After greeting us in the language she taught the lesson continued quietly and trouble free. She always kept a very upright and still posture and spoke quietly. Her class was one of only four in the school which never needed punishments.(1950s) the other three were art, music and p.e. Her last lesson of the academic year was very very relaxed and we all loved and respected her very much. It's interesting that the girls who followed us twenty or more years later all mention her with respect, love and awe in their Old Girls blogs so it wasn't just a generational thing.

Be prepared. When you know you have these classes prearrange with your colleagues to send troublesome kids out to their classes and have a pile of independent work with pens etc. all arranged in polypockets so there is no fuss and bother when you kick them out.
Don't talk if they are talking. Just stop and wait. It will be hellish at the start and you will spend a long time waiting but make it clear that you will not speak until they are silent. Don't shout during this time. Give them a row when they are silent and then move on. Stop again at the slightest whisper.
Hammer them with the school policy but give them a fresh start every lesson.
There's lost of good advice here!

*lots