The Dynamics of Classroom and Personal Space

A regular classroom averages about 40 feet wide and 60 feet deep. The front quarter is usually teacher space. The rest is student seating. The distance from your eyes to your elbow is considered “Intimate Space.” The distance from your eyes to your fingertips is considered “Personal Space.” When you help a student at their desk, you are probably within each other’s personal space. The distance between 3 and 15 feet is considered “Social-Consultive Space.” This is the distance of most tutoring and conferencing. Students in the front rows of a traditional classroom are usually in the far end of Social-Consultive space. The distance from 15 to 30 feet is called “Near Public Space.” Most of the students in the 2nd to 5th rows of your class are in Near Public Space from you. A student talking to you from across your desk from you is in Social Consultive Space. The distance from 30 feet to the back of the room is called “Far Public Space.” Students sitting in the very back of the classroom are in “Far Public Space” and most of them want it that way. Problem kids tend gravitate to the back of the room because they feel it makes them less accountable to the teacher.

Gaze Line

You reduce the perceived distance between you and the student when you look directly at them. This increases their accountability to you. It increases their compliance. Gaze line is always straight and done with a glare can be very effective. When you “scan” a class during a presentation, you are making everyone feel more accountable to you. Effective classroom managers constantly scan the classroom assessing engagement, watching for questions and anticipating problems. Novice teachers tend to teach to students giving them the most direct eye contact. Other students begin to feel left out and start becoming problems.

In one of our earliest studies focusing on the first day of school, an interesting finding was that teachers who established and maintained the highest percentage of direct eye contact on the first day emerged as the most effective classroom managers. Teachers who looked down, up, out the window, at notes, at their books, at the door, or focused on just a few students had more management problems. Effective classroom managers start the year with high percentages of direct eye contact with the class. By the end of the year a well-managed class requires very little surveillance. In contrast, weak classroom managers start the year with lower percentages of direct eye contact and finish the year having to watch the class constantly to reduce problems. How teachers us the dynamics of space, gaze line, proximity, tone of voice and time can shape the quality of their classroom management.

Establishing Proximity To a Problem Student or Students

When you move toward a problem student or students, you reduce the real distance between you and them. As you get closer, the student feels more accountable. You are moving from public space, into social-consultive space. Often, nothing needs be said, because the students know you are aware of their misbehavior. Students in the back of a classroom think they are less accessible. If your room is arranged to maximize access to all students, and you move about the room to demonstrate that you have total access, more student engagement is likely to occur.

Tone of Voice

Effective classroom teachers have three tones of voice: 1) conversational; 2) projecting 3) businesslike; and 4) yelling. Each has its place in the management of students. Effective teachers spend most of their time in conversational and projecting tones. They use the businesslike to create focus and establish engagement. They use yelling in times of urgency, emergency, student fights and to purposefully startle. As the tone of your voice goes up, students feel more accountable because you seem closer to them. You almost never hear effective classroom managers yell. Businesslike gets activities started and stopped. Businesslike stops student problems. The tone of voice that is the most engaging is one filled with enthusiasm about the subject.

Use of Time

The school day has three time contexts: 1) Before and After School Time; 2) Inside the School Building Time and 3) Inside the Classroom Time. How you use this time can communicate to students how interested you are in them and what you are teaching. Effective teachers “spend time” with their students. They are accessible before and after formal instruction. They speak and visit with them during the school day. They often sponsor or coach after school or before school activities or clubs. They go to student plays and athletic events. They “invest time” with their students. In my sixth grade class, I had many non-English speaking Mexican and Puerto Rican students. I started an after school sports program at the school. They decided among themselves that I was their favorite teacher in part because I was willing to “spend time” with them after school. Our language barriers broke down as we played together.

Dr. Douglas Brooks is a Professor in the Department of Teacher Education within the School of Education, Health and Society at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.  He teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in classroom management.  His research on the first days of school is referenced in Harry Wong’s popular book “The First Days of School.”

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