I have found that some of the most useful courses I had to take were those focused on Educational Psychology. I have always found Psychology fascinating, it is a science that helps explain why we as individuals, or others, act the way we do. For example, if one person is made to sit in a room and complete a test, and the room starts to fill with smoke, or some other danger, that person will seek help. However, if two or three people are put into the same room, given the same test, and the same smoke is pumped in a curious thing happens. If an individual sees that no one else is reacting, he or she will not react. Individuals will literally wave smoke out of the way of their tests without feeling any danger at all!
In education, this psychological phenomenon is very useful. If a class is quiet, it will generally stay quiet. Individuals will not want to be the first to react to outside stimulus due to a negatively reinforcing peer pressure.
One of the most useful pieces of advice that I happened to pick up was to not engage in students acting out. For the most part, students who act out due so for a reason; they want something. Students will often want to get kicked out of class because they don't enjoy the lesson (I know that the students needs are not being met, and a more student-based education system would be beneficial, but we work with what we are given). The main thing is to not get in a power struggle with that student, because if you do, you've already lost.
I had a student in my class, who I will call Richard, that did not want to be there. He was depressed, and had difficulty getting out of bed most days, let alone making it to school. He had missed a lot of class work, and had fallen behind, making him want to be in class even less. One week he seemed to decide that he had had enough and was going to get kicked out of school solving, in his mind, all his current problems. Richard started mouthing off to his teachers, breaking school rules, disrupting class time, and even going as far as ripping pages out of his textbook.
One day he came so late that he arrived just as the rest of the students were eating lunch. He brought his backpack, cellphone, and headphones into class and sat down to talk with his friends. He didn't have his lunch with him and carrying a cellphone is against school rules so I asked him to put his phone and backpack in his locker, get his lunch, and re-join the class. He went off in a huff.
Richard came back not two minutes later, still carrying the phone, with no lunch. I asked him again in my kindest, quietest teacher voice to please kindly put the cell away as I had asked and get a lunch before returning to class. He said, very quietly, and please pardon the language, "Suck my dick."
I knew that he just wanted to be sent to the office, and I knew that he just wanted to get kicked out of school, but I also knew that he had friends in class that he enjoyed hanging out with, and was desperate for that attention. I asked Richard in my least threatening voice why he would say something like that? I told him that what I asked for was really simple, and that all he needed to do was put his phone away. I didn't engage in the yelling fit that Richard was expecting. He was just trying to get a rise out of me and when he realized that that was not going to happen, he walked to his locker, put his stuff away, and enjoyed the rest of lunchtime.
Now, that was not an easy thing to do, and I don't expect that sort of stuff on the day to day in Middle school. It took a large amount of restraint on my part to recognize what was actually going on, but I did that in part because of my experience in the classroom, but mostly because of the knowledge I have of psychology gained from the Ivory Tower.
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