Teach English in Zhugou Zhen - Qingdao Shi

Classroom management is how the teacher handles things in the classroom. Classroom management includes setting rules, signing seats, and creating an environment that is appropriate. Every teacher has a different way of managing their classroom and rather they realize it or not teachers do certain things in order to manage their classroom. Even a teacher that has a class that seems to be all over place has things that they do in order for the students to learn. Classroom management also includes maintaining a safe classroom environment. A safe classroom environment is somewhere that the students are willing to go to. It is a place where the students can be themselves and not have to worry about things that are hurting or can hurt them on the outside of the classroom. It is a place where everyone knows each other and where they can trust each other. Students should be able to feel that it is okay to go to class because it is safe. In order to create a safe classroom environment, it is important for teachers to build rapport with their students. When I was getting my education degree, while reading about Charles’ suggestions to classroom management, I read that to build rapport a teacher must learn as much as they can about their students’ experiences, needs, and typical behavior. By understanding students’ experiences, needs, and typical behaviors teachers are able to identify the motivation behind students’ behavior. It also allows teacher to anticipate what topics the students are interested in; how the students will behave; how the students may react to various situations; how the teacher can interact with their students most effectively; and how the teacher can best work with them in a helpful manner. I think that Charles’ suggestion is important because without the understanding of your students it makes teaching difficult in all aspects. For example, if you did not know that a student was physically abused and you went to give that student a high five for their good job, the student may be frightened by my actions and become unmotivated to learn or to attend class. Understanding your students, the best that you can will allow you to come up with ideas that will keep the students interested in the lesson. If the students are interested the lesson that means that they are listening to what you are saying. If the students are paying attention to the lesson they will have little time to misbehave. There are many ways to prevent students have misbehaving, one way is implementing classroom policies. A classroom policy can be to keep your area clean and organized. This policy will help students behave responsibly because it makes them realize that they are not the only students that use that area and they wouldn’t want to come into class and see their seat a mess. This will also help your students to learn to take care of themselves. Another classroom policy is to only turn in work if it is your best work. This will cause the students to think before handing in something that they know is no good. It will also get students into the habit of thinking before doing something to make sure that it is the right thing to do. The last two classroom policy I will mention is to respect yourself, your classmates, the adults, and the school as well as that teamwork is key. With these two policies students will be able to build bonds with fellow students and teachers, allowing them to experience a sense of community. Besides classroom policies, teachers should also have classroom rules. In my previous classrooms, I had the rule of no bullying. I had this rule because I wanted my students to feel safe in my classroom but if they were being bullied they would be able to feel safe. If this rule is broken the student that broke it would have to attend a 15 minute after school detention. If the detention is not served or the student continued to bully others, I would contact the students’ parents. I have absolutely no tolerance for bullying therefore if the student continues I will suspend them. The second rule that I had in my classrooms was that students must be on time to class. I believe that being on time shows that you are a professional. If a student is late, they will have to sit in the front of room in a seat right next to my desk. For the students that are on time they may choose whatever seat they please. The third rule that I had in my classroom was that students must clean up after themselves. It was my classroom and the students should respect the fact that other students also used the classroom. If the students cleaned up after themselves, they would be able to continuing bringing snacks to class. If it becomes a problem the students will not be allowed to bring in snacks. Classroom management depends on the teacher, therefore, the teacher should apply classroom policies and rules based on their students. After building rapport with their students, a teacher will understand which policies and rules need to be enforced in order to keep the students safe and motivated to learn.