What Management Strategies Worked? What didn’t?

Teaching two Science 8 classes was definitely a good opportunity to practice class management strategies. I came into the practicum with a few management strategies picked up here and there. Unfortunately, many of them were ineffective in the beginning. In the end, I found a few strategies that worked and stuck with it until the end. Let’s go over my haphazard strategy of throwing ideas at the wall and seeing what sticks.

Failures:

Clapping
On my first day, I was struck by just how loud grade 8s were when they were excited. I guess I must not have noticed during my own secondary school experience. I tried clapping a certain pattern and having my students follow me. This backfired because of two reasons. First, my students were much too loud and the sound of my clapping trailed off into the ether. Second, my hands hurt after every class. I decided that this was an inefficient method.

Turning the lights on and off
This seemed like a more efficient method but honestly the students never even seemed to notice. I would flick the lights on and off for a full minute before I got any response. I gave this method up after one day.

Successes:

Seating Plan
When I picked up a grade 8 science class, I had taken over from a teacher who had arranged the students in alphabetical order. As I soon found however, one area of the room was resistant to class management. Certain students were quite energetic and did not respond as well to my management strategies. In response to this, I came up with a seating plan for the next day. I separated 5 of the more rambunctious students and placed them in strategic areas of the room. I then surrounded them with the quietest students in the class. From then on, class management became a much easier exercise.

Wait Time

After attempting and failing at various strategies for getting student attention. I resorted to the tried-and-true method of wait time. I simply walked to the front of the class, asked for their attention once and waited calmly until the class quieted down. This method placed less stress on myself and I didn’t need to stress my voice as often. Students would eventually quiet themselves down when I waited long enough. I would sometimes wait an extra few seconds, putting on my stern teacher face to let them know how disappointed I was. This was the method I had the most success with in my practicum.