Make it better

Thursday of this week, I had a dreadful day. The morning was packed with 12 year olds who'd fallen out with each other, and with maths, and at least 3 kids told me they 'couldn't be bothered' to think. It probably didn't help that my classroom was baking. At lunch a teacher I team-teach with told me she was ditching the class because she needed more planning time and had allocated me another teacher to team-teach with... 4 weeks before these students go on study leave. She said she was 'sure you'll agree it's what's best for the kids'! What? No! Add to that the looming prospect of a really long parents' evening that night, and I was not looking forward to period 5 with my naughtiest group.

My TA came up to my baking hot room and found me with my head in my hands, frustrated and tired and at the end of my tether. We had a chat, and I was reminded of something I've read a lot: I, as the teacher, set the weather in the classroom. Fair or stormy, I decide. I had 31 11 year olds about to turn up, who'd done nothing wrong, and I needed an attitude change before they came in! With my TA, I threw open all the windows on the shady side of the room and pulled down all the blinds on the sunny side (yeah, windows down both sides). Whilst we did this, we re-wrote the lesson plan verbally. Minimal silent individual work. We made some problem sets paired challenges, and others we decided to scrap and work wholly on the mini whiteboards for that section. We thought about questions to ask, and how to help them through the tougher bits.

We heard them yelling outside, so I plastered a big smile on my face and went out. The corridor was really hot, and I was happy that my room felt much cooler. It was dim too, which I thought would help calm them down. They lined up looking dishevelled and muddy after a lunchtime of football, but I got them in fast. I suggested they all take their jumpers off, and got right on with the lesson, using my favourite trick - saying it was a really hard lesson, but they'd done so well last lesson I thought they could handle it. My TA and I tag-teamed round the room, making eye contact and assessing which students needed us most, and where to position ourselves in the classroom for whole-class work. There were no tears. There was very little frustration. They took to the challenge, and the room felt full of positivity. No one whined at me, and no one was 'not bothered'. Everyone had some success. Random and my other 2 naughties stayed in the room the whole lesson, and did their work with minimal coaxing. When they filed out I turned to my TA and we both let out a long breath. 'Thank you' I said, 'That was a triumph'.

It's so easy to let my own frustrations spill over into my teaching, and it was so good to be reminded that I can change what feels inevitable, if I change my approach.