May

19

Strategies for dealing with kids who get physcially aggressive with teachers- Part 1- Establishing the classroom climate

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A. Introduction

It’s important for teachers to know how to protect themselves from those few students who deal with the vicissitudes of life by being physically aggressive. We’ve all heard those stories about teachers who get hit, punched or have something thrown at them. Fortunately, there are strategies that we can use in the classroom that will help reduce the possibility of that.

As some of you might know, I’m a special education behaviour specialist and have taught teenagers in jail, in open custody facilities, in vocational schools as well as in regular high schools. I’ve been teaching troubled, troubling and troublesome kids for over twenty years now and have learned or should I say have had to learn strategies that have kept me safe and happy in the classroom.

What have I learned over all the years? I’ve learned that the most important thing I can do to keep myself safe in the classroom is to prevent problems before they start. How do I do this- by establishing a positive classroom environment.

Ironically enough, I learned this lesson early in my teaching career when I was teaching young offenders in jail. The classroom I was to teach in had been set up by someone else so it didn’t reflect me as a person at all, and a guard was to sit in the classroom to protect me from my students-that was hardly conducive to a positive learning environment. So, I decided some changes had to be made.

You can imagine what happened when I first asked to have the guard removed from the classroom. I just wanted it to be me and the kids. The powers- that -be (I can’t remember exactly who that was) were more than a little reluctant to do that. But, fortunately Stu Auty who was my supervisor supported me in this request and the guard was gone, replaced by a large red emergency button that I could push if there were any problems. The guard now sat in an area down the hall, away from the classroom. That worked well.

Why did I want the guard gone? Of course I knew why the guard was there, I’m not stupid. But I felt that the guard brought the jail and everything it represented into the classroom, and I didn’t want that. As long as jail was in the classroom, the classroom environment wouldn’t be a positive learning environment. I wanted a safe, positive learning environment and that’s what I got. The red emergency button was there for safety, and the classroom environment was positive because the guard was gone.

Although I’m not teaching in jail anymore, I still want a safe, positive learning environment. In someways teaching in a regular high school today is scarier than teaching in jail- there’s no red emergency button and guard down the hall. You’re on your own more.

B. Establishing Classroom Climate

Establishing a positive classroom climate is essential for a safe, positive learning environment, and establishing classroom agreements are one of the ways to do that.

I used to call the classroom agreements rules, but rules seem so top down, and I don’t want that. Some kids see red when they see the word “rule”. I want them to see green instead. I want students to buy into the classroom code of conduct, not rebel against it.

At the beginning of the semester we establish our behaviour agreements. Basically it boils down to attentive listening, appreciation, mutual respect and right to pass. You can view my PowerPoint for elaboration.

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I want the classroom agreements to be a result of collaboration so that the students will be more likely to buy into the code of conduct.

This is what I do
1. Tell students that since they are in grade 9, 10 or whatever, I know they’re experts at knowing what makes a classroom work because they’ve been in many so classrooms

2. Set up a placemat group activity that will ellict the students’ expertise

3. Ask students to take a few minutes to think about what makes a classroom work and then jot those things down on their section of the placemat
4 Have students share their thoughts with group members
5. Place four pieces of chart paper on the wall labeled mutual respect, attentive listening, appreciation, and right to pass. It’s amazing , everything seems to fall into these four categories.
6. Have each student choose two or three things that they think are the most important and write each one onto a separate sticky note
7. Ask students to place their sticky notes onto one of the four pieces of chart paper according to where they think it belongs
8. Discuss the results of the activity with the class noteing how everything falls into one of the four categories
9. Add my own stickies if I see that something has been omitted. I’m part of the class too.
10. Thank the students for their expert input and tell them that I think that what we have here will make our classroom work and ask them if they agree. Most will say they agree and that’s what I want.
11. Have students create posters illustrating the classroom agreements.
12. Review the agreements next day using the powerpoint presentation I made. That’s when I make sure everyone understands what kinds of behaviours each agreement includes.
123. Ask students if anyone would like to display their posters. I let them choose where, but ask that they make sure that each wall has some posters on it.

It’s interesting to see and hear what happens. Students will start to remind each other of our classroom agreements by saying things like no put downs, attentive listening , mutual respect and right to pass when someone is behaving inappropriately. It’s much more effective to cite the classroom agreements than to say stop talking while I’m teaching or stop calling him names etc. I even hear my students cite the agreements outside of the classroom when they’re walking in the halls . I love that because I want them to be proactive and advocate for themselves in and out of the classroom.

The classroom agreements we’ve established set the stage for and support a safe, positive learning environment. That’s a good first step. The next thing I do is work at maintaining that positive climate or vibe. I’ll talk about how I do that in my next post. Look for it sometime next week.

Comments

3 Responses to “Strategies for dealing with kids who get physcially aggressive with teachers- Part 1- Establishing the classroom climate”

  1. Mathew on May 19th, 2008 2:02 pm

    Great ideas!

  2. Hartjes on climate at Behavior Modification on May 23rd, 2008 5:18 am

    [...] including establishing rules (though she prefers to call them “agreements”). Read the entire post. Sphere: Related Content « B-mod camps are [...]

  3. Edupunk.is.dead. (Insert witty web 2.0-eduism catchphrase here) « An (aspiring) Educator’s Blog on June 5th, 2008 3:28 pm

    [...] I think that the term ‘edupunk’ fails to capture what the DIY reform movement is all about. The most important aspect of the reform is changing the nature of student-teacher relationships. Instead of a top-down classroom hierarchy where the educator creates the rules of the classroom and controls content, the classroom needs to be an interactive community where interactions between students and educators drives curriculum. A great example of this is the behavior management techniques discussed on Elona Hartjes’ blog: [...]

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