Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Luna]

OK. Let me describe my situation and talk a little about my issues before asking my questions. Please bear with me, sorry for the loooong intro.

I'm a first-time teacher, and this is my first time coming to Korea. I've been here about four weeks now.

I'm having major issues disciplining about 4 of my 16 middle public school classes. I teach second grade. I could just sit back and act like a glorified babysitter and decide not to care - but I really don't want to do that.

I made my rules clear the first day of class, and communicated them to my co-teachers. I even had a meeting with all of my co-teachers (that I had to reschedule twice) and sent them all a four page letter detailing my concerns about teaching, the kids, and what I need from them to make co-teaching work.

I've had more cooperation from most of them. I still have one co-teacher who has NO control in class, and one co-teacher who backs up my attempts at discipline by telling the students to do something completely different from what i've just told them.

Obviously these are issues I need to address, again with them. *sigh*

However - I have a bigger question. From what I've seen at my school discipline is arbitrary. There is no system of consequences and punishments. For example if you throw things at another student you don't always get the same punishment.

I know I can't change the entire school - but in my classroom I need a system for my own sanity - and so the students understand that I'm trying to be fair.

It's not in my nature to hit - although I certainly have felt like hitting something lately - and my school has a repuation for troublemakers. In the last two weeks two students have called the police because a teacher hit them. So, no hitting. =D

So far the punishments that I have seen at my school (that aren't hitting the kids) are these:
having them put their hands on their heads, having them put their hand isn the air, having them stand by the wall with their hands in the air, push-ups, and having them stand outside with their hands in the air, making them kneel in uncomfortable positions.

I'm not sure what the students feel is the worst punishment, so I'm not sure what punishment to assign to what action. Does anyone have any other ideas for discpline? Can anyone tell me which punishments are considered more severe?

I know I need to be consistent to get results from discipline and I'm pretty sure that I'm not doing that right now. I also need ideas for punishing the whole class.

I've asked my co-teachers, and even other native teachers, and I have some ideas - but I would like more input from anyone who can help me. My co-teachers mostly just tell me how rought it is in their own classes, and how much work they have to do - which isn't very helpful.

Help?
Thanks everyone.

[kat2]

I don't have a ton of experience with MS students, but I'll still throw my ideas out there.

From my experience, making kids stay after and write lines works quite well with the older kids. They don't seem to respond quite as well to the physical (hands in the air) punishments as the younger ones. Is there a ten minute break between classes or some such? Make the kids stay with you (instead of chillingw ith their friends) and write lines or clean the classroom.

Always be fair in your class. bad behavior= punishment. Everytime. Don't rely on your coteachers to be able to handle such a complicated (yeah right!) idea. I think a two or three strikes rule is good. Kids do make mistakes, so don't go ballistic on tehm the first time. Maybe a warning and then teh second time they have to stay after class or whatever you decide is your big punsihment.

I work in public elementary school, and the discipline is kind of the same here. Totally random, not very strict. The main thing I have notcied is that kids get punished for academic "crimes" (not doing homework, missing questions, etc), but not for behavioral "crimes" (hitting, calling kids names, breaking things). Its kind of hte opposite of what its like in American schools, where the strictest punishments are for not getting along well with others and disrepecting things or people. Poor academic performance ranks second to poor social interactions.

Ok, this was kind of long and all over the place, but hopefully you can get something out of it! Good luck!

[Luna]

Thanks kat - I think I will try the writing lines.

Yeah I was blown away by how much misbehavior the students show. I couldn't have concentrated well enough to learn anything if all my classmates had been acting like some of the students I have.

I should mention - I have no academic discpline option. That made me really angry when I learned that. Apparently as a discretionary class - I only give them a review. There are basically no consequences, academic or otherwise, for misbehaving in my classroom.

[kat2]

Yeah kids don't really get "grades" in English at elementary school either. Another thing to consider is to be really nice to the kids outside of hte classroom, even teh bad ones. (say hi, strike up little conversations, etc)If they like you, they will try to please you inclass too. Even if you can just get half of hte class on your side, they will yell at the bad kids. MS kids hate to be embarrassed in front of their peers--use that to your advantage!

[Yu_Bum_suk]

Hey there, I have two MS classes (both grade 2) that do present some problems but that I do keep under control. One of the biggest things is not to get angry in a way the students may find amusing. That's a recipe for disaster. I also have a co-'teacher' (translator would be a much better term) who has no control. This means that it's all up to me. While I don't like doing it I do find that making trouble-makers kneel in the corridor holding their hands above their heads really works. It removes the immediate source of the problem and acts as a somewhat painful deterent. Then I can keep them for ten minutes after class and make them do the part of the lesson they missed. Some people may call that abusive; cry me a river. The next time you give them the serious look they'll take you a lot more seriously.

It's also really important to differentiate between good noise and bad noise. For instance, today we're doing a review quiz game and it can get pretty noisy at times. But, if everyone's settled down and is listening carefully to the next question, it's fine if it gets a bit noisy after that.

One thing, though: take the initiative yourself. Never rely on the KTs for it. If you're only four weeks in and already facing those sorts of problems you could be in for a hellish year if you don't.

[freethought]

I'm at one of the lowest level MS in Kyonggi and so the behaviour corresponds. What you can do is totally dependent on the greater environment and conditions that exist in the school. As you desribed, your class essentially carries no weight and doesn't matter, and the kids are aware of that. If it's a smart, upper class school, the kids may behave better.

One thing you can try doing is coming up with a mini textbook on a given topic: geography, animals etc. Something academic-like and 'non-fun'--- ie: not superheroes or pop-stars etc. Make it seem like a real lesson and real text (print all 4 or 6 lessons off and staple them making it seem a little more serious than weekly photocopies). This may work. It'd helped in a few of my classes, but far from all, and far from solved my problems.

The physical discipline hasn't worked at all for me (or the school) so finding someway to bring order to chaos might be the best first step, and once some sort of structure is established, then the physical discilpline may have more of an impact.

[Dan The Chainsawman]

[Luna]

yo bum suk :

Thanks for your input.
I've resorted to telling the teachers that i'm going to make a system and they are responsible for upholding it with me. I've told them I can't teach if I have to deal with misbehavior and I won't be a glorified babysitter.
We'll see how that works. Tommorrow I should finalize a system and send it to all the teachers.

If the whole class acts up I'm thinking about giving them copies of my rules and making them copy them over and over in English until the bell rings. That should be excrutiatingly boring.

Freethought:

I agree that I need to make all this chaos into order asap. I'm getting a lot of pressure to be critiquing the demo lesson plan, and for making new lesson plans - and i've basically told my co-teachers that discipline is more important right now or I won't be able to teach anything at all.

thanks for all your input everyone.

[Luna]

[riley]

Remember also that it can take awhile before you see any effects of your actions. What I mean is that, it can take awhile before you will have to stop being so active in classroom management, and that the students will know how to behave. You're also dealing with them during springtime, that can cause kids to be more hyperactive, just because the day is nice and they don't want to be there.

[Milwaukiedave]

DTC,

Yeah occasionally that's what I feel like.

Seriously though to the OP, I totally understand what your saying. I have one Korean teacher (the 6th grade teacher) that I feel is too soft on students. I have taken to writing letters to the homeroom teacher to make sure they know where I stand on this. While it may or may not do anything at least your telling them what's going on.

Three of my 6th grade classes are really bad and I kind of dread teaching them every week. I hate saying that, but it's how I feel. They sit there like a bump on a log. Then one of my other classes comes in and they are all raising their hands. I've pointed out to the Korean teacher it's like night and day difference between some of those classes.

Another possible solution, which I started last year is a point system. I see each class once a week and during their class depending on how they are I will give them from 1 to 10 points. The class with the most points at the end of the month gets something, the class at the end of the term with the most points gets a special class from me where we do something in English. Last year we made strawberry shortcake.

[Luna]

[Yu_Bum_suk]

I just had what I guess has ben my 'worst' class this year. I had to give a couple 'the look' and one of them managed to hide what I think was a handphone that I couldn't find when I made her stand up and searched her desk (she had been playing with whatever it was right in front of my 'co-teacher'). I thought to myself, if that's the worst class in the school I sure am damn lucky. I stopped the class once to say 'What!' to someone who was trying to tell her friend to open the windows while I was speaking and they immediately they went silent. Otherwise there were almost no problems with disruptions or disturbances, or students giving each other the middle finger, throwing things, etc. I have a sneaking suspicion that this may have something to do with me laying down the law rather stearnly in a few previous lessons. It's also interesting to observe the new grade ones discovering that they can disregard the rookie 'co-teacher' who ususally teaches their classes. I can still get by on the novelty factor without much trouble but I'm sure a point will come when they'll have to learn the hard way they can't disregard me. There's no end of stuff written - some of it by no means useless - about using positive reinforcement, but some students need to know that there are negative consequences, too, or they just won't take you seriously.

[Milwaukiedave]

Luna,

That sounds a bit more complex then mine, but if it works that's cool. I try to focus on the behavior of the class as a whole and will usually let them know if a certain student ruins it for the rest. My thought is to let peer pressure get them a little and maybe the other students will tell them to shut up. I'd certainly rather having them policing themselves then teachers doing it.

another couple of random thoughts....

I do have to say for the most part my Korean teachers do jump on the students if they are not respectful of me. A good Korean teacher SHOULD do this and it's at least a sign that your somewhat on par with the other teachers (although sometimes I have my doubts).

I have seen teachers hit students in my school, which I don't agree with. At the same time I won't step in and get between the student and Korean teachers. One thing that you CAN do is to give them a little thump on the forehead when they are misbehaving (I can't remember what that's called in Korean, but it's also used during games as punishment for the loser).

[Mark7]

Yeah Luna:

I can relate. The discipline varies from week to week. I have some classes which are a dread to teach, and then there are some that make your day because of how cooperative they are.

I think a big part of it comes with authority, which needs to be established quickly, but at the same time, be fair. I'm too nice of a guy, which is one of my faults in teaching, but at the same time when someone who pushes the envelope, I will get tough, but not super angry. It usually stops the class, and I individually stare at them one on one and tell them in English what they did wrong.

Some of my co-teachers don't help, but, it gives me more freedom to put my foot down as I see fit.

Example, last week. One of my biggest pet peeves while teaching is when a student 'mocks' my voice, trying to be funny, and I sure as heck know its not they are trying to pronounce the words I'm saying.

One kid did it while I was teaching, so I stopped the class, and I walked to his face, and he had this goofy face, but I told him to stop that. He said, 'okay.' However, my co-teacher does not help, she just translates what I say, and she hardly deals with the troublemakers. Why, its not her class to begin with!