The End of the Honeymoon Period: Let's Get Down to Business (Blog Post #2)

“In an effective classroom students should not only know what they are doing, they should also know why and how.”

 –Harry K. Wong

We all have heard teachers refer to the "honeymoon" period, right? I didn't believe it was true. When I first started this semester, I knew quite a few of my students already from last semester. I'm sure as many of you have experienced, the students were fascinated by you. They may have thought that you were the one on their side and sort of like a friend. Now that many of us are taking over a full teaching day, they may start testing your authority, if they haven't already. 

No, not Johnny. He was always such a nice kid to me! Well that's over now. He is now throwing pencils at the kid next to him and taking sticky notes off of my desk to write “Kick Me” signs on other student’s backs. Okay, it may not be to that extent but it seems to be much worse than when I had started my placement.  I'm not sure how many people are experiencing this right now, but, I can tell you that students are certainly testing my patience and giving me a learning experience in behavior management daily.  As teachers we realize the importance to self-reflect and grow daily. I came to realize it was time for me to apply my knowledge in my education courses collectively. As a future educator, it is my duty to give my students the most effective learning environment and using efficient methods to do so. Sometimes a method may not work, and that’s okay. It is a learning experience and I love every minute of finding out how to improve my instructional time as well as constructing a classroom environment.  

I found that talking to my cooperating teacher about difficult students and collaborating with other teachers has assisted me in finding solutions. The most important concept I've learned in behavior management and instruction: explicit instruction. It seems simple. Yet, the concept can become much more complex when a inexperienced student teacher doesn’t realize to the extent of the simplicity. For example, I’ve found at the middle school level that  students respond well to timers. It's a concrete way of keeping a pace in the classroom that is expected, and they realize that they don't have time to talk to their classmate about their plans this weekend. They have a specific task that they know they will be accounted for and a certain amount of time.

 I spent a majority of my time after conferences today, writing a list of very specific classroom procedures I expect students to follow. Something as simple as how I want them to turn in their papers can become a huge mess unless I have a systematic way of giving students instructions and consistent expectations. I've found that more than ever, I have to refer to my Wong text from our first year of the teaching program. I continue to use the texts given to me in my professional development hour at my placement, discussions in our seminar time, and the resources given to us throughout our teaching program to assist us in becoming successful educators. I love it. Tomorrow I implement my new “strategy” and I’m excited to explain how it rocks or it flops in my next blog. J