Classroom management - discipline

In this entry I want to focus on one aspect of the classroom management - discipline. I'm going to describe students's behaviour, its possible causes and teacher's response.

First two lessons I have seen were conducted by the mentor teacher in the first grade. These were math classes connected with the line of symmetry - teacher was talking about it with the children, she gave them examples and after that each pupil made his own symmetrical butterfly. The first lesson started with reading.  During the lessons students rather behaved well although there were a few situation when their behaviour was not appropriate. A few of them were talking too much or messing around and not paying attention to the teacher. In such moments teacher gave them a verbal notice  but when it did not work she was sending a child on the pillow to calm down. When the pupil had rethinked his/her behaviour and apologized he/she could come back to the activity. 

Next, I observed Phonics classes. During them students practised the song for the Winter Show. Then they made several tasks from the coursebook. During this lesson, there were problems with discipline during the rehearsal.Children were dispersed and were not concentrating on the task. Teacher's only reaction was telling students to behave well - somehow it worked.

Last lesson I saw was English. Children were singing Jingle Bells and Jingle Bell Rock. In the end they played hangman. During this class there was one student who was playing with his toys. Teacher reacted immediately - he took them from the boy, talk with him about his behaviour and asked him if he wants his parents to be called.

In my opinion students bad behaviour was not caused by boredom or not various activities but by the problems with concentration. I think that teacher can use a lot of tools to make students behave properly. It does not only have to be telling children things like "do not talk". Teacher can introduce a motivational system which might discipline pupils but I think that the most important is to talk with students about their problems, emotions as well as possible causes of disruptive behaviour - this is what I would do while working with kids.