How I developed my behavior management
How do you deal with students who seem problematic? As a teacher that is a question that I have struggled with before I even stepped foot into the classroom. I was warned multiple times, through coworkers, workshops, and every teacher blog that I encountered about that one "problematic" student.
Many resources were given on how to handle this student when the occasion should arise. Guarded with all the worse case scenarios I resolutely determined that I would not let behavior or behavior students ruin my first year of teaching.
(And) that is exactly what happened. My first year, I walked away with only one major behavior student and now looking back it was nothing compared to what I would go on to experience during my next four years.
It was during my second year of teaching that I realized something had to change. One of my students parents came to speak with me about their child's progress, they casually mentioned that their child was afraid of me and that is why they hadn't asked me about a certain question in class. The parent assumed that the student was over-exaggerating, but I knew that they weren't. It disturbed me to know that a student felt that they couldn't speak to me out of fear. I would love to say that I immediately changed my ways, approached the student to comfort them, and dedicated myself to proactively finding a better way to execute behavior management while cultivating a relationship with my students, but I did not.
I was afraid of loosing control and I also did not know how to balance being the leader of the class while also being there for my students as a source of emotional support. But one of the most impactful experiences I had that year was with a student who had moved schools three times. He was so used to moving schools that he knew it was only a matter of time before he left our school so he acted out quite a bit. This stressed me out a lot. This tested that fear of possibly losing control of my class. However, this should have been an indication that there was more that meets the eye, when after getting his 5th strike against him in classroom behavior, the next day he comes to class and gifts me a flower that he drew. It was for me. It was random, out of the blue, and his punishment had already been served the previous day so there was no benefit in it for him. I didn't know how to respond. I thanked him and hung it on my wall in plain view, but other than that I didn't really acknowledge his thoughtfulness. Looking back I truly believe that he was sorry and was expressing this the best way he knew how. The ball was in my court on what would happen moving forward - and I dropped the ball. I didn't put aside his behavior and get to know him, I approached him from his behavior standpoint and continued to deal with him according to his behavior. It pushed him further away from me. I can only imagine what he thought of me, how isolated he felt, and probably summed me up to be just another blabbing teacher who always accused him of doing something wrong.
My third year of teaching this had to stop. I knew it had too, but I couldn't do it alone. It helped that my school had a complete overhaul of administration and my 5th grade team was completely brand new. During this year, I learned how to develop a relationship with my students, how to strengthen the classroom community, and most importantly how to not be a behavior nazi. If my students misbehaved, I talked with them instead of punishing them. I immediately let go of the incident and while they may have had a consequence, I didn't approach them based off of their behavior or their consequence. I learned to approach my students based on their potential and the hope for a future that I had for them.
I am happy to say that I apologized to some of my students from my previous first two years of teaching. I let them know that I wasn't perfect and I could have handled the classroom better and how proud I was them.
Relationship is so important in a classroom. I can't help but imagine what would have happened to that one student who gave me the rose if I had responded differently? It's so easy to overlook those little acts, but it all has an impact.
Many resources were given on how to handle this student when the occasion should arise. Guarded with all the worse case scenarios I resolutely determined that I would not let behavior or behavior students ruin my first year of teaching.
(And) that is exactly what happened. My first year, I walked away with only one major behavior student and now looking back it was nothing compared to what I would go on to experience during my next four years.
It was during my second year of teaching that I realized something had to change. One of my students parents came to speak with me about their child's progress, they casually mentioned that their child was afraid of me and that is why they hadn't asked me about a certain question in class. The parent assumed that the student was over-exaggerating, but I knew that they weren't. It disturbed me to know that a student felt that they couldn't speak to me out of fear. I would love to say that I immediately changed my ways, approached the student to comfort them, and dedicated myself to proactively finding a better way to execute behavior management while cultivating a relationship with my students, but I did not.
I was afraid of loosing control and I also did not know how to balance being the leader of the class while also being there for my students as a source of emotional support. But one of the most impactful experiences I had that year was with a student who had moved schools three times. He was so used to moving schools that he knew it was only a matter of time before he left our school so he acted out quite a bit. This stressed me out a lot. This tested that fear of possibly losing control of my class. However, this should have been an indication that there was more that meets the eye, when after getting his 5th strike against him in classroom behavior, the next day he comes to class and gifts me a flower that he drew. It was for me. It was random, out of the blue, and his punishment had already been served the previous day so there was no benefit in it for him. I didn't know how to respond. I thanked him and hung it on my wall in plain view, but other than that I didn't really acknowledge his thoughtfulness. Looking back I truly believe that he was sorry and was expressing this the best way he knew how. The ball was in my court on what would happen moving forward - and I dropped the ball. I didn't put aside his behavior and get to know him, I approached him from his behavior standpoint and continued to deal with him according to his behavior. It pushed him further away from me. I can only imagine what he thought of me, how isolated he felt, and probably summed me up to be just another blabbing teacher who always accused him of doing something wrong.
My third year of teaching this had to stop. I knew it had too, but I couldn't do it alone. It helped that my school had a complete overhaul of administration and my 5th grade team was completely brand new. During this year, I learned how to develop a relationship with my students, how to strengthen the classroom community, and most importantly how to not be a behavior nazi. If my students misbehaved, I talked with them instead of punishing them. I immediately let go of the incident and while they may have had a consequence, I didn't approach them based off of their behavior or their consequence. I learned to approach my students based on their potential and the hope for a future that I had for them.
I am happy to say that I apologized to some of my students from my previous first two years of teaching. I let them know that I wasn't perfect and I could have handled the classroom better and how proud I was them.
Relationship is so important in a classroom. I can't help but imagine what would have happened to that one student who gave me the rose if I had responded differently? It's so easy to overlook those little acts, but it all has an impact.