I have every sympathy for teacher teaching in an open-classroom. It makes your life and your students' lives so much more difficult as it introduces countless number of extra distractions. I have little advice beyond what is in my post... but bucket loads of sympathy.
Students coming late to class, silences being interrupted by e.g. tannoy announcements, other teachers sending students into the class to borrow equipment/books etc, water bottles falling off desks, leaky pens.
Once a member of SMT took a call on his mobile phone at the back of my class. Another time, same school different deputy head , member of SMT came in and started trying to get a girl with a tongue stud out of class to remove it. First time I'd had her attention and she wasn't going anywhere so five minutes of shouts and threats while the class disintegrated.
Interesting thoughts. I can go off on a tangent at times and need to stop and keep explanation more concise. I also find it hard when students are actually working in silence(doesn't happen often) to not break the silence but then it distracts them.
11. Followed by that same student, that stopped to listen, to ask the same question.
Another interruption - every time teacher is explaining, the students turns to a different student, starts chatting, when teacher finishes the explanation they loudly explain that they do not know what to do, picks primary maths part from worked example and asks something along the lines of "how do I add two numbers together?".
Yeah I suppose here it's series of trade-offs though , I can imagine their a negative impacts of snr leaders not regulars visiting classrooms , would the benefit of these outweigh the downside of interruptions ?
We can all agree that sending for equipment that could be reduced.
Another that used really annoy me was a phone in my room , for one particular class with a fair few characters I would often get up to 10 calls a period, didn't help. I unplugged the phone in my room after a few weeks of that.
The start of every lesson is an interruption to learning for my classes- there are not enough rooms in the school which means I have to move to different rooms, sometimes on different floors, between lessons, I then have to wait to get logged onto the technology, which for some reason works in a different way in each of these rooms. I have to find the board remote and pen, which could have been left anywhere in the room. All of this whilst trying to instil in the pupils the importance of them getting into the room and ready for the lesson. Oh how I dream of being based in a classroom.
Low level chat between learners, mobile phones, late arrivals, shouting out
Mobile phones! Possibly the biggest attention sapper!
yes, we like to include them through technology but biggest pain ever
Any advice on minimising interruptions when teaching in an open classroom? I get distracted let alone the children!
Great that you pointed out when we break the silence with words of encouragement or reminders. I’m definitely guilty of this.
I have every sympathy for teacher teaching in an open-classroom. It makes your life and your students' lives so much more difficult as it introduces countless number of extra distractions. I have little advice beyond what is in my post... but bucket loads of sympathy.
Students coming late to class, silences being interrupted by e.g. tannoy announcements, other teachers sending students into the class to borrow equipment/books etc, water bottles falling off desks, leaky pens.
Yep, some classics there! I forgot about tannoy announcements. Random bells going off are another one
Once a member of SMT took a call on his mobile phone at the back of my class. Another time, same school different deputy head , member of SMT came in and started trying to get a girl with a tongue stud out of class to remove it. First time I'd had her attention and she wasn't going anywhere so five minutes of shouts and threats while the class disintegrated.
Sounds like a nightmare!
It was. A "challenging" school!
Interesting thoughts. I can go off on a tangent at times and need to stop and keep explanation more concise. I also find it hard when students are actually working in silence(doesn't happen often) to not break the silence but then it distracts them.
Yep, I have struggled for years to not break the silence when kids are working. Harder than it sounds!
11. Followed by that same student, that stopped to listen, to ask the same question.
Another interruption - every time teacher is explaining, the students turns to a different student, starts chatting, when teacher finishes the explanation they loudly explain that they do not know what to do, picks primary maths part from worked example and asks something along the lines of "how do I add two numbers together?".
Yeah I suppose here it's series of trade-offs though , I can imagine their a negative impacts of snr leaders not regulars visiting classrooms , would the benefit of these outweigh the downside of interruptions ?
We can all agree that sending for equipment that could be reduced.
Another that used really annoy me was a phone in my room , for one particular class with a fair few characters I would often get up to 10 calls a period, didn't help. I unplugged the phone in my room after a few weeks of that.
Oh yes, there are definitely trade-offs. But I don't thin the negative impact of SLT visits is often considered. The phone sounds a nightmare!
The start of every lesson is an interruption to learning for my classes- there are not enough rooms in the school which means I have to move to different rooms, sometimes on different floors, between lessons, I then have to wait to get logged onto the technology, which for some reason works in a different way in each of these rooms. I have to find the board remote and pen, which could have been left anywhere in the room. All of this whilst trying to instil in the pupils the importance of them getting into the room and ready for the lesson. Oh how I dream of being based in a classroom.
Yep, I have had a few classrooms like that over the years. Has such a negative impact on learning. You are fighting a losing battle from the start!