Mrs. Call was really good at keeping students on task and making sure that they behaved. She would use rewards such as treats, kisses, and table points. She would also take away minutes of recess if they were misbehaving or unable to finish their classwork on time. She taught me that one of the best ways to manage a classroom is to have the students respect you. However, I quite frequently felt like the students were more scared of her than just respected her. And although I was trying to learn from her, this was one aspect that I felt like I could not apply in my future classroom. I do not want my students to be scared of me. I want my students to feel like school is a safe place and that I'm a safe person to talk to.
Perhaps not using fear relies too much on intrinsic motivation, though, I'm not sure. Because I was terrible at classroom management. I did feel like the students definitely respected me, because they knew I respected them. They definitely didn't fear me. I was told that I was "too nice to be strict." But they didn't take me seriously either, probably because they saw me as more of a peer rather than an authority figure.
Learning how to manage my classroom is one of the things that I look most forward to learning. I know there must be an in between from having the students fear me and having the students not take me seriously at all.
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