How do you handle a really noisy class?

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Effie F.
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How do you handle a really noisy class?

Post by Effie F. » Tue Jan 16, 2007 7:36 am

And it's only not that they're noisy. They don't want to pay any attention, like they're in the classroom for another reason. We have a very nice book with interesting topics which I'm supposed to cover, but it's extremely hard to do it. And it's not like I can do something different that they will enjoy, this is what I have to do. But I want them to "be there". I hate yelling all the time for them to be quite. And this situation makes me sad. :(

David-sensei
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Post by David-sensei » Tue Jan 16, 2007 11:17 am

How old are the kids and how many are in the class?

Sally Olsen
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Post by Sally Olsen » Tue Jan 16, 2007 6:38 pm

I think you are in Greece, are you not? That means that many of the kids go to English lessons after school and are probably ahead of what you are doing in the classroom and those that don't, don't know enough to keep up to the level that they are in. They are preteens as well as I remember and the hardest age to teach. If you survive this in your first year of teaching, you will survive anything else they can throw at you.

I would give the class a version of the final test if there is one and find out who can do the work and who can't. For those who can, make them partners with those who can't and make them responsible for getting those students through the year. They can go off in pairs or groups of three and go through the book and workbook by themselves with you facilitating if you hear them teaching the wrong thing. Your class will still be noisy but at least it will be noisy with some learning going on.

Always speak to them in English so they have to work to understand you and give instructions in English. Someone will know enough to translate for the rest if they really don't understand.

Put up a banner across the front of the room with all the requirements of the year - either the topics in the book or what you got in your teacher's manual and get them to make sure they can check off each section.

If you have exams or tests for each section, you can run off copies and have them in folders for the students to take as they finish their section of the book. You can give them surprise exams if you think that their partner did most of the work for them and they don't really know the sections, especially at the beginning when they will try to get out of helping each other.

You have to plan for June though because most groups will have finished the book and be wanting something else - that is when you can have fun and do all the extra things that they tell you about in your teacher's manual or just go on picnics, watch English movies and have fun with English.

Instead of yelling, lower your voice until they can barely hear it but say what you were going to say with equal force of body language. That always intrigues students and they will stop to try to figure out what you are saying. Or sing the instructions. Turn off the lights in the classroom so there is minimum stimulation even if it is very dark. Your eyes will soon grow accustomed to the darkness and you will still be able to catch those that are misbehaving.

Did you take our advice and establish classroom rules with the students and conseqences when they misbehaved that they dream up? It is really only two or three students who are taking the lead and if you can get them on your side, your problems will disappear. Follow them home after school and find out where they hang out and what they do, what they are good at. If they know you know where they live, that will be enough of a deterant usually. If you can't do that, speak to them privately after class and ask them if they know how their behaviour is bothering you and ask how you are going to work together to solve the problem. Don't talk to them in a group or they will support one another, not you.

Laugh about the situation and try to remember how you treated substitutes and extra credit teachers. They are always treated with disrespect until the students come to know them so participate in school acitivites as much as you can - watch their games, cheer them on at sports days, admire their paintings or music or writing or helping out the younger ones. Catch them being good.

clio.gr
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Post by clio.gr » Thu Feb 01, 2007 9:48 am

Hi! I am from Greece too.

I know what you mean. And if you work at a state school they are told by their parents not to pay attention because they go to tutoring schools in the afternoon and they learn English there. So you are all alone with the parents against you.

I sympathise with you because I work at all day schools and fortunately there is not a book I have to teach so I follow the Experiential and Communicative approach.

Can't you say to the supervisor (symvoulos) that you are doing the book (which in high school I think is badly written and boring) and make a more interesting lesson with crossword puzzles, wordsearches, project works, board games etc.? I've noticed that both preteenagers and teenagers love these lessons and many parents appreciate the effort (esp. those with dyslectic children).

I knowa some old teachers who do it. I don't know exactly the situation, but this is what I've decided to do because I know the situation and it's really bad (I hope I'll enter the state schools as a subtitute teacher really soon or succeed in the ASEP exams).

Sally Olsen
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Post by Sally Olsen » Thu Feb 01, 2007 5:28 pm

Lliana also described your situation awhile ago and I thought made some very good observations.
http://www.eslcafe.com/forums/teacher/p ... ile&u=4930

If it is any consulation, it is not only in Greece that these things are happening. In Japan, they call it Classroom Collapse. I went to a Japanese school to give a talk on Canada along with others who were talking about their country and during the assembly, the students never stopped talking to one another and no one asked them to be quiet. it was chaos with us trying to talk on the sound system. I was amazed as none of the children I met were like that in my classes. The teachers were just throwing up their hands and said that this new generation was so self-involved and uncontrollable. I guess if you have those expectations, you will get that behaviour.

I have always found that children want to learn but they can be swayed to learn how to disrupt and make the teacher uncomfortable too by a few, so I concentrate on those few at the beginning and on making my lessons practical, relevant and fun so the "good" students tell the others to behave as they don't want to miss anything.

Don't give up. Teaching can be so rewarding when you overcome these difficulties and you can. I remember that feeling of panic when I had to go into a "bad" class as the other teachers described it. I remember the nightmares of "bad" classes, but when you start to make a difference, you really get hooked on overcoming these difficulties.

Try smiling at the good students as soon as you come in the room and put up a mirror somewhere you will catch your image often so that you can change that frown or angry look into a smile for the good students again or a laugh at yourself when you are sucked into being angry yet again by "those" students.

Tell the disruptive students over and over and over, until they are sick of hearing it, "Be Nice and Work Hard".

clio.gr
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Post by clio.gr » Fri Feb 02, 2007 7:38 am

Sally I totally agree with you.

Pair work and group work, interesting lesson that applies to their interests, involving them in the process, deciding together on the rules and putting up the rules somewhere the whole class can see them, not yelling etc are very effective.

But I can sympathize with Effie too. You don't know the Greek reality so you cannot understand the way we build in the morning and the parents destroy in the evening.

In Greece all the children (not the majority, all of them) go to private tutoring schools in their neighbourhood. Parents (and here the state and we teachers have got a great responsibility) don't trust the school system when foreign language teaching and learning is concerned. So they tell their children not to tire themselves participating in English lessons during the day so that they can pay attention during in the evening.

Very few of them work with us and a great number don't even bother to see us during parents day.

AND HERE LIES OUR GREAT RESPONSIBILITY CONVINCING OUR STUDENTS AND THEN OUR PARENTS THAT THEY DON'T NEEd THE TUTORING SCHOOLS AND THAT THE OFFICIAL SCHOOL IS NOT FOR BABY SITTING. AND WE CAN CONVINCE THEM THAT LEARNING CAN BE FUN.

Sally Olsen
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Post by Sally Olsen » Fri Feb 02, 2007 4:43 pm

I can sympathize, empathize and understand it is difficult.

In Greenland, where the attitude is very similar but for different reasons, I used to ask the students to give me the 45 minutes because they were in the room and most of them were awake. I told them that I couldn't help them all that much with their problems outside of school although I would listen anytime they wanted to talk and that I couldn't change the conditions in the school, the weather or their physical characteristics (bad hair day kinds of things), but that for 45 mintues we could put our best energy into doing something that would make us feel proud at the end of it. Then at the end of the lesson, I would point out all the good thngs that happened. That gradually adds up over a long period of time and it took me six months to really feel that I was making some kind of difference. The same in Mongolia but there I had more days after the six months that I was discouraged and would go up in the hills with my dog to cry and shout to the winds with frustration but better days eventually came.

Every job has these moments. Both my sons who are in different fields - one a musician and one a computer programmer complain of similar difficulties. It is the people who are excited about what they are doing and stick to it that will make the difference in the end. But also the people like you who reflect on things and search for ways to change what they don't like, know that change doesn't come quickly and with change comes three new problems to reflect on.

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