Part I
Developing Your Teaching Style
In this part . . .
We teachers are a stylish bunch. No, I’m not talking about leather elbow patches on tweed jackets, or dodgy pinafores and sandals with socks. I’m talking about the teaching style you have – a style that’s all your very own. I’m going to show you how your style works, and the kind of impact it can have (positive or negative) on your chances of success in your classroom. I share all those little tricks of the trade with you. The ones that make your students believe you’re in charge, even when you’re a quivering wreck inside. You need to project confidence and a belief in your abilities. Get started on building that confident persona!
Chapter 1:
Building Your Teaching Skills
In This Chapter
Developing a teaching style that works for you Discovering how to communicate effectively with your students Understanding how to manage and teach your class Examining the kind of relationships you want to build with students, staff and parents Exploring how to develop your skills beyond the classroom Being a teacher is a tricky job – you have so many different areas to get right. You have to develop a style of teaching that works for you and your students. You have to communicate with both classes and individuals, and build up bonds between you and your students. You also have to know how to plan and teach your lessons, so your students get to learn loads, and hopefully have fun at the same time. And on top of all that, you need to build up effective relationships with staff and parents as well. The job’s a big one!
But teaching’s well worth doing. Being a teacher is one of the best jobs to have. If you get things right, you help your students discover new things each and every day. If you get things right, you inspire your students to go on to great things. As the saying goes, nobody forgets a good teacher. This book can help you become the best teacher you can possibly be, and this chapter gives an overview of the challenges that await you.
Developing Your Teaching Style
As a teacher you have your own, individual teaching style – a teaching personality that’s as unique to you as your fingerprints. Some teachers take a firm, strict, old-school approach, like the classic sergeant major with his authoritarian manner and loud voice. Other teachers have a fun, relaxed and even comic style, using humour to get the best out of their students.
No one style is right for every teacher, although some styles work better than others. Similarly, no one style is right for every class. Some students respond brilliantly to a teacher who’s strict and scary; others become confrontational if the teacher tries to lay down the law. Much depends on the type of students and the sort of class you’re teaching. The more you develop the positive aspects of your teaching style, the better teacher you become. This development’s all part of the process of becoming a great teacher. The following sections give an overview of the key characteristics of a successful, confident teaching style, and Chapters 2 and 3 offer a variety of other strategies you can use to develop a style that works for you.
Understanding your teaching style
The key to success is to understand your teaching style: to become aware of which parts of your style work well and how to develop them; and to know which parts of your style aren’t so effective and how you can improve them. To develop your teaching style to its peak of perfection, you need to:
Reflect on your teaching approaches and how well they’re working, preferably while you’re teaching. Be conscious of how your behaviour in the classroom affects the way your students respond to you. Adapt the methods and strategies you use to suit the way your students respond (again, preferably during the course of the lesson). Vary the approaches you use according to the age and type of students. Adapt the style you use to fit with the mood and ... 
