I am currently undergoing my formal education as a teacher of English and German as a second language, but I’ve been a full-time private tutor for 5 years. I’m not supposed to teach in a school yet, but due to the state of the education system in my country, there was a lack of teachers and I got invited to teach in my former high school. I teach a group of 11 thirteen-year-olds 6x45 minutes on Mondays and Tuesdays.
I felt like I was doing quite well, but today devastated me. We had our second lesson in the canteen (due to lack of available classrooms) and it was a disaster. I try my best to plan engaging, exciting lessons, so after a short vocabulary test they were due to write, I asked them to go around the classroom and ask each other some questions related to our new unit, I even made and printed them a spreadhseet with their names that they could fill out. They started asking each other for the information in our native language, no matter how many times I asked them to speak in English, and after the time was up, I could not, for the life of me, get them to settle. Half of them were shouting and chatting, the other half were eyeing me, waiting for my response. They are generally quite lively, but today was the first time I could not get them to settle.
Now, I never yell. I do my absolute best to respect everyone, just like I promised them the first time we met. However, I asked for their respect and cooperation in return and I can see that faltering. They got used to me, got bored with me, I don’t know.
Initially I thought I would have more problems with the boys, but they are okay. It’s the girls, they mature faster so they are already these moody teenagers. I can’t get them all to do their homework, even by giving them bad grades for it, can’t get them to engage, put away their phones, nothing. I tried interesting debates, topics, but it doesn’t work for more than 5 minutes. Nothing I’ve seen in movies, experienced as a student myself works anymore. They don’t have the attention span. They are under- and overstimulated at the same time and cannot sit still, but cannot do a stand-up activity in an organised manner, it turns into chaos.
Academically, they are bright and have a very good level of English thanks to video games and movies. They do fairly well in tests, but they won’t improve unless I manage to get through to them. I have some rules in place and I stick to them, so I have given them a few bad grades, etc. but I don’t feel like it’s enough.
For information, I’m barely taller than them and I’m a 25-year-old, younger looking girl so I’m not very intimidating. I’m also not mean-spirited and never talk down to any of my students, but I realised I need a modified approach to teaching in a group compared to teaching privately.
I would appreciate any insight or tips on how to achieve a calm and disciplined environment in which I can actually use the fun stuff I work hard to prepare.
I’m sorry. It can be really tough and stressful planning the next class after a situation like that. I’ve been there.
One thing I think you’ve probably learned the hard way is that the rapport you can build with students in private tuition just doesn’t work in larger classrooms.
You say you’re undergoing formal education as a school teacher - is there a professor on your course that you could consult?
Classroom management techniques will vary vastly between our cultures. The teacher-student-parent dynamic is so different in different countries.
What are kids like at that age in your culture? Do they get self-conscious about how they look to their peers when they engage with teachers or anything like that?
With students in my culture, if I’d just gone through a class like the one you described, my next lesson plan would be very dry. Limited engagement, brief explanation of concepts and straight to textbook exercises and dictation. Trust was given last lesson and it was abused, so now trust is withheld. But that’s with my culture. It might land very, very different with your studets.
That’s why I think consulting one of the professors where you’re studying would be the best course of action. The best advice will clme from there, or from your senior colleagues at the school (the ones who know you were hired ‘early’ in your training).
Thanks for your answer, it was really thought-provoking for me.
I knew going into this that what has worked in my private lessons probably won’t work in a classroom setting, but I was still surprised.
I might ask one of my professors for advice, but I won’t be at the university until the end of the month, but it is a really good idea.
Yesterday, I reflected on your thoughts on classroom management in my country and also in the specific area where I live, which is the poorest part of the country with lots of underfunded schools. I even spoke to their formteacher and she said many of them come from small villages without any proper teachers and have a hard time adjusting, and she told me to be strict but kind. I did put together a dry-ish lesson plan for today but agreed with them that if they cooperate, I’d bring along a game for the last lesson of the day, and it was fine. We had a good discussion and they managed to work in silence as well.