Effective Teaching and Classroom Management

By Abigail Derrick 2019

Introduction
There are many qualities and classroom management strategies that effective teachers
employ. Classroom management is appreciated by all effective teachers and is useful
because it can help educators to teach more effectively. Kounin’s classroom management
model is preventative and is reaffirmed by many researchers and theorists. Mrs Le Roux
was an effective teacher I had in school who exhibited many of the strategies described
below.

Qualities of effective teachers

Effective teachers show their student's that they care for each of them on an individual
level, because first and foremost teaching is a relational job (Barry & King, 1998). An
individual approach to teaching allows the teacher to adapt and aim lessons at each
student's ability which in-turn improves the overall achievement of the class. Creating an
appropriate and effective relationship in which the teacher fosters high self-esteem and
empathises with each student means learning about each student in as many ways as
possible and finding aspects of each child that they genuinely like. Children, subsequently,
will begin trusting and wanting to learn from their teachers. This intrinsic motivation is
highly effective in improving student learning (Marsh, Clark, & Pittaway, 2014).

Effective teachers foster high self-esteem which results in more intrinsically motivated
children. Intrinsic motivation is motivation that comes from within the child; where the child
feels that doing the task is a reward in itself (Clark & Pittaway, 2014). A major role that
teachers have is preparing their students for the adult world, where physical rewards are
uncommon and intrinsic motivation is required. Children with higher self-esteem tend to
value their achievements and be more intrinsically motivated (Anderman & Anderman,
2010). Good teachers inspire a high self-esteem in each of his or her students by
recognising accomplishments and efforts, by comparing students to themselves rather
than to their peers and by having realistic expectations (Marsh, Clark, & Pittaway, 2014).
This encouragement of students is part of striving to be the best, most effective teacher
possible.
 

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Effective teachers continuously strive to be 'complete people' and improve themselves
(Boag, 1989). The notion of being a 'complete person' involves every aspect of one's life;
working to be more compassionate, kinder, more understanding and more willing to try
new things. Striving to a complete person inspires students to do the same, and is part of
preparing students for their life as adults which is also something that effective teachers
do. Effective teachers, in their endeavour to be better, enthuse their students with
innovative and interesting lessons, while employing a sense of humour to keep their
student's minds active (Cowley, 2014). In this way teachers can improve their students’
learning.

A good classroom management plan is a mechanism that every effective teacher develops
from their past experiences, professional knowledge and from times of reflection. This
mechanism refers to a variety of skills that effective teachers use to keep the students
organized, focused and productive during a lesson (Marsh, Clark, & Pittaway, 2014). Good
classroom management can enable students to achieve twenty percent higher results
(Marzano, Marzano, & Pickering, 2003). Without good classroom management, the class
cannot learn effectively. Kounin’s classroom management model (1970) is comparable to
many other classroom management models.

Kounin’s Variables
Kounin describes five main preventative classroom management strategies which
teachers use to create a classroom environment that discourages behaviour problems
before they even start (10.2 The Facilitative Teacher, n.d.). Kounin’s variables include:
with-it-ness, overlappingness, smoothness, momentum and student accountability
(Kounin, 1970). Kounin emphasized the influence that teachers can have on the amount of
on-task behaviors students display, and that the use of these strategies can reduce
disruptive and off-task behaviours. Each one of these strategies are comparable to other
classroom management models presented by multiple experts.

With-it-ness refers to the ability of a teacher to be aware of what is going on in all areas of
his or her classroom at all times (Barry & King, 1998). This with-it-ness allows the teacher
to quickly and subtly redirect a child’s potentially problematic behavior without disturbing
the flow of the classroom (Barry & King, 1998). Groundwater-smith (2011), and Cowley
(2014, p. 10) describes strategies manage classroom behavior similar to with-it-ness;
Groundwater-smith’s thirteenth tactic tells teachers to be attentive of the classroom and

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keep track of what is happening in all areas and one of Cowley’s tactics is to “be aware”.
This information expresses the crucial necessity for all teachers to be aware of what is
happening with their students.

Overlappingness refers to a teacher’s ability to multi-task while maintaining the flow of

instructions (Barry & King, 1998). To have effective overlappingness teachers must have
good time and stress management as well as with-it-ness. Kounin describes both
overlappingness and with-it-ness as “crucial to preventing off task and unwanted
behaviour” (10.2 The Facilitative Teacher, n.d.). To succeed in overlappingness, teachers
should teach children to respect others by waiting their turn or to continue working even
when there is an intrusion. This is then comparable to the three R’s (O'Neill, 2019).

The three R’s consist of rules, routines and respect; these three R’s are used to develop
strong classroom management (O'Neill, 2019). Overlappingness requires the teacher to
have already taught her students respect for each other and already have routines in place
so that her students know what to do when an interruption occurs. If the students are not
taught these routines they will not practice them, and the flow of work will be interrupted
and lost every time a distraction occurs.

Smoothness refers to how smooth the teacher transitions between each learning activity
(10.2 The Facilitative Teacher, n.d.). This transition is smoothest when the lesson has
been planned ahead of time so that any extraneous issues are foreseen and taken care of
(Handley, 2012). In Boag’s list of qualities of an effective teacher he makes the point that
effective teachers are organised and prepared (1989, p. 47). Kounin’s variable,
smoothness, requires teachers to be organised and well prepared to smoothly transition
from one activity to the next.

Kounin describes momentum as the constant motion that lessons require to keep students
engaged and on task (10.2 The Facilitative Teacher, n.d.). To maintain momentum Kounin
suggests avoiding slowdowns (Barry & King, 1998). Slowdowns reduce student
engagement and therefore can result in student boredom and unwanted behaviours. There
are two kinds of slowdowns that Kounin found, the first kind Kounin called over-dwelling
(Barry & King, 1998).

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Over-dwelling refers to the times when teachers do too much unnecessary talking. One
way this is done is by teachers dwelling on one aspect of the lesson for too long which
disengages the students because they already understand the concept (Barry & King,
1998). This happens when teachers do not know their students well enough because they
are not aware of what the students already know. The AITSL standards also require
teachers to know their students, which shows how important it is (Australian Institute for
Teaching and School Leadership, 2017). There is also another kind of over-dwelling which
teachers can make the mistake of doing.

The second kind of over-dwelling refers to times when teachers overdo their reprimands of
students. Barry and King (1998) describe a situation where a teacher discusses the
student’s past ineptness and goes on to talk about the student’s messy desk and untidy
writing. In this situation, the teacher has done two things; firstly, she has wasted time
talking about irrelevant information and secondly, she has humiliated the child and broken
the relationship they shared. This lack of relationship can lead to problematic behaviours
as Barry and King (1998) describe in their book. Effective teachers avoid over-dwelling in
this way because it is not helpful for the children’s development.

Another kind of slowdowns are called fragmentations and are characterised by the
unnecessary break down of activities (Barry & King, 1998). When the activity is broken
down, and performed separately instead of simultaneously time which could be used for
teaching is wasted. This aspect of Kounin’s theory is related to time management, which is
something all effective teachers need to have. When time is wasted with slowdowns,
students become bored and may behave badly.

When students are interested and engaged they are less likely to perform behaviours to
entertain themselves (Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development, 2011).
These behaviours often lead to misbehaviours that distract and disrupt the class.
Slowdowns disengage students and therefore lead to these disruptive behaviours. An
effective teacher will avoid slowdowns and strive to keep their students engaged.

Student accountability is when the teacher holds the students accountable for their
learning (O'Neill, 2019). This can be done by the teacher informing the students about the
participation expectations that she or he has for them, and by frequently calling upon
students to demonstrate their learning (Barry & King, 1998). Kounin’s variable of student

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accountability is reaffirmed by Groundwater-smith’s eighth guideline: “Encourage students
to take responsibility for their learning” (O'Neill, 2019). When students take responsibility
for their learning and know what their teacher expects of them they tend to misbehave
less. Effective teachers use student accountability, along with Kounin’s other variables, to
proactively manage low-level misbehaviours (Martella, Nelson, Marchand-Martella, &
O'Reilly, 2012).

Kounin’s model of classroom management has a preventative approach which can, when
all the variables are used effectively, reduce low-level misbehaviours. It does not advise
teachers what to do when students continue to misbehave despite the attempts to engage
and encourage the students (Martella, Nelson, Marchand-Martella, & O'Reilly, 2012). This
is because Kounin’s model is only preventative and doesn't contain enough components to
be effective for those students who are difficult to manage (Martella, Nelson, Marchand-
Martella, & O'Reilly, 2012). An improved classroom management model would contain
many more components (Martella, Nelson, Marchand-Martella, & O'Reilly, 2012).

Reflection of an effective teacher

I had a teacher who used all these strategies and more. She was the kind of teacher
everyone loved, even the children that were previously the ‘naughty children’. She was
good at commanding the class. She could get the class to be quiet and listen without even
talking. I loved being in her class for many reasons but the most memorable reason was
her kindness.

Mrs Le Roux was kind and caring: she showed everyone in her class that they were
special. She was aware of the emotions of the students in her class and could tell when
someone was upset. She also knew just what to say to each child when they were upset
because she knew each one of us on an individual level. This relationship she had with
each one of us meant that we respected her.

Everyone respected her because she respected us. She modelled to us how to listen to
other people without interrupting and she modelled kindness and understanding. Mrs Le
Roux was a wonderful person, and she continuously strived to be the best she could be.
She told us of all the interesting books she was reading about all sorts of things because
she wanted to learn and improve herself. Her enthusiasm for learning inspired her
students to learn with passion. This engagement we had led to our positive behaviours.

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Children in Mrs Le Roux’s class were well behaved. Mrs Le Roux made her expectations
clear to us when we first got to her class. She also seemed to have eyes on the back of
her head because she knew when someone was starting to misbehave. She was
consistent in her expectations and didn’t over dwell on reprimands. Her lessons were
engaging, which prevented students from getting bored.

Boredom is a major cause of misbehaviour and so Mrs Le Roux did her best to engage us.
She avoided using slowdowns: she didn't over-dwell on instructions or explanations and
she didn't unnecessarily break activities down. She also was very smooth, keeping the
time between activities short and smooth. Each student was also responsible for their own
learning because of the way she got each one of us to participate in discussions and
activities. Mrs Le Roux used many strategies that made her such an effective teacher.

Conclusion
Teachers combine many strategies to create a positive environment, to encourage student
engagement and to manage behaviour. Kounin presented five key variables that effective
teachers exhibit when managing the behaviour in their classroom. These management
strategies are reaffirmed by multiple researchers and theorists, and when paired with the
qualities of an effective teacher create a flourishing classroom environment with engaged
students. Effective teachers use the strategies mentioned above and appreciate classroom
management.

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