S/o not being in control of classroom b/c of childhood?

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 4:50 pm

Curious about previous thread where op could not control class and also not a success in work world. I too had this issue and was wondering if my childhood dysfunction caused my problems in controlling the class which led to me leaving teaching. Wondering if other people are like me who left teaching b/c of classroom discipline that also could be related to their not having a normal childhood.

And in general how your childhood affected your work life and the difficulties you face in the work world - answering to a boss, dealing with tough clients, asking for raises, needing appreciation etc.

amother

Emerald

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:00 pm

Yes, I think it's possible childhood dysfunction could prohibit someone from controlling a classroom. That's because controlling a classroom takes one thing: Confidence.

A class of children or teens can tell in 2 minutes if the teacher believes in herself, is professional, and is going to demand discipline and excellence from them. All classes will misbehave sometimes, but a confident person who knows she's "got it" will still own the classroom and not overreact. Children and teens are wired to push the buttons of adults, and what they crave is an adult who can set boundaries and stay centered despite the button pushing.

Someone with childhood dysfunction has a hard time with confidence, not being too sensitive, and has more triggers than someone raised with love and acceptance and stability. Own your childhood, get support, and try to choose a job where you can be centered and successful.

amother

Rose

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:03 pm

I think standing in front of a class and teaching students all day is difficult and not for everyone. Not being successful in a particular profession is not a sign of dysfunction!

As one of the posters in that thread who left teaching because I felt unsuccessful, I actually realize in retrospect (and was told by former students) that I was a pretty good teacher, but I never felt good enough. I also had a tendency to take the negative way too much to heart but ignore the positive. So if 90% of the class was behaving and learning and 10% were chutzpadik, I let the 10% overshadow everything else. Now that I'm older and wiser I'm learning to focus more on the positive and not let obnoxious people get to me (still a work in progress!).

I don't regret that I left teaching. I went on to bigger and better things. I admire the people who can teach and are successful at it. They're a small minority! Most teachers are average at best, but are doing the best they can in a difficult, grueling profession that doesn't pay very well. And judging from conversations around people's shabbos tables, we're not willing to cut our children's teachers the slightest slack and blame them for our children's lack of middos. No wonder people have no interest in continuing in chinuch.

amother

Rose

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:06 pm

amother [ OP ] wrote:

Thank you so much - well said. just wondering if someone can have a perfectly functional childhood but have such a hard time in classroom to drive them away as well.

Of course!

People have different personalities. Not everyone is cut out for teaching.

Just like we don't wonder if someone is dysfunctional if they can't play piano.

amother

Mint

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:08 pm

I am also a teacher who can't control a class and will leave the profession soon. (Thank G-d I am now in a situation where I work with smaller groups and not a whole class.) I believe that while my childhood trauma has caused a lack of confidence and difficulty with multitasking that makes it hard for me to teach, but at the same time, it's also a personality thing. I knew deep down that teaching wasn't for me, but I convinced myself that it would be. Well, I'm getting out now.

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:09 pm

amother [ Emerald ] wrote:

Thank you so much - well said. just wondering if someone can have a perfectly functional childhood but have such a hard time in classroom to drive them away as well.

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:12 pm

amother [ Rose ] wrote:

Of course!

People have different personalities. Not everyone is cut out for teaching.

Just like we don't wonder if someone is dysfunctional if they can't play piano.

yes- but my personality is really really cut out for teaching. I am amazing a prep, super organized, well liked with people, clear in giving information, warm and super caring. I just feel like looking back my childhood caused so much dysfunction that I was doomed to not succeed unless I had gone for therapy while teaching. I had no boundaries, no self, no concept of other. I was literally doomed for a crash landing the moment I stepped into class the first day and it really showed. Despite all the amazing amazing things about my personality (not to toot my own horn).

imasinger

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:20 pm

What is a "perfectly functional childhood"?

Nobody's perfect.

And very few, if any, will say their childhood was.

It seems to me that classroom control, like most other things, is some combination of skill and talent, with the vast majority being skill. The talent is something you're either blessed with or not, but the skill is learnable.

It's important, for those interested in learning it, to find a mentor who shares your teaching style. Some control a class by a forceful personality, some by their creative energy, some by strictness. Most good teachers employ all three.

You have to know when to note and take action, and how to do so in a manner that will be seen by students as caring.

All of this can be learned, and is best learned by example, mentorship, and experience.

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 5:27 pm

imasinger wrote:

TYSM - so this is where I really really struggle. I went to a teaching seminary, I got multiple degrees in teaching, I took every single teaching course known to man. I'd sit for hours at starbucks literally reading every single book on class discipline. I learned the skill but I still struggled. Vs. girls my age who literally walked into the classroom knowing nothing of what I learned and having full command of the class. I am sure they never heard of a book or course on discipline in their life. That's why I keep thinking it very much is my childhood.

amother

Rose

Wed, May 05 2021, 6:13 pm

amother [ OP ] wrote:

So, if you have multiple degrees in teaching, you must have done a lot of student teaching. Did you ever get feedback on your performance? Did they give you pointers? Do you have mentors from school that you can explore where your weaknesses are. Maybe you're more cut out for a different age or a different setting. Maybe you can do curriculum planning or create materials for other teachers to use.

amother

Mauve

Wed, May 05 2021, 6:37 pm

amother [ OP ] wrote:

Many teachers struggle the first few years with classroom management. Very very normal, no matter what kind of childhood the teacher came from.
Statistics show that a very large percentage of beginning teachers leave the profession within the first 5 years, I've seen this cited over and over in educational journals and articles.
Few people just walk into their very first classroom and have the students mesmerized and fully under control.
As someone said above, it's a mixture of innate ability, personality, and a lot of learned skill. It takes time and perseverance and isn't something you can totally learn from classes or books. Having a mentor teacher is huge. Developing your personal teaching style (and everyone has their own) is huge.
FWIW, I fully felt like an imposter and a failure my first 3 years of teaching. My 4th year was a huge learning curve (I did long term subbing and learned how to teach effectively and begin to manage the kids) and the 5th year, I got a job in a new school where things finally clicked and came together and I felt successful and got great feedback from my administration and students/parents.

amother

Emerald

Wed, May 05 2021, 6:47 pm

amother [ OP ] wrote:

Thank you so much - well said. just wondering if someone can have a perfectly functional childhood but have such a hard time in classroom to drive them away as well.

You and I could be twins in the sense that we are perfectly cut out for teaching but find the sense of boundaries and having a thick skin to the triggers to be challenging. We constantly come home from a day of normal discipline struggles and overthink everything and take it way too personally, which causes us to have lower confidence the next day, and it just snowballs from there. We're the types to set a boundary with the class, and then see one girl smirk and roll her eyes at another, and think "did I set too big of a boundary? Do they associate this with my lack of control?"

Do I read you right?

Yes, childhood dysfunction causes this lack of confidence. But you CAN overcome this and become confident.

I managed my teaching years like this:
1. I simply decided that my subject was so important, and I was so important to the school, that I wasn't going to let a single eye roll or chutzpahdig word penetrate. This was my classroom, my rules. I didn't care if I was warm, nurturing, blah, blah, blah. I was there to teach. I ended up the favorite teacher, and I had plenty of opportunities to be warm after they learned I could care less what they thought of me.

2. My family wasn't depending on me for parnassah, so after a few years of teaching I would take a few years off to be with my family, and return to teaching when I was in the right mental place once again. Because of my trauma background, I needed some down years to rejuvenate and come in strong mentally again, and I gave that permission to myself.

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 7:03 pm

amother [ Rose ] wrote:

Yes- I had student teaching but somehow discipline did not come up in student teaching - there is another authority figure in the room with you. I took specific courses to help with discipline - nothing helped at all. I am now totally out of teaching and like in the other thread, I vowed to never return after the tzaros I endured teaching which haunt me until today. When I bump into former students from years ago I literally cringe and want to run and cry. I just wish I had gone to therapy when I was in my early twenties to figure myself out more and possibly made teaching work for me. I think I would have been frummer than I am, a better mom, more sippuk in my work. I really had the makings for a great teacher. oh well. Hashem runs the world.

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 7:06 pm

amother [ Emerald ] wrote:

You sound amazing and yes - like a twin! I'm kind of so so burnt out from those years I literally cannot imagine ever ever stepping into a class again. Even when I have PTA or have random things at my kids school I have "PTSD" from seeing the inside of a classroom - that is how bad it was. I've never ever admitted this to anyone but it's the real truth.

Your confidence is amazing. And how you structured teaching to work for you is so smart!

amother

Wed, May 05 2021, 7:08 pm

amother [ Mauve ] wrote:

Thank you so much - it's embarrassing for me to admit but I stuck it out for much longer than 5 years. I'm a fighter and I didn't go down easy. Looking back I probably should have quit after 3 (of course should have gotten therapy immediately so that I can stay long term). It's not lack of skill- it was more than that. It was deeply empty missing self - due to my childhood.

amother

Sienna

Thu, May 06 2021, 7:12 am

I had much the same experience as you, and no, I didn't have a dysfunctional childhood. And I find many of the replies here extremely invalidating. Like really, you think we didn't try everything suggested and more? Had the degrees, had the training, had the mentorship and professional development. Btdt got the tshirt. Just as with every other profession, it's just not for everyone. I left, went off to do something else, never looked back, and no, I'm not interested in trying to dissect what wrong anymore. I thought I was better suited to it than I turned out to be, it is what it is.

amother

Thu, May 06 2021, 7:21 am

amother [ Sienna ] wrote:

Thank you - I really appreciate this perspective. I truly was curious if you're doomed from the start with a dysfunctional childhood. I guess it could happen to anyone.

amother

Indigo

Thu, May 06 2021, 7:44 am

I figured out that I'm not a good teacher- I'm a good tutor. Because of my personality, I don't do well juggling a class full of students at once. I am good at using my knowledge and planning for one student, or sometimes a small group. But I really can't do that when there's a kid on the other side of the room doing who knows what. Give me that kid on their own and I'm fine, even good, and can really help and get through to them. And yes, I have a hard time juggling the needs of and managing all my kids at the same time too.