Q: What relevant classroom management strategies and models would you have adopted to prevent the problems discussed in 1 from taking place in your class? (7 marks)
A: i ) Not a single student turns up for her lesson within the first 10 mins of the lesson.
- Do not always assume students will remember their timetable well, hence it's always good to co-ordinate with the class representative or subject representative. Miss Lim can always remind the representative at the start of school during flag raising.
- Miss Lim can always send sms a day before the lesson to the representative to remind the class the venue of the lesson.
- Miss Lim can get the help of the subject teacher who has lesson before hers to remind the class.
- Miss Lim can get the class/subject representative to organize the class and bring them to the special room.
- A copy of lessons schedule and venue should be place on the noticeboard in the classroom.
ii) No fix seating arrangement in the special rooms even though the lesson was conducted thrice in the special room.
- Miss Lim should have plan the seating arrangement in the special rooms before the 1st lesson is conducted.
- Reinforcement should be done every lesson to ensure the students are seated accordingly to the seating plan.
- A copy of seating plan should be place on the noticeboard to remind the students.
- Ensure that the ratio of gender and races of the class are equally spread out in the seating plan.
iii) Environment was not conducive for learning.
- Miss Lim should try to be in the special room earlier than the students to ensure that the temperature of the room is suitable for conducive learning.
- Should the temperature be uncontrollable, always remind the students to bring a jacket along during her lessons.
- Rules and expectation must be set in the 1st lesson.
- Reinforcement of the rules to prevent students from doing things in their own way.
- If possible, always purchase immobilizer furniture.
iv) Students do not feel motivated and have no idea what to expect for that day lesson.
- Always start the lesson with introduction and objective for the day to arouse students interest.
- The teacher might want to address the issue of lateness before starting the lesson.
v) Teacher centred learning.
- try to encourage students to participate actively in learning the material by introducing games, inculcate collaboration amongst students and plan more hands on activities such as problem-based learning, case-based learning and project-based learning.
- Instill interaction between the teachers and students. One of the ways to do this would be to ask questions or to change the pace of the lesson
- Introduce formative and criterion-referenced assessment.
vi) No eye contact with the students and weak projection of Miss Lim voice.
- Miss Lim must be able to observe all students at all times and monitor their work and behavior through the following :
- Instead of using mouse to control her presentation slides, she can use wireless devices to control her slides. Alternative, she can use a laptop instead of computer station for her lesson.
- In order to ensure good projection of voice, Miss Lim can use a microphone to aid her.
- Miss Lim can also walk around the classroom as she teaches. This ensures more interaction with the students and students tend to be more attentive as the teacher is in closer proximity. This also allows Miss Lim to monitor her students' behaviour and ensure that they are paying attention to her class.
vii) Poor classroom management.
- Reinforcement of the rules such as giving reminders, warning.
- Introduce punishment if students refuse to follow the rules.
- Build a good rapport with the class.
- plan enough simulating activities that involves students so successfully such that they spend little time thinking of misbehaving.
viii) Students are not motivated in the lesson.
- Introduce extrinsic motivation. eg. if you do this, you will get reward, but this should also be done with much discretion as it may lead to students doing something for the sake of getting a reward, and not to learn.
- Always offer encouragement or praise whenever necessary.