Job Discussion Forums

[Jess.Ika]

Hello!

I hate for this to be my first post here, but I'm replacing a teacher at an eikaiwa on Tuesday and the teacher who is leaving left me with a real challenge. She has no background in teaching and has done absolutely nothing in terms of classroom management. She's basically leaving me with chaos and even with experience teaching, I have no idea where to start.

The kids are screaming, hitting, mocking her, saying crude things in Japanese, crawling around on the ground, and generally just doing whatever they want. She also doesn't speak Japanese, so it was a little terrifying watching the things these kids were saying and having her not even realize.

The school is also very laid back, so if I try to change things too much or enforce any kind of strict rules, they probably won't have my back. They also love the teacher who is leaving, so if I try to be too strict they'll just see it as me being a bad teacher because the kids don't like me as much.

Please, if anyone has advice on how to control nightmare classes at all, if anyone has worked for kids who are used to not being told what to do in any way shape or form, or if anyone's started a teaching career like this and has advice, I beg of you, please share it with me. I would be really grateful.

(I also apologize for the jumbled format of this post, I'm borrowing someone's internet connection right now as I don't have my own)

[fluffyhamster]

I once worked for an eikaiwa that put kids (siblings) with quite widely-varying ages together for the parent's convenience. Thankfully those classes were quite small (3 students apiece), as were the classrooms, so things couldn't get too riotous, and it was only an our or two once or twice per week, so it was "manageable" in terms of marking time almost. There was however a real nightmare class LOL. The eikaiwa had arranged a series of classes at an out-of-town juku on Saturday afternoons~evening. In the afternoon there was a room full of over a dozen kids (depended on how many parents wanted to take advantage of the virtual creche) ranging from 3 or 4 years old up to junior high level, all running around or sort of doing their own thing amidst a lot of noise. I think even somebody with a PhD in childhood education would baulk at those conditions and admit there's only so much that can be done. Admittedly the kids weren't hitting each other or me the teacher, or cussing or being intolerably rude, but if I'd had to deal with a class like that every day rather than just once per week I'd've left that eikaiwa a lot earlier, believe me! (The consolation was that the classes became much more pleasant and interesting towards the evening, as the ages and maturity increased). I think actually that school owners have a responsibility to ensure that they aren't just marooning teachers in what the kids can see is clearly a Lord of the Flies-type situation where all the norms of (Japanese) society have apparently completely ceased to function. But I digress. What can you do to regain and maintain some semblance of control while the bosses are busy bean-counting and have put up a clear Do Not Disturb sign on their office door? ("You're the expert, ne? But do also remember that the customers always know best!"). Apart of course from legging it into say dispatch AET work at elementary schools, where there's some sort of order in place already (although even there the kids can still take advantage of the comparative freedom that communicative or ostensibly communicative English classes might offer compared to the J curriculum).

Some teachers seem to almost relish bad behaviour, or at least become quite the disciplinarian control-freaks. They come up with all sorts of rules and procedures that will be exhausting to explain the logic behind let alone grim-facedly implement. Naughty steps, time outs and all that, as if they're trying to rival Supernanny. I look at that sort of stuff and think it is coming at it (supposed education, engaging educational content) from completely the wrong way and won't always be guaranteed to work anyway. I sometimes wonder what they would actually teach when presented with a perfect class of model students. Patronizing slightly disapproving tut-tutting at best, I suspect. Some would probably start looking for transgressions (and thus something, anything to do to keep up the usual menacing time-filling routine) even if there weren't any offenders!

Instead I would advise approaching even the worst class with some educational expectations, obviously patience, and above all with almost inexhaustible reserves of humour and dare I say it love. I've always been one to try to knock myself out designing interesting, genuine, useful, fun and motivating activities, so when naughty students act up I get "upset" about the lack of interest in the activity - so it isn't as personal. Plus I'm not concentrating to the "Why are you being naughty" but rather "Why don't we do this now and instead? It's fun, honest!". So whatever "grit" I might display has ulterior ends to simply disciplining. And when my patience and humour does start to get exhausted, the change in my demeanour (I become shall we say quite straight-faced and of more piercing gaze LOL) is actually noticeable to the student(s), who tend(s) to alter their own behaviour accordingly. I want to please them and they generally end up wanting to please me. Beats hating each other for the duration of each lesson.

I've posted a number of activities (my elementary syllabus might be a good place to start - search for "alien AND nattou" or "kaeru" [frog] lol). Start preparing to do that thing called, y'know, TEACH ENGLISH (I note you have experience, but the caps need repeating sometimes! As not everyone fully or gladly quite grasps the perennial nettle) and a lot of your anxieties will be allayed, and any potential problems start to almost solve themselves. Be prepared to do A, and half-prepared to do any of X, Y and Z. I also find it helps if you have some eye-catching picture, physical activity or bit of comedy to kick off the (each) lesson. For example, that picture of a horse...or is it a frog? (When rotated back and forth through 90 degrees, see images here: https://www.google.com/#q=frog+or+horse ). Or this: https://www.google.co.uk/#q=rabbit+or+duck . Or I can separate not only the fingers as used in the Vulcan peace sign on both hands, but every digit through and back. :O Or I grab one of those magnetic chalk holders and do a silly magic trick (silently show how no strings are around it then TA-DA! It sticks like magic to the blackboard! ROFL). Or I might do the tiger-mouth move from karate and show how it is similar to hubud moves from escrima. And how about that trick where one person crosses their arms, turns their palms downwards to face each other, interlaces the fingers, then twists their hands under and up until they're in front of their sternum, and then the other person points to (but doesn't actually touch) whichever finger of the interlocked person's that they want them to try to move (wow, what unclear instructions LOL. A visual demo would be easier, but can't find anything like it on YouTube, ah well!). Oh, and speaking some Japanese (a smattering, a pattering, to help explain activities say) really helps despite what Direct Methodistas insist otherwise. (But hey, you speak Japanese cos you understood what the kids were saying to the teacher you're replacing. Can I ask why you committed to the job after seeing the chaos? (Just kidding, I guess the job application and offer was too far along by then to look for an alternative LOL)).

Actual methodology-wise, I think you're going to need to move slowly from teacher-led "one-to-one" engaging with esp. the individual, more boisterous "ringleader" students of the class, to training the students up in group and then eventually pairwork activity. It may be weeks or months before they're at the point where you can expect them to work diligently without a lot of very clear guidance beforehand each time, but eventually some general routines will become established enough.

Anyway, if you wanna pick what little brains I have some more then don't hesitate. (But like I say bear in mind I'm more an optimistic can-do will-do guy, so I tend to concentrate on suggesting activities rather than disciplinary procedures). I hope others chime in with whatever thoughts and experiences too.

[RM1983]

Id have a word with the school, dont assume they wont help you. That might be what the previous teacher didnt do. You have a limited window of opportunity, because in 2 months if one of them hurts themself cos you were letting them run wild, then it's definitely on you and not the outgoing teacher.
Express these concerns precisely, if they act up. That someone could get hurt or school equipment could get broken, should be enough pressure for the school to help you.


My own experience is usually theyll be wild if theyre bored or the content is too hard. Make sure neither happens. Find fun stuff to do, a song and a game and an activity each class and that will probably be most of your problems sorted

[fluffyhamster]

I agree with RM1983 that it'll be useful to cautiously establish quite what the school is aware of or where it draws the line. I wouldn't be surprised however if they don't admit to or downplay(ed already? LOL) any problems, and put issues of controlling student behaviour firmly in your court first and foremost. And the risk of expressing concerns (even to you founded ones) is always that you will begin to appear less capable, resourceful or willing. (If these school owners were half as capable themselves they'd be teaching the classes and not hiring you, right?). If it turns out to be a truly awful and insoluble situation then often the only easy option is to find work elsewhere ASAP!

[nightsintodreams]

A serious question about teaching? You've come to the wrong place mate.

Anyway, it takes time but once you develop a menacing evil stare, everything falls into place.

[fluffyhamster]

[nightsintodreams]

It was a joke. Never mind. Mushi shite ne.

[Jess.Ika]

@fluffyhamster, thank you so much for all of that input!!!! I'll be working with groups of 1-5 kids, and yeah, they're doing the siblings together thing at my school, too, and I already can see that plenty of kids are in the wrong level and have been put there because of age or convenience of the class time, so I'm also going to have to work hard to make sure that the younger/lower level kids are keeping up and the higher level kids don't get bored.

I don't think it's that they want nothing to do with how the classes are going as much as they've just put way too much emphasis on the idea that they want the kids to be having fun, to the point where even if they're not really learning, it's ok, as long as them and their parents are happy.

I agree about the other extreme of overly-disciplining a class being just as much of a problem. If the kids are miserable and scared, why should they even want to be there, let alone learn or use English? :/

I completely agree about making things fun and not taking any bad behavior personally. Before coming here I had already prepared myself to face some problems and had resolved not to let it affect my teaching, but I just wasn't prepared for this many in nearly every class... I also generally have a lot of energy when I teach and I love making learning fun for people (on a very nerdy level, which I guess is good for this job, haha)

I'm not so much worried about how to handle problems as I am about what happens if I have to do something and they still don't listen, for example, if a kid is throwing materials at another student and I try to tell them with a stern face that it's not ok and they continue throwing things and mocking me. That was the kind of situation I was seeing all week and worried about the next step after that before telling the school owners or the parents. I'd also hope that I don't have to, but with some of these kids, I'm seriously concerned for the safety of the other kids in the class, but if I say anything, the parents are likely to be socked and confused because the previous teacher clearly never said anything to them about it.

Thank you for mentioning those materials! I'll check them out ASAP!! I also took home copies of the teacher's book pages that I'll need and I'm going to spend today and tomorrow lesson planning. There are way too many 'teachers' who come here and treat it as a paid vacation, so I understand the need to put that in caps, haha. I'm going to make sure not to be one of those people because I find that so unfair to the students. Morally speaking, it's just not ok in my book.

Ahh, yes, It's through a big company and they had training before this and in the training everything seemed a lot more structured and controlled (and not like this, haha ;w; ), also, when I got there, the girl told me about hoe great all the classes were and how smoothly everything goes and how it's easy. I signed the contract before I got to observe her teaching, and by the end of the first class I could tell that the reason it was so 'easy' for her was because she'd been putting absolutely no effort into it. >_> If I knew beforehand that it would be like this, would I have taken the job? Hmm....that's tough, haha. I'm a little less terrified now that I have the weekend to prepare and reflect, but I can tell that it's going to be tough. I'll just have to work hard at it and be consistent.

You have a good point about the group thing, and that's one thing I really did want to focus on, since she had too many activities that only kept one student occupied at a time.

Thank you so so much! I apologize again for the general rambly-ness of this (I'm now bowing Starbucks internet with a dying battery, haha) I might take you up on the offer to ask you more, but everything you said really helped, even if just to reassure me that there actually are other teachers out there who go into things like this with an intention of helping children to learn English rather than just make easy money.

[Jess.Ika]

@RM1983 Agreed. I definitely want to make sure that even if I'm dealing with chaos, that I try to make the class actually fun and educational. After all, if they're not miserable, a lot of the problems will (hopefully) go away. And I'm going to see how the first few classes work out, if nothing I do works to stop the violence and rude comments from one student to another I'm thinking that I'll definitely be talking to the owners because you're right, it's better to do something before someone actually gets really hurt.

She was basically playing bingo (with vocabulary that was unrelated to the lesson or any previous lesson) in every single class, every week... A lot of the kids were actually saying they were bored but she doesn't speak Japanese, and they refused to say any of it in English... It was so bizarre and terrifying watching it happen. I don't like making people bored. I don't want my students to be bored...

@nightsintodreams Hahaha, I think this week and the week before have been so stressful that I feel like I'm already walking around with a glare, so if nothing else, that shouldn't be too much of a problem. XD

[Master Shake]

Hi Jess,

I've had nightmare kids class like the one you described before. Classes where the main lesson aim was to keep the kids from killing each other.

I wouldn't touch that class with a 10-foot pole. If things have gotten that bad, it's likely that nothing you do will turn the behavior situation around. What's worse, taking over a class like that can actually make you a worse teacher and kill your love of teaching kids, since you will be subjected to humiliation and will probably be forced to adopt bad teaching practices (e.g. shouting, physically separating students and doing activities designed to just get them to settle down, etc.)

But as others have mentioned, definitely make sure the school is informed about the situation. Try to involve the parents when the kids do really unacceptable things, like throw books. It sounds like you don't have much of a choice here.

On the bright side, the kids will be better behaved at first, as they start testing where your limits are. Try to set rules, establish discipline and routines and get off on the right foot.

[rxk22]

Parents don't care much about progress. Make the classes fun, moving and dynamic at first. Then worry about actually teaching the kids.