Liking and Respect—Working with Difficult Boys in the Classroom

After many years of working with high achieving students I decided to teach a more diverse population this year. A good number of these kids will misbehave, either refusing to work, acting on impulses and attempting to steer the class in a direction of their own choosing, or clowning around for peer attention.

While not all the misbehaving students are boys, most are, so I will concentrate on males for the purposes of this discussion. Boys want to like and respect their teacher. Liking and respect are two sides of the same coin. Teacher reasonableness and listening generate liking. Teacher qualities of firmness and fairness create respect. If I am able to build a relationship with a troubled boy, he is less likely to act out in my classroom. If I punish him immediately, effectively, and proportionately for infractions, he is less likely to act impulsively in the future.

When I show interest in boys’ lives and listen to them tell their stories, I build a relationship. Fortunately, this is not hard to do. Boys wear their interest on their sleeves, literally, and wear shirts and hats that affiliate with athletic groups, hobby interests, and favorite music groups. All I have to do is ask about those things. I reciprocate by mentioning to the entire class a few of my favorite foods (burritos and pizza) and playing ten seconds of drums in class. Most boys like fast food and an athletic drumming display. My pizza and burrito stories become an in-joke, used whenever I need an example of an enjoyable time.

I also build relationships with boys by being “real” as we used to say in the 1970s—an authentic person with weaknesses. Of course I get to choose what foibles I will make public. I make fun of my own handwriting, artistic abilities, mispronunciation of certain words, and receding hairline. “Bob, you’re supposed to be reading. My big bald forehead will not reflect the words from the book!” I believe that when teachers refuse any self-disclosure they are hiding their humanity from the students. On the other hand, I don’t tell them anything I don’t want the whole world to know.

Despite my best intentions, early adolescent boys will occasionally let their impulses get the better of them and come late to class, make a mess, throw things or engage in rough play. I recommend acting on the minor infractions as well (talking out of turn, inattentiveness, chewing gum, wearing a hat), but I am referring to major infractions here. It is easy to simply tell the offender to knock it off or give a warning, but I have found that warnings rarely work in the long run, and you will see a similar rule violation quite soon. A fair consequence is more effective. I try not to let the minor infractions interrupt my teaching and the lesson, but you have no choice but to go to the mat when a kid has challenged your authority with a major infraction.

Perhaps the most difficult thing to do, after you convince yourself that he really did throw that banana against the wall, is to keep calm. His behavior has nothing to do with you, and you will calmly set him straight.

After a deep breath and making sure I’m not angry, I deal with the offense immediately: “Pick it up right now. Here’s some paper towel to clean up, and you owe me 10 minutes of detention after class ends.” The detention will be the time you can examine more thoroughly what the kid was thinking, and what will happen if there is a next time. If boys are engaging in rough play I take them out of the classroom immediately and assign them a chore such as taking out my recycling, and tell them what will happen if the rowdiness happens again. My kids know they will get an interrogation reminiscent of the FBI interviewing commie spies if they are late: “Why are you late? Do you know you lose credit every time you are late? That excuse is lame—don’t be late again.” Most of the time I do not berate students publicly—they quickly turn into your enemy if you embarrass them—but I make an exception for lateness. “If you aren’t here, you can’t learn, and look; I’m acting in your best interest.” My school district lowers kids’ grades for lateness, but the boys don’t conceptualize that nearly as well as the unpleasantness of a public chastising.

No one said walking a tightrope of affability and strict enforcement of rules was easy, but it is what teachers must do if they want to successfully manage a classroom of teenage boys.