[Carl Fazackerley]

DAJ Belshaw, on Oct 5 2006, 07:02 AM, said:

If I've learned anything about behaviour management over the last 3 years it's that students tend to forget the previous lesson unless you bring it up. Remember, if they only get you once per week, they'll have had over 20 lessons since their last one with you!

I'm sure you are right - I really hope this is true. I have now become aware that there are wider school issues with these pupils.

Quote

My advice would be to welcome everyone into the classroom with a smile on your face and make a point of welcoming the two girls by name.

I met both girls with my HoF today and we have operated a good cop bad cop routine on them - so expectations are now very clear!

Quote

go through 'That's your first warning', 'That's a formal warning', etc.

I am getting better at this, but as I don't know the classes very well I do find it difficult to pinpoint the problem sometime, so do find myself "firefighting" so to speak.

Quote

All in all, don't let them rattle you - it's not worth it. If they're playing you up they'll be playing everyone up.

True! The classes @ KS3 are all mixed ability tutor groups and they have a log book that one student carries around with the class all day to record issues in - and yes it isn't only me they are playing up. However I do feel that some of the situation yesterday was of my own creation as I wasn;t as firm as I should have been and allowed things to develop in a way that should not have occurred.

Quote

And John D is spot on - act as if you own the place and they'll respond accordingly. Your classroom is your domain, not theirs...

I am trying! I find it hard not having my own room as I constantly arrive just as they do so am trying to setup when they are already there which makes it hard to settle the group. I'm working on different strategies and lessons are getting better every time. I am told that I'll notice a big change after half-term when they realise that I am still there and I am still maintaining my expectations!

On another note - it doesn't help that I look about the same age as most of the sixth-form!!!

[DAJ Belshaw]

Glad to hear you're a bit more upbeat about it Carl!

Carl Fazackerley, on Oct 5 2006, 10:45 PM, said:

On another note - it doesn't help that I look about the same age as most of the sixth-form!!!

I had that problem. Grow some stubble (seriously!)

Doug

[Susie W]

Hi All,



This is my first post as an NQT and must say that I am having similar 'roller coaster' experiences as Carl and Ahoney. I teach a humanities 'mixed bag' of history, geography, RE (yr 10) and the dreaded GS. I really enjoy the geography and my two GCSE classes (history) but am finding it really challenging teaching the yr 8 and 9 groups that I have for history. This is a real shame as they are the only two KS3 history classes that I have. They both contain students with a wide range of behavioural issues and, although they are both bottom sets, there is a wide range of abilities. I also find that the pupils moods, what they have (or haven't) eaten that day, who's fallen out with whom etc., affects the whole lesson.



I've tried a number of different activities with each group (card sorts/match, converting text into drawings/diagrams, games etc.) but find that there are still some that just don't 'get it' no matter what I do! I don't want to go down the 'colouring route' as I think they should be given the opportunity to 'do history' ( and there are a couple in each group that consistently work well)but at the moment I'm not sure what else to try!!! I want these students to come into the classroom and really enjoy history - or is that me being a little idealistic?! Any advice would be greatly appreciated.



Saying all that, I'm really enjoying teaching and the difficult lessons are outnumbered by those that I thoroughly enjoy!







Susie

[Gwendoline]

Hello! Am a NQT-bod as well and I have to say this half-term ahs been a shock to the system. My department has no Schemes of Work and I get told how my lessons should be taught!! It would be OK if they were great ideas but its all posters and one-off lessons. My bigggest fear is that all the stuff that I've learnt in the last year I will forget because everytime I use thinking skills, drama or larger enquiries I get told that we teach like this because it works!! Am determined to plough on with the 'new' ideas though- just the atmosphere of the department is getting me down- its' so stifling!!!



Anyways, I teach some lovely classes and am enjoying it- in just feel bad that the kids aren't getting the level of eductaion that I know the department COULD deliver if it could be bothered!!

[Carl Fazackerley]

Hi Gwendoline and welcome to the NQT Diary. Welcome also to Susie. I'm glad others are starting to post as I was beginning to feel all alone in my rollercoaster ride.

Gwendoline, on Oct 8 2006, 02:12 PM, said:

Am determined to plough on with the 'new' ideas though- just the atmosphere of the department is getting me down- its' so stifling!!!

I am really sorry to hear that you are in this kind of enviornment. The one thing that is really keeping me going at the moment whilst I struggle with the behaviour is a truely supportive department, who are keen to try new things, indeed encourages all of us to do so. I have an outline scheme of work and lesson plans in the shared area for all KS3 lesson, but if I want to do something my own way I can and if it works it goes onto the plan for next year.

Gwendoline, on Oct 8 2006, 02:12 PM, said:

My department has no Schemes of Work

What topics do you teach and I'll see if I can help you at all with this. Post or PM me.

[sarahn]

I will also help if I can!
Sarah (not a NQT anymore!)

[Joel Thorpe]

Me three!!

[Jo Leech]

Me too. Just started as NQT and finding it harder than PGCE in some ways and easier in others. Glad it's not just me!!!

[lindsayh]

Jo,
were you on interview at a lovely school on teeside last term?
you're name seems familiar?
Maybe I am wrong

[Carl Fazackerley]

Just thought I'd check in. Life has been really hectic and I really need the half-term break. The assessment cycle has really taken it out of me these last two weeks. We have to NC level every pupil every half-term; we only get an hour a week to teach, which means that I have 13 classes to level! Another policy produced by those core subject SMT members who have a class for 3 or 4 hours per week!

Behaviour is still challenging but I'm assured that once the classes realise I'm still there after half-term things will settle. I think the biggest problem for me at the moment is that there are one or two in almost every class who are looking for a confrontation when they come into the room, which is really hard to handle particularly as many in the class take their lead from these individuals. I'm going to need a rethink on my approach with them. Next term I intend to role out the expectations exercise again, but this time get them to copy them down into their books.

Oh well! Only one day to go!

Also can I put out a plea for others to begin posting here so that we can have a dialogue that might help each other. If you have some successful strategies you have used to handle behaviour or to teach topic then post here as I'm sure we will all benefit from the contributions.

[JohnDClare]

Carl Fazackerley, on Oct 19 2006, 08:29 PM, said:

Just thought I'd check in. Life has been really hectic and I really need the half-term break.

So too all of us, Carl - but well done for surviving.

Quote

The assessment cycle has really taken it out of me these last two weeks. We have to NC level every pupil every half-term; we only get an hour a week to teach, which means that I have 13 classes to level! Another policy produced by those core subject SMT members who have a class for 3 or 4 hours per week!

Or by English teachers who see their classes 3-4 times a week. You are, of course, absolutely correct; it is a great burden on teachers who have one hour-long lesson a week and lots of classes ... this has been the moan of RE teachers for years.

Quote

Behaviour is still challenging but I'm assured that once the classes realise I'm still there after half-term things will settle.

Yes, and more so at the start of next term. The more so still at the start of next year. Then a huge change comes after 4/5 years, when you've been at the school longer than any of the pupils. And another seismic shift after 15 years, when you start to teach the children of children you've taught!!!!

Quote

Also can I put out a plea for others to begin posting here so that we can have a dialogue that might help each other. If you have some successful strategies you have used to handle behaviour or to teach topic then post here as I'm sure we will all benefit from the contributions.

Again, spot on ... a trouble shared is a trouble doubled ... or something like that I think. It can be terribly lonely out there on your NQT world.
But to bowdlerise St Paul, you are suffering nothing that hasn;t been suffered by every one of us in the teaching profession, but if you keep things in perspective, perseverence will pay off.

Congrats on your first half-term!!!

[Jan.D]

Re 'Perseverence' I think that is exactly right. When I was having a really hard time in my first term of NQT - 2 years ago - the retired head of history, who was back doing supply, said to me that 'success' in your NQT year is when you keep coming in every day and doing the best you can ... So when I was having simply terrible year 9 classes, (books being chucked around, kids constantly talking, ignoring me when I was stood right next to them telling them to sit down and stop talking, hardly any work being done, kids wandering around etc. ), I clung to her words like a mantra! I chanted them as I went round picking up the worksheets I had spent hours on, from the floor at the end of lessons! And as John says, it WILL get better, its just that at the beginning when people tell you this, somehow you find it so hard to believe! So, before you finish tomorrow, find a teacher who has that auror of total control, who just seems to get the kids to do what they want by magic and ask them to tell you about their first term as an NQT and then BELIEVE what they tell you! It will make you feel so much better! Then go home, crack open a bottle and say to yourself, the first half-term is the worst and now the only way is up!

[Gwendoline]

Wahey!! We've survived our first half -term and I'm feeling pretty chipper about it!!

I have had a word with my HoD about the non-existent schemes of work/ lesson plan situation and it seems that as we are due to be Ofsteded (?) this year and they've just changed the History KS3 that they're being rewritten. So, at the moment am still working off a written list of topics and resources but its good because in the last couple of weeks I've just taken control and begun to teach the way I want to teach with my own resources and ideas and its been really good!1



Carl, I sympathise with the year 10 issue mine are a pain, I've had them in with the HoD, HoF and even the headtecaher ( also a hist bod) but it doesn't work!. Parents aren't supportive either as they blame the rest of the class and myself and refue to believe their duaghteer can be a complete cow at times!!



But new half term, new positive focus so have redesigned the seating plan and am goign to restate my rules etc in the first lesson which is goign to be a slight;y'quieter' lesson for myself with more individual written work and plan on clamping down hard on those who cross me- I want to send the signal this half-term will be different, but will keep you posted.



Enjoy the break all, will pop in soon,



Gwen

[Carl Fazackerley]

Gwendoline, on Oct 25 2006, 05:09 PM, said:

But new half term, new positive focus so have redesigned the seating plan and am goign to restate my rules etc in the first lesson which is goign to be a slight;y'quieter' lesson for myself with more individual written work and plan on clamping down hard on those who cross me- I want to send the signal this half-term will be different,

My thoughts exactly. I am intending on having the classes copy down my "rules" into their books rather than discussing them as we did at the beginning of term. I think I need to make the point also that I will not tollerate the low level disruption that occurs, that in some ways I have been too slack with in the first half-term. I think the phrase is: its the little things that make the difference. Well I'm hoping that I can make sure that it will be the little things that send the message!

This post has been edited by Carl Fazackerley: 25 October 2006 - 04:56 PM

[Seb Phillips]

There is a well known business study done several years ago that shows people respond to change - whether it's good or bad, they generally acknoweldge that it's a new situation.

A new half term is always a good time to make changes in your classroom, because now the kids believe you mean it. It's OK to acknowledge that you were still learning about them, still finding out what would work - now you can put that into practice. So, new seating plan, a new set of rules to stick in their books, haul out the worst offenders and make sure they know that from this point onwards, you will be fair with them, support their attainment and even encourage specific interests, but you expect X type of behaviour, or Y is going to happen. Use your HOD to support you, or their form turo, parents, the scarey school padre, anything that gets the message across.

New half term, new start.

Also, do the same thing with your good kids too. Pull out your top predicted grades for a few minutes at the end of the lesson, tell them that this is the half term they are really going to shine, and tell them how they are going to do it. Let them know what's coming up, and point them towards some rsources they can use to get a head start. Include them. Conspire with them.

And stick to it. Loads of rewards, a very firmly held line on behaviour.

And you - look at your working practices from last half term. What worked best for you? What do you need to change to ensure that you get through THIS half with the minimum hassle. Are you still working yoruself into the ground creating new resources? Are you missing deadlines of reports and assessment because you are too busy to see them coming? Be honest - can you maintain the pace for the first half term for another year? The answer is probably no. So what changes do you have to make to esure that you (not only survive) but actually have a life come August?

New halt term, new start - for teachers too!

Best of luck - Enjoy!