Teachers: What is the worst classroom experience you have ever encountered?

Question

the most detailed wins the prize of ten/ten points. no extra credit allowed on this one!

Answer 1

I had a ninth grade Algebra 1 class where a 12th grade boy was placed because he had failed the class repeatedly. One the first day of class when I was telling the class my policies and procedures this boy got up and told the class that they did not have to turn in or do any work that I assigned. He continued to say, "What's he gonna do, fail us all? If he does, he'll get in trouble." I assured the class that if they did not do the work, they would fail the class.

After telling the class to do something that they did not want to do, this same boy tells them, "We don't have to do anything he says if we don't want to...what's he gonna do, write us all up? If he does that HE'LL get in trouble." I managed to get most of the class to follow the direction, but there were 8 that refused. I tried many ways of dealing with these student in the classroom. When everything else failed, I sent these 8 students to the Dean of Discipline's office for Gross Insubordination. They were returned to class without having received any form of discipline...not even a warning.

After the students went home that day, I was called to the principal's office. I was told that I needed to learn to control my class and should not be sending that many students to the dean.

Well, it seems the boy was right!

During this time, I was out sick for two days and had to have a substitute for my classes. This class was so bad during that time that the substitute left the room in tears and quit. This particular substitute was very experienced and had subtituted for me many times during the preceding 4-5 years and usually enjoyed my classes.

These same eight students became much more disruptive and not only did they refuse to do any work in my class, they also dragged everyone else in the class down with them. By the end of the first grading period, there were only 2 out of 22 students in the class with passing grades.

After grades had been submitted and report cards issued, I was called into the principal's office once again. I was chastised because I had failed so many students I was told that I was an ineffective teacher and should consider a different line of work. (At this point I was in my 11th year as a teacher and 5th year at this particular school. The prior year I only had 14 students out of 180 students that did not pass the state competency exam and of those that did fail, none failed by more than 20 points on a 100-450 point scale, I had been nominated for teacher of the year by my colleagues for three consecutive years, and been selected for "Who's Who Among American Teachers" for the three previous years).

Needless to say, I no longer teach at that school.

Answer 2

I do a workshop for new teachers on the philosophy of Cooperative Discpline, and honestly, I wouldn't give them the worst situations... Those are few and far between. Give them the real situations that happen everyday; students talking, out of seat behaviors, talking back, etc. Most teachers out of college don't know how to deal with those things, and those are the tools they will need the most! There are a lot of great websites that talk about why students exhibit behaviors. If I was at my school computer I would give you the web sites... sorry! But use a search engine and type in any of these key words. Good luck!

Answer 3

I taught EFL to adults in a European country. I had one student who was "difficult".

To teach the second conditional I asked the class what they would do if aliens landed in their backyard. One student said, "I would barbeque them and eat them." The weird student turned BRIGHT red and started shaking in his seat. Then he shouted out, "ALIENTS ARE SENTIENT BEINGS! THEY DESERVE RESPECT!" It was really scary.

We were discussing transportation another day and this guy said, "I find automobiles physically repulsive." That was pretty odd, since he accepted a ride home from his classmate after every class.

But I think the weirdest thing was the time we were doing a written exercise and I pointed to something he had written. "That's REALLY good," I said. He tensed his hand around his pen and started scratching all over the work until he had bore a hole right through the page.

Because it was an adult class I couldn't take the same steps I would take in a K-12 class. I went to my boss and had him contact the training co-ordinator at the weird student's company. The co-ordinator talked to the weird student "to make sure he really wanted to be in the class" and apparently the student was really keen on continuing lessons. My boss wouldn't remove him from the class because they would lose the income. Lucky for me I quit a few weeks later and never saw him reach his EFL breaking point!

Answer 4

Let's see...
When I was a substitute teacher, I had a student threaten to stab me with a pencil and told me I didn't have the balls to send him to the office. Needless to say he went to the office and was suspended for 3 days.

I teach students with disabilities and I have been cussed out more ways than you can imagine. I have heard and interesting choice of words involving the "f#*&" word combine with "bit#@", "as$", "mother-f#$%^&" and a few more all in one breath. Been hit, slapped, kicked, shirt torn, etc. Sometimes a student will strip in my class. Not fun, get a mat out and cover up as much as possible. I enjoy what I do though.

Answer 5

I was teaching my class maths and one boy got an answer wrong, one of his classmates laughed at him. They got into a big fight to make matters worse the whole class was cheering them on. I tried to calm everyone down by blowing a whistle. That didn't work so I tried to separate the two boys but one of them hit me. I went to the principles office. She finally calmed everyone down. Man that was a hard day at work.

Answer 6

teacher is always known as a noble and sacrificing job..if we are satisfied and happy with our job we will never feel frust and tired to whatever student's have done.there's a big endurance field for us as a teacher of theirs..we hope to teach them to be wiser and there will never be worst and worse classes for us..we enter the class meaning that we are ready to encounter challenge and whatever happen,as a teacher we should teach them in a proper way.hopefully student's heart are easy to be soften..as time goes by.they would change if they know our intentions that we implemented so far..hence,students need guidance and perhaps they need it too..worst will never make us spiritless and 'worse class' never appears in our mind cause' in our mind there are only 'tomorrow is a better day for us and them' coz' we're giving all of our demanding efforts.

Answer 7

well...i teach special ed for prek, so my experiences are different, but I think one of my worst days was one girl threw up pink starbursts all over herself and me...it landed in my cuffs of my pants, and set into my shoes and socks...it was so gross...that same day another kid had a major seizure and another one bit me through my shirt and broke my skin so I had to go to the doctor...AFTER i went home to change my clothes...aaargh...the joys of teaching!