Am I a teacher or a bouncer?!

For the first time, I taught all four of my classes today. I did my first lesson with my Credit/General S4 class – on An Inspector Calls – and it went really well. However, I had little time to feel pleased with myself, because my next class can best be described as an unmitigated disaster. I was taking one of my S2 classes for the first time and was introducing the topic of imaginative writing. I had planned an exciting lesson based on the 'sherbet lemon' game (stolen, like so many of my so-called ideas, off www.teachit.co.uk), but they were absolutely uncontrollable; not only did I have to move someone, send someone else out, confiscate two mobiles and write a string of names on the board, I also issued my first two punnies. On top of that, the sherbet lemon idea wasn't the best as as it turns out one boy is diabetic and one girl wouldn't taste it as she said it made her feel sick. Oh dear....

I am beginning to wonder how I can ever get any teaching done with a class like that, when so much of the lesson is taken up with crowd control? It's a bit of a worry, so I have already decided to start my next lesson with them by delivering a stern lecture (stern? Me? That'll be a first) on the behaviour I want from them. I've seen other teachers do this after a particularly riotous lesson, and it seems to work (for a while anyway).

I've just had an email from one of the teaching unions inviting me to a free behaviour management seminar, and have put my name down. I wonder if I should have taken this option for my APD instead of Media (not that that was my first, second or even third choice, as I never tire of moaning about) as it would have been rather more useful. And talking of Media, I am struggling to come up with an idea for my research project, but if I can get Shakespeare in there somewhere, I will!