Proven Techniques to Control an Unruly Classroom

In most schools, the bell will ring and the students will meander up to their classroom from their morning foray in the playground. 

Students will dawdle into their seats in waves, usually in the very groups they formed that morning. They will chatter about the activity in which they were involved a few minutes ago while you attempt to gain their attention.

You can jump in right there and put a stop to unruliness.

Or can you?

So you have taken on the role of the Classroom Gatekeeper.

The unruly students at this point, will start to feel uneasy, because the classroom was their domain before.

You have taken away their locus of control.

Now you need to Create your presence.

You are about to build a culture of compliance for all students.

This module looks at how to build a culture of compliance in your classroom.

This is the greatest hoax in out educational system. The soft start to the day can do so much irreparable damage that you could be setting yourself up for failure. My opinion differs to some of the experts.

What do you think? 

The behaviour of unruly students may not be your fault, but as a teacher, you must act. But how should you act?

There is no doubt that unruly student behaviour gets a reaction.
 
It drives up our blood pressure and causes us no end of grief in the classroom. 

Teachers often play into the hands of unruly students by making misbehaviour into a badge of honour.

Don't create a badge of honour which support unruly behaviour.

What Makes an Unruly Students and How to Manage Unruly Students in Your Classroom.

The unruly student really is an absolute pain.

They seem to surface for most teachers - unfortunately.

Your role, as a teacher, is to ensure the unruly student does not interfere with the right of other students to learn.

That can be an exhausting and a full time job in itself.

This module looks at strategies that work.

The Antiseptic Bounce is a preventative behaviour management measure that can be applied to unruly students before they become unruly.

It is not a new strategy. In fact it has been around for a long time. It is much more than a simple time out.

If used correctly, it is a great behaviour management tool to have in your repertoire. 

However, there are several traps that will cause this strategy to fail. 

This module will show you have to use the antiseptic bounce effectively as a protocol in your managing student behaviour regime.

Being liked by your students is an positive expectation, but it puts you, as a teacher, at a distinct disadvantage. Being liked is over-rated. Not being hated has a more productive impact on your classroom experience,

Abraham Kaplan's first coined the expression "If All You Have is a Hammer" in 1964. He called it, “The law of the instrument." 

Abraham Maslow's in his book The Psychology of Science, published in 1966 also referred to the "Law of the Hammer."

So, the phrase has been attributed both to Maslow and to Kaplan. It doesn't matter who used it first.

This analogy gives it meaning. 

Give a small boy a hammer, and he will find that everything he encounters needs pounding.

The course and the subsequent resource, is about behaviour management in the unruly classroom.

For too long, teachers have suffered from The Law of the Hammer. Behaviour management in the old days involved the use of the cane (or the rod or the strap) and little else. Thank goodness, we have come further than that.

Or have we?

This is a great strategy to beat the unruly student at his/her own game.

This is a great strategy to beat the unruly student at his/her own game.

Keeping unruly students on task can be a difficult exercise.

Once an unruly student gets started in the learning activity, how did you, as the teacher, keep the students on task?

Here are a couple of pointers to help keep unruly students engaged and on-task.

There is also a clever take on distracting unruly students so they do not become a destructive influence in your classroom.

Motivational Questioning is a comprehensive strategy that draws unruly students into accepting responsibility for their actions. 

The two powerful question challenge the unruly student to substantiate the effort applied to tasks. 

This technique draws the student away from apportioning blame  and moves them towards choosing the responsibility to become involved in the learning task.

Learn how to use motivational questioning in challenging the unruly students into your classroom.

Do students take advantage of perceived weakness? It is not clear but a teacher without authority seldom has complete control of an unruly class. Or does the class become unruly because the teacher does not have control.

This module outline 8 clear behaviour management strategies to bring the unruly student back to the task.