The Unteachables Podcast
Welcome to 'The Unteachables Podcast', your go-to resource for practical classroom management strategies and teacher support. I’m your host, Claire English, a passionate secondary teacher and leader turned teacher mentor and author of 'It's Never Just About the Behaviour: A Holistic Approach to Classroom Behaviour Management.' I'm on a mission to help educators like you transform your classrooms, build confidence, and feel empowered.
Why am I here? Not too long ago, I was overwhelmed by low-level classroom disruptions and challenging behaviors. After thousands of hours honing my skills in real classrooms and navigating ups and downs, I’ve become a confident, capable teacher ready to reach every student—even those with the most challenging behaviors. My journey inspired me to support teachers like you in mastering effective classroom strategies that promote compassion, confidence, and calm.
On The Unteachables Podcast, we’ll dive into simple, actionable strategies that you can use to handle classroom disruptions, boost student engagement, and create a positive learning environment.
You'll hear from renowned experts such as:
Bobby Morgan of the Liberation Lab
Marie Gentles, behavior expert behind BBC's 'Don't Exclude Me' and author of 'Gentles Guidance'
Robyn Gobbel, author of 'Raising Kids with Big Baffling Behaviours'
Dr. Lori Desautels, assistant professor and published author
And many more behaviour experts and mentors.
Angela Watson from the Truth for Teachers Podcast.
Whether you’re an early career teacher, a seasoned educator, or a teaching assistant navigating classroom challenges, this podcast is here to help you feel happier, empowered, and ready to make an impact with every student.
Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss an episode packed with classroom tips and inspiring conversations that make a real difference!
The Unteachables Podcast
#103: Quick Win Challenge! The power of hello.
This week’s challenge is all about warm welcomes. While it sounds simple, doing it with intention and consistency can completely transform the culture and community in your classroom.
IN THIS EPISODE, I DISCUSS:
- Why warm welcomes matter, and how greeting each student contributes to their emotional piggy bank, boosts buy-in, and improves behaviour.
- The power of routines, and why predictability helps students come to class more regulated and ready to learn.
- Breaking negative cycles, and how a consistent, personal greeting can help reach even the toughest students.
- Practical tips, including easy ways to make warm welcomes fun, personal, and consistent even on chaotic days.
QUICK WIN CHALLENGE:
This week, stand at the door and warmly welcome each student as they enter.
- Keep it simple by using a smile, eye contact, and their name.
- Add novelty by letting students choose their own greetings, such as a wave, fist bump, or handshake.
- Use visual prompts like a greetings poster on the wall, which can make the routine fun and help you stay consistent on busy days.
This is not about being fancy. It is about being intentional and consistent, showing each student that they are seen and valued as part of your classroom community.
Head here to grab my ready-made warm welcomes posters!
Have a question, comment, or just want to say hello? Drop us a text!
Resources and links:
- Take the "What's Your Teacher Type" Quiz
- Join The Behaviour Club
- My book! It’s Never Just About the Behaviour: A holistic approach to classroom behaviour management
- The Low-Level Behaviour Bootcamp
- Browse all resources on TPT
- Free guide: 'Chats that Create Change'
Connect with me:
- Follow on Instagram @the.unteachables
- Check out my website
Welcome to your weekly Classroom Management Quick Win Challenge. True classroom management is not how we address behavior when it pops up. Instead, it is a compounding effect of many, many micro decisions we make in our teaching practice before the behavior even pops up. In these Quick Win episodes I'm handing over one actionable, small but mighty tool to help you move the needle every single week to stop crowd controlling and to start calmly classroom managing like a pro. Let's dive into this week's game changing challenge. Hello, wonderful teachers, welcome to the first ever quick win episode. I am very excited for this change. It was originally the behavior bites episode, but I chose to change the way that I structured the second episode of the week because really effective classroom management really is the compounding effect of many, many, many micro decisions that we make in the classroom. It isn't how we address behavior when it pops up, although of course that's a part of it, but that kind of stuff is keeping us stuck in this crowd control mindset. So I wanted to use this time as a way to give you one really actionable challenge that you can go away and implement each week, because think, one tiny challenge a week is 52 micro changes in your practice a year. That will compound and add up to immense change in 2025 and I am so excited for it. My old old mentor, cara, who was like my first ever she was the beginning teacher mentor when I was first a teacher. She used to do these little challenges in our beginning teacher meeting and, you know, every week we'd have to bring in like a little post-it note or, I guess, something to share from our, from our lessons, and that compounding effect of the tiny things just added up into something huge for my practice and I just wanted to find a way to do the same thing on this podcast and bring you along on a journey of transformation in your practice in the best way that I knew how in this space. So I'm really, really excited that I can do this and I can't wait to see how it all goes.
Speaker 1:And your first challenge for this series is to welcome your students into the classroom. Yes, that's pretty simple, right. However, I realized that I said that I did this and I did do it, but it was very inconsistent because I was rushed. Oftentimes, I was stressed. I really felt quite anxious about what the class was bringing in, so the way that I welcomed them was impacted by that, my head was off somewhere else. When we truly do this with intention, when we make it personal to each student, when we make it a non-negotiable routine, it can absolutely transform the culture and community in our classrooms, and it certainly did for me when I had this as my focus for like my little quick win for the week.
Speaker 1:Here's why welcoming your students into the classroom really is a bit of classroom management magic. The first thing is that it is a way for us to deposit into every student's emotional piggy bank each and every lesson in a way that's consistent and reliable, which boosts buy-in and makes classroom management so much easier. If you listened to last week's episode about, you know, pressing the reset button and having a better year ahead, and I spoke about investing in students' emotional piggy banks, and the big thing about that is some students make it really hard for us to invest in their emotional piggy banks because there's not a lot of positive interactions that we have with them in the day-to-day. So having this as a consistent routine at the start of every single lesson is such a brilliant way for us to break that cycle and just know every day there's going to be one opportunity at least for us to invest in that emotional piggy bank. The second reason why it is a bit of classroom management magic is that it's an expected routine, so it's something that is predictable when every single student comes to the room, and this supports behavior by helping them to come to class regulated, because predictability is regulation's best friend. It's the brain's best friend. The more we can embed predictability and consistency into the routines that we have in the classroom, the better things are going to be for our classroom management, because our students are going to be more regulated. It's as simple as that.
Speaker 1:And the third thing is that it helps us to break negative cycles with the hardest to teach and reach kids. We are planting seeds with them every single lesson that are saying in this room you are seen, you are a part of this community. I know your name, I'm happy you're here, I am welcoming you warmly into the room, and that is something that we do every single day. Now, I'm a secondary teacher, so I definitely had to lean into the dog factor with this and, believe it or not, this was in itself a huge boost for the relationships I was able to foster with my students. You don't have to do anything fancy either. By the way, you can just stand there and say hello and call them by their name. It's a really fun and consistent part of the lesson. But if you do want to do something that has just a little bit more novelty and a little bit more fun and a little bit more personalization, you can get students to choose their own greeting. That can be a bit of fun.
Speaker 1:You might have seen greetings posters. You can make one of those to have up on your wall so students can look up there as they get to the classroom, be like oh okay, this is the greeting that I'm going to be doing. I'm going to do a fist bump, I'm going to do a high five, I'll do like a, an elbow bump or you know, whatever. It is that the choices are up on that poster. But the benefits of having it up as like a visual on the wall it just number one. It reminds me to do it on the days where it feels really chaotic. But it also helps students to know that you're taking this part of the lesson really seriously and these warm welcomes really seriously.
Speaker 1:If you want one of those posters, if you want a visual up on your wall, but you don't really want to spend the time making one, I have created some Wicked Done For you posters that you can use straight away, and the only reason I made these posters was because everything that existed out there with these greetings was very young in appearance. So I just made these with my older students in mind Still appropriate for the younger ones. If you like the style, but it's just got older kind of clip art, I'll pop the link in the show notes for you. If you want to just grab and go with those ones, or you can make your own, or you don't have to do anything fancy at all. Remember, it's just about standing by the door and saying hey, and making that a very positive, consistent way to invest in the student's emotional piggy bank. That's it. Don't make it over complicated. If you don't want to, you don't have to do a poster, you don't have to do anything.
Speaker 1:Your challenge this week, your quick win for this week, is just to say hey, how are? How are you going? So nice to see you, james, so nice to see you, claire, like welcome. So good to see you again, like that is it. So just a quick recap on this week's quick win challenge Simple but effective Stand at the door welcoming your students. Weeks down the line, maybe months, depending on your context, you are going to have students who are the toughest to reach and teach coming on board in a way that you likely haven't seen before. It does take time, but it does happen. Stay consistent, keep it joyful and keep classroom managing, not crowd controlling. Friends, have a good week and I'll see you next time.
