Teach Middle East Magazine June 2014 Issue 2 Vol. 1 | Page 20

Sharing Good Practice

ESSENTIAL THINGS TO DO
BEFORE THE BELL RINGS
By Terrence Lorick - Guest Writer

M

aintaining a well-managed
classroom is about more
than just discipline. A teacher
with experience in effective
classroom management knows that
the level of efficiency a classroom has
is determined before you even meet
your students. This carries through
to every aspect of teaching. Good
classroom management is as much
about preventing problems as it is about
cleaning them up after they occur.
More importantly, instead of looking at
student behavior in isolation, teachers
should consider it in the context of
classroom design, lesson planning,
and
instructional
strategies, as these
are all important
tools to help us
achieve our main goal,
student engagement.
Classroom design is a key way
to
initiate
effective
classroom
management before the first bell even
rings. A classroom can be a warm,
exciting place. However, if not properly
designed or maintained, the classroom
can quickly lose its potential to assist a
teacher in maintaining a well controlled
learning environment. For instance, a
classroom that is set up for cooperative
learning promotes the idea of teamwork
and responsibility. Conversely, a
classroom that uses a more traditional
design such as straight rows does not
support the team approach and limits
student interaction.
Classroom maintenance is every bit as
important as classroom design. Simply
put, students enjoy an environment that
changes periodically. Study centers
with rotating themes invites enthusiasm
for your subject, which in turn promotes
engagement. However, just as you
may want to enrich your classroom,
there may be times when you want to
impoverish it as well. You may need a
quiet corner with few distractions, as
some students will get caught up in
visual exploration. For them, the vibrant
colors are sirens that pull them off task.
The quiet corner is a place where you
can steer these students, allow them

18

June 2014

Class Time

to maintain focus on the task at hand
and not become a disruption to the
learning environment. Another idea for
classroom maintenance is to display
student work around the room. This
helps to give the students a sense of
belonging and ownership of the space.
One
other
important
classroom
management strategy, perhaps the most
important, is lesson planning. Lesson
plans may be viewed as a tool that
allows both teachers and students
to maintain the necessary levels
of engagement, through a

sense of
purpose and
procedure.
They should
be
written
in a manner
that allows you
to begin each
lesson with clarity
about what students
already know and what they should
be able to do by the end of the class
period. If every second of your day is
purposefully moving you toward that
end, it will encourage engagement
while discouraging behaviors that are
disruptive and disorderly. In addition to
clarity about student knowledge and
the learning objectives, you should also
have a clear sense of the behaviour
you expect at each point in the class
period. These expectations need to
be communicated to the students.
By so doing, you give students the
responsibility of managing their
conduct, by becoming aware of how

closely the choices they make reflect
on the overall outcome. This in turn
allows the teacher the capacity to
address behaviour management more
clearly and directly.
Finally, the strategies and techniques
that you choose to use to facilitate
learning are as important to the
management of your classroom as
any of the aforementioned aspects.
Teachers should possess a
repertoire
of
effective
instructional strategies to
use in the classroom. Peer
tutoring,
discussion,
debates, questioning,
and group work are
examples of very
different
teaching
methods that can
achieve
similar
goals. The ability to
initiate a lesson with
a given strategy,
coupled with an
understanding of how
to assess the strategy’s
effectiveness,
can
be very useful in
maintaining
student
engagement; as such,
be flexible. If a technique
proves to be too demanding
or the interest isn’t there,
adapt it or c hange it completely.
Be open to even starting over the
lesson. The benefit of a class that is
engaged, is worth any modifications
you may have to make to your lesson.
These ideas are a good place
for any teacher to begin building
a strong foundation for a wellmaintained classroom. Remember,
classroom management and behavior
management are not synonymous.
Design well, plan strong, perfect your
approach, and reap the benefits.