5 Classroom Management Strategies to Keep the Lesson Flowing and Keep Students on Task
There will undoubtedly be students who don’t understand, students who don’t want to understand, and students who finish before everyone else. This will cause you problems unless you’re prepared for it by having strategies and systems in place to prevent and deal with disruptions. A student who needs support, for example, will demand your attention by shouting out, getting out of their chair or, if they are left too long, messing about and distracting others. rnHere are some ways to reduce and manage problems so as to keep the lesson flowing.
1. Use routines
Let’s take an obvious action that happens a hundred times a day – a student getting the teacher’s attention by the simple raising of a hand. Even this needs a routine because students need to be taught responsibility. They aren’t going to learn to solve their own problems if they get used to enjoying immediate support and assistance every time they put their hand up or ask for help. Imagine thirty young people all demanding immediate and individual attention from you at the same time!
A ‘self-check/teacher/partner’ routine frees the teacher up from tending to what are often unnecessary, time-consuming requests for help - and it teaches students to rely on themselves and each other. Students are told that whenever they have a question they must first self-check their work again to see if they can find a way of solving the problem. If they can’t they must then as their learning partner or other group members. Finally, if they still can’t find a solution they can ask the teacher. This is an example of how a simple routine can save you a great deal of time and stress and make your classroom run more smoothly.
2. Have a visual reminder of noise levels
For younger students coloured ‘traffic light’ cards can be very effective (this isn’t really suitable for older students).rnWhen green is up - the noise level in the room is fine. Orange equals a warning - the noise level is too high and needs to drop immediately. If it doesn’t drop after an agreed time the red card goes up. Red means the activity must stop; the students lose a minute of break time and have to work in silence for 5 minutes. A simple ready-made ‘Noise Level Indicator’ on Power Point can be found in the free download area of our teacher resource site Lesson-Ology.
3. Use lots of praise when appropriate
With a difficult group we tend to focus on what’s going wrong... “I told you to be quiet”, “That’s the third time I’ve had to tell you!”, “Be quiet!” This makes for a very negative classroom environment, reinforcing the group’s entrenched view that the classroom is not a nice place to be. rnI don’t care what anyone says - there is not a child on the planet who, deep down, doesn’t want to succeed. If you’re the one who consistently recognises and acknowledges it when they have done something right, done something well, or managed to do something they have previously struggled with they will respond to you.
rn4. Tell them that you will assess every piece of work by the end of the lesson/day
Challenging and vulnerable students will benefit from, and appreciate, immediate feedback on progress. By setting smaller, ‘chunked’ tasks which can be completed in a short space of time, you will have time to mark them and give feedback. This gives you additional opportunities for praising students as well as a bargaining chip if they are becoming boisterous – “I’ll give you your feedback as soon as you’re settled.” Remember, your most challenging students do want to succeed and they like you to notice when they try.
5. Be prepared with ‘emergency’ resources and Back-up activities
I’ve recently been reminded of one of the most important lessons in behaviour management. If you have been on my Free Tips list for any length of time you will know that I’m currently (at time of writing) juggling my business (writing, training and speaking) with looking after my elderly mother who has dementia. rnIt’s a cruel, cruel disease and one of the most difficult symptoms to deal with, from a carer’s point of view, is that the sufferer tends to ‘wander’. When my mother is occupied and sitting down she presents no problem and no risk to herself. It’s when she gets up and starts wandering around – usually at inappropriate times – that the problems start.
Isn’t that a lot like managing behaviour in the classroom? When your students are occupied there are no behaviour problems. When their attention is held by an activity or task, behaviour looks after itself. It’s as if there is no space left on their ‘hard drive’ for naughtiness – it’s all used up.
Keeping your students involved in the work is one of the most powerful and effective preventive strategies you have and many behaviour problems in class can be attributed to work which is either too dull/boring or frustratingly difficult. rnWhenever things start to go wrong in a lesson, a change in activity or a switch to a different ability level/learning style might be all that’s needed to bring your students back to order.
--------------------------------------------rnTo get your FREE Classroom Management Mini-Course which will show you how to succeed with your most challenging students click the following link: FREE Classroom Management Mini-coursern--------------------------------------------rnRelated articles: rnClassroom Management Strategies for Transition TimesrnClassroom management strategies to deal with students who won't complete their workrnMore classroom management strategies