Classroom management in action

Very often student-teachers have difficulty in transferring declarative knowledge into procedural knowledge. When they are taking a practical course like EDUC 4120 Classroom Management, they find it difficult to apply the theories that they have learned in the course directly to their teaching practice because real-world classroom management problems are far more complicated. To bridge the gap between theory and practice, a videotape recording entitled “Classroom Management in Action” was produced. The recording has six cases of classroom management problems. Each case is a typical pupil discipline problem found in Hong Kong secondary schools. Through viewing the six cases and the professional advice given by experienced frontline teachers from the Hong Kong Association for School Discipline and Counselling Teachers and going through in-depth class discussions, student-teachers could have a better understanding of the kind of pupils’ misbehaviour that they have to deal with in their teaching practice. At the same time they could think of some effective methods or techniques used to tackle pupils’ discipline problems and to facilitate positive classroom behaviour.