The use of nonverbal communication in avoiding and preventing the students’

misbehaviour in a classroom

Introduction

Communication can be categorised into two means that are verbal and nonverbal
communication. The combination of those means will generate the pattern of classroom
communication. It is vital for a teacher to use both of these communications in establishing
the positive environment of a classroom. Mastropieri and Scruggs (2006) supported that
without the existence of effective communication in a classroom, it would be difficult for any
teachers to create a positive classroom environment that facilitates students’ learning. In
relation to that, classroom communication is also important in shaping students’ behaviour in
order to enable them to achieve the learning objective of a lesson. In doing this, a teacher
may manipulate the usage of any of those elements of classroom communication namely
verbal or nonverbal to avoid and redirect students’ misbehaviour so that they will be able to
behave well in achieving the objectives of the teaching and learning process. The students’
behaviour is a major element in determining the success of a lesson. Wearmouth, Glynn, and
Berryman (2005) noted that if a teacher could not take control over students’ misbehaviour,
the behaviour will negatively affected the quality of the teaching and learning process. It is
because the misbehaved students will definitely be carried away by distracting other students
who really want to learn. This may lead to the ineffective teaching and learning process for all
students in the classroom.

What is my problem?

When I was studying in primary school, I was hardly understood the contents of my teacher’s
lesson. It is due to the actions of some of the misbehaviour students, who continually disturb
the flow of the lesson by conducting their misbehaviour throughout the lesson. In addition,
the misbehaviour students also disturbed other students including me. They were enjoyed
pulling and pushing other students’ desks, books, tables, and even the students’ bodies than
listening to the teacher’s instruction. Due to this, hardly any of us in the classroom ever paid
attention to the teacher’s talking. Surprisingly, the teacher was already tried to stop and
prevent the situation to continually occur by using all of her verbal instructions. She did
remind, advise, and even scold the misbehaved students. However none of her efforts is
efficient in overcoming the disturbing situation. The misbehaved students were still remained
the same without a change in their behaviours. This made the teaching and learning process
to continually be an unruly situation, which not benefits most of the students in the
classroom.

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The same situation takes place in my life again when I was on school-based experience in
S.K Taman Dato’ Harun, Petaling Jaya. I had an opportunity of observing the teaching and
learning sessions of several classes. As I can remember, many of the classes that I
observed did face the same problems of having the misbehaved students, who love to
disturb others than learning. It affected the flow of the teaching and learning process, as
teacher was continuously addressing the problems throughout the lesson. As a result, the
teacher was not able to effectively transmit the contents of the lesson to all of the students. In
one of those classes, one of the misbehaved students pulled a hair of his classmate, which
made the girl to cry hysterically even though he had been warned by the teacher for not
doing the action several times before. It required the teacher to stop teaching and solved the
problem that made the teacher failed to finish all of her teaching contents of the lesson on
that day. At that time, I was wondering why did the misbehaved student was not able to
understand the teacher’s verbal instructions? Even though he had been reminded and
warned of not conducting the misbehaviour several times verbally, he still inclined to conduct
the misbehaviours in the classroom.

In Australia, my school-based experience required me to observe and assist teachers there

to teach primary school students. Then again, I had fortune to observe a class that contains
students with misbehaviour problems. The first time I entered the classroom, I could hear the
class teacher was trying to explain the importance of behaving well to the group of students,
who have been misbehaving during the lesson. However, I noticed that the students were not
really listening to her as they continued to misbehave. Some of the students were just
ignoring the teacher and walked away from her, as if they were not involved in the problem.
This made the teacher to get angry and took the students to the principal office. When the
teacher walked the students to the principal office, one of the students came to me and
expressed her dissatisfaction and frustration of the teacher’s action, as according to her the
teacher was only care about the misbehaviour students not them. As an education
practitioner myself, I understand the feeling of other students in the classroom, who are really
want to learn. They were certainly felt disturbed and frustrated by the actions of the
misbehave students, who always caused problems and ineffective teaching and learning
process.

What have I learned about the problem?

My discussion with many teachers and lecturers in Malaysia and Australia discovered that
most of them are very frustrated and de-motivated with the scenario of their classroom,
which always been bombarded with the actions of misbehaviour students. This happens due
to the fact that the misbehaviour students are not interested to the lesson itself. Perhaps, the

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teacher is not able to conduct the lesson in a way that they preferred. According to Ryan and
Cooper (2008) students, especially children need to be taught in a way that meets their
preference and interest in order to avoid them to misbehave during the lesson. If a teacher is
not able to present and conduct the lesson in an interest way, they will get bored and
distracted in the lesson. Chitravelu, Sithamparam, and Teh (2005) also agreed with this by
saying that if the teacher is not able to make the lesson interesting by providing good
materials, and teaching strategy that meet the students’ interest and learning styles, it will
definitely drive the students’ motivation to learn away, which may lead them to misbehave.

In addition, students are also conducting the misbehaviour in a classroom because there is
no other element of communication other than verbal involved in any of teachers’ instructions
and classroom communication. This implies that most of the teachers are not able to
manipulate the function of nonverbal communication in overcoming this issue. Nonverbal
communication is a powerful communication tool that is always been forgotten by teachers in
communicating with their students in a classroom. Riggio and Feldman (2005) claimed that
nonverbal communication is an important element that needs to exist in a classroom, as it is
effective in expressing the teacher’s expectations and feeling towards the students’
behaviours. This will enable the students to understand of what behaviour is appropriate to
be conducted in the classroom. Poyatos (2002) explains that children’s mental ability may
not be able to understand the expectation of adult to them. This is due to the limited
exposure and explanation of adult feeling and expectation to them. A research done by
Rogers (2003) proved that most of the adults will never give any explanations of their
feelings and expectation to the children’s behaviours, as they will just verbally scold or
punish the children straightaway after the children had misbehaved. Perhaps, the integration
of nonverbal communication with verbal communication will be able to assist the students to
understand the expectation and feeling of an adult likes teacher to their behaviours.

Apart from that, the nonverbal communication is also essential to be implemented in a lesson
because it is effective in redirecting the students’ misbehaviour to a productive behaviour.
This occurs when teacher manage to apply vicarious reinforcement by using nonverbal
communication in praising the other students’ productive behaviours. This will grow the
misbehaved students’ motivation to redirect their behaviour in order to get the teacher’s
praises as well. Eysenck (2004) believed that with the present of reinforcement, it would be
easier to redirect students’ behaviour in a classroom. It is because students especially the
young ones love to get rewards in term of praises from the teacher, as it can be an indicator
of success for them.

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Interestingly, St John Neill’s (1991) research supports that the effect of attaching nonverbal
praise with the verbal is more effective in creating good behaviour among the students, as it
will enable the teacher to show how pleased he/she is when the students are behaving well.
This may lead the students to produce better behaviour because students, who are young,
are inclined to do something that will make adults pleased so that they will be liked by them.
This behaviour pattern is recognised by Kohlberg (1973, p37) in the moral reasoning theory
as: ‘good boy-nice girl’ orientation, which stated that children will behave in what adult
perceived as good behaviour verbally and nonverbally. Thus, it showed that nonverbal cues
are good in assisting teachers to demonstrate the high level of excitement via praising to the
students’ productive behaviour that will lead them to create and sustain the behaviour in the
lesson.

What is my proposed action?

After I had read literature, several discussions, and observations, I believed that it is
important for a teacher to apply the appropriate use of nonverbal communication in assisting
the students’ to achieve the desired behaviour. In my opinion, the implementation of
nonverbal communication should also be accompanied by the use of verbal language at the
same time in order to increase the effectiveness of it. Evertson and Weinstein (2006)
supported that this happens due to the strong relation that both of these have to each other
in making the process of conveying massages to be successful.

At first, I had planned to conduct a group activity focussing on the macro skill of reading, in
which the destructive students will be placed in a group. The rationale behind this decision is
it would be easier for me to monitor and observe the destructive students, if I place all of
them in a group. This will assist me to implement the nonverbal communication towards them
better. Tomlinson (2007) supports this by highlighted that a key principle for a teacher to
follow in grouping the students if he/she has a plan to implement any learning theories or
strategies for the betterment of the students is to put the targeted students in a group. It is
helpful in making the implementation of the plan can be carried out successfully.

Additionally, I had also planned to get the students involved directly in my implementation of
nonverbal cues in managing their behaviour by telling them the purpose and meaning for
each nonverbal cue before I start with the lesson. For instance, I will inform the students that
when I put my finger on my mouth, it means that they need to be quiet and listen. By doing
this, it may help to clear the vagueness of the meaning for each nonverbal signal to the
students that will enable the students to understand the signal better. Powell and Caseau
(2004) explained that the understanding of the nonverbal cues is important in determining the
effectiveness of it, as it will able to create the awareness among the students about the

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teacher’s expectation to their behaviour. As a result of this, the students will have no problem
in turning their disruptive behaviour to the productive behaviour, as the high awareness that
they have on the teacher’s expectation on their behaviour will be able to support their general
understanding on why the teacher use such nonverbal cues in managing their behaviour.

Apart from that, I also wanted to improve on my techniques of praising by using more
nonverbal cues to the students’ targeted behaviours so that it will help in sustaining those
behaviours. In doing this, I had planned to give my nonverbal praise in a continuous
schedule that is; each and every time the target behaviour is exhibited. This is because the
continuous schedule is quite effective in creating and establishing the good association of
target behaviour and reinforcement. By doing this, the students will be more motivated to
produce the target behaviour, as they know each of it will be reinforced by the teacher. Blase
and Kirby (2000) support this by stating that a continuous schedule is more effective in
sustaining the students’ good behaviour especially with young children, who still need to be
helped to get used to the new behaviour.

Lastly, I also had planned to be authoritative in the next lesson. I wanted to be firm, but still
friendly via my body language. For instance, if the students behaved well, I would smile and
put a happy face, but if they were not behaving well, I will disapprove their behaviour by
exhibiting a straight face and angry gaze. This is because; it is an effective measure to
control the students’ misbehaviour if I turn and show my displeasure, it will definitely enable
the teacher to show the students their expectations of their behaviour. According to Brown
(2003) the teacher’s personality has a big impact on the students’ behaviour, as the
students’ behaviour actually depends on the environment that the teacher created through
his/her personality, which is controlled or not.

What is my research question?

In executing this study, there is a question that guides me, which is;

“Can the use of nonverbal communication help to avoid and prevent the students’
misbehaviour in a classroom?”

Who will be the target students?

I had decided that I will implement this study to all of the students in my classroom,
particularly the destructive students. The reason why all of the students, which includes
students with good behaviour, will be involved in this plan is because they are an essential
element to create the concept of vicarious reinforcement to the destructive students. It hoped
that after the destructive students notice how the students of good behaviour receive the

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positive reinforcement likes praise, they will make an effort to get it as well. I am very
impatient to see how this plan will work on the targeted students.

What the instrument that I will use?

In determining the effectiveness of my plan, I will record data in three different ways. Firstly, I
will administer a questionnaire (refer to appendix 1) for the students to complete. The
questionnaire aims to see whether all of my actions are effective or not. The questionnaire
contains only six items, as I want to make it simple and short for the students to respond. An
example one of the items is “My friends are not disturbing me during the lesson”. In stating
their responses, students are required to thick the smiley faces that indicate their feelings to
the statement. For example, if they think the statement is true and they are totally agree to it,
they need to thick the smiley face with the bright smile. This questionnaire will be
administered to the students twice, which are before and after the lesson. The rationale of
this is the different between the responses after and before the lesson will enable me to
measure the level of the effectiveness of my planned action of the study better.

Another way that will be applied in recording the data is through writing journal entries. I will
write all of events and incidents that I have observed, heard, talked about with my students
throughout the implementation of the planned actions. In doing this, I will channel my
attention to the students’ behaviour after and before the implementation of nonverbal cues
according to my planned actions. For instance, I will write short anecdotes like:

“Today Nicky was conducting his misbehaviour as usual, as he tried to pull Minah’s scarf. I
could see his intention while he was no longer reading his book and started to move his
hands to Minah’s head. As he will usually pull other girls’ hair after he directed his hands to
the girls’ head, I was pretty sure that he will do the same thing to Minah, but this time, he will
pull Minah’s scarf. Right before he did that, I clapped my hands as loud as I could to him and
while I was doing that I called his name with my stern looks in order to get his attention and
telling him that his behaviour cannot be accepted to happen in the classroom. Nicky was a
little bit shocked and this leads him to stop his action immediately. However, I am sure that
Nicky will not be able to stop his action there, he will try to pull Minah or other girls’ scarf
again. In intervening this, I started to remind Nicky about the rules and consequences of his
actions with my serious face. I was also informing Nicky that if he was able to behave well,
he will receive a positive reinforcement. As I expected, Nicky turned his destructive
behaviour to a better behaviour and as promised, I gave him a star sticker and praise him.
Nicky felt so happy and he told me that he will never pull anyone hair or scarf again next
time.” (Journal entry 12, 25th May 2010)

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The final method of recording data will be conducted through the observation of my
colleagues. I will ask a favour from them to sit behind of the class, while I am implementing
my planned actions of using nonverbal communication in avoiding and preventing students’
misbehaviour. I will provide them with an observation sheet (refer to appendix 2) that
requires them to thick on several statements in indicating the effectiveness of my planned
actions. In the checklist itself, I will also politely ask them to leave comments regarding to the
effectiveness of my planned actions.

How will I record and analyse my data?

In discovering the effectiveness of nonverbal communication in avoiding and preventing

students’ misbehaviour in a classroom based on the students’ questionnaire, I will try to find
the means of the students’ responses before and after the implementation of the nonverbal
communication as in table 1 below:

Table 1: Comparison between students’ perspectives of the use of nonverbal

communication in avoiding and preventing the students’ misbehaviour before and
after the lesson

No. Item Mean Responses

Before After Diff

1. I can understand the lesson well without

distractions.
2. I am able to learn without distractions from
friends.
3. My friends are not disturbing me during the
lesson.
4. I understand the teacher’s instruction of how
should I behave.
5. Most of my friends are behaving well.

6. I am looking forward for the next lesson.

From the table, the effectiveness of the planned action in students’ perspectives can be
obtained based on the mean of the responses. If the values of mean responses are higher in
individual item and for the overall, it indicated that the implementation of nonverbal
communication has proved effective in avoiding and preventing students’ misbehaviour
based on students’ perception. If otherwise happens, it indicated that the planned action has
failed to avoid and prevent the students’ misbehaviour in a classroom. Additionally, in order
to support the findings of table 1, I will total up the frequency of students’ behaviours showed
in the observation checklist as exhibited in table 2 below:

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 Table 2: Comparison of students’ behaviour after and before the implementation of
nonverbal communication in avoiding and preventing the misbehaviour

No. Item Mean Responses

Before After Diff

1. Students understand teacher’s nonverbal

communication by showing actions of reducing the
misbehaviour.

2. Students response to teacher’s nonverbal cues well by

redirecting their behaviour.

3. Students response to the nonverbal praise well by

sustaining the desired behaviours.

4. The misbehaved students are influenced by the

vicarious reinforcement by trying to achieve the
targeted behaviour.

5. Students are affected by the nonverbal communication

due to misunderstanding eg: scared, angry, and cried.

6. Students ignore the teacher’s nonverbal cues by

continuing the misbehaviours.

7. Students continue conducting the misbehaviours even

after they have been praised nonverbally

8. The misbehaved students ignore the vicarious

reinforcement and continue doing the misbehaviours.

From table 2 above, the implementation of nonverbal communication will be proved effective,
if the frequency of positive behaviour (item1-4) is higher than the frequency of negative
behaviour (item 4-8). It can be understood that the implementation of nonverbal
communication is effective in avoiding and preventing the students to conduct misbehaviour
during a lesson.

For the final reaffirmation of the effectiveness of the planned actions, I will also refer to my
findings that have been recorded in my journal entries. The anecdotes will be used as a

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justification if applicable. Besides, I will also use the comments that my colleagues wrote in
the observation sheet in validating the findings of the study.

What outcomes do I expect?

Hopefully, via the implementation of this study, I will gain positive outcomes that indicated
that the nonverbal communication is effective in avoiding and preventing the problems of
students’ misbehaviour. At the same time, I cannot deny that the situation can also be in
otherwise, as there will be the unexpected actions and reactions of the students toward the
implementation of this new behaviour management strategy. Despite all that, I am sure that
the process of conducting this study will enable me to learn on how to manage the students’
behaviour in a better way. This will make my teaching and learning process to be more
effective, as students’ behaviour is one of the major determiners in ensuring the quality of a
lesson. In my opinion, this learning experience is more important for me other than the
findings of the study. It is because it will enable me to develop in this profession
professionally. My next course of action is depends on the result of this study. If the study
shows the nonverbal communication is effective, perhaps I will conduct a study on how to
enrich students’ positive and productive behaviours by using the nonverbal communication.
However, if I found this behaviour management strategy is not working well, I will need to do
another study by using other alternatives methods namely the use of engaging activity or
physical movements in avoiding students to misbehave.