A Problem Shared - By Natalia Martyn

Feeling prepared for my lesson, power point up on the board ready to go, lesson plan in hand, I’d taught the class a few times before and gotten to know most of them well; What could possibly go wrong? 

A troubled student arrived in class. They had missed a lot of their previous lessons as they had often been in “Time out”. Me, thinking I could be the saviour to turn them around, decided I wanted to keep them in class. A downfall I wasn’t prepared for.  
Partway through the lesson the student began playing up. I asked them to stop and carried on with my lesson. A little while later, they continued, I asked them again to stop and had a quiet word. Unfortunately some other students had picked up on this and decided to join in. Before I knew it, almost the whole class were talking over each other, making silly noises and generally lost focus. I attempted to reset the class but it was too late. I had lost them, it was clear I wasn’t going to get them back this lesson no matter how hard I tried.  

After the lesson was over I sat down with the teacher observing me, they detailed all the things that had gone wrong (with a few positives thrown in) but it was a hard pill to swallow. I knew I had lost the class. I knew it was my fault, I knew I should have sent the student out. It was very disheartening. The teacher carrying out my observation suggested I observe some other expert colleagues to see how they do things.  

The following lesson I had decided to reset, giving the class expectations for entering the room, and resetting the class again during the lesson. The lesson went better but the behaviour was still quite challenging, with many of the same students picking up where they left off last lesson. I managed to keep my cool, and challenge the behaviour in line with the school policy. The person observing me picked up on more behaviours than I had even noticed. Feeling disheartened again I was determined I wasn’t going to be defeated by it. I started talking to other student teachers in the school, and other expert colleagues. All responded with similar stories and lots of positive feedback.  
The following lesson, I reset the class again, ensuring high expectations were explicit from the offset. I called some students back out of the room and got them to reline up in silence, setting the tone for the lesson. The same students tried making noises or not following instructions, but this time I was more prepared, showing them there were sanctions for their behaviour. Fewer students were showing negative behaviours and many of them had settled into the lesson. Focusing on setting high expectations over lesson content for the sake of one lesson proved fruitful later on. The behaviour improved in following lessons. There were still a few niggly bits to nip in the bud, but on the whole it was much better which meant I could focus more on lesson content rather than behaviour issues and my feedback from my last lesson was nothing short of positive.  

The conversations with expert colleagues reminded me they have all been faced with challenges at some point in their career. I feel lucky to have such a supportive team of colleagues for my first placement.  

By Natalia Martyn

------

Keep up-to-date with the latest Maths Scholarships news:

Find us on Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, YouTube, and Facebook.

Join our mailing list or get in touch Here.