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Previous Chapter 4)
From Transformative Classroom Management. By
John Shindler. ©2008 Wiley Press
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unlawful without permission
In
This Chapter
When we walk through any school and peer inside the many classrooms, we
find that each exists as its own unique environment. It has its own feel, tone
and “way things are done.” While much of the students’ overall experience comes
as a result of our intended actions and plans, a substantial portion of what
makes up the overall climate and experience of a class could be termed its
implicit level or “hidden curriculum” (Eisner, 1984: Jackson, 1968). Michael Haralambos (1991) defines the hidden
curriculum as, “consisting of those things pupils learn through the experience
of attending school rather than the stated educational objectives of such
institutions.” The intentional or explicit level of schooling is made up of
such factors as the stated rules and procedures, explicit expectations and the
intended curriculum. By contrast, the implicit and commonly unconscious level
is made up of such areas as the unwritten rules, implicit expectations, social
systems, the way power is manifested and to a great degree the teacher simply “teaching
who they are.” In this chapter we will
explore the nature and impact of this implicit and largely unconscious level of
the classroom experience.
Chapter Reflection
3-a:
What is your reaction to the idea that there
are implicit level factors operating in the classroom? “So what? So things
happen that are not planned.” Or “I don’t understand them, so they can’t be
very important.” As you proceed through the chapter you may better appreciate
the power of this level of the classroom experience. And as it is with the laws
of nature, they operate whether we understand them or not.
To begin to make sense of this dimension below the surface of any class,
it might help to think about a trip down the hall of our local school. Let’s
imagine that we choose to examine three comparable classrooms, once at the
start of the school year, and then a couple months later. What are we likely to
observe? If the classes are truly comparable (e.g., same grade and/or subject
area) what we are likely to see are three classes that look very similar at the
beginning of the term. As with any new group, the students will behave in a
manner consistent with their experience and past expectations. But if we return
in two months, it is very likely that we will observe three classes that look
and feel dramatically different from one another.
Chapter
Reflection 3-b: Do your own investigative research and
observe a set of classes at the start of the year and then a few weeks later. What
are the differences? How would you explain the causes? Is it the students, or
the teacher?
What is the explanation for this difference?
We could probably conclude the following:
1. In the long-term
the experience of the students in any classroom (in most cases) will have more
to do with implicit level factors than the explicitly stated
wishes of the teacher. This experience is constructed and negotiated over
time through the continuous interactions of the teacher and students.
2. The environment
will be defined primarily by the teacher and only secondarily by the
students. As Haim Ginott suggests, as the teacher “we create the weather” in
the classroom.
3. The degree to
which a class is more or less “intentional” as opposed to “accidental” is
strongly related to the degree to which the teacher understands and is aware
the implicitly operating aspects of the classroom environment.

If we were to classify the various factors within
any class, there are those that are primarily explicit, such as the curriculum,
the rules, and the explicit expectations, and those that are more implicit,
such as the social frames, the way power is manifested, and to a great extent
the teacher teaching “who they are.” (see
Figure 3.1).
Figure 3.1 Depicting the Explicit and Implicit levels of the Classroom Environment.
|
Degree to which area can be concretely
evidenced. |
Component of the Overall “Classroom
Reality” |
Relative Level of Awareness |
|||
|
Explicit Level The factors in our management that are
obvious and concrete. |
|
Sound
|
|||
|
Implicit
Level The “hidden curriculum” The factors in the
class that are below the surface, but most often define the majority of the
classroom environment. |
§
Social Frames §
How Power is
manifested §
Emotional Bank
Account §
Teacher Language §
Teacher teaching
“who they are” and what they value (e.g., default tendencies, self-image,
parent tapes, world view) §
Implicit
Expectations |
Potentially
below the level of awareness and operating accidentally |
* The methods practiced on this explicit
level can also lead either up or down the effectiveness continuum depending on
how sound they are (as discussed in the previous chapter).
The remaining chapters of the book will be
devoted to examining how to successfully create an intentional classroom. Yet
before we move into how to achieve results on a mostly explicit level, it will
be valuable to explore how to be more effective and aware on the implicit
level. While the typical class functions with a substantial lack of awareness
of the underlying factors on this implicit level and how they operate, it does
not necessarily have to be so. The more that we are able to develop an
awareness of our classroom’s implicit level factors and take an intentional
approach toward making them work to the benefit of the members of the class,
the less accidental and more functional our class will be.
Exploring the most fundamental components of
the implicit level of the classroom environment it makes sense to begin where
it all begins with us, the teacher – teaching “who we are.” This will be
followed by how our words effect the class, the social “frames” that operate in
the class, the principle of the emotional bank account, the way that power is
manifested, and the many ways that social or indirect learning takes place in
any learning environment.
It is said that, “we teach who we are.” If we
recall our years of schooling and reflect on what we learned in each class, we
would have to agree that as much of what we learned was related to “who” our
teachers were, as it was to “what” we studied. Recall the array of teachers who
you have had in the past. What do you recall about them? What stands out in
your memory? A reasonable guess is that
what you remember is more related to who they were as a person than what they
were trying to teach you. In fact, who they were taught you a lot. In some
cases, it was how to be a good person or the kind of teacher you wish to be, or
in some cases it was qualities that you have tried to avoid exhibiting, and/or
what not to do as a teacher. Our teachers taught us something about being
human. Some teachers we respected, some we felt sorry for. Some inspired us to
learn, and
some seemed to us to be bent on killing whatever interest we had in learning.
In a very tangible way we are continuously teaching our values, culture,
biases, politics, cognitive style, and a whole lifetime of mental conditioning
in addition to our intended curriculum. No matter what we want our students to
care about and what we want them to focus on, the truth is that they are
continuously learning from “who we are.” Or more accurately, “what our
conditioning expresses about us when we teach.”
Becoming Self-Aware of My “Default
Tendencies” and “Unconscious Conditioning”
If I am unaware of my default preferences or
mental conditioning or unconscious tendencies, then I am essentially engaging
in teaching unaware of a whole host of things that I am teaching to my
students. And in my own way, I am very predictable. I will have tendencies,
biases, values, and patterns that will significantly influence my teaching. Is
this a problem? The answer is usually yes.
Commonly, unconsciousness leads to behavior we regret later. The more aware we
are, the less predictable, and the less aware, the more predictable. What is
the problem with being a product of our conditioning and hardwired preferences
that lead to predictable and knee-jerk reactive tendencies? The short answer is that our students are
penalized. The long answer will become
increasingly apparent as you read further into the book. Most classroom
management problem conditions are manufactured by the teacher. And that teacher
usually has very good intentions. So, if
most of us have good intentions but still create endless problems for
ourselves, good intentions must not be sufficient. Successful teaching that
includes effective classroom management must require a substantial level of
self-awareness. Moreover, the higher the quality of our self-awareness the more
focused our intentions can become. There are countless domains of our thinking
and behavior that are useful to become more aware of, and as you read on you
may discover some, but in this section, we will focus on four of those areas –
1) self-concept, 2) cognitive style, 3) stored away parent tapes, and 4) world
view.
If I like myself, does that count for something? Conversely, if I don’t
really like myself, what difference does that make to my teaching performance?
The fact is that in many subtle and unconscious ways, we are perpetually
teaching our self-concept and level of self-respect. Moreover, research shows
that how we feel about (and ultimately treat) our students will inevitably be a
reflection of how we feel about ourselves (Friedman & Farber, 1992). And
simply put, we will be better teachers if we like our students. If we
feel good on the inside, it will show on the outside in a thousand ways that we
may not even be aware of, but our students likely are.
In addition, if
we like and demonstrate a love of learning and enthusiasm for the material we
are teaching, it will rub off on students. Cabello & Terrell (1994) found
that when teachers were more enthusiastic about what they were teaching,
students learned more.
Chapter
Reflection 3-c Recall the teachers who have engendered the highest amount of love and
respect from you. Were they the teachers with the largest personalities? Or the
teachers who thought they were the coolest? Or was it a teacher who expressed a
care and/or respect for you as a person?
2. Cognitive Style: Examining Our Default Preferences
Research into Cognitive
Preference (also called Personality Type, Learning Style, or Temperament Type)
demonstrates that teachers’ values are strongly predicted by their type on
various cognitive dimensions. In a very real way “we teach our cognitive type.”
Myers, McCaulley, Quenk, and Hammer (1998) found that if teachers did nothing
to alter their teaching – that is when they resorted to their “default”
tendencies, the students who were less like them by cognitive preference were
less successful, enjoyed the class less and actually received lower grades,
while the student who were more like them felt more successful and received
better grades. Conversely, if the teacher was aware of their cognitive style
default tendencies and actively worked to be more responsive to the diversity
of their students’ needs the students who differed from them in cognitive type
approached the success and enjoyment of the students who were like them. Simply put, this is another dimension of
teaching in which unconsciousness leads to the penalization of students. And
just as we penalize those students who are culturally different from us when we
are not aware of our biases, we penalize those students who are cognitively
different from us when our lack of awareness leads to our defaulting to our
hardwired tendencies. Appendix X explores the relationship between learning
style and classroom management in more detail.
Chapter Reflection 3-d: Recall
a teacher in whose class you thrived. If you were to identify his/her cognitive
style, would you say that you were similar? Do you think that had anything to
do with the affinity and comfort you felt?
3. Accessing our Parent Tapes
It is common to be teaching and hear our own
parent’s voice come out of us. For some of us this is mostly a positive
experience, but for many of us, it can be disturbing. We assumed that we would not make any of the
mistakes our parents made. We need to first resist the temptation to feel
guilty or resentful of our parents. Next, we need to simply recognize that what
we might refer to as our “parent conditioning tapes” are in there, often in the
form of mental scripts. Some of the most common negative parent conditioning
tapes include the following:
As we become more familiar with these tapes
in our heads, we need to learn to identify the triggers that lead us to react.
Triggers include being worn down, feeling inadequate or insecure, or when our
students bring the same problems to us that we brought to our parents. Finally we
need to recognize that we are not determined by this past conditioning. Being
aware of it and the triggers that set it off allow us to be more intentional
rather than unconscious and reactive. The remainder of the book should give you
ideas for how to be more intentional in your practice, and Chapter 16 explores
pathways to creating greater levels of consciousness and self-awareness.
Chapter
Reflection 3-e: What
are some of the parent tapes that you find yourself reproducing in your class
and/or relationships?
4. Examining our World View
What are my basic assumptions about young
people? What motivates them? What do they need? What characterizes the world
that they are entering? Our answers to
these questions will have a profound effect on how we teach. Moreover, it is
likely that our “world view” will define how we approach classroom management.
If we have a dark view of human nature, we will expect the worst from our
students. If we have a hopeful view of human nature, we will maintain faith in
our students. This book does not endeavor to answer the questions of human
nature, but it is a certainty that what you believe to be true about the basic
nature of your students will define your classroom. Many teachers maintain a
hostile view of the world. And their classes take on those qualities of
coldness, competitiveness, and antagonism. The idea behind their basic
philosophy is that if it’s a cruel world out there, we might as well get used
to it. Whether this is an accurate reflection of the world or not, the result
is the penalization of the students in this type of class. If our job is to
create high functioning students, we will not get there unless we create a
school world that meets their personal and learning needs and fosters a psychology
of success (see Chapter 7). Moreover, we need to recognize that “the real world”
is made each day in our classroom. We are manufacturing the future by every act
that we make as a teacher.

Chapter
Reflection 3-f: Recall the last time you heard a teacher make
a suggestion to you that included the phrase “the real world.” What was the
context? In your estimation, what did the suggestion assume about the nature of
students?
Teacher Language and Message Sub-Text
It has been said
that words define our reality (Devitt & Sterling, 1999). We need words to explain what is.
Herbert Kohl (2002) suggests that everything that is said and how it is
said is significant and that “small things – comments, questions, responses,
phrases, tone- often make a big difference in students’ attitudes, not merely
toward their teacher, but toward what their teacher teaches.”The use of
language in the classroom is a powerful influence and defines the very nature
of how we make meaning of what is going on.
This idea may sound very abstract, but examine the language in any
classroom. As you listen and observe,
ask yourself these questions; “What is the purpose of the language used?” “What
emotional climate is being created by the use of the language?” “Is the
language used consistent with the non-verbal messages being sent?” In essence,
“What is the sub-text of the speech?” When you examine the words spoken by each
of the three teachers represented in exercise 3.1 below, assume that they all
possess a desire for roughly the same
explicit outcomes. Yet, as you read their words, would you predict that their
language exchanges would produce similar classroom environments?
First, examine the following
teacher language patterns. Second,
classify and then develop a label for the types of language that are occurring
in each case. Use any words you feel best for your labels. Next, as you reflect
on each set of phrases attempt to characterize the classroom climate that would
be manufactured by the use of each of these hypothetical language patterns.
Teacher A:
·
(After handing out an assignment) “I don’t
want to see all the sloppy papers that I saw the last time.”
·
“Stop talking or I will . . .”
·
(After a wrong answer) “No, you guys aren’t
getting this.”
·
(Sarcastic responses on a regular basis)
·
“I told you guys to get to work.”
·
“When are we ever going to learn?”
I’d label this language _________________
The effect on the classroom climate (and/or socially
constructed reality) would be ___.
Teacher B:
·
(Gives directions and students are still
talking) “Listen to me!”
·
“There is too much noise in the room.”
·
(After directions are given, and students
were not paying attention, and they do not do what the teacher wants) “OK, I
told you to keep the glue in the box until you get your paper ready,” (as
students are still not listening). “Put the glue away I said!”
I’d label this language _________________
The effect on the classroom climate (and/or socially
constructed reality) would be __.
Teacher C:
·
“Take a look at this group, see how they .
. . that is a good example of the process we are looking for.”
·
“I know it is almost lunchtime, but I need
you to stay with it for 15 more minutes.”
·
(After some students were not attentive to
directions) “Someone was talking, I think I will start the directions over, I
need 100% attention.”
·
(After an incorrect answer) “OK, you seemed
to be doing . . . and that would be right for that process, but what we were
looking for was . . ., given that do you want to try again?”
·
(After a poor effort) “We have got to do a
better job with this than last time. We
need to get this stuff down by this week.
We will need to have it for the test next week and for your projects.”
Before we explore the language of each
teacher, it is useful to recall that you did not know a great deal about any of
these three teachers depicted in exercise 3.1. You only had a small number of
words from each of their classes. What could possibly be inferred from such a
small amount of information? First, I am guessing that you inferred a great
deal. Second, I will wager that your assessment was on the mark.
When asked to characterize the words of
Teacher A, I would guess that you used terms such as negative, hostile, condescending,
antagonistic and threatening. I also bet that you described the climate with
words such as combative, hostile, depressed, and non-motivational. If so, you
would be correct. The climate in this actual class was quite antagonistic. Some
students chose to withdraw, while others took the challenge and chose to engage
the teacher in a power struggle. If we were to classify this teachers language
on the management style matrix, it would fall into the category of a 4-Style.
If we examine some of the phrases more
closely we can recognize why it was not difficult to see the eventual negative
environment that was created by the teacher.
·
“Stop talking or I will . . .” – This
is a classic example of a threat. In essence, a threat sends two very
ineffective messages. First, “I am hostile and unsafe.” Second, “I am too weak
or lazy to take any meaningful action.”
·
I don’t want to see all the sloppy papers
that I saw the last time.” – We could refer to this phrase as an
example of “chronicling failure.” This is when the teacher points out to the
students their past inadequate performance in a weak attempt to promote
positive behavior in the future. While
this is very common, like many other forms of negative recognition, as we will
discuss in the next chapter, it has no positive value. It is past-oriented, does
nothing to help support future behavior, is weak and hostile.
·
“When are we ever going to learn?” – This
phrase is a put-down. Like threats, put-downs show that the teacher is hostile,
yet too weak to take constructive action.
Even when said in jest, put-downs have a price. Humor can be a wonderful
asset, but victimizing humor can work against building a safe emotional
climate.
The descriptors that you used to characterize
the language of Teacher B likely included words such as passive, timid,
anxious, chaotic, frustrated and ineffective. Teacher B’s words reflected a
distinct lack of a sense of legitimate authority. Like Teacher A, they put
misguided faith in the use of negative recognition to achieve results. Yet, the
passive nature of this teachers approach would best be classified as 3-Style.
This passivity can be seen in teacher B’s words. The phrase “Listen to me!”
could best be described as a plea. It implies a lack of an operating set of
explicit boundaries or social contract. He/she is making the appeal, in so many
words, of “listen to me if you respect me.”
This teachers efforts demonstrated that relying on implied desire for respect
rather than clear expectations typically results in frustration and
disappointment.