Student Misbehavior # 1

I have had a plum assignment this past week. A teacher went to a week-long conference and left me with four periods each day to take charge of. The first three of those periods were taken up each of the five days by a presentation put on by a local health organization. These preentations concerned STDs, AIDS, HIV, Alcohol use and stress. Frankly I am very proud of the school district and thje school for having these presentations given to ouyr high school students.

One sometimes wonders what possesses individual kids to make them behave the way they do. Many are polite and respectful, but not a small number are openly hostile. This hostility shouldn't be taken personally because the causes are usually not personal. As I was told two weeks ago, "I don't like you. We don't like substitute teachers."

While not taking this kind of remark personally, it is sometimes not easy to accept behavior and attitude. Students are aware that substitutes don't know their names. They believe that they can act with impunity without a disciplinary write-up. They assume they can talk, ignore the lesson, listen to their iPods, and bother each other without consequences.

The school where I substitute is the only school where I work, and I am there about 3/4 of the time. After a while I get to know the bad eggs by name, so they are no longer anonymous. This begins to give me a handle on at least some of them.

Once they learn that their substitute teacher knows them by name, this improves their behavior. But if bad behavior isn't penalized and the same substitute meets the same students elsewhere, these same students will walk all over the teacher.

Thia week on Monday as the first period was beginning and our guest speaker was prepared to start her preentation, I approached three students standing in the back of the room. I made it a conscious effort to be as casual, as respectful and as courteous as I could when I asked them to take their seats so the lecture could begin. One of them, a kid in a red cap, baggy blue jeans with heavily embroidered back pockets -- see another post of this type of dress --, and a red-striped polo shirt told me, "Get outta my face."

I didn't know this student by name, but I recognized him as one who'd given me minor defiance in another class the week before.

Now, how can one deal with that ? No teacher can force these kids to do anything. They will do whatever they want. The trick, obviously, is to make them want to behave. I was aware at the time that if I didn't check this student's behavior right away, he would walk all over me every time I substituted in any of his future classes. He also knew that I didn't know his name.

I looked the kid straight in the face and stated, "I wasnt you to know that I have a policy. Whenever any student tells me, 'Get outta my face' I automatically write him up for disciplinary action." With that I simply returned to my desk, took out a disciplinary write-up slip, and began filling it out. At this point I still didn't know his name. I also knew that he was probably counting on my being there that day only and not being there for the rest of the week.

The kid came running to me, saying, "I was only fooling." I replied that I had noted his behavior the week before in another class, and I didn't think so. At this, he ran out of the room, missing that day's presentation.

The next day he once more arrived and stood with his friends in the back of the room. The sign-in sheet was being passed from student to student and I saw him sign in right after a student whose name I knew. Because of this, it was easy later to look at the sheet and identify the troublemaker. I could then put his correct name on the disciplinary write-up, whch I hadn't yet passed in. Obviously he wasn't counting on me knowing his name. Later I checked his name and photo on the school computer just to make certain I was correct, and passed the disciplinary clip in the the appropriate vice-principal.

He came to class the rest of the week, but avoided me. On Friday he was sitting at a desk in the back of the room. Students who misbehave tend to gravitate to locations as far away from the teacher as possible. In my rounds I came up to him with the sign-in sheet. Without a word, he stood up and left the classroom, probably thinking I still didn't know his name. For that particular day I simply marked him absent.

Understand, it isn't the kid I dislike. It is his behavior. If this could successfully be modified, we might be able to turn him into a serious student. This may happen in the next two or three years because as high school students mature their behavior improves. Let's hope this maturation happens to him.

A Problem Student

I was lucky enough as a substitute teacher to receive a request from a teacher I have previousy subbed for to sub in his classes for five days while he attends a conmference. Furthermore, the job was much easier than usual because through a federal grants three of his four daily classes are being given presentations by a local Hispanic-oriented health organization, so that my active teaching is only required during the fourth period.

During this fourth period, I discuss a bit about a scientific subject -- static electricity, magnetism, lightning, for examples -- and then give the students worksheets from which they read material and answer questions based both on my discussion and what the duplicated pages ask.

One student, a ninth-grader from Yemen, has done almost nothing so far. This third day I really caught on to him. He refuses to sit in the area where the other students sit, tries to play at the computers in the room, and makes no effort. Today he took his worksheets at the last minute and copied answers from another student.

I know that this student misses his father, who is in the army in Yemen. The boy spoke about his father, and how he hopes his father will be back in the United States soon. He also let me know that he stays with his uncle and his uncle's family, and doesn't like his living situation.

I sense that the kid is a good kid, rebellious perhaps because of his situation. I have tried to communicate to him this opinion, and I know I must make him understand that it isn't him that I don't like, it is his behavior.

Today I must lower the boom. If I can teach this student that he is no longer in primary school and must seriously work, then I will have achieved something. My plan is this: first I shall have a short talk with him, telling him what I expect from him; second,I must insist that he do the worksheet work by himself after listening to my presentation; third, I probably have to write a disciplinary note about him so that he will be seen by one of the vice-principals; and fourth, I must call his uncle and describe the young man's classroom behavior.

Can I actually help this kid grow up and get serious ? We will see.

An Interesting Indication

Each class I teach as a substitute teacher at the high school starts the same way. The bellrings, the students enter the classroom, and we size each other up.

What will the coming hour be like ? I wonder. Am I goiing to have trouble with any of the students ? Or will they settle down and do the assignment their regular teacher has left for them.

I have watched very carefully during the past few weeks to see how I can predict. As odd as it seems, I have found an indicator that seems to be accurate.

I have written elsewhere in this blog about the way students in this high school dress. The girls tend to wear blue jeans so tight they must have had trouble getting into them before leaving for school. With the boys, it is quite the opposite. They weae baggy blue jeans that hang halfway off their butts. Usually their boxer shorts are showing. This is the "jailhouse style." Prisoners in many California prisons are not allowed belts for fear that they would use them to commit suicide by hanging. Without the belts, their pants are constantly falling off and need to be pulled up.

In high school, these baggy blue jeans are usually decorated. The back pockets are almost always decorated with with fancy embroidered designs.

And here is the indicator. In classes where the students are very bright and hard-working, one may find one, two or even none of this embroidery on the back pockets of the boys' jeans. In ckasses where the boys are rowdy, not so bright, and not interested in their studies, almost all the boys sport jeans with embroidered designs on the back pockets.

One can guess that the intelligent boys are more sure of themselves and don't care as much about fitting in and being accepted by their peers. They place less value on conformity. When I see a class in which the boys don't have embroidered designs on the back pockets of their blue jeans, I know I am going to have a relatively easy time dealing with them.

Kids Who Don't Care

A few weeks ago I felt very depressed at the end of one particular day. I had had five classes comprised mostly of kids who simply did not care about their school work. I tried to get them to do the work their regular teacher had left for them, but most didn't do a thing. I was told bluntly by one student "I don't like you. We don't like substitute teachers."

I have been a substitute for more than two years now, so this kind of remark doesn't bother me. I just don't take it personally. Some substitutes make the mistake of taking comments like these to heart. I've even heard of substitutes who've left a classroom literally in tears because of student attitudes towards them. Being a substitute teacher is a tough profession. One has to develop psychic armor as strong as steel to withstand its challenges.

What depressed me was not the lack of respect for me, but knowing that many of these kids just don't see any connection between school and the rest of their lives. They have dislike and sometimes even contempt for school and learning. These kids don't know it but they are headed down paths that lead to terrible unhappiness.

In the case of the school where I teach, many of the students will eventually become either institutionalized -- in prison -- or dead at a very early age. It doesn't have to be that way. But how does one get through to them and make them realize that if they don't shape up, life will eventually be a lot tougher than what they're experiencing now.