The first year in any school is by definition going to be horrific.  I've taught in 4 high schools, and every time I've gone into a new position, it's been a terrible year.  I think it's the combination of getting to know the students, who may have issues about having "lost" a beloved teacher to retirement or staffing changes, and getting used to the culture of the school and trying to figure out the job in that particular institution.

I can't emphasize consistency enough - make your rules and stick to them like glue.  I took a seminar on pedagogy once and we spent a day on classroom management & discipline, and the entire focus of it was on how the teacher is actually the cause of the vast majority of discipline problems - because of inadequate planning.  I was immediately put off by that - how could I

possibly be the source of the problem....but then I looked at the materials we covered about momentum & I realized that I had an awful lot of dead downtime because (a) I was not using agendas and (b) I was not keeping the kids on task from bell to bell.

The best way to get disruptive students under control is to give them something to DO.  Ideally, you'll have all students in the class engaged in some form of active learning at least 75% of the time.

Suggestions for controlling momentum (flow):

1.  Use an agenda - post the plan for the day, every day.  Students who know what's coming up next will be far less likely to be disruptive.

2.  Use do-nows - every day.  Let the Do-Now habit kick off class, every day.  Students come into class, see the do now, and generally will get started on it right away.  After you get them into the habit of starting with the do now, you will see - they will start themselves each day, and

usually, they will prompt each other to get started, even before the opening bell rings.

3.  Plan your class so that student activity is bell-to-bell.  Starting with the do now, students will have active work (not busy work) to do from the beginning of the class until the end.

Promote Active Learning

I think most teachers are quite comfortable standing in front of a class talking about the day's lesson for most of the class period, and calling on students one at a time for answers or responses.  I know this is how I experienced classes from high school to graduate school.  And I know that I

spent more than 50% of my time bored.  Because (a) auditory learning is not my thing and (b) I can't sit and listen to somebody talk for longer than 15-20 minutes before I need to shift gears.  If I can't do that, how can I expect my high-schoolers to?

Things to Consider

1.  Learning modalities and multiple intelligences - there's a ton of stuff online about these things - but in a nutshell, there's a lot of theory and research to support the theory that people learn in different ways.  On the most basic level - visual, auditory & kinesthetic learning modalities; on a

more complex level - consider Gardner's theory of multiple intelligences. Self assess - how much of your teaching caters to different learning modalities?  If you are "top-heavy" in one area, how can you develop classroom activities to support the other areas?

2.  Active learning is when the student must perform - not the teacher.  How do you want active learning to function in your classroom?  You've got 4 basic areas to deal with - vocabulary, grammar, reading/translation, and culture.  What kinds of activities can your students do so that they're all involved in the activity, most of the time?

Example - Flyswatter - This is a fun vocabulary game in which the teacher divides the class into 2 teams.  One player from each team races to the board to slap the correct Latin vocabulary word with a flyswatter when its English definition is called out.  But it's still one kid at a time, times 2 teams.  Instead of putting the words on the board, why not create mini-flyswatter "boards" (Use WordArt, part of the Microsoft Word software package, to create attractive boards), pair the kids up and  have them play the game in several groups of two, instead of two groups of many?

3.  Fun activities are all well & good - but how much of your "fun and games" actually enhances the learning process?  Kids are going to tell you the games help them learn - because they equate fun & learning.  It's helpful to consider objectives when you're self-assessing this area of your

teaching.  Ask yourself - what's the point of the activity?  How is it reinforcing the learning?  Any activity you do to reinforce learning should ideally require the students to go through the same or similar mental processes as they will need to do on the quiz or test of the material.  When your activities are keyed to objective-based learning, students are much more focused and engaged.  And then less likely to disrupt.

Ideas For Involving All of the Students All of the Time

1.  Individual whiteboard activities.

2. 2. Paired and small group activities.
   

3.  Computer lab time - Give them a class period to go online and play the games and do the activities that exist for the textbook you use.  You know where they are and you probably give students links to them all the time - if you think computer based study activities are important, then put your money where your mouth is and let them do the things during class time

periodically.

4. Scavenger hunts - I love these - whatever you're studying - make an answer sheet with 15-20 blanks and  the instructions.  Make 15-20 index cards with vocab words or forms or clauses.  Hide the cards around the room & give students 20-30 minutes to find them and do the activity (define the vocabulary  word, change the nouns from singular - plural, change the verb active to

passive, indicative to subjunctive, modify the noun with the adjective - you can customize this in a million ways)

5.  The Booty Game - so named by a former "disruptive" class of mine - a group of freshman boys who giggled madly every time I said "booty" (praeda).  This used to be the 10-second Game, but the new name is ever so much more fun.  You use index cards, again, and put one on each desk - at least one per student in the class.  I usually do 3-5 extras.  Everyone starts out in a chair.  When the game starts, they flip over the index card and  answer the question/do the activity.  At the 10-second mark, you get to yell out "BOOTY" at the top of your lungs (you could ring a bell, but I always used to forget to bring the bell, hence the evolution of "Booty" as the trigger sound), and they all have to move their booties to a new chair, where they get 10 more seconds to answer the next question.  Body checking is forbidden.  The idea is to have them all answer a certain number of questions.  But for every 10-second interval, each kid is focused on a question; not one kid, one question.  The Booty Game takes only a few minutes to set up.

There are many ways to involve all the students all the time.  It could even be as simple as having them all working on a given worksheet - a prereading, or a grammar drill.  Or as complex as a cooperative learning jigsaw translation.

When you shift your focus to managing your own momentum, and set goals about active learning in your classroom, then the issues with class disruption generally melt away.