ELEMENT 5: TEACHERS CREATE AND MAINTAIN SAFE AND CHALLENGING LEARNING ENVIRONMENTS THROUGH THE USE OF CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT SKILLS
I have…
In all my professional experience, I have attempted to ensure that all students in my class had respect for each other and myself. In saying this, I always made sure that I had nothing but respect for my students too. In my classrooms, there have been points of conflict between students and I always ensured that these conflicts were dealt with effectively and fairly. I feel that I gained very good rapport with my students and always felt that they respected me and in turn listened to what I asked of them. I also think that my students knew what was expected of them in terms of their behaviour towards one another and that I would not tolerate any form of bullying or disrespect to another student or school property. I have demonstrated a variety of strategies to develop student rapport, such as learning names very quickly and making sure I used them by recess time (Appendix A). Evidence of my rapport with the students can also be seen in my Professional Experiences 1 report.
I believe that I effectively demonstrated knowledge of practical approaches to managing student behaviour and their applications in the classroom. This was particularly important in my second year practicum at as one student in particular had very challenging behaviour with the capacity to disrupt the whole class and refuse to participate in lessons. I feel that I dealt with his defiance and violence appropriately and effectively (as shown in Appendix B). For Stage One children, I have also made use of a Whole Body Listening chart to aid students in settling down before a lesson (Appendix C) and using it at the start of lessons where appropriate. In this situation, and in many others, I believe in the importance of making students feel responsible for their own learning.
I will…
In the future I would like to become more individualistic in my teaching style to make my rapport with students stronger. I would also like to be able to use more strategies to teach my students about how to treat others in their class and my expectations around respect. I envisage myself having a classroom where all students can feel safe and supported and one in which maximum and equitable student participation takes place. This will help with their social and emotional development and their social interactions with each other even out of the classroom. I would like to see more students putting their hands up to answer questions, as I know that many students can feel threatened by getting the wrong answer, so this is something I would like to work on.
I need…
I need to research and implement new classroom management techniques. I also need more experience in managing a Stage Three classroom, which I will gain on my practicum and internship.
I believe…
I believe that all students should feel comfortable taking the risk of full participation. Teachers can encourage risk-taking by making sure student’s answers (right or wrong) are valued and that students are not negatively judged by their peers when giving the wrong answer. I believe a teacher should create and maintain a positive classroom climate and constantly refine his/her classroom management skills.