Classroom Management: Creating a Positive Learning Environment

Preface

Preface Teachers in Hong Kong, like those elsewhere, are concerned about classroom discipline. During the period we worked with them, they had expressed grave concern about how to handle students’misbehaviour positively and effectively. This is the case particularly for those who feel it necessary to defend their roles as teachers when facing difficult classes and spend most of the time on discipline rather than instruction. This book is based on listening to their inner voices and recognizing their needs. In it, we have attempted to provide practical ideas and theoretical frameworks for student teachers, in-service teachers and school managers to help them develop ways of creating and maintaining learning environments in which teaching is conducive to better learning, positive discipline is exercised, and helping relationships between teachers and students, and among students, are established. By combining literature, research evidence and examples from everyday practice, we encourage teachers to develop their personal systems of classroom management and ways of engaging their students in learning. For this purpose, the book examines classroom management in both Chinese and Western societies, especially recent developments for managing discipline in non-confrontational and supportive ways. Other topics of concern to all teachers, such as managing challenging behaviour, establishing classroom rules, communicating authority and coping with bullying, are also dealt with. A broad perspective is taken to view issues in classroom discipline at the whole-school and cultural levels. In this book, we invite teachers to consider what constitutes a positive learning environment and cover the following topics to help them in this endeavour: • Classroom behaviour is examined from an interactionist perspective, and teachers are led in particular to look closely at the contexts in which incidents and problems arise (see Chapter 1). • An effort is made to raise teachers’ awareness of cultural influences on their beliefs and practices of discipline (see Chapter 2). • The major components of effective classrooms which teachers must take into account in constructing an inviting environment for students are identified, and teachers’ roles as good classroom managers are discussed (see Chapter 3). x Preface • A continuum of strategies for managing student misbehaviour is examined, to facilitate personal planning (see Chapter 4). • Various approaches and models for managing classrooms are introduced, and a framework with simple and practical strategies to help teachers in using them is outlined (see Chapter 5). • The importance of good communication for productive teacher-pupil relationships is stressed, and ways of inviting communication and communication roadblocks are analysed (see Chapter 6). • Various strategies are suggested for enhancing friendship among students to enrich their school lives and learning experience, including the teaching of some social and emotional skills which promote and maintain positive relationships among peers (see Chapter 7). • The benefits of collaboration are emphasized and practical ideas are given to enable teachers to identify contexts in which they can work collaboratively and collegially to deal with issues of concern and develop action plans for implementing change (see Chapter 8). • The potential contribution of parents to improving classroom behaviour and the quality of learning both inside and outside the classroom is highlighted, and teachers are advised to create contexts in which positive and creative partnerships with them can take place (see Chapter 9). • Reflection and action research are promoted as effective means for examining and tackling problems in the classroom, and ways of establishing personal management plans are introduced (see Chapter 10). Our schools are subject to increasing demands for particular sorts of performance in the current wave of educational reform and the overwhelming culture of auditing and accountability. This may narrow our attention, diverting it from those aspects which contribute to healthy behaviour, helping relationships, a positive learning environment and effective achievement. Classroom management is, after all, about creating an environment that is inviting and appealing, so that students are pleasantly engaged in their learning and teachers share their enjoyment of the learning process. Only when the efforts of management fail should teachers have to resort to controlling or intervention strategies. It is hoped that this book will broaden the ways in which teachers examine classroom episodes and provide insights into how to create a positive environment where all school participants work together for the welfare of students and put effort into making things better. ...