New student who doesn’t want to be here

[Laura2121]

Hello all

We’ve got a new student in the small One-Year GCSE class, which otherwise has keen students. This new student is older than the others (originally applied for Year 12 but didn’t make the grades at GCSE), strongly opinionated and is causing a disruption to the nice dynamic that we have all built with this little class.

He has done the GCSE exams already and is just re-sitting it at our school, passing brash comments on the education system that held him back a year, which is putting a negative tone to the lessons.

He avoids eye contact when I’m teaching and is a stark contrast to the other members of the group who are keen and engaged, wanting to be there.

Given that the other students in this group and I have built something significant these last 8 weeks, this new presence is putting a dark cloud over the lessons sometimes. I am not sure how to solve this?

I think this is a ‘kill him with kindness’ situation. I mean, don’t kill him, obvs, but loads of positive attention, find out what his interests are and play to them. Praise. Praise. Praise.

infuriating that you need to do so, but you need him onside, and most people respond best to positive reinforcement…

Is this a private school? I'm not sure about the held back a year dynamic, and I can see that would be difficult for him.

Would it be worth having a one on one chat about what you can both do to help him succeed this year?

If he's really disturbing lessons, then he does need sanctions too- it's not fair on the rest of the class for him to ruin things for them.