The Unteachables Podcast

#50: Teachers with few behaviour issues have the following 5 things in common... Or do they?

• Claire English • Season 4 • Episode 50

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There are absolutely no absolutes when it comes to behaviour. So when somebody makes a sweeping generalisation that if you do X, Y, and Z you will have very few behavioural issues in your class, they are misleading you, big time. 

In this podcast episode I talk about a very misleading teaching post I stumbled upon on social media. It was divisive. It was shame-inducing. And it went VIRAL! Which means there were a hell of a lot of teachers who saw it, engaged with it, and may have felt like crap because of it.

Listen in as I break it down and smash it apart. 

This is a no-shame space for teachers!!


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Speaker 1:

Welcome to our Teachable podcast. I'm Claire English, a passionate secondary teacher and leader, turned teacher, mentor and author, and I'm on a mission to transform classroom management and teacher support in schools. It doesn't feel that long ago that I was completely overwhelmed and out of my depth of behaviour, trying to swim rather than sink. It took me spending thousands of hours in the classroom, with all of the inevitable ups and downs, to make me the teacher that I am today Confident, capable and empowered in my ability to teach all students yes, even the ones who are the toughest to reach and now I'm dedicated to supporting teachers like yourself to do the same. I created the Untouchables podcast to give you the simple and actionable classroom management strategies and support that you need to run your room with confidence and calm. So if you're a teacher or one in the making, and you're wanting to feel happy and empowered and actually enjoy being in the classroom, whilst also making a massive impact with every single one of your students, then you're definitely in the right place. Let's get started. Hello, hello, wonderful people, welcome back to the Untouchables podcast, and welcome back to me as well, because I've been gone for what feels like far longer than a couple of weeks I just made the move from the UK to New Zealand.

Speaker 1:

For anybody who hasn't been listening to my episodes and my goodness it was epic, I think any move, no matter who you are, no matter where you're going, whether you're down the street to another country, to the other side of the world, it is such a big deal. Having to pack up and move, moving with a one year old was another thing. That was just beyond difficult when we left the house on the morning of our flight. You know when you usually move house and you can kind of put everything over in the new house, settle in, pop over to the old house, get some little things, get the last little bits and pieces, put some rubbish out. For us it was the morning of our flight. Having to make sure the entire flight was empty, making sure that all the nappies, all the food, everything was gone the morning of the flight, and then go to the airport and start a very long journey home. It was just immense and I've only kind of just started to settle back into a routine. And you know, having to get her onto a different time zone, which is really hard with a baby and you can't tell them come on stay awake for longer. So we had a lot of her waking up at one o'clock thinking it was the start of the day, 1am that is, and we are finally after being here. I've been in New Zealand for a week now and we're finally feeling like we're on a bit of a we're in a bit of a routine. Now we're back into the swing of things.

Speaker 1:

So I thought what better time than to record a new podcast episode? I needed to get back. I needed to do this again. I have been itching to get back at it actually, and unteachable stuff in general, so I'm so happy to be back. If you haven't heard the unteachable podcast before, if this is the first episode you're listening to, welcome. I'm so happy to be able to support you.

Speaker 1:

This podcast is just all about classroom management, because it's something that you don't get a lot of support with at teacher training university when you get into the profession. I'm not the only one to think it is completely single swim, and I feel like in my career I have had to do a lot of my own work to get to a place where I feel incredibly confident walking into a classroom, incredibly empowered walking into a classroom and dealing with some of the most complex behaviors. So I needed to do work around supporting teachers to do the same thing. That's why I'm here, that's my mission and that's what the Unteachables podcast is all about.

Speaker 1:

Today's episode I've been itching to record, even during the move. I think it was two days before we moved the whole house was in disarray and I saw this post on Instagram and I thought to myself I need to have a rant about it. This is kind of a different type of episode, because it's not. I didn't plan it out. I just wanted to talk through something, talk through a concept that I saw. And yeah, even two days before moving, in the chaos of all of it, I said to myself okay, I'm just going to sit in my bedroom with my little microphone on and try to talk through things. Obviously, I didn't have the time to do that. I often how would I say it? I over commit myself to certain things, but here I am recording this episode. Finally and I still have the same passion for what I saw I got myself fired up before I recorded this episode by going and relooking at what I was going to talk about.

Speaker 1:

So before I moved, I was on Instagram and I saw this post and the first page of the post. If you don't follow Instagram, you've got like a first page and you can swipe through the post and the first page of that post. The first little image of that post was really clickbaity and it said teachers with few behavior issues have the following in common. So immediately my ears prick up and I'm like, oh, come on, like there is no simple formula for teachers who have few behavioral issues, except for teachers who have a class full of students who have the ability already to self-regulate, which is a very important distinction to make. Some teachers, even if they don't do any of the following, can have few behavioral issues because of the context that they work in. Of course, some areas, some schools, are going to have different types of challenges, not necessarily behavioral challenges. So the first page of this post teachers with few behavioral issues have the following in common. I'm already thinking, yeah right, let's, let's see what this is all about. I'm not going to say who posted this, by the way, but I'm not here to slay anyone, but I scrolled across.

Speaker 1:

The first thing it said was the teachers that have few behavioral issues rarely get offended. Already. I'm like, oh my gosh, we are human beings. We get offended, even if we don't show the offence. Sometimes it's very hard not to. They're saying very personal things to us. If you're working with the most high-end students, the things that they say are incredibly personal sometimes. I've spoken about it on this podcast before that when I was pregnant, I was really struggling with working with the students that I worked with. I was working with students with incredibly complex social, emotional, mental health needs. Offended might not be the word for it, but I definitely took things personally and I definitely had a far harder time to co-regulate with my young people because of that, like everything that was going on with me, I felt more protective of the pregnancy. I felt really dysregulated hormonally and I was exhausted and I was hungry and I felt really sick. So that's the first thing rarely gets offended.

Speaker 1:

The second one starts every day with a clean slate. That's all well and good, that's fantastic. But teachers who start every day with a clean slate need the very complex skills of being able to resolve the behaviors prior to the day that they're starting that clean slate or the lesson they're starting that clean slate. They need to have the skills around having the dialogue with these young people. They need to have the skills around being able to actually encourage students to take accountability for their behaviors, to resolve the behaviors meaningfully using real consequences. There are so many things that go into resolving behavior with a student so you can start every day with a clean slate. Starting every day with a clean slate doesn't mean let's ignore the behaviors that happened the day before and let's come back or fresh and happy. That has a really big impact on us as teachers if we don't have the skills to resolve it meaningfully. So that's the second thing. It starts every day with a clean slate. These had no other pieces of information around it, it was just kind of blanket statements.

Speaker 1:

The third one talks with kids before and after class. Yes, of course we need to talk to our students. Again, there is so much more than that. What are you saying to these students? How are you approaching these conversations? Are you approaching them strategically, in a way that's going to encourage them to reflect on their behaviors, to make amends for the following lesson, to be able to give them the skills to approach things differently, to be able to co-regulate with you, to regulate themselves? There are so many things that go into discussions with young people. That will improve behavior and connect with them rather than disconnect with them. Again, there was no context around that so I could talk to old Jimmy after class and say not good enough, mate, not good enough, you need to pick up. Like you know, pull up your socks for next lesson, do better, do better. Everybody else is waiting for you to be quiet so we can get started with the lesson. That is still talking to a young person after class, but that's going to have a very different impact on the behavior, in a negative way, mind you. Then if I was to approach that conversation in a way that's more restorative, trauma-informed and just as a human being, sitting down and talking to a young person about their behavior and coming at it from a place of care and compassion and education and true discipline.

Speaker 1:

The fourth thing that teaches with few behavioral issues have in common, according to the post, was that they just consider de-escalation a win. Yes, I agree with this. De-escalation is a win in the classroom. But again, we need to approach de-escalation as a win, but we also need to know what the next steps are, because what happens if we just de-escalate the behavior and then that behavior keeps happening and happening over and over again and we don't have the skills to be able to then work with the young person to learn how to get stop getting it to the point of escalation, to nip it in the bud, to be able to work with them to resolve the behaviors when they're happening. It's going to be so disempowering for us and we're going to be like repeating the cycle and it's not doing our young people any favors. So when we are, when we are able to de-escalate behavior, that is absolutely a win.

Speaker 1:

And in my courses and all the work that I do, I teach when we're talking about behavior, we're talking about reducing behavior as a start, all the things we do before the behavior happens. Then I talk about how we resolve, I'm sorry, how we respond to the behavior in the moment. Which is a part of that is de-escalation, and de-escalation is the main focus for that part. But then there's a third part which is resolve. So if one piece of that puzzle is missing, whether it's reduce, respond or resolve, then we're not going to be able to shift behaviors. We're not going to be able to see a reduction in behaviors for the following lesson. So teachers with very few behavioral issues don't just consider de-escalation a win. But they know exactly how to reduce the behaviors before they occur, including the ones that they're de-escalating in the moment, and they know how to resolve the behavior after. They know the steps to take to meaningfully work with the young person afterwards, which, again, like it's all a big piece of the puzzle. And if we don't do one of those things, we're not going to be able to see the wonderful work that the young people can do.

Speaker 1:

And the last thing, the number five thing, for what teachers with few behavioral issues have in common is that they don't need the last word. Of course, like that is all a part of being a mature adult and I am not going to sit here and say that I have not tried to lean on my sword and I have not tried to have the last word with students and I have not gotten caught in a game of locking horns and I have done everything I can to win the battle with a student. I have because, again, I am human and I've gone through my whole career of having to work out for myself what it takes to be able to deescalate and resolve behavior. Of course we need to not lock horns with our young people. Of course, doing so and trying to have the last word is going to escalate the behavior beyond what it was initially. But to say to somebody you don't have to have the last word. Again, it is incredibly disempowering for educators. People who want to have the last word is because they don't have any other strategies to be able to resolve the behavior in the moment. So we need to approach it with support, not judgment, not shame.

Speaker 1:

When we're talking about teachers and the strategies they're using, I talk about it as being your inherited classroom management. You, at the moment, in your classroom, are using strategies that you have either developed throughout your career, been taught through your teacher training and if those have not been adequate, if you have not had adequate support or training to be able to sit in that classroom and deescalate, resolve, respond to behavior, what happens is you fall back on the inherited classroom management strategies that you have learned along the way, and that happens by osmosis. It's the stuff that you were up against at school yourself. So how did your teachers approach things? How have you seen like depictions of discipline and consequences in the media, in television shows, in movies? So your inherited classroom management is what you bring from your past and, unfortunately, because classroom management has changed so much, or the way we understand behavior, the way we understand the brain, the things that teachers were doing when we were at school, depending on how old you were.

Speaker 1:

I finished school in 2007,. That has changed a hell of a lot from what it is now. I remember just being put out in the corridor and, you know, just being left to my own devices. Nobody checked in for my welfare, nobody cared that I didn't want to go home overnight thinking, okay, something's wrong here, like what's going on with this, with this student. Things have changed, but we still bring forward the strategies that we saw at school ourselves.

Speaker 1:

So excellent teachers Do all of the above. We can do all of the above. Excellent teachers Our teachers that might really get offended might start every day with a clean slate, might talk with kids before and after class, might consider de-escalation a win, might not need the last word. Sorry, but excellent teachers can do all of the above and still have immense issues with behaviour. I need you to know that just because you still have behavioural issues in your class and you do the above, it does not mean that you're failing by any means. And also, excellent teachers don't always do all of the above, because it's hard and we're human.

Speaker 1:

And to suggest that if you do all of these things and it's just a fix, it's a gross oversimplification of classroom management. If it were that easy, we wouldn't have to have these conversations, I wouldn't need to run a podcast, I wouldn't need to run training with teachers, because I could just give them a list and say don't get offended, have a clean slate, talk with kids before and after class. If they de-escalated, that is a win, wonderful. Don't have the last word, just let things go. Of course that is not going to be the fix it, the be all end or of classroom management. If you do do all of that and you do have few behavioural issues, then it is because the needs of the students you're working with aren't on the end of the extreme, where they're really struggling with the skills of self-regulation.

Speaker 1:

But also, kids are kids. That's why, when I talk about my approach, it's not a trauma-informed approach necessarily. It's not a restorative approach necessarily. It is just an approach to behaviour that is holistic. It takes into consideration the function of behaviour, of course, the impact of trauma, but it is just about kids, just kids sometimes, and they're trying to meet their needs in the best way that they can. So you're working with young people. I don't know what age you're working with at the moment, but I work with secondary students. Their behaviours sometimes are not because of trauma and not because of the stress response. Sometimes they're just being kids as well. So you will have behavioural issues in your class. It's inevitable.

Speaker 1:

And to suggest that if you do a very broad list of things, that you can reduce most of those, it's definitely a gross oversimplification and it can make people feel like crap. I saw heaps of comments on there saying but I do all of these things and I still have issues. What am I doing wrong? Then I posted it about it and people like thank you so much. I felt so bad seeing this. It also suggests this kind of post also suggests that behavior operates in a silo and it's not impacted by absolutely every single thing that we do in that room before us.

Speaker 1:

So before the behavior, we do stuff. During the behavior, we do stuff. After the behavior, we do stuff. We have to consider what we're doing with our pedagogy, how we set up the lesson, the clarity and consistency we're bringing forward, the felt safety we need to craft.

Speaker 1:

There are so many things that teachers who are I'm not going to say a few behavioral issues. There are many things that teachers who know and feel empowered to reduce the behaviors in their classroom definitely do, and it is so much more than those things. So those five things that I mentioned the rarely gets offended, starts every day with a clean slate, talks with kids before and after class, considers de-escalation a win and doesn't need the last word. They're all attributes of teachers who actually have a good support net, who have been taught about behaviors, that have the knowledge to be able to de-personalize. Teachers who have been explicitly taught how to de-escalate or taught how to have really effective dialogue with their students. Teachers who feel empowered with how they can follow up, they understand they don't need the last word. Teachers who can effectively resolve behavior through real consequences so they can welcome their students in with open arms. The following lesson All of those things take ongoing support, quality professional development, mentorship from people who actually understand behavior and know what it's like to be sitting there in front of those 30 students in a room 30 students who are all competing with their knees, who all have a really different context, who all have things going on that we have no comprehension of. So, yes, these are wonderful reminders of the importance of these things, because they are important things. They really are, but there's so much more to it. So if I had to change it to anything, it might be that teachers with few behavioral things have the following in common Teachers with few behavioral issues either have a class of students who have the skills already to self-regulate and behave in a way that is deemed classroom appropriate, and remember that some teachers can achieve a class of few behavioral issues without doing any of the things mentioned.

Speaker 1:

Some teachers get offended. Some teachers start every day holding grudges against certain students and labelling students. Some teachers don't bother getting to know their young people. Some teachers don't care about de-escalation. Some teachers feel like they always have to have the last word, and those teachers sometimes have no behavioral issues because of the context they work in, whether it's because the students are so used to feeling scared, whether it's they just have the skills to behave in a way that's appropriate. So it's really important to note that these aren't attributes of teachers who have few behavioral issues. That is really good attributes to have, or B they have an incredible amount of skill and support a deep understanding around the function of behavior. They have a deep understanding around the impact of setting the environment up for success and everything else I mentioned before. So those are the attributes of teachers who are really on top of behavior, who are able to not have few behavioral issues because, again, we can't control the behaviors in our classroom but when I think about teachers who are able to really effectively respond to behavior, reduce behavior and resolve behavior, those are the kind of things that we need. And if you didn't notice, all of that is something that you need support around, you need training around. It's not something that we can just click our fingers and have. It is so much more complicated than that. So that was my.

Speaker 1:

That was the rant that I've been thinking about in my head. I was, honestly, on the plane from London to LA thinking about my God, I wish I could record that podcast episode. I've been thinking about it. I've been ruminating it all in my head. I was getting fired up about it because it's so important in the space that I work in, which is like the only thing that I want to do is be able to support you, to support your young people, and when I talk about having the right mentorship, the right support, the right training.

Speaker 1:

That is why I have poured every bit of myself into that will teach them, which is my signature training course over the last two years, where I've been able to help hundreds of teachers to be able to respond, to resolve and to reduce which is the main goal, isn't it? The challenging behaviors they have in their classrooms. And in that will teach them. I give you the exact roadmaps and resources you need so you can walk into your classroom feeling confident and calm and empowered and more in control of your space. And I don't mean in control of your students, but I mean in control of your space and in control of your practice. I am so proud of this course. I am so proud of the amazing results of the teachers that I've been able to work with.

Speaker 1:

And if you want to be a part of that incredible community of like-minded educators and just feel really empowered in your practice, become a leader in classroom management.

Speaker 1:

I've had people go on to be leaders of training for their school, which is just the most amazing thing being able to support teachers, to then support teachers to support their students. So if this sounds like something you want to be a part of and I hope it does then please join the wait list, because if you're on the wait list, then I will be able to give you an amazing early bird discount and I'm also giving really amazing course bonuses to those of you who joined the wait list before doors open. I just can't wait to welcome you in. I can't wait to support you in amazing and big ways in 2024. And if you're not in a position yet to join that or teach them, I can't wait to continue to support you in this space and to always just keep it real with you and say classroom management is far friggin harder than the five things that we spoke about this episode. Have a lovely week and I can't wait to see you next time. Bye for now.

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Claire English

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