Step back in time with me to an era when the sharp crack of a paddle echoed through school corridors. We're exploring the seismic shift from such historical classroom discipline to the empathetic and creative strategies I use today as a substitute teacher. Remember the days when a teacher's stern gaze was enough to silence a room? I'll regale you with stories from the trenches, contrasting the old-school methods with my personal touch—think less drill sergeant, more mindful mentor.
Step back in time with me to an era when the sharp crack of a paddle echoed through school corridors. We're exploring the seismic shift from such historical classroom discipline to the empathetic and creative strategies I use today as a substitute teacher. Remember the days when a teacher's stern gaze was enough to silence a room? I'll regale you with stories from the trenches, contrasting the old-school methods with my personal touch—think less drill sergeant, more mindful mentor.
We have had so many new subscribers in the last couple of years that I'm going to play an archive episode from before that. Since we've had this podcast for five years, I want you to hear some of the episodes that made this podcast popular. So enjoy this archive episode this week that you probably have never heard before the Year 1972. The Place, the Classroom, back when Mr Collins was a student. Here's what the teacher said Greg, are you causing trouble in my class again? You do know that Big Bertha is over here in the corner, correct? Now? Who is Big Bertha? We'll find that out today.
Speaker 1:Number 6 of the Substitute Teacher's Lounge Alright, it is July 27, 2019. I'm guessing most all of us have about three weeks before the new school year starts. The summer went by so fast, but yet here we are. I think one challenge for the substitute teacher that every teacher, substitute or not, has to deal with, but it's just a little bit different for the substitute because most of our students were seeing one day at a time. That challenge is discipline. If you haven't already guessed, big Bertha that I was referring to in the opening back in the 70s was a paddle that probably had holes in it. That's what a lot of teachers did back in the 70s. Thank good, paddling is over. I think. To look back on that now, it kind of makes us all cringe that we ever actually physically paddled students in school. But we do have to deal with discipline and I think first of all I'm going to start out by saying that a lot of it has to do with our personality. There are different personality types with substitute teachers. Therefore, all of us discipline in a little bit different way. Some of us try different things. Some of us aren't quite as outgoing as others and I think that also affects how we discipline children.
Speaker 1:Now I'm going to give you a little background of myself. I am pretty much an extrovert. I am outgoing. I joke that I probably talk as much as my kids. That's why we get along so well. But the way I discipline is I try to make it without yelling. I will give warnings and then if students misbehave as long as it's mild I'll have them come back and sit close to me. I'll tell you some of my observations in that respect. As we go along I've had to raise my voice. But even when I raise my voice, I talk to that student later in the classroom and we try to get things back to a more reserved situation so that that child knows that he shouldn't have done that, but yet he doesn't think of me as the big, fat ogre sitting behind the desk. And of course, again, it is different for a substitute teacher, I think, than a teacher, because you have different kids every day.
Speaker 1:Now I will tell you this what I have tried to do, even though some teachers I'm already close to, so they will tell me things when I first show up. For instance, they try to tell me about the background of a child and possible situations that I might want to look for. Now, to be honest, I will listen to that. Would prefer they not even tell me that, because I want to size up the child on my own as the day progresses. Now I will tell you.
Speaker 1:For instance, I had one class that I taught one time. We were getting close to the end of class and, as most kids do, we lined up at the door the last couple of minutes getting ready to change classes. Just so happen. I was substituting during a Actual teachers meeting, so some of the teachers were there, but there is one. I had one student in the class that evidently had been a troublemaker for them and he was loud, but he was no more loud than some of the other kids waiting to change class. But yet when one of his teachers came out he was the one that teacher yelled at and you know I could. I could pretty much tell right off the bat that he had Caused that teacher some trouble. So I like to go into a class kind of blind so that I can size up the students on my own. Now, if we have a Possible physical situation or a way out of control situation, obviously the teacher needs to tell that to me, but I like to learn the students on my own. I'm an outgoing personality. I'll joke around with the kids. I'm usually Listen to a lot of things before I discipline, and we'll talk about all that today.
Speaker 1:Let's start out with another observation. I have had to Substitute teach classes before that because of the situation. It was more of a collaboration. I rotate it with a class to provide assistance to the other teachers. So I did that several times. I recall one time when I did that I rotate it into four different classrooms for different teachers for different subjects and all of them had a different teaching style and I was basically there to help the students and help the teacher, as called on. So here's my observation.
Speaker 1:I went into one class it was the same students that I was going to have all day. Some of them were integrated into a bigger class, but it was basically the same students and I went into one classroom that was really very loud and the teacher let them be loud until that teacher was ready to begin. When that teacher was ready to begin, the first thing they did was yelled the students to get quiet. They finally settled down, but I noticed as the class progressed, they always heat it back up very quickly and he, that teacher, had to settle them back down again. Now, later in that same day Same students basically I went into another classroom and the teacher couldn't have been more soft-spoken and I remember thinking to myself wow, I bet these students are gonna run right over this teacher. You know not having been in there before, but it was amazing how well those students behaved for that teacher.
Speaker 1:So I don't know what that says, if anything, but sometimes the way we treat the kids is the way they will end up treating us. So I tried to put that into practice as well. I always give my speech, as I've told you before when I have a new class that I Respect what they have to say. I think their opinions and their knowledge is important. I want to hear it and I will trust them and respect them, as long as they don't give me a reason not to do so, and that's usually the way I start with my classes.
Speaker 1:Let me mention a concept to you. Analyze this statement and see how you feel about it. Should we say yes to everything students suggest, unless it's unsafe? If we say no to many things that the students suggest, are we cutting back on their creativity? Should we give every student an equal shot? Do we look at students and discipline some students before we discipline others? Do some students get bad reputations and therefore we're always looking to discipline them? That's some of the things I've run across too. I've been to schools where I've heard teachers yelling up the hallway. Now, that's rare. That's rare, but it brings us to the philosophy of what's the best way to motivate our students and what do we do accidentally sometimes, to demotivate our students?
Speaker 1:I was happy that some of the students began to trust me enough, as I saw them on several days. Maybe I would teach them. Come back a few days later and teach them later. Some of those students confided in me problems they were having. I had one student tell me of how somebody told a bus aide that I had cigarettes on the bus and I got in trouble for it, even though they didn't check to see if I had any. That is, they confided in me that story. I have had students come up to me who were upset with another teacher because they thought that one of their friends got in trouble when it really should have been someone else. Now I'm happy that students felt comfortable in coming up to me. I would never state an opinion.
Speaker 1:I loved all the teachers I worked with. I know how difficult it is to teach and obviously they have a lot more responsibilities to teach than substitute teachers do. There's a lot more things that go into being a regular teacher. Again, my wife is a fifth grade teacher and I hear some of the things that she has to go through, like grading and talking to parents and all that kind of thing, and it's a much more stressful situation than I think we as substitute teachers have. So my two favorite ways to deal with unruly students was either having them move to the classroom and sit there for a while, and usually that was when they were talking too much or if they were being disruptive, basically just wanted to be seen by other students. I would have them actually pull the chair over right next to my desk. I'd observe some interesting things. One student that no-transcript wanted the attention of the other kids. It seemed I had to move back next to me and as soon as I did, as soon as he was behind the students instead of in front of, he actually turned on his brain. I would ask questions of the class. He would be one of the first ones to answer just about every question, so it caused him to get his thoughts focused on what the class was supposed to be about.
Speaker 1:Now I didn't punish students for lengthy amounts of time. I would usually have them set next to me maybe ten minutes of the time and send them back, and I saw improvements in that regard. Sometimes I was a little bit surprised on some of the results. Of the ones that I did have to punish, I did come close to have to discipline to the principal's office one student. One day when I was substituting I had a report written up. A student aid that worked for the school was in there I should say counselor was in there with me that day and I wrote up the paper. I started to throw it away because I just had kind of a change of heart, but then the the counselor encouraged me to go ahead and submit that. So I did do that. I did that. I only had to do that one time.
Speaker 1:Now I'll give you two stories about students. That particular student I think. They ended up going to alternative school before it was over, but a couple days after I had taught that class he came up to me in the hallway and he was actually very nice. So here I was, I wrote him up on a report. He had to go to the principal's office, but yet he came up to me and had a conversation just like none of that had happened. So you never know what's going on in a child's life, what they have in their background, and I was just surprised that he chose to come up and talk to me even after I had disciplined them, because you know it breaks my heart to discipline the kids.
Speaker 1:Another student, one that caused trouble in the class, mild trouble, sometimes every day during a week, of course. I noticed that when I was long term subbing. I also noticed that one day when we had a presentation in the gymnasium for the entire class, I went up and set on the bleachers. He came up and sit down next to me and enjoyed the show, giggling just like a. You know the young child that he was. And here I was thinking boy, I know that's one student that really hates me because I have to discipline all him all the time, but yet he came up to me, sit down next to me, just like I was one of his friends. So you never know what kind of effect you have on students.
Speaker 1:I will say I have had another observation. I was at a school once where I was the substitute and there was also I believe it was a student teacher. The student teacher arrived late and immediately started yelling at the students and saying I'm gonna write problems up on the board that you all gonna have to calculate. So he was the student teacher. I let him do that. I did have students call me over and say Mr Collins, would you mind putting up the problems instead? He scares me. So that gives you the kind of reflection that the students have on that. Now we can't just let students run over us. But there are different ways we can handle the exact same situation. I tried to handle everything as much as possible from a non yelling situation. Again, that's part of my personality and we got along great.
Speaker 1:My personality I'm the kind of person I'll just give you an example. On one day we took the entire sixth grade on a field trip and there was four school buses. I was on there with another teacher and they were joking because I was the teacher that sit in the back of the bus and led those kids in songs all the way there. They thought that was funny, but that's the way I've always been. I want to be. I want to make sure those children learn, but also, you know the little, the big kid comes out in me all the time and I want to participate with them as much as possible and I think that helps in the long run too. I think it has helped them to respect me more when I participate with them and I don't put myself above them. So that's one of the things that I try to do as well.
Speaker 1:I also once while was a long-term sub. This, this idea, works best when you're there for several days with the same class, but I became concerned that maybe there were some students that were having a little bit of trouble concentrating because they were being distracted by another student. So one day I just walked in. I had prepared a survey the night before and I asked them several questions about the, about the classroom situation. I did the survey right after there were some disappointing results on a test, so I just handed out the survey. I had them write down these answers to these questions. The reason the area quiz was so tough is number two was I think I would understand our math topics more easily if we. The next question was the reason some students did a lot worse on this quiz is and my additional thoughts for making math class better are. So they handed those in. I looked at those and here's what it helped me with. It was the last two questions.
Speaker 1:I found out that several of the students thought that a certain student in their period was distracting and it was making it difficult to learn. So in a nice way, privately, I just told those individual students what the other students had said about them. Now, basically it was just if it was a predominant sentiment by all students, if most all students said this student is distracting and it's difficult for me to study when they're in there. I would just go up to them and say listen, we all have to learn this topic. A lot of the students on the survey claim that the reason they were having difficulty learning is that you were being too distracting, too destructive in my class. Do you think you could improve on that? And I was. I shouldn't be surprised, I guess, but I was very surprised about how well that went over, because I did it to them individually. I didn't call them out in public in front of the other students, and those students tried their best to behave better because they didn't want other students to do bad on a test because of them. I will also say that I think it helped the individual student because they were concentrating at least a little bit better on not being distracting. So they too were less distracted and it helped them make better grades on tests later on as well.
Speaker 1:There was a board in the classroom. Some of those students, when they made a real good grade, they would put they were allowed to put their test score up on the board just because they were proud of their score. So after all that happened, we had a test score where we had a lot of good grades. So we had a lot of papers put up on the board and it was a way to motivate those students. I had one of those students get an 80 on a test. After that I had another one get a 95. So I was excited that it went over. In that respect, I mentioned way back I think in our very first episode that I had written a book last year about not being judgmental. It's kind of just a small devotional book called Religiously Speaking.
Speaker 1:I think that concept has helped me to be a better substitute teacher, because I try my best not to judge those students when I go into their class. I don't know what happened to them that morning, I don't know what they've got going on in their mind, but I want to come in fresh and not judge them before I walk in there. I want everybody to start out on a new slate. That is my philosophy. It has worked well with me. I will also mention one form of what I call soft punishment that I absolutely hate it when I was a kid in school but it didn't take me to realize how long that form of discipline helped out. I could say to a student if they got in trouble. I could punish them as much as I want to, but what I have found to be more successful is if part of that punishment includes a small punishment for the rest of the class.
Speaker 1:Now, I don't do this all the time, but let me tell you a situation that I would do it. Sometimes we would have worksheets to work on in our class. Others would also have computer related work. You know tests that they had to work on on an ongoing basis in the class. I would give them permission, if they finish their worksheets, to get on the computer and work on their extra work for the computer based tests that they were taking. Now I would walk around. I guess they didn't think I was as computer savvy as they were. Sometimes they'd have extra Google tabs open, or they would just have tabs at the top or extra tabs at the bottom, and they would think that was hidden for me. But in that case, if I actually caught them goofing off rather than doing their work, I would just say okay, we've had a student who has ruined it for the whole class, so everybody needs to get off of the computer and we'll work on paper worksheets instead until the class is over Now, that's most of the time those individual students would not get caught doing that again.
Speaker 1:I emphasize, not get caught. I couldn't catch everyone, but I think it helped sometimes to strengthen what they need to do. The punishment has to be inflicted on their friends as well. They don't want to, you know, be discouraging to their other friends, so a lot of times that goes over. It wasn't big-time punishment. I didn't call them to the office, I just said all right, we had an agreement. I told you that I would trust you and respect you. As long as you gave me a reason to and they gave me a reason not to trust them, I could just tell them no and punish them. But I think it took on a lot tougher situation when they realized they had hurt the rest of the class and in that regard they didn't do it again. Perhaps if I had just punished them individually they would try it again later in the semester. But once they realized it was going to hurt the rest of the class, they concentrated and didn't let that happen again most of the time.
Speaker 1:Having said all that, I would love to hear how you have handled discipline in your classrooms as a substitute teacher or even if you're a regular teacher, some thoughts you might have about what was talked about in today's episode I would love to hear from you. Send me an email at GregColin substitute at gmailcom. I've given out a couple of different emails. Any of those emails will work. This one seems to be working best right now. I get them quicker for some reason, or I should say more quickly, so try that.
Speaker 1:I want to mention one other thing that I have started reading that I would recommend as reading material for teachers and substitute teachers alike, and principles as far as that goes, because it was written by a principal. The name of the book is Relentless Changing Lives by Disrupting the Educational Norm. That's Relentless Changing Lives by Disrupting the Educational Norm. It's by Hamish Brewer. He is referred to as the Tattooed Skateboarding Principal. I haven't completely finished the book yet, but I really like what I'm seeing.
Speaker 1:He mentions that he meets new students and family by skateboarding down the hallway into the room where he's going to meet them. It really offers a refreshing view of the principal In his situation. He said one. You know he had the comment made to them. You know the not the traditional comment would be well if our principal skateboards down the hallway. All the students are going to want to as well. Well, the non-traditional response to that is how about we start a skateboarding club here at the school? So what ended up happening in his situation? He got the kids interested in skateboarding, and sometimes the skateboarding crowd at a middle school or high school situation tends to be kind of a rough crowd, maybe some loners, just as a stereotype. He found that organizing this club and getting those types of students to participate actually also helped them participate better in the classroom because they felt like they were a part of the school system. So it's a very good book relentless by Hamish Brewer.
Speaker 1:I would encourage all of you to watch that. He is actually going to be in a movie I think that is coming out later this year. It is called Humanity Stoked. It is a movie about the skateboarding community, but they ask him to participate. Tony Hawk if you're into skateboarding and all you know who he is he will also be in the movie and it sounds like a good movie about the skateboarding world but also how people have used their situation to help out others. So I'm looking forward to that coming out. I'll be one that goes to see that movie, humanity Stoked.
Speaker 1:So as we wrap it up this week, I know that the last thing that you want to do as a substitute teacher is to have to discipline someone. It's difficult. Again, our personalities affect the choices we make. I am not one of those that thinks that yelling is a great way to deal with students. I think there are other ways. Thank goodness we're not back in the 1970s, when Big Bertha was sitting over in the corner. Let's not judge our students. Let's try to discipline in a constructive way so that it helps them in the future. And by all means, I do want this to be the substitute teacher's lounge and hear your thoughts as well. Please once again email me at Greg Collins substitute at gmailcom.
Speaker 1:Would love to hear what kind of discipline procedures have worked well in your classrooms, how maybe they differ from, maybe, small city to large city. If you've had experience in both, let us know that and we'll move on from here and try to do our best to affect our students in a way that it will increase not only their learning capacity but also make them feel more comfortable with the situations they find themselves in at school. Let's face it, with us being so getting ready to start school again in just a few weeks. You know just as we're nervous as teachers. Some of the kids are beginning to get nervous as well. They know that school is starting. They wonder who they'll be sitting with at lunch. They wonder what kind of work they'll have in the classroom. They wonder if they'll get along. They wonder if the teachers will be nice and they wonder if the substitute teachers will be nice, will be substitutes that they look forward to have come back.
Speaker 1:You know, I guess you know when it gets right down to it, the best substitutes are the ones that you know I'm. Not only do I remember what it was like to be a kid, I feel like I never grew up, so I like to fit in with those kids as much as possible. Granted, it helps to be a high school official as well, because I see a lot of those kids when I'm officiating and that helps with the bond. So please email me if you have ideas. We're not going to leave this on a downer We'll talk about since we talked about discipline today, we will talk about rewarding. What rewards work well, and I've got about seven interviews coming up, so I promise those will be in future episodes soon. But as we close. I'm happy that you were with us here today. Please hang around, email me and be back for the next episode of the substitute teachers lounge podcast Music provided by Binsancom.