Never hesitate to “big up your bad self”! Tongue-in-cheek flexing is a great way to bring a light-hearted element to your lessons. It is a brief repose from the seriousness of teaching and learning.
As a teacher you will become intimate with all aspects of your personality. Any air and graces will be chased away promptly as you dig deep into being your authentic and unfiltered self.
You will have to come to terms with your actual subject knowledge, your pedagogical skills, your capacity for patience and your sense of humour.
Excellence in all areas should always be your goal. Excellence, however, like flexing is also an attitude.
When I was in primary school, in Year 6 I drew a drawing of a Viking boat. My teacher complimented me on the technique I used to emphasise the wood. He said it was excellent. Ever since then I have considered myself an excellent artist. Drawing is my flex. Any (most) drawings that I produce that are below par I consider as me just having a bad day. My confidence in my artistic abilities will not be shaken.
Your haters are your motivators
I take that same energy to all of my lessons. As I science teacher I often have to draw the Earth, cells, plants, animals, transportation and so on in order to illustrate a point.
I am often met with howls of protest and looks of confusion. I am, however, impervious to any negative feedback, and I always insist that what I have drawn is in very good (if not excellent). If they disagree, then that is unfortunate.
You will also have an aspect of your delivery for example, a style of writing, that they will be merciless when offering critique. Find it and offer it up to be mocked.
Be bold. Be brave and don’t budge.
This is a great way to let them “in on the joke” with you. A little bit of levity that it appropriately pitched but not so raucous as to actively interrupt the flow of your lesson.
Big up your bad self
Finding a small piece of you that the students can collectively drag you on is a nice way of letting them know that you are comfortable with being more “human”.
Be really bad at something – drawing, mathematics, pronunciation – give them something to mock you about. This is a great way to introduce some levity if needed.
It is not essential that you find your “shtick” and laboriously work it into the lesson like a comedy routine.
I guarantee that the pupils will find many reasons to laugh at you. Openly or otherwise.
Any disrespect does, of course, have to be handled according to your school’s behaviour policy but find the joke that you’re happy to turn on it’s head and use it as an opportunity to be more relatable.
Sprinkle the flex
Being the butt of the joke does not mean being the class clown. It is important to strike a very fine balance so always keep it short and sweet. Never allow it to deviate from the core of your lesson.
There are many different types of teachers. This article states 14 different types. As you continue your teaching career you need to consider what type of teacher you are. You need to consider what kind of personality style you want to adopt.
Adopt a personality style?
But I want to always be my authentic self with the children!!!
You will be. Kind of.
It is a little naïve to think that your personality only has one mode and that you are exactly the same all of the time to everyone equally.
Think of how you interact with your grandparents at Sunday lunch versus how you interact with your best friends at Saturday night drinks. Are you being authentic with them? Yes. Are you speaking and behaving in the exact same way with both of them? I hope not.
The greatest showman
The same applies in school. Think of your role in the classroom as a performer. Before you arrive, you have planned the seating, the lesson, the classwork, and the homework. If you are a very new teacher, you will also have practiced teaching the lesson.
This all needs to be delivered in a certain amount of time. All while keeping an eye out that your instructions are being followed, off task behaviour is in check and everyone is clear about what to do next. You are executing instructions, explanations, demonstrations, questions, and corrections in a pre-arranged format. As well as being clear on what you are going to teach it follows that you should also plan how to teach it.
You will naturally gravitate to being one (or a combination) of the 14 teaching styles above. Consider in advance the type of relationship dynamic you want to strike between you and your pupils. You will be better informed about what type of “vibe” you want to promote in your classroom.
For example, the Enthusiastic Teacher may encourage lots of discussions of topics between students before they tackle independent work. The Traditional Teacher, however, will most likely restrict class discussions because of the greater opportunity it allows for off task chatter between pupils.
When you are connecting with the class it is through this assumed version of your normal self. You are likely to be more exaggerated in your facial expressions, more expressive with your hand and body movements, more modulated with the tone and volume of your voice.
Perfection will not be achieved, but you can improve every lesson by being intentional about your persona. You can only be intentional however by planning in advance.
Shake it off?
Adopting a persona maintains your sanity because you’re only giving part of yourself – a curated (and yes, contrived) version. This way you are protecting the rest of “you” so when the inevitable verbal assaults of teenage rudeness, backchat and disdain come, they aren’t attacking youbut your persona.
Consequences should be issued in line with your school policy when this happens, but don’t take it personally. You are just another teacher to them – they cannot be aiming anything at you because they don’t know you.
In my experience the teachers that suffer the most from being disrespected always state that they are shocked because the pupils were their friends and had got to know them.
They had adopted the Cool Teacher or Teacher Buddy persona and considered that they were regarded in a different way to the other teachers. By sharing details of their personal lives and connecting with the students outside of lessons they assumed that they would get a pass and therefore be immune to any bad behaviour from the little monsters.
Sharing your private life with pupils has to be very carefully managed or it can be detrimental to both you and the pupils.
Remember that you should, of course, be friendly. But they are never your friend. It doesn’t matter if they like you/ hate you/ tolerate you. You are there to teach them. Your job is to assume your best teacher persona in order that you can give them the best teaching experience possible. Who YOU are is irrelevant.
There is a narrative among some politicians and media outlets that some (all?) teachers have a “woke liberal agenda”. Teachers insidiously try to infiltrate the pure and innocent minds of the students with the aim of corrupting them and making them become leftist shills.
This article from the Times Education Supplement Magazine – Are we indoctrinating our pupils? – is a tongue in cheek summary of just how ridiculous that premise is.
If you are so inclined, you can try to brainwash the little vessels, but you definitely will not succeed.
Contrary for contrary’s sake
My inability to even get a foothold in my mission to influence minds has been demonstrated many times.
One perfectly illustrative example of this was when I was teaching a Year 8 (age 12 to 13) class. The topic was viscosity (how thick and gloopy liquids are). I wanted to make sure that they knew what it was.
I asked the whole class if they had ever seen maple syrup being poured and three students had not. I then asked if they had ever seen honey being poured and two of the three students said no. Suspecting mischief I asked them both if they had ever seen vegetable oil being poured. They both said no.
They could tell that I needed a consensus on the class’s knowledge of a substances viscosity. It suited them to be contrary little monsters.
They will sometimes even tell you an outright lie. It can become a sport for them to gaslight you.
I was teaching the concept of friction to a different class. I needed them to confirm that they had walked on various surfaces. We needed discuss how slippery they were in comparison to each other. The surfaces were a concrete pavement, a linoleum floor, a wooden floor and a carpeted floor. Three boys claimed to have never walked on a carpeted floor.
Rather than scold or sanction them, I informed the class that future discussions required that the pupils had knowledge of shared experiences. I told the class that only the pupils that knew what we were referencing could speak or contribute. The mischief makers soon got back on board.
Indoctrination for dummies
Indoctrinating a child takes more than the occasional negative reference to Brexit or joke about the prime ministerial revolving door. The people that believe brainwashing by teachers is possible (and easy) have not spent any time of substance engaging with secondary school pupils.
It is difficult enough for teachers to find the time to teach the core National Curriculum comprehensively, let alone shoe horning in discussions of The Communist Manifesto in lesson time.
If you do try to indoctrinate children with your agenda (left, right, or whatever) – the pupils will see through you.
Some will gleefully parrot back whatever you say. They will be grateful to have found a way in which you can be easily manipulated – and diverted from teaching a lesson. Some will grudgingly agree with you hoping that if they concur you will hurry up and shut up about whatever it is. The rest will sense your passion for your propaganda and actively and aggressively disagree with you just to watch you get more and more angry.
You will have only succeeded in losing their respect. They will see that you are treating them as intellectual equals and / or you need them to validate your opinions. From that point on they will then treat you with the lack of respect that you will have now earned. They will no longer regard you as a teacher and leader but a peer who has been put in their place – beneath them.
You will spend every future lesson managing disrespectful behaviour and teaching nothing.
This has been your guide on how to indoctrinate children. Good luck with that.
“You don’t look that old. How old are you?” I have been asked different versions of this question many times. Just one example of the invasion of my private life.
My answer is always the same. “Thank you for asking me but I don’t discuss my private life at school”.
Just tell them. They are just trying to get to know you.
Not really. Some pupils really do care about you and do want to get to know you. Most pupils are just being curious. Some pupils want to have the bragging rights of having found out from you directly, which affords them the ability to flex when they share the information with their peers.
Regardless of the intent the answer should always be the same.
Those that really care may view you as their friend so it’s natural that they would ask their friend personal questions. You must always remember though that you are not and will never be their friend. You should of course be friendly and caring but this does not mean sharing personal information.
Children that need a teacher as a friend are probably struggling with not having peers as friends or see you as a trusted adult maybe because they do not have that at home. You will have had safeguarding training regarding what to look out for and how to report it should you have any concerns – it is always better to err on the side of caution, if you think it might need to be reported, definitely report it.
They just want to know your age. Why does that have to be so private?
There will always be a follow up question. They will keep going until you tap out. Part of being professional is maintain the distance between yourself and the pupils. They should not feel like they have the right to know anything at all about you. It is possible to have a great relationship with pupils without sharing your place of birth, star sign and retirement plans.
Harsh? Maybe.
Seriously though. What are they going to do with any information you share about your trip to the gym, favourite films, number of cats? Your intention should be to forge strong bonds of mutual respect so they “know” you outside of the classroom. They are children and you are an adult who does grown up stuff – don’t share grown up stuff with children.
Let’s get back to basics and remind ourselves that you’re a professional with a responsibility of care. You are there to educate them and teach them how to be responsible members of society. You can be friendly but don’t share your private life. Remember, they are not your friends.
But my private life is my life, nothing to do with school
Yes. But definitely no. I actively choose to always work in schools nowhere near where I live. Luckily that is easy to do living and working in London. I don’t want to come across pupils in the street/ supermarket/ park while I’m enjoy some downtime. It then becomes a game of “will we pretend we haven’t seen each other” or “will we have an awkward two minute non-conversation” (don’t worry they will be more mortified than you).
Some teachers actively live near the school they work in and they love to see the pupils and their parents around and about. That’s great for them. They are less protective of their privacy and don’t see any inevitable questions about their private life as intrusive.
The problem is that once you open that Pandora’s box then it can never be shut again. Once they have one piece of information, they will feel entitled to know more. This is even harder to counter if they themselves have shared personal information with you. It is up to you to decide on your boundaries in advance and then make sure they are not crossed.
Especially your socials. Your school will get you to sign on to a bunch of policies at the start of the year. Most schools are now explicit about what is permitted regarding communication with pupils and parents outside school that is not via the schools email / Teams / SharePoint (or equivalent).
Some good advice I got from my first school was to hide away all your social media pages, for example, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, TikTok, Snapchat – make your profile pictures unrecognisable, remove your surname from your profile, and enable all the privacy controls so any new friend requests can be vetted to ensure that they are people you know. Remember that mum and dad might be curious cats with different surnames to the pupils.
I have had pupils in two different schools tell me that their parents had found me on Instagram (luckily, it’s an old one from six years ago with only two boring posts but I’ve forgotten the password). Protect your privacy. Make sure that your private life remains that way.
So am I supposed to shout them down when they ask me anything?
No, that would not be friendly. Tell them that you’d be happy to discuss it at the end of the lesson. This stops you from batting off their questions during valuable teaching time. Their queries will become louder and more insistent – especially if they can see that you are not comfortable with the questions.
Some of the queries will be innocent, other’s will be downright rude and inappropriate, those need to be sanctioned in line with your school’s policy on behaviour.
They will most likely not come to see you at the end of the lesson to have their personal questions answered. If they do, then thank them for being interested but tell them that you do not discuss your private life at school. Any follow up questions from them can have the same answer. If they become belligerent and rude then of course follow the policy on behaviour.
Remember that it is up to you to decide if you are comfortable sharing your age / where you live / if you are married etcetera etcetera, they are not entitled to know.
I didn’t say that. Remember to be friendly. On a tour of the school with a new cohort once I noticed that one of the girls was humming Dynamite by BTS she was blown away that I knew it and after that I was always asking her about what music she was listening to.
In a line up for assembly once I noticed a boy had a pencil case of my favourite football team. Every time I saw him after that I got him to give me an update on how we were doing.
You get the gist.
When you are walking around the school make it a point to say hi to every student you walk past. Make sure you say their name too, they love to be acknowledged. If you are approached by a pupil and they clearly want to talk to you but seem shy, you will get a response from one of these questions:
How is you day going?
What lesson do you have next?
Are you joining any school clubs this year?
The questions are open ended enough to afford you a follow up question regardless of what they reply. They are also closed enough to allow them to give you a one-word answer. You can also then tell them your answers to these questions, and they will feel like you are connecting with them.
What if I let something slip?
Don’t beat yourself up. It is a tricky balance to find. There are so many things that need to be negotiated and considered on a daily basis you’re allowed to give yourself a break. Protect your privacy fiercely. Don’t let yourself find out the hard way why you must always be friendly but can never be friends.
