A new study analyzing the instructional progress of 25,000 novice teachers in Tennessee finds that the best predictor of a new teacher’s effectiveness and likelihood to stay in the job is how quickly they learn classroom management, including managing student behavior, according to an Education Week article.
“Classroom management has spillover effects in how it shapes the overall classroom dynamic,” says Brendan Bartanen, an assistant professor of education leadership at the University of Virginia and co-author of the study. “If you do not have a classroom that is orderly, in which most students can think and learn without distraction, you’re going to be hard pressed to see substantial improvements in student learning.”
Key takeaways from the article:
1) Overall improvement among new teachers is likely driven by improvement in behavior management and content-presentation skills.
2) Struggling with behavior problems is more likely to lead to teacher burn out. “
3) Providing more effective feedback for teachers after observations is one immediate way for principals to support teachers.
4) More training and support for young teachers in managing students can benefit the school overall because new teachers are more likely than others to refer students to the principal’s office for discipline.
5) Many new teachers feel like all students are going to listen and be engaged—and they don’t.
6) Explicit training on classroom management—a skill often underdeveloped in teacher-preparation programs—hopefully will cultivate closer relationships with students and better manage, or prevent, disruptions.
7) Punishments that remove students from class lead to lost instruction and often further disengagement. This is where classroom management training could prove more effective.
8) Teachers with less effective classroom management often interpret the behavior personally and negatively. More experienced teachers are likely to interpret the behavior neutrally and are more likely to ask the student questions about the behavior rather than jumping to discipline.
9) School policies have been moving away from discipline that takes students out of the classroom, but most teachers receive little preparation in implementing more positive and inclusive classroom-management approaches. Inclusive discipline approaches like restorative justice depend on strong teacher-student relationships, but the National Council on Teacher Quality finds many teachers get little preparation in the best practices for building those relationships.
10) Only 27 percent of teacher-prep programs required that aspiring teachers learn to reinforce positive classroom behavior, according to NCTQ’s most recent, 2020 review of classroom management practices in teacher prep programs. In a survey of educators, 39 percent of K-12 educators told the EdWeek Research Center that they had never received explicit classroom-management instruction in their teacher-preparation program.
11) New teachers often don’t take enough time at the start of the school year to get to know their students and explain the purposes behind class procedures and routines.
12) After eight of these two-week cycles, a study found teachers who participated in a mentoring program were referring fewer students for discipline outside the classroom.
“You watch these shifts in the teacher’s behavior and then you also watch shifts in the kids’ behavior,” says one educator. “They’re paying attention more. They’re looking like they’re enjoying the classroom more, participating in the classroom to a greater extent. … It’s like the classroom becomes a more active environment.”
Education Week
