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I think it's more important to teach with your own personality style and if you're not a hardass naturally, then you'll probably not fool them. If you keep them busy and engaged and plan transition times well, and you don't let them take advantage of your good graces, you shouldn't have a lot of discipline problems. I work in a tough high school with lots of little gangsters, so we do have a lot of discipline problems, but I know a lot of smiling teachers who don't have problems with it--and I know a few who always scowl, and they do have problems.
It's NOT appropriate to be friends with your students. It blurs lines that shouldn't be blurred.
But, ultimately, you don't have to be an ass to earn respect. Few asses do.
How should the teacher conduct him/herself when the friendship with the student predates the teacher-student relationship?
As a high school student, I didn't have to be told not to refer to my teacher by his first name at school as I did in our neighborhood. But my 11th grade English teacher and I were friends before I was in his class, and the relationship continued until he moved away several years later. For a time, he even drove me back and forth to school until I found some friends to ride with. There was nothing inappropriate about it. My mother knew him and his wife from the neighborhood, as did all the other parents.
In many communities, children and adults have friendships which have nothing to do with their roles as students or teachers. I think that as long as they behave appropriately in whatever context, there is no problem.
I'd like to know how you would handle situations like this, where the personal relationship exists before the professional one begins.
How should the teacher conduct him/herself when the friendship with the student predates the teacher-student relationship?
As a high school student, I didn't have to be told not to refer to my teacher by his first name at school as I did in our neighborhood. But my 11th grade English teacher and I were friends before I was in his class, and the relationship continued until he moved away several years later. For a time, he even drove me back and forth to school until I found some friends to ride with. There was nothing inappropriate about it. My mother knew him and his wife from the neighborhood, as did all the other parents.
In many communities, children and adults have friendships which have nothing to do with their roles as students or teachers. I think that as long as they behave appropriately in whatever context, there is no problem.
I'd like to know how you would handle situations like this, where the personal relationship exists before the professional one begins.
You mean like the first day you go in to substitute teach and your daughter is in your class?
Relationships that existed prior to a teacher/student relationship do muddy the waters, but you just have to deal by maintaining whatever consistent approach you use overall with students, and emphasizing the difference in roles that do exist. I'm from a small town, it was def. not uncommon to have teachers who were your aunt or your cousin or your dad's business partner's wife or your Little League coach.
I have a set of twins among my tutoring clients who are children of a personal friend and coworker, and I had a relationship with them prior to beginning to tutor them, and had also watched them on occasion for their mom. When I first started tutoring them, the fact that we weren't just there to play was an adjustment for them, because they were used to it being totally recreation time when I was around. But we established a different atmosphere (including adapting the space, etc.) for tutoring time, and that helped a lot. Now they know the difference between work time and play time. And they're only in kindergarten...if they can make the distinction between Teacher Tabula Rasa and Mom's Friend Tabula Rasa and Babysitter Tabula Rasa, I'm confindent that most kids can, if it's presented that there ARE different roles and situations where the rules and contexts are different.
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