Classroom Management Strategies for Attention-Seeking Behaviour

Here’s a classroom management strategy for dealing with those pesky students who like to disrupt your lessons with immature, attention-seeking behaviour. 

I’ve often found that those students who ‘need’ to show off and crave attention benefit from being given the opportunity to do exactly that – albeit in a controlled way.  Please understand that this classroom management strategy is not about condoning or encouraging inappropriate ‘calling out’ from students but if a kid has a bright future as a stand-up comedian it should be (sensibly) encouraged as long as you can do that without losing your control, and without creating a disorderly atmosphere of ‘anything goes’. 

Consider these two different approaches: 

Example # 1: 

Teacher: “Jonny, I’m fed up of you messing about!  If it happens again you’re in detention.” 

(Jonny carries on behaving like an idiot to gain approval from his peers). 

Teacher: “Right Jonny, that’s it, I warned you, you’re in detention.” 

Example #2: 

Teacher calls Jonny outside class before the lesson starts. 

Teacher: “Hey Jonny can I have a quick word?  Listen, you’ve got an incredible talent.  Do you know what it is?” 

Student: “Um…” 

Teacher: “You’ve got an incredible talent for making people laugh - you’re very lucky.  It’s a very worthwhile skill and will make you very popular.  But we’ve got a bit of a problem.  When you do it in the middle of the lesson or when I’m trying to get the class to work it distracts everyone because they all fall about laughing (teacher smiles).  Right?” 

Student: “Er, yeah.” 

Teacher: “So how about this.  I give you a set time for your comedy routines and cabaret but the rest of the time you keep quiet.  How would that suit you?” 

Student: “What do you mean?” 

Teacher: “I’ll give you five minutes somewhere in the lesson – either at the beginning, the end or somewhere in the middle if we need a break and you can tell some of your jokes.  But there are a couple of rules: the jokes have to be clean and non-racist; you can only start when I give you the signal; you have to stop when I give you the signal.  If you can’t do that then we’ll have to go back to the detention thing, and I don’t think either of us really want that. Okay?” 

Hopefully, you can see from the two examples that the attitude of the teacher when dealing with challenging and attention-seeking kids is crucial.  It can exacerbate a small problem or it can turn it into a learning opportunity. 

Back when I was still teaching I was covering a colleague’s lesson, delivering a science lesson to a bunch of 14-year-olds.  Can you believe that they’d been banned from doing any practical work at all in their science lessons?  This was a huge shock to me when I came into the classroom, as I hadn’t even been warned… so in I walk and announce, “We’re going to be using chemicals today!” 

It’s any science teacher’s dream – providing you have a reasonably well-behaved class – as they always love experimenting with chemicals. I remember back in school the mindset of the naïve student, the assumption that you could create explosions just by mixing anything together. Imagine my surprise when the kids responded by telling me that they didn’t carry out any practical work as they weren’t allowed to use the equipment. Their usual teacher had decided that this class was far too silly to be doing anything active, so he’d had them working from worksheets every single lesson without fail. I can understand a class being told that they won’t be allowed to do any practical work for a day or two as a consequence of bad behaviour, but to ban them forever just seemed like an insane move.  No wonder they were known as a bad group – they were bored stiff! 

I told the group that I wanted a fresh start and that I’d trust them to behave and act sensibly around the equipment so that we could have a practical lesson.  The look on their faces was a picture; they couldn’t believe that this was happening.  But I did set one condition; I told them they’d have ten minutes to start with, so that they could prove to me that they could behave around the equipment.  In the end, we had a great lesson – it was great fun, the kids were grateful and worked hard, and didn’t blow anything up.  

Breaking things down into smaller chunks seems to be the key here to managing this kind of behaviour. Some kids just can’t handle the big picture and need smaller, manageable tasks and reminders along the way.  They need clearly set-out boundaries that remind them what will happen if the activity goes wrong (and a backup activity or lesson plan in case it does).  Have a conversation with them.  Tell them how it’s going to work and that you want them to have fun, but make sure they understand that’s not a green light to get out of hand.  

Three ways to learn more from Needs Focused Teaching

 1. The Classroom Management Kit – Only £1 

It’s PACKED with novel, actionable ideas you can use in your classroom tomorrow. 

• A novel way to silence any group in just 10 seconds! (Works every time!)  
• Ten words that guarantee respect from ANY challenging student  
• The super-effective way to stop behaviour WITHOUT arguments  
• The simple lesson plan addition that creates 100% focus and engagement 
• How to instantly gain total silence whenever you need it.  
• How to set up and apply consequences 
• Plus much, much more  

Includes 3 strategy-packed guides and 2 training videos 

Get Your Copy Now for Just £1: 

https://www.needsfocusedteaching.com/cmkit  

2. Get Rewarded for Your Love of Reading Education and Parenting books! 

We're inviting you to join our special Book Launch Team! Enjoy a free copy of our latest educational or parenting book, complete with bonus materials and future discounts on new releases.

How to Participate? Simply join our community by visiting https://www.facebook.com/groups/247108030664196. 

An honest review about each book is appreciated but not compulsory.Don’t miss out on this opportunity to enjoy books and rewards together! Join us now!

3.  Our books. All available on Amazon.