I have found the classroom management style and expectations to be very similar in Bath to the techniques practiced in American schools, but they are helpful nonetheless. From the minute the
children walk in the door, it is clear that my CT, Mrs. Williams, has high expectations
for what is expected of the children.
They are to put their bags in either the “Boys” or “Girls” bin, hang up
their coats, and put their lunch in their drawers in the classroom. Then they need to take their seat on the rug,
which is lined with tape to indicate which row they sit in and each child has
an assigned space. Almost all of the children
do this flawlessly, showing that a couple weeks of rehearsing this has worked,
while a select few still walk in and start playing or sitting where they aren’t
supposed to. In this case, Mrs. Williams
starts to call out students who are doing what they are expected to do, saying
things like, “I really like how Ella is sitting quietly on the rug.” This usually gets everyone’s attention and
they correct their behavior fairly quickly.
It is easy to tell that the morning routine was stressed as very important
from the first day of school.
During play time and activities throughout the day, the
class has the opportunity to freely complete whichever activity they want and
there are not too many instructions associated with this, but when it is time
to stop, Mrs. Williams rings a bell indicating that it is time to “tidy up” and
the students must stop what they are doing and pick up their station before
returning to their seats on the rug.
This is always a more hectic part of the day for the children because
they had just been playing so it takes a moment for them to settle down, though
they do tend to start cleaning up right away.
Once they are at the rug, the students wait to be told what they will do
next. The rug is used as a gathering
place for either lessons or transitions into different parts of the day and
works well to settle the children down so they are aware that it is time to
listen. In general, the students listen
pretty well to Mrs. Williams and Miss Cullen.
As most kids do, they sometimes get wound up, but it is clear that they
regard their teachers’ authority because they never stay too distracted for
long. The class routine was incorporated
into the students’ day well, so they are already well-rehearsed on what is
expected of them early in the school year.
I had a similar experience in my Australian classroom. Most of the strategies were very similar to what I've seen at home in the U.S., but it was still really helpful to get more practice at implementing them and to see what really effective classroom management looks like. In my classroom it was also really clear that the students respected my CT. I thought that was probably the most important thing about the classroom management in my placement: that the students respected the teacher and wanted to make her happy. It was really interesting and cool to see that similar classroom management techniques are used on the other side of the world.
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