So the first day or so after the kids came back from break were fantastic. They were calm, ready to listen and mostly (in fact I'm sure) still rubbing the sleep out of their eyes from having to get up so early for the first time in awhile. Those two days ended so fast. Since then, it has been a constant fight to get their attention for anything (even recess, RECESS people!) But...
(For those of you non-teacher people; that's a behavior chart!! That kid must go to school on the weekends though!)I've tried as many (perhaps even more) different kinds of behavior management styles as I have ways of keeping track of the writing implements in my classroom. I've tried those behavior charts with the color coded pockets. I've tried putting everyone's name on the board and keeping those in for recess that have two or more check marks. I've tried yelling (after asking nicely more than once.) I've tried keeping everyone in at recess. I've tried the-put-your-hand-in-the-air-and-wait-for-silence-method. I've spoken to parents. I've tried shutting the lights off. I've tried a password. I've tried the good cop/bad cop method. Some of these things worked for a few days, some for a few weeks, some for an hour. I couldn't get anything to stick for any real length of time.
A few years ago, these were the sorts of things that would get me all in a tizzy and keep me from sleeping for days and sometimes months at a time. I would be stressed out because my days were so awful in the classroom because it felt like I always fighting against them. Very little good teaching can go on in that type of environment and so I constantly felt like I was failing them and not doing my job. Which at the end of the day would only make me feel worse and cue the no sleeping bit.
Today was a tough day. There wasn't much teaching going on, some of my pencils (my beautiful mechanical pencils!) were stolen, I was lied to, kids hit each other. I was standing there, trying to teach a lesson about place value. I had somewhat of a break through. I realized that I wasn't internally panicking. (I learned a long time ago that you can NEVER outwardly show panic. They are very much like animals. They smell the fear.) I realized that I was calm. I was ready. I was going to deal with it and have it be done. It was a very empowering feeling. I was on top of the world.
So, I said loud enough for only the kids sitting in first row to hear, "I'm taking a minute off your recess." The news spread quickly, but it wasn't until minute seven that something started to happen. They started to quiet down. I got back to teaching and the next time it happened, I didn't even have to say anything. I just added minutes to the board. They lost over half their recess. Later however, they earned it back by sitting ALMOST completely quietly during read aloud (both while I read and while another student read!!!!!)
I decided that when they can't earn it back, everyone comes into my room for the beginning of recess. After about a minute, I'll let the four (out of eighteen children) that I never have to ask twice, outside early and kept the other for the rest of the time. This way, I'm giving consequences for not behaving, rewarding positive behavior and (hopefully) encouraging other kids to just FOLLOW SIMPLE DIRECTIONS like "Sit Down Please."
So when the classes changed and I got my fourth graders, whom I can usually count on to bring me up after my third graders I was relieved. When we got back from lunch (which was CRAZY) I realized that it was not going to be an easy afternoon. I was lied to, disrespected, not listened to and one kid smacked another kid. Ergo, not much learning going on.
And so, I did the repeated the process I had gone through with the third graders. I finally got a math lesson going. Some kids were gone for speech and so when everyone came back, we paused and I called everyone over into the library to have a little chat. Everyone was silent. They could tell I was very unhappy. I hadn't raised my voice, but they could tell from the way I was talking that I was not happy.
So we all sat down. I explained how I was feeling and how it wasn't working for me. We talked about why we come to school. We talked about what will happen if they didn't follow directions. We talked about whether or not my "new" rules were fair. They agreed that they were. Just as we were finishing and I was about to send them back to their math assignment, Mr. Rama came in. (Presumably, but I didn't find out for sure about about another thirty minutes, to take Kismet for his afternoon break.)
Mr. Rama really makes me uncomfortable in a lot of different ways. The one that really annoys me is the way he acts so superior. He can be very dismissive of other people, without actually being dismissive. He'll say things like, "I don't mean to interrupt, but..." or "I don't mean to step on your toes, but..." or "I certainly didn't mean to take over, but..." When he totally DOES mean to do all those things. He says all the right things so that you can't accuse him of not saying all the right things. Then later, he'll come up and apologize again, to make it seem like he was really sincere about his faux pas. (He's done this to me in front of parents before. PARENTS people!) But he doesn't mean it, because he'll just do it again at the next meeting or during the next class discussion he happens to walk into.
Mr. Rama realized that we were having a classroom discussion, which is pretty much his favorite thing in world because he gets to go all mollycoddle on the kids, let's talk about our feelings, let's define our feelings, let's give examples of our feelings. So as I predicted the moment he walked in, he said, "Let me ask you a question. How do you feel about following directions?" and he looked at me as if he just remembered that I was leading the discussion and said, "I hope you don't mind but..." Since he had already asked the question, I wasn't going to say, "Well, no actually..." (But I think next time, I'll have the guts to!) All the children turned in his direction. I had just lost all the control. Done. Eyes were no longer on me.
Also as a preface, I've had lots of conversations about what what things like respect and following directions means on other occasions. During the day before, in fact and so I was being very stern, quiet and clear very much on purpose. I've had the kids come with their own definitions in their own words. (You might be surprised at how many kids DON'T know.) We done that. More than once. They know exactly what is expected of them. It was time for some tough love.
The conversation about what feelings mean, examples of feelings, examples of times the kids didn't follow directions went on and on and on and on and ON. All of the questions came from Mr. Rama (who also did some of the answering.) By the time it was over, he (I say he because he was the one REALLY in charge!) had used up our entire Science Literacy period. There was also a point near the end, where he decided to come kneel next to me (I was sitting in my chair, the kids were on sitting on the floor) to make the kids turn towards me again. (You know as if to remind me once again that I wasn't the one in charge.
If this was the first or even second time he pulled something like this, I wouldn't care. But I feel like I've gotten his routine down enough so that now, I can figure out a good way to stop him next time.
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