Of the many goals teachers have, none compares in importance to helping students maximise their potential. Presumably, every trained teacher has a pretty decent idea of how this can be achieved in the classroom.

However, along the way, there are slip-ups normally made unconsciously or unwittingly. Try avoiding these blunders in this new year/new term.

Avoid cheap popularity. Crossing the line from friendly to informal is simply unprofessional. I don’t subscribe to the tyrannical dictates that paints the picture of a teacher as a lion, but making students your best friends is equally too extreme. You should exercise kindness and warmth without being an open book for the students. My wife, my sister, my...whatever it is, should not be the icebreakers of your sentences in class. Even worse is when a teacher finds it convenient to chinwag about other teachers with students.

Stick to the rules with firmness and love. When you let things go, even seemingly innocent behaviors, it nudges a tiny speck of a snowball down a steep and bottomless hill. Needless to say, misbehavior will be a daily, even hourly, presence in your classroom. The fact of the matter is that students will always test the waters, albeit gently, even on the first day of school. When they do, it’s an opportunity for you to teach a critical lesson — one that will reverberate long after the moment has passed. Also, empty threats should be avoided.

Similarly, avoid farming out punishment responsibilities to your superiors. Some teachers are simply amusing!

Like children, they run with every little thing to the discipline master or Dos or whoever is willing to help. When you rely too much on administration for classroom management, you give up your own power as a teacher and disciplinarian, not to mention: you look like an underdog.

Do not engage in arguments with students (and let them see you sweat!).Students test boundaries and will get under your skin just to see if you’ll take the bait. If you snap back at them, or get into a verbal battle…they win.

And it’s fun for them. Seriously, if they can liven up their day by making the teacher scream and rip out her hair, all the better! Speaking of which, do not take things personally. If a student defies your orders, punish to deter not to inflict pain as a sort of vengeance.

Do not go to class unprepared. Even if you have been teaching the same staff for gazillion years, it helps to prepare before class, lest you are caught off guard. If you’re unsure about what to do next, you will begin to hem and haw, repeat yourself, change your mind, speak too much, appear befuddled or worse, lie to learners. A prepared teacher perpetually provides value. They’re worth following and listening to.

By the same token, don’t be a talking post at the front of the class. By moving around the classroom, you spread your attention throughout the students and include even those who have tried to avoid that inclusion. Truth be told, it can be very tempting to remain at the front of the class, that place where the authority of a teacher seems strongest. However, this sets a precedent that you will not interact with your students and creates an imbalance in the class. Habitually, troublemakers will attempt to sit in the back of the class where they are reasonably free from the teacher’s scrutiny.

In addition, avoid calling only on students who volunteer. It is easier to call only on students who raise their hands than it is to force all students to engage in the class.

However, you will eventually want all your students to participate, so setting that precedent early will help you down the road. Unfortunately, this is not quite as simple. To begin with, you may not have time to get all students to speak.

Further, if it is the beginning of the year, this will be a new class and the students may not be entirely comfortable with one another. Some students are particularly shy and forcing them to answer overly difficult questions can only cause them to withdraw. Ideally, do more of encouraging than forcing.

Further still, avoid categorising your students. Teachers tend to class students into two categories: good students, and troublesome students. This can cover a whole range of qualifiers that usually vary based on the teacher but may include behavior, intelligence and interest among others. To be realistic, these mental categories can be very helpful when creating seating charts, groups, or for classroom management, but it is important that teachers don’t use them to promote bias. We all have favorite students: those who make us laugh, are interested in our subjects, go the extra mile, but (and this can be very difficult) we shouldn’t favor them above their peers.

As much as I would like to babble on and on, every great journey begins with a step. Avoiding these blunders will imbibe you with a demeanor and style that allow you to naturally build rapport, elicit fervent devotion, and cause your students to want to behave. As we begin this New Year, let’s take the first step in making our schools and learning environments better for the learners.

The writer is a lecturer at The Adventist University of Central Africa