The Unteachables Podcast

#161: What we get wrong about classroom management, low-level disruption, crafting a strong teaching presence + more

• Claire English • Season 8 • Episode 161

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0:00 | 59:30

A few weeks ago I had the absolute pleasure of jumping on the Teacher Takeaway podcast for a proper behaviour-nerd chat… and the second we wrapped, I knew I wanted you to hear it too.

Because if you’ve ever walked into a lesson feeling like you’re doing crowd control (and then gone home thinking, “Why am I like this?!”)… this one is for you.

In this conversation, Aaron and I unpack the biggest misconceptions teachers have about “behaviour management” (spoiler: it’s rarely about the behaviour), why so many of us feel wildly unprepared for the classroom management side of the job, and what actually makes the biggest difference when you’re dealing with that constant drip-drip-drip of low-level disruption.

We also get really practical, teaching presence, routines, attention signals, resetting a class mid-year (YES, you can), and why your nervous system is basically the hidden curriculum in your classroom.

Let’s roll the tape. 🎙️

What you’ll learn

  • Why “behaviour management” isn’t actually about behaviour (and how that misunderstanding keeps teachers stuck in whack-a-mole mode)
  • The proactive stuff that matters most before anything goes pear-shaped
  • How to build a strong teaching presence without being “strict”, cold, or shouty
  • The credible vs approachable sweet spot (and why frantic energy accidentally invites chaos)
  • What to do when the “grace period” ends in Week 5 😅
  • How to reset a class at any point in the year (even if you feel like you’ve missed the window)
  • Why low-level disruption is the real big behaviour — and how to reduce it at the mitigation stage
  • Practical attention-getting moves: attention spot, stillness, consistent cues, and not teaching over the noise
  • Why some off-task behaviour is actually a learning need (hello, task anxiety + chronic failure)
  • The reminder you might need today: it’s not your fault… and you’re not stuck

Have a question, comment, or just want to say hello? Drop us a text!

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Welcome & Episode Setup

SPEAKER_02

Oh, hi there teachers. Welcome to the Unteachables podcast. I'm your host, Claire English, and I am just a fellow teacher, a toddler mama, and a big old behaviour nerd on a mission to demystify and simplify that little thing called classroom management. The way we've all been taught to manage behaviour and classroom manage has left us playing crowd control, which is not something I subscribe to because we're not fans as we're teachers. So listen in as I walk you through the game-changing strategies, and I mean the things that we can actually do in action in our classroom that'll allow you to lean into your beautiful values as a compassionate educator and feel empowered to run your room with a little more calm and dare I say it, a lot less chaos. I will see you in the episode. Hello there, fabulous teachers. Welcome back to another episode of the Unteachables Podcast. However, it is a little bit of a different episode today because a few weeks ago I had the absolute pleasure of being a guest with Aaron Johnston on the Teacher Takeaway podcast. And it was such a great discussion. We spoke about misconceptions around classroom management. We spoke about how to reinforce solid expectations, low-level disruption, crafting a really strong teaching presence, all of the things. Like it was such a wonderful chat. So naturally, I emailed him and said, Hey Aaron, do you mind sharing that recording so I can share it with all of my Unteachables people? Because why not? Why the heck not? I hope you love the episode and I will see you back here for an Unteachables OG episode next week. Enjoy.

SPEAKER_00

You are here for season six and episode two. We are so excited to have you with us for this episode and diving into a brand new season of the podcast. For today's episode, we are going to be really diving into all things behavior, behavior support, um, and you know, working with students in the classroom. Um and it is a huge honor to welcome someone who I have the utmost respect for and admire as an educator and a professional, the wonderful Claire English. Hello, Claire.

SPEAKER_02

Oh, that's really lovely. Thank you, Aaron. Hello, how are you?

SPEAKER_00

I'm really good. I'm so excited to have you on. I know we were just talking about this before I hit record. Um having you on the podcast has been like one of those long-term goals. And so it's so good that we've finally been able to make this happen. We really appreciate you joining us and giving us your time and expertise.

SPEAKER_02

Oh my gosh, it's absolutely my pleasure. And I am so excited to nerd out about classroom management with you and your crew.

Claire’s Early Teaching Struggles

SPEAKER_00

Awesome, because it's one of the things that we love to do most is nerd out about all things teaching. Um, so before we dive into the episode and we really start to unpack this topic around behaviour, behaviour management, classroom systems, and things like that, I'll go through your bio just so our listeners um get up to speed with who you are and what you do. Um, for anyone out there that doesn't know you, Claire English is an Australian educator, senior school leader, author, and behaviour specialist who spent her career supporting students with complex social, emotional, and mental health needs. Having taught and led in both the UK and Australia, Claire is known for translating the toughest classroom behaviour challenges into practical, actionable strategies that genuinely work and center both the educator and the student. She's the founder of the Unteachables Academy, where she supports thousands of teachers with evidence-informed training and tools to build calm, connected classrooms without relying on outdated punitive approaches, which we love and are all about here on the podcast. So, Claire, we are super excited to dive into this topic with you today.

SPEAKER_02

Amazing. You know what? Like when I hear that particular bio, it still blows me away that that's me. I'm like, wait, who are you talking about? I want to meet that person. Because as we'll talk about soon, like my journey hasn't, I didn't start out that way, you know? Like I didn't just magically walk into the classroom feeling really confident and capable. So I'm really excited to dig into the stuff today in contrast to that bio.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, perfect. Well, that's a great leading to our very first question, which outside of your bio, that's kind of the work that you do now. But let's dive a little bit deeper into your journey. So let's talk us through your journey so far in education. What's that been like?

SPEAKER_02

Oh, so I am a Western Sydney girl. Uh Western Sydney girl through and through, and that's where I cut my teeth, so to speak, in education. Uh, but I got into the classroom and you know, I was working in a school that was in a tough kind of low SES area. And I quickly realized that despite going into teaching, because I really wanted to be the teacher that I needed when I was at school, I was so ill prepared for all of the stuff that was going to be eventuating in the classroom. Um, and then I realized, so yes, I had a really strong why. I wanted to be like a really kind and compassionate and empathetic teacher. And, you know, and I'm sure your listeners are the same, you know, they want to be that teacher that is like really connecting with their students and, you know, like doing great things. However, I recognized that I started to lean on approaches because I was so out of my depth. I started to lean on approaches that were incredibly punitive. And I was becoming the teacher that I didn't want to be. Like I, like the exact teacher who I was going into education to be the opposite of. I was, you know, shouty, I was punitive, I was quite resentful of my students, and I just hit rock bottom with it. And I thought, like, no, I need to do something different here because I didn't go to university for five years because I wanted to impact the lives of students positively, just to walk away because the behaviors were so tough, and because I was becoming this horrible version of myself that was just burnt out and stressed and just being really horrible. Like, you know, like I just didn't know how to approach these behaviors and I was blaming the students and I was caught in that cycle, and I was just, it was just horrible, right? So I made it my mission to one day get really, really great at classroom management. And even way back then, I'm talking my second year of teaching when I was in my early 20s. I'm a 36-year-old woman now doing the unteachables. But even back then, I said to myself, right now, I'm really crap at classroom management. I've got no idea what I'm doing. We have been thrust into this situation. I promise that one day I'm going to support teachers to also get greater classroom management, and I'm going to support teachers to support students. And that was way back then that I had this mission, like this deep mission. And since that day, you know, like work walking over the coals of being a teacher and, you know, working in some of the toughest contexts. I moved to, I moved back from London recently, and I spent seven years there working with um the most at-risk youth. You know, I worked at a school specifically for students with social, emotional, and mental health needs, and I was a senior leader there, and you know, I worked there for quite some time. These students had significant trauma. Um, you know, like they did not give a crap about me teaching them Shakespeare, I'll tell you that. So working with those students and working in contexts that were incredibly challenging, I've been able to hone my craft in a way that I wouldn't have been able to if I was working in schools where the behaviors weren't so challenging. Um, so yeah, and then I had my baby, the rest is history. I'm here doing the unteachables and, you know, speaking to you. But that is kind of the whistle stop tour of not just like how I've kind of come to this, but where I've started in education.

SPEAKER_00

And I and I think like the beautiful thing that you shared is that going on like this has been like a personal journey. You didn't just like wake up one day and have all the tools and strategies. And I always think about it as you were talking, because I know you shared a post this week, like on your Instagram page, and it just resonated with me, you know, where you get your class allocations and you see those names, and you just like, oh God help me, like, and you just feel like that, right? Like we've all been in that situation where like I've got to have this particular student, and you just feel like right the year off. But like I said, like we've all been in that situation, but it's about going on a journey of you know, unlearning, relearning, and just becoming that little bit better, like building our toolkit, right? And I think that's the the beautiful thing about your journey and what we're gonna, you know, share um in this episode is like you've lived that journey, like you've been in that situation. Um, and you know, now you're able to support teachers to, you know, go on that journey themselves.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, absolutely. And I'm so glad that resonated with you. Everything that I share, I'm like, okay, how can I make sure people understand that like I get it so deeply, and people think that they're just bad at classroom management or that they're not a strong enough leader in the classroom and things can't change. But like my whole thing is about making sure teachers know that no matter what you're dealing with right now in the classroom, it really isn't hopeless. And I think at the end of that post, in the caption I said, like it is an inevitability that you will be able to like become strong at classroom management if you just start to put little things in place and it will take a little bit of time. But it is, it's an inevitability that you will be successful in this space. Any teacher can. You're not like you know, soft enough or quiet or too quiet or not strict enough. Like, yeah.

The Big Misconception About Behaviour

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And I think like, you know, what you were saying um is so true in the sense of too, like, we all feel unprepared for this. Like, no matter how many years we've been teaching, no matter what our roles are, even like myself as a school leader, I still feel like unprepared. Like I don't know at all. And I remember like you stepping out of uni going, I do not know what I'm doing. Like I was not prepared for this. So let's normalize that, everybody. It's okay to feel that way. Um, so really excited to hear from you in this episode, Claire, and all of the things that you've learned in this journey so far. But let's start off um diving into the, I guess, the topic with some misconceptions when it comes to behavior, behavior management in the classroom. What do you think are some of the biggest misconceptions or misunderstandings?

SPEAKER_02

I think the biggest misconception that people do have when it comes to classroom management is that behavior management is about behavior itself. Like it's about responding to the behavior and resolving it through restorative conversations. But that is just such a small part of the overall puzzle that is classroom management. And I really do speak about it like this puzzle that we start to like put the little pieces together as we go through, and you know, like we're talking about the journey of kind of understanding classroom management more. When it comes to behavior management, classroom management, most of the magic needs to be done before the behavior is even happening, before there's any behavior you respond to whatsoever. Because of the misconception that classroom management is just about behavior, teachers get trapped in this never-ending cycle that they just can't get out of, that is so disempowering. And this is a cycle that will leave teach, like lead teachers to leaving the profession because they just can't feel empowered and get on top of things. You know, the behavior happens, they respond to the behavior, they resolve the behavior, the behavior happens, they respond to the behavior, they resolve the behavior, and it just becomes this giant game of whack-a-mole. And of course, there are things that we're doing at the level of responding to behavior and resolving behavior that will create some change. I'm not saying that's not important as well, but that change takes a lot of time. Like when we're dealing with the most complex kids with, you know, really challenging backgrounds that have the most challenging behaviors, that kind of response to behavior takes a long time for us to be able to see. I'm talking like years, maybe even like a decade later, they'll come to us and say, like, hey, Miss English, like, thank you so much for the way that you responded to us in the classroom. When we're talking about in the moment classroom management that is actually going to immediately create some change and break that cycle, it's all of the things that we're doing before. All of the, I guess, pretty much everything that we're doing in the classroom, it's our teacher presence. It's how we're balancing that credible nonverbal presence with our approachable nonverbal presence. And that's not being like a strict teacher that's like giving students the look. That's not what I mean. I'm talking about crafting a really strategic nonverbal presence. And I talk about that a lot in the work that I do, um, Michael Grinder's Envoy. That changed my life. And if you're a Western Sydney teacher, you probably heard of Envoy because it was really like popular around the time that you know I was at um I was at a school in Western Sydney. But it really does change things like the flick of a switch. It changes so much when we're able to craft that nonverbal teacher presence. And just an example of that. So when I was in my early teaching career and I was like really struggling, my energy that I was bringing into the classroom was frantic. I was running from pillar to post, like writing names up on the board, going to help another student, doing this, doing that, raising my voice. Like the energy was just pure franticism. When that is, and that's even though it doesn't sound like that's the approachable nonverbal body language, like that's exactly what it is, because we're like looser in our um body, we're we're louder, we're more reactive. Instead, if we were to uh to model the nonverbals that we want back from our students, so we're practicing stillness, we're dropping our body, like our volume, we're speaking with a different inflection, those are the things that can start to shape a really powerful, strong uh teacher presence. So that's just one of the things that I teach when it comes to um, you know, like starting to get on top of these things. Another one is the routines that we're using because those are non-verbally communicating our expectations every single moment of the day. We do these expectations lessons, but we forget that like the expectations are actually the day-to-day stuff that we're communicating nonverbally. Um, it's the way that we set up our tasks. So we're reducing the significant anxiety that some students are bringing in with them because they have had chronic amounts of failure in their education with certain subjects. Uh, when we do all of these things, and I could go honestly on for hours about every single one of them. When we're doing those things, we're working at the level of mitigation, the pre-behavior phase, and we're stopping behaviors in their tracks. I'm not saying that we're going to stop every single behavior, but what that does is it weeds the behaviors out that are a result of, you know, a lack of clarity or the stress response. So then we can actually have the space to deal with the big, big behaviors that we do need to respond and resolve. So we're not caught in that cycle with them. So biggest misconception is that behavior management is about the behavior. In a nutshell. I know I went on a little bit long there, but that is in a nutshell what that huge misconception is.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. And I and I think too, like one of the things that you talked about, um, like there's so much power in a lot of the things that we don't actually see. Like I think about, you know, sometimes you walk into a classroom and it's beautiful and calm, and you think, oh, this teacher, they just like they must have it all together. But there's actually so many things that you don't see that are going on that have created that classroom environment. Like, and you said, like the power of our own self-regulation and the presence that we bring into a classroom, like the impact that that makes, because it's contagious. Like calm is contagious. Um, and there's a lot to be said for that. Like you said, the energy that you give off, you know, if you're in that place where you're feeling frantic and you just respond, respond, respond, that, you know, students can feed off that. Um, so I think, you know, there's a lot to reflect on and think about just in the way that we show up, that's really powerful.

SPEAKER_02

And it's important as well to say, like, just as easy as it is for us to, not easy, but like as powerful as it is for us to co-regulate with our students, the reason we find classroom management so tough as human beings is because we're co-disregulating with them all the time. Like our students come in dysregulated and they're like we're jumping on their, you know, like they're bringing us into their chaos rather than us trying to bring them into our calm. It's happening the other way, and we're stuck in that cycle as well. And that is really, really hard. Like, we're just human beings trying to do the best job we can. And we've got all these students in the room that are incredibly dysregulated, and like, of course, we're allowing them to bring us into their chaos in terms of our nervous systems.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, absolutely. Now, I know we we touched through on this, and you talked about it in your bio a little bit, is about you know, going into the classroom and having that sense of like, I do not know what I'm doing, like I do not know how to do this. And I think every teacher out there, hand up, would be going, yep, that's me. That's exactly how I feel. Why do you think like most teachers feel this way, particularly when it comes to behavior, classroom management? Why do we feel so unprepared or you know, ill-equipped?

Teacher Presence: Credible Vs Approachable

SPEAKER_02

I think we feel ill-equipped and unequipped because like we are, like we genuinely are. Like I I went to university and I had like over five years, I had 20 minutes of classroom management training where the tutor said, okay, if a student's not listening to you, what do you do? And then he went into this really kind of like tacky, humorous, like, you know, script or like, you know, dramatization of what it would be like to be in the classroom. He was just walking around like tapping on students' desks and like looking at us. And like that was the extent of my classroom management like training when it came to the five years I was at university. And these are people who haven't been in a modern classroom, at least for a long time, and they're preparing us to teach our subjects, but they're not preparing us to teach our students. And there's such a big difference between like we don't teach our subjects. A lot of us go into the profession because we're really passionate about English, or you know, I did as well. I I mean, I had other reasons, but the reason I chose English was because I was like, oh my God, like this was an escape for me. English was powerful and it changed my life. And then you get into the classroom, I realize that it's not your subject, you're teaching, you're teaching your students. And I think that university fails in a sense to recognize that because it is very heavy on the subject, which of course we need to be experts at as well. I'm not saying that, but there needs to be kind of like a middle ground. And because there is so much confusing and contradictory messaging around what quality classroom management is, it does get really hard for them teachers to by themselves work out what they're supposed to do. So I know there's a lot of professional learning in schools around classroom management, but a lot of it doesn't take into account that middle ground. So, for example, a school goes trauma-informed, and if they don't, you know, recognize that not all behavior is because of trauma. Like there's a whole bunch of other reasons. And yes, it's important to understand trauma and make a safe space for students, and but that doesn't magically equal a calm classroom. Again, things like restorative practice, we get on the route of, you know, let's make this school a restorative school and have restorative practice. Again, that's at the end of the behavior cycle and it's really reactive. And it doesn't take into account all the stuff that happens before the behavior. So I think that we get so focused on certain behavior approaches that we are confusing teachers because they're like, but okay, do I have to do this? What about this? Like, you know, and it doesn't actually like encompass a holistic view of what classroom management is. And again, there are punitive and you know, approaches and reproach approaches with reward systems that are just about the behavior, and they're just like a band-aid that gets old and falls off. So there's just so many confusing mixed messages when you do come into the profession when people then try to play catch up from being unequipped. Uh, and it just gets really hard for us to know what I am supposed to do. Like the biggest question I get asked by teachers, whether it's like on Instagram or like either communities that I run, it's like, but but what am I supposed to do? What is it that I'm just tell me what to do because I'm so confused. That is like the consensus.

SPEAKER_00

Yep. And and I think too, like you said, because it's such a complex thing, like behavior, um, you know, and things like that. It is so complex and there's so much to it. And so that actually isn't like a quick, easy fix or solution um that's going to magically work for everybody, like it we kind of talked about before. It's about having a toolkit of lots of different strategies, lots of different um philosophies and approaches so that we can utilize them in the right moments at the right point in time to make the biggest difference.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah, I talk about it like it's just so when I wrote my book, my book is called It's Never Just About the Behavior. Can you tell? Like that's like my overarching umbrella philosophy. But I call my approach a holistic approach to classroom management and not in like a wack-a-doo kind of like, oh, I, you know, but it really is taking into account everything. Like you need to think about, like, you need to just have a bird's eye view of it. And it is like my approach is trauma. formed. My approach is restorative, but it's so much more than that. And it has to be more than that.

SPEAKER_00

Yep. Yeah. Absolutely. And, you know, I think like you said, like teachers just want to know what to do. Like just tell me. Like give me the things that I should be doing. And so, you know, I thought we'd get into some of those practical things, having talked about the philosophy and all of the things that we we know, right? That the behavior is like exactly what you said. It's not really about the behavior. There's so much more going on there. But what do you think at this point in time, you know, we're heading into you know going back to school for the new year. What should teachers be doing now to set themselves up for success?

Why We Feel Unprepared

Foundations For Week One Success

SPEAKER_02

So it's such a good question because when you think about that first week back of school, the conversation always kind of goes to like how are we going to set expectations? That's like the first thing that kind of comes to mind. Then it is okay, well, how are we going to break the ice and how are we going to build community? And that kind of all happens in that first week. But then what do you do beyond that? Like so we're doing like one lesson on icebreaking we're doing one lesson on expectation setting. What is it that is going to stop the grace period from ending in week five? Because you know Aaron like you get into the school year and you have a certain class and it's like oh my gosh like my year eight English class is beautiful. I'm so excited. And then you get to the end of term you're like hang on a second like why like why do I feel like this class is going down the drain? Like how why is this so hard? That's why when I'm talking to teachers about going back to school and what they need to do to kind of set up the foundations of their classroom management. It isn't like a one and done thing and we spoke about routines a little bit before but I'll I'll go into them more now. I like to obviously do icebreakers in a way that is going to get buy-in like my favorite way to approach icebreakers is by starting with a day one starter activity which sounds like quite boring but I always do something like let's sit down five minutes like write five things that sum you up in a nutshell so when I'm going around the room students aren't going oh what am I going to say what am I going to say and then they're like kind of looking to other people and like they're thinking about their own things. They're not listening to everybody else. Like I try to set that up in that way. So there's more meaningful buy-in when it comes to icebreaking. When it comes to expectation setting sorry you can tell I've got to toddler a daycare because I'm never not without some kind of lurky. When it comes to expectation setting yes I do an expectation lesson. I think it's very important. However what happens is those expectations then tend to like sit up on the wall and collect dust. So we need to think of a way that we can extend the community building and I like to think of it like breaking the ice is breaking the ice and then throughout the year we kind of warm that ice into like a nice tea of community. So it's not a one and done. It's like the starting point. So community building just start like just open up opportunities for students to like authentically get to know each other, have a bit of a laugh, nothing that's got too much social risk. And then you can start doing things throughout the year like five minute brain breaks that help students to connect more and feel more at home in the classroom you know some really great starter activities that then lead into certain things. When it comes to expectation setting making sure it's really collaborative there's a lot of buy-in I do that by teaching expectations through concept first like I would with any other kind of English lesson. So instead of just going into like these are your expectations this is what I expect of you this is what you expect of me. I start with like why are expectations a thing? Do you know what expectations are? Where do you see expectations in the real world? Like when you go home at night like when's your bedtime like you know are you expected to eat dinner? Like can you have lollies at 12 pm you know and then like thinking about like sporting teams like you know what are your expectations there. But the whole point of that part of expectation setting is making sure that students know it's not something that I'm imposing on them because I'm this horrible teacher is because expectations are something that is required for us to be like functioning as a society. So that's how I kind of approach expectation setting. But the most important thing I do in week one and I take this throughout the entire year is setting the heartbeat of the lesson which is routines. And I will uh kind of implicitly set them. So day one for example with the icebreaker starter that is already saying to students that every time you come into this lesson, there'll be a starter activity here. I expect your engagement I expect you to be sitting here quietly for five minutes doing this starter activity. I then start to drip feed in different routines. So that first day back I'll do an exit ticket and with that exit ticket I'll have something that relates to the icebreaker like you know write down three things you learnt about somebody in the class or you know something that, or what are you worried about for the year ahead or you know if there's one thing that you could tell your teacher what would it be, depending on the year group you teach. So I make sure I'm still putting in place the bones, the heartbeat of the lesson, even though it's that first week this is how we strike that balance between the credible and us needing to be a leader in the classroom, a credible leader and striking that balance with the approachable which is I'm here, I care about you. I want you to be a part of this community in the classroom because that balance is very hard to strike. And I think teachers get very confused by the mixed messages of like don't smile to Lista, but then also relationships are the single most important thing in the classroom. So just framing everything through the lens of those routines that you're then going to take through to the rest of the year because that is what is going to communicate nonverbally your expectations every single day.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Love it absolutely I think it's um like you said it's it's lots of mixed messaging lots of um things and like you said it's not necessarily doing something once and then going oh tick that off my list done that and then going oh why isn't the behavior like what I want to see and I think too the other thing which I want to kind of springboard into I mean further questions but something that you just said is I guess for those teachers like maybe you know they're listening to this podcast a little bit later than we've recorded it and say we're you know halfway through the term it's like oh well I've missed that window of opportunity in the the first week of the term like is it ever too late? Like what do we do? Like what do we how do we how do we shift it for someone that's gone oh well you know I'm at the end of the term it's too late I just have to ride the year out. Like how do we approach that? How do we make that shift? Because I think that was another thing you said in your Instagram post is it's never too late to make the shift and think I can change things. So like how do we do that? What are your what are your suggestions for that?

SPEAKER_02

I've done the same process in turn four with some classes. I've come into classes late and done this. It really is never too late. And I think it so when I did Envoy training I remember like back in the day I had a really challenging year 10 class. They were the high we called them the the high level class you know the ones that were um like the most academically capable. And I think because of that I was treating them very differently and I was being more approachable and I was being more relaxed. And then I learned in Envoy training that I was I was causing all of this chaos because I my expectations nonverbally were saying like hey like let's have a chat like I'm all cool like it's all good. I might be telling you to do your work but I'm sitting here leaning on the table and I'm really relaxed and you know I'm trying to be your friend and all of those things. It was so uncomfortable doing envoy training having to face that in myself and then going to the next lesson with my year 10s term three as a new like I was quite a new teacher and then saying I'm going to shift this and I'm going to see what happens and I changed my body language. So I went from being in my approachable body language so looser louder a little bit more frantic trying to be a little bit more friendly not understanding the difference between kind of being um like the leader and meaning business to then being like hey like let's get this let's get this started I shifted that and I immediately went into my app my credible body language when I was trying to line them up I got these questions from the students miss what's wrong with you why are you acting like that like are you sick? I got questions yeah like or to say I I I immediately changed like my my something had shifted in me and they didn't know what it was. I wasn't being cold I wasn't being nasty I wasn't being quote unquote strict but my body language had changed. That lesson I walked out crying not because it was a bad lesson for the first time in God knows how long but because I realized that I wasn't hopeless or stuck at any point in the year because it was the best most productive most beautiful lesson I've ever had and I've had teachers that I've worked with like voice noting me after a day at school going, I can't believe that this is the lesson that I just had like this is magic. No matter what part of the year you're in, you can start to implement these strategies. So the credible and approachable body language is definitely one that I would start with. I'm probably not doing a very good job of explaining it because you know when you just know a concept and you kind of like put it out there. But I do have a lot of good podcast episodes about the approachable and credible body language. So that's one thing you can do start to kind of shift your, you know, your teacher presence um setting up these routines at any point during the year. It doesn't matter like where you are in the year, you can start rolling out these routines and just the the most important thing is then being consistent with them after that so they know when I go to Miss English's class, I know that I'll have a starter. I know that if I finish a task early that I'm going to get the checklist so I can check off whether or not I'm actually finished or I've just rushed through this. And then when I'm finished I'm going to get one of the early finisher activities. So I'm not sitting there with my hand up with 10 other students or going on my phone when I've finished a task. So students are then automatically like there's hardwired in them to know what is expected. So really rolling out those routines no matter what time of the year it is just going to be so powerful. And you can set expectations you can go back and teach an expectations lesson in term three if you wanted to and the way that I've done it before is being really transparent with students. I'll walk in I'll have a new seating plan up on the board. Usually I'll change the furniture around in the room as well because in terms of like um like the brain when we walk in there's something different we pay attention to that. So I'll change things around in the physical space and I'll go in and I'll say things haven't been working. I'm not happy with how things have been like we aren't working together in the way that I would expect by this point in the year. So we're going to be doing things differently now.

Resetting Midterm: It’s Not Too Late

SPEAKER_00

Every time you walk in this is what it's going to be like every time we a cyber activity every time we do a task so then we go into resetting those expectations you are the captain of your ship you can at any point in time change the way you're showing up in the classroom yeah absolutely I love I love that now I know you talked a little bit about some strategies like that approachable credible body language which I'd love to explore a little bit more but I want to explore it I guess in this sense of you know when we when we talk about behavior our minds tend to just go to those really big major behaviors and we have those and yep we need to know how to deal with them. But actually for the next little bit of our conversation I actually want to flip it to just that low level behavior just the little ugly things that actually just like stall learning like you know you're doing something behavior kind of stuff what you're doing that interrupts the flow of the lesson. Like how do we approach I guess tip strategies to ideas for those low level behaviors that that stall learning and I guess like let's unpack some of those things like the approachable credible body language and what that looks like in practice. Because I think a lot of teachers you know they don't necessarily want to talk about the big major behaviors. It's like what do I do when I've got that kid who just interrupts all the time or you know the kids are off task because they're the things that we kind of are constantly dealing with that you know we can deal with the major things and we can debrief and move on. Those things don't happen all the time. It's all those like little low level things that I think fester and get it's really frustrated because I'm just not getting through my units. I'm just not you know getting through the teaching that I need to do. So how do we approach those low level behaviors in the classroom that make a real big impact overall to the learning I love talking about low-level behaviors.

SPEAKER_02

Like it is my thing I'm actually writing my second book at the moment it's called the low level disruption playbook. And I I'm doing this because low-level behaviors we spoke about misconceptions before when it comes to low-level behaviors they like they are completely misunderstood. Like you cannot address low-level behaviors as behaviors at the behavior level. It is not possible because as you said it's a torrent of them if you were dealing with low-level behaviors moment to moment like behaviors and trying to speak to students and trying to address the behavior you would be making phone calls all night to parents you would be like it is all consuming. The low-level behaviors are the big level behaviors because they are the things that are stopping us from actually teaching. So it's really about working at the mitigation stage. And I mentioned it before where I said if we are treating our classroom management like that puzzle and putting things in place at the mitigation phase, I said that we filter things out so then we only deal with the big stuff. That is how we deal with low-level behaviors by stopping them from happening in the beginning. And if they are still happening then that is when we start to move to like like crafting our practice and really honing that and trying to do our very best to put the things in place that reduce the low level behaviors. But then if there are those pockets of students one or two that then continue the behaviors then we can focus on them. But it's really about working at the mitigation stage. Obviously routines are a humongous part of that strategically crafting that credible teaching presence is another so for example let's just say that you've got a class of 30 in front of you and you can't deliver your teacher led instruction because there's always someone popping up or the class you just can't get them. You know how like you just see teachers teaching over the noise because they're like I've given up I can't be bothered like I just need to teach over the noise because I've got to get something through to those two kids at the front that are looking at me dull eyed as wanting to learn something which is the most disempowering horrible feeling and you feel so guilty. Really standing in the same attention spot every single time because that will nonverbally signal to students that it is time to be listening. So always pick the same attention spot. The biggest mistake I was making with that year 10 class I was standing behind the desk. I was leaning on the desk I was halfway over there I was trying to get their attention from like you know from God knows where. Picking an attention spot standing there planting your feet firmly on the ground evenly we're not like you know standing with with our hip out again something that I was doing without we just don't realize unless we tune into what we're actually showing unless someone is there to tell us or we're recording ourselves, which I've done many times, or we start to really become attuned to actually what we look like in the classroom we don't realize how we are in our credible body language when we're supposed to be in our approachable in those moments. So feet planted on the ground, standing up straight, shoulders back, taking a huge deep breath I'm talking like neutral face huge deep breath and then dropping our shoulders. Even just the act of taking a huge deep breath when we're in front of a class waiting for their attention that is enough sometimes to send waves of co-regulation out into the classroom if they're still not listening, hand up really clear or any kind of like um verbal signal you I'm sorry um nonverbal signal you use and then pairing up with a verbal call to call and response. So okay unine back to the big group and then standing there still really trying to embody that credible strong but still like we're not we're not being nasty or strict or anything like that. We are just standing strong in our teaching presence. We are standing confidently in that what Sykes teaches out is this takes a long time the first few times. And then as your class gets to know your body language and they get to know the language and the communication that you're sending to them it gets quicker and quicker and quicker and easier. But the most important thing is not doing anything until you've got the whole class listening. And like close enough isn't isn't good enough because if you've got one student in the back of the room that's still talking you're like okay well I just need to get through the freaking content that one student talking is going to be the non you're nonverbally saying to the whole class, I don't expect you to listen.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

It doesn't matter if you're listening. I don't care if Jack's not listening because he doesn't want to listen anyway. So it's really important for us to have the entire class that's just one of the roadmaps I teach in my low level behavior boot camp. Because there are quite a few things that we it's very nuanced. Like as you were saying before it's very nuanced and it's something that is hard to capture like this is all very nonverbal and it's all something that you have to see kind of play out in a classroom. But it's so powerful like it is so, so powerful. So that is one thing when it comes to like getting whole class attention low-level behaviors in general because it's not just one thing that we do we're just stacking up the things in our practice that's going to mitigate it because we have to think of the reasons behind those low-level behaviors. Is it the fact that they are dysregulated is it the fact that they're distracted is it that they're not sure about the task so they're talking to each other do they feel like the task is like scary they don't want to like it's easier for some students to chat to their friends or to zone out than it is to admit that they actually aren't capable of doing something. That it's too hard or is too hard.

SPEAKER_00

Don't know what I'm doing. Yeah.

Crushing Low-Level Disruption

SPEAKER_02

Exactly so when we start to kind of stack up okay I'm gonna nail my my teacher presence and you can do that no matter what kind of person you are, no matter how quiet or you know timid you think you are. So stacking up teacher presence stacking on routines stacking on tasking in a way that is so clear um so scaffolded and differentiated. So no matter who you are in the class you are able to do that. When we start to stack up all of those things you will see the low-level behaviors drop significantly and then you'll be able to start to work with the students who are still struggling because of other barriers that are in place or the barriers are too high.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah yeah and I think too like you said um it's really understanding what's going on in that low-level behavior because you know the lack of engagement like you said could be um it's just too difficult and maybe the thing we actually need to focus on is not a behavior management strategy, it's differentiation to meet the need of that student because it's easier for them to be off task than for them and their peers to know I actually don't know what I'm doing.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah absolutely it's scary. Like think about it they're they're teenagers I'm a 36 year old boy and I still struggle in staff meetings to say my piece sometimes because I'm like well that sounds stupid like the social risk of doing something in a group is huge. And if a student has experienced like so much failure in education or they've felt humiliated or they feel dumb or they see they look around. Imagine being a that's why by the way a lot of students will get themselves out of exams. If they're in an exam hall that's why they'll start to go F you F you I'm not doing this throwing their paper because they're looking around and they're seeing that most of the students around them are able to pick up a pen and write something and they probably look at that page and go, I don't know what to do. What is this? It's like another language to me. So these are the kind of behaviors we have to be thinking about as well.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah and like you said and what that student needs isn't punishment or a punitive approach or they don't need a reminder of the expectation because like hello I know what the expectation is but at this point in time the thing that's that's driving my behavior is I don't feel like I can do this. It's too hard it's beyond me. Yeah absolutely and it's looking at all of those things with a different lens I guess isn't it and and being able to to look a little bit deeper than the behavior and and like it's gonna then mitigate it what strategies can I put in place so that thing actually don't have to deal with that thing. It doesn't happen because I'm prepared. And part of it comes down to you know that most important Teaching standard of all, and that is knowing my students and how they learn.

SPEAKER_02

Yeah. And I think it's really important to say as well, like teachers, like it's very overwhelming to think about that standard because you're like, but I've got 180 students. How can I know all of my students that intimately? So I think that when we like I remember speaking to I was in a staff meeting, God probably like 10 years ago, and we're talking about that standard, and we're like, you know, you know, when you're around the staff room table and you're like talking about things and having like a moment about like school and all that kind of stuff, and we're like, what do they expect us to do? So the the great thing about this approach is you don't actually need to intimately know how every individual students learn because you know how your students learn as a collective, because you understand behavior. That is why this is so powerful. If you make these strategies just an everyday part of your teaching practice, you are already, without even understanding, like you know, Mark's specific needs, of course, you need to understand like if there's actual needs there, but like without having to go, okay, like what does Mark need? What does Lucy need? What how do they learn best? Without doing that for 180 students, you're putting in place the structures, the bones, the things already in your practice to mitigate the behaviors before they begin. And that is empowering because we can't sit there and regenerate 30 different worksheets for every single class. We don't have the time for that. We can't look at a class that's having low-level behaviors and go, well, why is Stacey acting like this? Why is Karen acting like this? Because you're mitigating those things. So it's about embodying a holistic approach to classroom management that empowers you to get on top of things in a way that's super sustainable as well.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah. Absolutely. And I think, you know, you've you've said that beautifully because it can be overwhelming thinking I need to have, you know, 180 different classroom profiles. No, not at all. You but you have to have, like you said, that holistic understanding of of how, as a collective, your class or your classes, what the dynamics are at play, and then putting those strategies in place to mitigate, and no mitigation plan is perfect. Like you can put the strategies in place, and sometimes they still won't work, and that is okay. It's not a failure on you because kids are kids, they're humans, um, and you know, we we can't totally predict what they're gonna do, but we can try and put things in place, but then it's you know, having that that deep toolkit that, you know, that that thing I put in place hasn't worked. What do I do now? I don't just let it unfold or oh I I give up, I've tried everything. Like, what are the other things that I can do um to to hopefully make a shift or make a difference, right?

SPEAKER_02

I love that because like behavior also isn't all like, oh, behaviors are bad. Like they're children and they are, you know, they've got age-appropriate behaviors, just like my toddler. Like, she'll kick things at me and I'm like, we are two years old. Like, what am I expecting? Of course, I'm not gonna accept it and I'm gonna try to teach her to do something different, but also age-appropriate behaviors. Kids are driven by their need for belonging. Of course, if they get a message from their best friend who is having a crisis in another class outside, they're gonna run outside. Like, we need to understand that as well. Like the fact that they are, they are just human beings like us, and they're also living their life for the first time like us, and we're all imperfect, and we're all together kind of trying to do this thing, which is get them through their education. And like, I think taking that approach where we are all just doing our best as human beings with the knowledge we have, with the skills we have is so crucial to being a teacher, which is a very human, hard, messy profession to be in.

SPEAKER_00

Absolutely. And I think acknowledging that is really powerful and really impactful, right? Now we've we've touched on some strategies. Like I said, like we could talk about this for weeks. You have a library of podcast episodes diving into all of these things. You've got a book, you're working on another book. For the for the people out there listening, you know, hopefully we've given them some real practical things they can go away and try. But if they want to dive deeper, what are your recommendations around books to read, courses they can do, um, either from yourself or others? Like, where where can people go if they they want to dive deeper into some of these things that we've talked about today?

SPEAKER_02

I'm going to assume that your people haven't heard of me before. And if this is the case, um, I created this thing called the Kickstart. It's a$1 thing. Um, and the reason I created this$1 Kickstart was because, as you probably heard throughout this episode, there are so many moving pieces to classroom management. And even this episode has probably made you go, well, where do I start with this and like what's most important and all of those things? I created this kickstart because I wanted a place to send you any teacher who might be struggling with classroom management, who wants to hone their skills, who feels really like lost or kind of hopeless or helpless. And I wanted a place where I wasn't telling you, like, you know, maybe try all of these things, but really explicit five quick wins. So it's five, 10-minute sessions, and it introduces teachers to um a couple of those routines and just like really quick actionable things. At the end of my podcast, I always sign off with like and keep sprinkling that classroom management magic into everything you do. These five quick wins are things that you can do immediately that will start sprinkling classroom management into your practice. So that is, if you want immediate change, if you want to see some of these things in action, the approachable and credible is one of the 10-minute Kickstarter um lessons. Then I strongly suggest you start there. Um, it's just a great way for you to get to know me, my work, and a very affordable way. Um, the only reason I made it a dollar rather than zero dollars is because I wanted only people to join who were going to do it. And that was a great way to kind of create that barrier. Um, but you can head to the dash on teachables.com forward slash kickstart. It'd be awesome for you just to see the power of some of these things and to put these things in place. I give you some like really great resources as well. So it's not like just telling you what to do, it's giving you literal like resources to then go and do it.

Differentiation, Anxiety And Engagement

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, love it. And obviously, your book tells you.

SPEAKER_02

Obviously the book. So my book is it's never just about the behavior. And that is kind of like my it's it's zooming up in a bird's eye view of my entire holistic approach to classroom management. Um, and I've got my podcast, the Unteachables Podcast, which is my favorite place to hang out on Instagram, obviously. But um, I've got like 150, 160 episodes. I just had a message from someone yesterday actually saying, Oh my god, Claire, I was driving from City to Canberra and back and I listened to six hours of you. And I'm like, I was like, what? You listen to just my voice for six hours? Like I just um, but she was saying that like every episode there is something really tangible to take away as well. So if you want to learn a few things, then definitely come and hang out on my podcast. It's it's a great place to yeah, to get to know some little classroom management tip bits as well.

SPEAKER_00

We we love that. We love those practical takeaways. Now, Claire, how can our listeners keep in touch um with you and follow the work that you're doing? So, yeah, tell us all the places to find you um out there in the wide world.

SPEAKER_02

Uh you can come and hang out with me on Instagram if you want to, the dot unteachables. There's a lot of dots and dashes. Uh so the dot unteachables and obviously my podcasts. You can head to my website, which is theddashunteachables.com. I'm assuming you'll just pop all these in the show notes anyway. So you don't have to remember that. I feel like I'm so used to saying my um my website name. So all the places if you want to come and hang out. If you did listen to this episode, by the way, and it's the first time you're finding me, please come and like chat to me on Instagram, like send me a message or a voice note or something. I love to hear from people who have discovered me from different places and yeah, if you've gotten something, it'd be really, really cool.

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, absolutely. Well, we will definitely put all those links in the show notes. But yes, people who aren't following you, Claire, they definitely should be because they have been missing out. I've been following you for years now, and I always get so much from the things that you share, and I've loved connecting with you too, um, you know, through social media and having chats via DMs and and all of that. So um I appreciate the the support that you give to teachers out there. So as we wrap up this episode, we always like to finish off with takeaways. Um and so the the takeaways from the episode. So for me, a couple of key takeaways. Number one, um, is really for me, I guess, being more mindful about those things that we talked about, like the presence, the way I stand in the room and what that communicates. Because it's it's something that we probably just don't think about, right? Just those little things, two feet on the floor, standing like straight, not sort of like leaning on something or you know, with my hip out to the side, like all those little nuanced things that can make a really big impact that we often just don't think about. We just unconsciously do them. Um, and even like the language that I use, the way that I phrase things, the tone in my voice, all those little inflections that could actually communicate something actually completely opposite to what I'm trying to do. And I guess it's being more mindful of those and going into a position where I'm thinking about those ahead of time. Like I'm gonna go into this lesson more conscious of where I stand in the room, how I stand, these kind of things. Um, because that can have a really big impact. And I think, you know, like you were we were talking about too. Now, if something's not working, like addressing it. But doing it not in, you know, not in the yelly sense, but just hey, things aren't working. So we're gonna we're gonna refresh this. We're gonna go over this expectation again. We're gonna talk about, but I don't have to yell and scream and humiliate or blame or make them feel bad. Claire, it's all your fault. Claire didn't do this, so we're gonna but it's it's not it's not a bad thing to pause and go over those things, but again, it's about doing it in a way that's holding, I guess, everyone accountable for the sense of like we're all responsible for making this classroom work. And so we're gonna come back and revisit this and not feeling like, oh, it's too late, I just gotta ride the term out. Um, you know, get to the end of the term because we can kind of live our life like that. Um, but we can constantly, at any point in time, we've got the power to make a shift. Um, and so I think they're my two biggest takeaways from the episode. What about you, Claire? Any final takeaways or reminders?

Sustainable, Holistic Management

SPEAKER_02

Oh, I love that. I love how you got those takeaways. That's really nice. Sometimes, like, I'm sure you do it too, like when you just have like a chat and you're talking away and you think in the back of your head, like, I wonder how this is translating. Because you have a whole lot of context behind the work that you're doing, and then you're like, is that trans? Like, so that's really nice to hear those takeaways. And I'm I'm really glad to hear it. Um, I think the final you sum that up really nicely. I think the final reminder is that like if you are struggling with classroom management, I think that this has like kind of been a theme that's run through the episode. And it is, if you're struggling right now with classroom management, whether it's like in a small way or a big way, if it's not your fault and you you're not doing anything wrong. You're doing the best that you can right now with your skills, your current skills, your current context, your current knowledge, the support that you've been given. And on top of that, not only is it not your fault and you haven't done anything wrong, you're also not stuck. So if you're there thinking right now, I don't have the support around me, I've asked for help and I'm not getting it, you truly aren't stuck. Like there is so much support that I offer, and I know a lot of people do come listen to my podcast and start to make some changes.

SPEAKER_01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02

Feel empowered to make little changes. And as I said before, like if you do that, if you make it a priority, even just one hour per week to listen to a podcast episode and put something in place, it is absolutely inevitable that in a year's time you are going to feel more confident, more capable in your classroom management. And even like I've worked with people who, you know, at the end of working with me for a period of time, they have had senior leadership coming to their classroom saying, What are you doing in here? Like, oh my gosh, like, can you talk to staff about it or can you support this person? It's these ripple effects that go out, like these threads that go throughout all of us and the work we're doing that is just so powerful. And um, yeah, so you're not stuck. You know, it's not your fault if you're really struggling and there are so many things that you can do to feel better about the situation you're in. Because if you are the kind of teacher who wants to be in the profession to do things differently, I don't want you to leave just because you don't feel supported. Like that'd be an absolute travesty, you know?

SPEAKER_00

Yeah, yeah. And I love what you said. Like, you know, there's lots of things that will that you can do. Um, like I said, listen to a podcast, grab a book, have a read. Um, you know, yet you might not be able to necessarily get, you know, the opportunity to go to a PL or something like that. But there's lots of other little things you can do. And even if it's just, like you said, an hour a week, one strategy that you you get from a podcast that you listen to, over time, like that builds. And before you know it, hopefully in, you know, 12 month time, you look back and go, wow, look how far I've come just from diving into a podcast or you know, pulling apart a chapter of a book a month or something like that. So really practical things that you can do. But Claire, you are amazing, and we're so grateful for you for joining us for this episode and sharing all your knowledge and expertise in this space. Thank you so much.

SPEAKER_02

No, thank you, Aaron, for allowing me to come onto your podcast and talking to your community. It's always incredible to yeah, to be able to meet some new people and to get that message across. So thank you for all of the work you're doing.

SPEAKER_00

Oh, pleasure. Like I said, it's an absolute pleasure to have you on. We really appreciate it. But we are gonna wrap it up there for season six, episode two, um, and all things behavioral listen. We would love to hear your takeaways from this episode. You know where to find us on social media, teacher takeaway podcast, on all the channels, drop us a DM, um, head into the comments. We would love to hear your takeaways from this episode. What are the things that you got that you're gonna try? We'd also love to hear your thoughts, recommendations if you've got um, you want to explore this topic a bit further, you've got questions that you'd like us, we can always jump back on with Claire and have another chat. Um, but we're gonna wrap it up there, Claire. Thanks again for joining us. We're really grateful.

SPEAKER_02

Thank you, Erin.

SPEAKER_00

And that's it. We'll have you back with us again soon for another episode of the Teacher Takeaway podcast. Thanks for joining us.

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Claire English

Host