What To Do When Students Won't STOP Talking
What can teachers do when students just won’t stop talking? This video shares practical classroom management strategies to reduce unnecessary talking, regain students’ attention, set clear expectations, and keep the classroom focused without constantly raising your voice.
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Video Summary
AI GeneratedTom Gibson, a middle school teacher, provides practical strategies for managing talkative students. He emphasizes maintaining emotional composure, assessing lesson engagement, and implementing structured communication systems to regain control of the classroom without relying on frustration or yelling.
Howdy, ladies and gents.
My name is Tom Gibson.
I'm a middle school math, robotics,
and YouTube video production teacher.
And today we are going to talk about what to do
when your students just won't stop talking.
The first thing you need to do is relax.
Your natural instinct when students are talking
and you've already asked them to stop five times
is to get flustered,
to feel like you're being disrespected,
they're not listening to you,
and you just want to kind of lash out and show that emotion.
On rare occasions, that might be effective.
But for the most part,
So take a deep breath, know that it isn't personal,
and then move forward with some of these other tips.
The next thing you can do is assess your current lesson.
Are they talking because the work is too easy?
Are they talking because the work is too difficult?
Are they talking because the work is meaningless
and kind of boring?
I know there have been many times in my classroom
where I'm getting super frustrated
because students aren't engaged in what we're actually doing
and they're just talking to each other.
And I realize, I'm like,
this is just a super boring lesson
or a super boring assignment.
And so I'll make a whole different video
on how to create more meaningful and engaging lessons,
but assess the lesson, see if that's the culprit
because sometimes just having something
that's not too difficult, not too easy
is enough to get kids engaged in the task
and have them actually talking about that topic.
And speaking of that, the next thing you can try
is building in time for them to actually talk.
I work with middle schoolers and they are super talkative.
And so I leverage that in my classroom.
A lot of times I'll pose a question
where there's like some pattern
that I'm looking for them to find,
or I'll say, there is something wrong about this answer.
See if you can identify it.
And I give them a few moments to look quietly
and then see what they can find on their own.
And then they turn and talk and discuss what they see.
Once I feel either the conversations
are starting to move off task
or they just kind of stop talking to each other,
then I'll come together a whole group.
And several other benefits of this
is I can now call on a student
that maybe doesn't normally raise their hand and say,
hey, what did you two talk about when you brought this up?
And that's a pretty disarming question
because it's not like, hey, did you guys get this right?
What's the right answer?
But you're just sharing what you actually talked about.
So give them time to actually talk
about the content in class.
If you're trying to take long stretches of time
where they're not even talking or interacting
because after 15, 20, 30 minutes
and they haven't really engaged with each other,
you're just gonna keep battling them talking to each other
instead of just saying, here, talk about this.
The next thing you can do,
which is kind of popular in elementary schools
is having a call and response
sort of way of getting your students' attention.
When I taught elementary school, I would say, class.
And however I said the word class, they would say, yes.
So class, class, class, yes, yes, yes.
At my school, which is a middle school, high school,
in our large group settings, we'll just do three claps
and then students respond with.
You can have a bell that you ring
and then just count down from five non-verbally,
but just with your fingers.
And with all of these, if you choose to utilize them,
you wanna practice them with your students.
You don't have to start at the beginning of the year
if it's mid-year.
You can just say, hey, we're gonna try something new
just so we can all get on the same page
when it's time to get quiet and I need your attention.
And then say, okay, I want you guys to talk to each other,
but then I'm gonna ring this bell
and then I'm gonna count down from five down to zero.
By the time I get to zero, I want there to be no talking.
And then we're gonna try that.
If we can get that perfect five times in a row,
then we'll move on from the practice.
But we need five perfect rehearsals before we can move on.
And so if you frame it like that
where if it's more of like a game
you guys have been talking so much
and we are not gonna stop this
until we can do it five times.
If anybody talks, we're gonna start it over.
Because then it's coming from a place of frustration.
The kids feel like they're being punished.
Instead of just setting the expectation
in sort of this neutral tone.
The next thing to keep in mind
is don't continue to talk and give your instructions
if people are talking.
Because if you keep going and they're still talking,
they realize, well, it doesn't matter.
They're gonna keep doing their own thing.
Even though they may not literally be thinking this,
they're subconsciously realizing I can talk
and their expectation is that
I'm not gonna have any consequences
even if the teacher is talking.
So if I'm trying to give directions
and I have several students that keep talking to each other,
I may just stop and wait.
And if it continues, I may say something like,
if you are talking right now, please stop.
I avoid using names because then that might turn into,
well, this person's talking too
and you're not saying anything to them.
And if it gets down to just a few people left
and I'm still waiting,
if students don't already start redirecting like,
hey, stop talking, she's waiting for you
or he's waiting for you,
I will say, still waiting on three people to stop talking.
Still waiting on two people.
Thank you.
And the big thing is I'm not yelling this.
I'm not saying, I am still waiting for two people.
It's going back to the way that you carry yourself,
the tone that you take can have a significant impact
on the results that you end up getting
and how the students feel.
And whether they're feeling like you're frustrated
and they're feeling disrespected,
then they're just gonna respond in kind
and it's not gonna be as effective for you.
Another thing to keep in mind is
if you have a class where students,
you're okay with students talking a little bit,
but it's just like maintaining that,
hey, you can talk a little bit, but now it's too loud
and I don't wanna say no talking,
but man, it just keeps getting too loud.
It's like that in my elective of robotics that I teach
where I'm okay with them talking
as long as they're working.
Something you can do if it continues to get too loud
is write the letters noise up on the front board
and letting students know whenever it gets too loud,
I'm gonna be erasing a letter at the end of the word noise.
And if it gets down to N-O,
then there's gonna be no talking for 10 minutes.
I found this to be pretty effective
because you're giving students a visible representation
of all the warnings that they're getting
and they know the expectation
that when we get down to no,
and I'm like, okay, we're down at no,
we have 10 minutes of silent work time.
Students are generally pretty bought into that
because they recognize, well, we had a chance
and so I guess we're just not allowed to talk anymore.
And they're quiet for 10 minutes.
If I have students that begin to whisper,
I say, there's no talking for 10 minutes, please.
And if it continues, then I will
either move a student next to me
or move a student to be by themselves in the classroom.
I generally try to avoid sending students out,
but if I need to, then I will.
Something I did when I was in elementary school
was I used a decibel reader app,
which I don't remember the name of it,
but if I find it, I'll put it in the description.
I projected the decibel reader app up on the projector.
And then I said, if the decibel reading gets above
whatever I set the limit to,
then I'm gonna erase one of the letters.
That one, they ended up being almost more sensitive
to the idea that they were getting letters.
It's like, oh, shh, be quiet, be quiet,
because they could see how loud
the level was getting visually.
And one of the last things you can do
if you've got a talkative class
is rethink your seating chart.
You do not need to completely revamp
the seating chart to make it effective.
Often, I may just switch three students
and it completely changes the dynamic of the class.
So those are some things that you can keep in mind
if you have a class that just will not stop talking.
Let me know in the comments if you have any other strategies
or if you've tried all of these things
and you're still like, ah, I don't know what to do.
They're still talking.
And perhaps we as a community can come up
with some more ideas for things you can try.
That being said, thanks so much for watching.
My name is Tom Gibson.
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Thanks for watching,
and hopefully I'll see you in the next video.