Korean Job Discussion Forums

[SteveSteve]

I teach adults in a graduate TESOL certificate program, and I've been having issues with one challenging student. Last night, she made a huge outburst at the end of class and slammed the classroom door in my face. The other students were completely appalled and couldn't understand why she freaked out the way she did. I think this behavior is completely unacceptable not only for adults but also children. I want to get at the root of the problem and prevent this from happening again, but I will not tolerate this behavior a second time. But first, a little background info:

Last week I gave the class study guides to help them prepare for their midterm examinations. I told them to e-mail me any specific questions they may have about the study guide so that I could point them in the right direction. This student e-mails me all her answers to the study guide questions (about 25 of them) and all but two of them were correct. I told her to check again and e-mail me back when she's ready. About 15 minutes later, she sends a desperate reply, something to the effect of "I can't find the answers! Can you give me the answers? I'm really worried!!" I told her that most students do really well on the exam and not to worry, and I also gave her specific page numbers and notes so that she can find the answers.

I'm more than willing to help students inside and out of class, but I encourage them to help and push themselves to discover an answer before consulting me. That's why I didn't give in and give her the answers immediately. I wanted her to work for it a little bit. She didn't agree with my approach to teaching so she called to complain to the receptionist and both of my supervisors. Of course, my supervisors think she's being very sensitive, making a ridiculous request and agreed that I'm not obligated to give students answers to study guide questions, much less a study guide for the exam.

Fast forward to last night; I'm passing out graded essays to the class. Most of the grades are really good. In the A-B+ range. I give this particular student a 90% A- because it was a day late and she didn't follow the assignment directions. Still, an A- for this essay is really good and I was very lenient and generous with the points, too. She starts tearing up in like a Soap Opera actress and demands, "Do you hate me? Why do you always give me low points!? (Keep in mind, the semester just started and this was the first graded assignment with any points that she got from me). You didn't give me the answers to the study guide and you give me a very low grade!!!" At this point she's screaming and she runs out the class, slamming the door behind her.

Whatever the outcome may be, I will take this as a learning experience on handling difficult students. But what should I do? I already discussed it with my supervisors and they want to give her another chance before kicking her out of the program. *EDIT* [sentence removed], so I think another similar outburst is going to be inevitable. By the way, she is in her 40s and I have never had anything remotely resembling this situation happening to me.

-Teacher with Limited Experience with *EDIT* Different Students

[schwa]

I've dealt with emotionally disturbed adult students (public school teachers!) who put on similar antics. The pro therapy they need isnt really a socially or professionally acceptable option. Their colleagues tend to turn a blind eye but they know whats going on.

Continue to be firm, fair, & kind. You cant guess the cause. One of my "cases" turned out to have a brain tumor but after treatment & a year off she's a reasonable person again.

[kimchi_pizza]

You seem to be doing everything well so my advice is do to absolutly nothing.

Me? This past semester I taught low level adult students basic english conversation in the evenings and I had two young men in their mid-20s.
They would come to each class, sleep, chat together, laugh, roll their eyes and grunt at lessons, activities and assignments. After the third
week of this, I pulled them outside during a break and told them their
bahavior was unacceptable. That was my warning.
Another 3 weeks passed of the same antics and I had enough.
During break I asked them both to follow me to the admin office, I told
the admin officer to refund these men their money because they are
going home as I'm a teacher, not a baby sitter.

The whole time I tried to be patient, remain calm and in control of myself. I wouldn't show how pissed I actually was.

And I continued my class like nothing of significance happened. Shocked,
the guys humbly walked into class, collected their effects and left. I can't tell you what a huge, positive effect
that had on my class for the rest of the semester. All the other adult students sat a little straighter in their chairs! ha!
But we all had a much better classroom atmosphere and experience.

Goodness, I've made at least a half dozen edits to this post and it's still a mess. Proof that late night poker games and posting doesn't mix. oh well!

[superNET]

Since you requested advice, I will let you know what I think.

1. She isn't emotionally disturbed. Your false labeling demonstrates that you will leap to a conclusion without asking the right questions and getting all the information you need. You have done her more harm than good here.

At worst, she is very sensitive not disturbed.

2. "I will not tolerate this behavior a second time"- not a good attitude for a teacher to have. Students are not robots or things but have emotions which at times cause them to respond to different situations in ways that a teacher may not like. It is up to the teacher tobe sensitive to the needs of his or her student and learn how to approach different personalities in different ways.

All you are showing the students here is that you will be dictatorial and they must toe the line or else. Not good. Some students may like this approach but it doesn't work for them all. You need to be flexible and learn.

3."This student e-mails me all her answers to the study guide questions (about 25 of them) and all but two of them were correct"

She gets 23 of them correct and you cannot lower yourself to help her over the hump? Not good. This tells her that you demand that she be perfect before she can get any help from you. Again, not good at all. Teachers have to learn that their actions always teaches their students something and it is not always positive.

Would it have killed you to give her 2 answers? SOmetimes they really need the help because they have tried an dall you are doing is telling them that they are failures and cannot expect to look to you when they need help, you are just going to send them off on their own to fend for themselves.

4. " handling difficult students" she is not difficult, that is your assumption based upon the fact that she asked for help on 2 questions. She did 23 on her own like you wanted her to and you gave her no reinforcement for that effort. Givingher 2 answers would not have undermined you in any way but would have helped her a lot.

5. "I'm really worried!!" she gave you a clue to how she was feeling and you blew it off. The message she got from you is that you do not care about her.

6. "She didn't agree with my approach to teaching so she called to complain to the receptionist and both of my supervisors. Of course, my supervisors think she's being very sensitive, making a ridiculous request and agreed that I'm not obligated to give students answers to study guide questions, much less a study guide for the exam. "

Not everyone will agree with your approach to teaching, get used to it.
Of course she is because she is a sensitive person.
No you are not obligated to give her answers but it wouldn't hurt to be nice. After all she got 23 correct without help. Your being anal about 2 says a lot and it is negative.

7. "I already discussed it with my supervisors and they want to give her another chance before kicking her out of the program"

That is extreme and tells me you have no patience for your students especially if they do not do things 100% your way. You are not a dictator, lighten up, learn that when students ask for help it does not mean they want the easy road all the time, you need to learn how to discern the difference.

8. "She obviously is craving attention and/or has suffered some recent trauma"

She is is not craving attention nor did she have a trauma but she may have have a fear of not being accepted by you or anyone else unless she is perfect and she knows she is not perfect tghus she feels she will be rejected. Stop assuming things without evidence.

9."Teacher with Limited Experience " This part of that sentence is true. You have a lot to learn when it comes to people and you will find that your college pofessors and other experts you may respect, have it wrong.
You cannot expect to have cookie cutter students when they all have different personalities or were raised differently. You need to learn to be patient, adjust your own attitude, that giving answers will not hurt your 'authority' or cause you to lose respect, and you need to learn how to respond to different people in different ways.

10 You will find that I will disagree with about 90-95% of the people on this board and that unlike many others I will not tell you what you want to hear. A piece of paper doesn't make you a teacher, that you learn how to be on the job, after making many mistakes and learning from them.

You have a lot to learn about teaching, being a teacher and doing the job in another culture. Get some understanding for your students and discernment.

[iRock]

Wait a minute superNET.

In one thread you are saying that the child abuse victim may be some delicate butterfly that bruises easily, or that a bruised FACE may just be discipline. Not violent at all. Right.

Then in this thread you're defending a woman acting like a whiny tween who wants her super sweet sixteen to be the BESTEST.

He didn't want to give her the 2 answers. She's an adult. You don't baby adults. You've got your priorities mixed up.

[interestedinhanguk]

superNET, your screen-name is as fitting as princess's.

[SteveSteve]

@SuperNET,

I suppose you're right and I should be more sympathetic to the needs of my students, which is something that I'm really working on. Really. And perhaps it was a little unfair to call her "emotionally disturbed" without evidence. I was a little upset when I started writing this post, but I understand that's not a good excuse in the first place. And in hindsight, I should have just given her the two answers to the study questions. (But in my defense to that point, our program enables all students to transfer up to 12 credits to one of four American universities, including a top 10 school, towards a MA in TESOL. You'd better believe that I'm going to hold my students to a slightly higher standard. Should I really be stigmatized for doing that? Well, there have been numerous research responses addressing teacher expectations and student success. In one study, a 3rd grade teacher was assigned to a class of autistic students, only the researchers did not mention this. Instead, they told the teacher that her students were mainstream or "normal" kids without any developmental, social or cognitive defects. The findings: her class outperformed all other mainstream 3rd grade classes at that school because the teacher held higher expectations for them. But I digress....)

SuperNET, I really do appreciate your advice and complete honesty. I really do because you pointed out some areas of improvement that I should develop. However, I don't think I'm being a dictator when I expect my students to behave as adults. Of course I understand my student are not robots. They get tired, bored, hungry, and restless from time to time. They may have gotten into a huge fight with a friend before class. Maybe they are sick and they just don't have the energy to participate. I fully understand that, but you took something I wrote out of context. Yelling at an instructor in the classroom in front of the other students and then running out of the room after slamming the classroom door in the teacher's face is completely disrespectful, and I don't think I'm being too demanding or strict when I said that I wouldn't tolerate this specific behavior a second time. In fact, I believe that particular behavior should never be tolerated by any teacher. Responding in this manner to any situation is unacceptable. I have seen students react in a number of ways to low scores and stress, but this is the first time that a student has exhibited something like this.

Sensitivity and understanding the students' needs and personalities aside, there must be a line that separates acceptable and unacceptable behavior in a classroom. It's not being a dictator. It's not having unrealistic expectations for your students. And it doesn't require them to be cookie-cutter examples of exemplary scholars. Starting scenes, yelling and slamming doors in a class, I'm afraid, are not characteristics of a healthy and socially-functioning adult. This is something that we can expect from frustrated children, but men and women in their 40s should already have enough life experiences to handle stress that invariably occurs in a graduate level course.

[superNET]

[superNET]

[winterfall]

I don't think she's emotionally disturbed. She's just very immature. A very low frustration tolerance (Independent learning) and she must've grown up in a home that emphasized perfectionism so she can't tolerate "Perceived" failure. And she doesn't know how to take responsibility (Always blaming someone else for the "Perceived Failure")

A healthy adult would rationalize a B+ as a, "I did the work, I answered the questions but there was nothing particularly special about my work that would've warranted me getting an A" Notice a healthy adult understands they are at fault. Unless there is a significant amount of observed evidence to justify blaming someone else. While an immature person would say "You hate me don't you? That's why you didn't give me the answers" Notice how there's no reasoning?

There is no solution to being immature. Just keep doing what your doing now and establish firm boundaries. If she yells at you in class again, punish her. Have her removed from the room. She needs to understand there are boundaries.

In a few years she'll grow out of it or wind up in a job that she doesn't love because someone else decided it for her. Either way it's not your responsibility.

I STRONGLY ADVISE YOU. To remember this is the uni level. Your not in high school anywhere. Your not doing anyone favors by babying her up. Your crippling her for life. This is the time that people have to start learning how to take responsibility for themselves. If they don't learn that now they're gonna wind up losers.

Edit: When in doubt refer to the standard AA meetings. Every meeting starts with someone standing up saying "I'm X, and I'm an alcoholic". The reason they do this is because, they're acknowledging they alone are the reason they have a drinking problem. It's not someone else's fault

[superNET]

[winterfall]

[ThingsComeAround]

[superNET]

[winterfall]