As we approach the halfway point of the year, many of us are ready for a well-earned break. Hopefully, as you wrap up and reflect on Term 2 there’s plenty to celebrate. However, there might be the odd area in which you’d like to find a few more wins and improvements during the back half of the year… and from my recent conversations with teachers, it’s most likely related to student behaviour.
Dealing with behaviours in our classrooms can be draining, especially if you’ve been tackling it for the last two terms and haven’t seen the progress you desire. For now, the best thing you can do is enjoy the break and recharge your batteries. And when the new term begins, I propose the next most valuable thing you can do is chat with your team about what supporting each other looks like when dealing with student behaviours.
Why? Because often we’re not clear on what to expect from each other in these moments. Often with the best intentions to support our colleagues, we unintentionally affirm to students that the teacher is struggling to deal with the challenging behaviour. And that can snowball.
As a teacher, when a lesson is derailed and you’re at the end of your tether, it’s a common step to seek support from either a team member or a leader. That’s fine. We might ask a leader to remove a student from the class, or come in to reinforce expectations. Seeking support is encouraged, however it’s how we that support is perceived by the students that’s important. Getting someone else to resolve the situation on your behalf might give you a short-term win, but it can make managing your class more challenging in the long run.
Whenever we seek support, we want to ensure the students see you as the leader of the classroom culture, or more specifically, the authority figure. However, our authority doesn’t mean we’re authoritarian, where we use power to control behaviour. It’s about being authoritative, which engenders respect and admiration from your students. Authoritative is relational, underpinned by mutual respect and a nice balance of firmness and fairness. It’s still authority, but it’s derived from the relationship.
As a teacher, here are a couple of proactive steps you can take when seeking support:
- Stay involved from start to finish
- Be clear in wanting the leader to supervise, until the time is right for you to work through it, but not to deal with the matter for you.
If you’re the leader in this situation and you’ve got a teacher in your team with a few challenges, try to fight the urge to jump in too early and resolve matters for them.
It’s a fine line – yes, be there for them, but help them to lead the charge. By removing the student and dealing with the behaviour, you can potentially disempower your team. We need to be careful not to send a subtle message to the student that, as a leader, you’re the only person who can deal with this behaviour, not the teacher. Try to think about your support motto along the lines of, “I’ve got you, and you’ve got this.”
As a leader, here are a couple of proactive steps you can take:
- Ensure your team is clear on what support looks like so that they know what to expect when you get involved.
- Create opportunities that empower the teacher. Walk alongside them through each step. This is the coaching moment.
- In some cases, it might be more productive to watch a teacher’s class for ten minutes so they can deal with the behaviour.
When we get this right, we’re united in our approaches and create a relational culture built on respect, responsibility, and fairness. We’ll eventually see a positive shift in behaviour that isn’t driven by asserting our dominance, but rather students knowing that their teachers care.
