Avoiding a Daylong Game of ‘Sink the Sub’

Cy Bassett could handle the first-graders. Even at the middle school, where other teachers mistook the fresh-faced 25-year-old for a student, he kept the kids in line.

The substitute teacher never expected that a class of unruly fourth-graders could be his undoing.

The lesson plan directed Bassett to make them read. But the kids would have none of it.

“All I could think to do was say, ‘Hey, class, settle down,’ over and over, until I was yelling,” said the San Clemente man, still sounding flustered a few months after the experience. “It was pretty feeble. The teacher next door had to come and settle them down.”

Too often substitutes must devote their energy to preventing disturbances in the classroom, with little time for anything else -- especially teaching.

But there is help. Training seminars, like one given recently by the Capistrano Unified School District in south Orange County titled “Being a Super Sub,” aim at making substitute classroom stints a time for productive learning rather than glorified baby-sitting or, worse, anarchy.

Bassett was one of about 50 substitutes who attended the voluntary seminar, which the Capistrano district will offer to three more groups this spring. Attendees ranged from some who had never set foot in a classroom to white-haired, retired teachers.

Most are substituting until they are hired as full-time teachers, but others, like Bassett, are trying to find out if they want to teach for the rest of their lives. For retirees, substituting and its $90-a-day pay in that district gives them something to do and supplements their pensions.

A substitute’s most important duty is to maintain classroom control, ensuring that the children don’t turn the class into “sink the sub” time, said Southern California Teacher Recruitment Center consultant and seminar leader Marj Ingram.

“They’re going to test you,” she said. “But your goal is to continue the instruction in that classroom.”

During the recent two-hour presentation, Ingram discussed teaching strategies, discipline and legal responsibilities.

Such sessions are becoming more common -- and rightly so, said Geoffrey Smith, president of the Substitute Teaching Institute at Utah State University. His institute has estimated that by the time students graduate from high school, more than a year of their education has been taught by substitute teachers.

Still, fewer than 10% of districts nationwide offer such training seminars. Only a few states, including Hawaii, Iowa and Wisconsin, require them. California does not mandate such training but requires substitutes to have bachelor’s degrees, be fingerprinted and have passed the California Basic Educational Skills Test. More than half of the states allow substitutes to teach with only a high school diploma.

“We spend a lot of time on permanent teacher training, but substitutes are rarely addressed,” Smith said. “A lot of times, their only experience is being a parent or being a student themselves a couple years before.”

Successful substitutes start their preparation well before the dawn phone call directing them to a classroom, seminar leader Ingram said. They should keep a bag stocked with essentials, such as activity worksheets, and a blank seating chart to deter impish kids from switching places. They also should set aside part of their closets for “substitute-appropriate” attire.

Ingram, shuddering as she described wearing miniskirts as a kindergarten sub in the 1970s, advises against tank tops, shorts and “scoopy necks” if substitutes want to be taken seriously.

“It is critical that everything -- your style, manner and dress -- oozes authority,” she said. “You are not there to be their buddy.”

Prowling the room during the seminar, Ingram demonstrated her classroom control techniques on self-conscious attendees. A middle-aged woman in the front row blushed as Ingram stood an inch behind her left shoulder to demonstrate the quieting power of proximity on a talkative student.

When the whole classroom is noisy, Ingram said, grab kids’ attention by writing directions on a chalkboard, one word at a time and erasing in between. Intrigued by the appearing and disappearing words, the students will soon quiet down, she said.

After the seminar, Bassett said he planned to use the write/erase technique if faced with a group of kids similar to those rambunctious fourth-graders,

“Keeping kids in check is the hardest part of my job,” he said. “Now I know how to do this thing that will be way more effective than trying to shout over them.”

Clapping hands or whispering also work, Ingram said. Cutting the lights in an attempt to restore order, however, can have the opposite effect.

“When it’s dark, it becomes chaos,” she said. “You’re also punishing the good kids by making it impossible for them to do their work.”

The session took a more serious turn when the topic turned to a teacher’s legal responsibilities. Touching students is a no-no, as is being alone with them.

“You don’t know the parents or the other teachers, so no one’s going to be able to defend you if a student misreads what may have been a harmless situation,” Ingram said.

Disciplining students who act up presents another challenge. Substitutes don’t want to get reputations as tattlers, always sending kids to the office or calling on other teachers for help, but they should be able to gauge when a situation calls for outside input.

Bill Walsh said he could have used that advice when he started substituting nine months ago. The retired phone company worker’s first assignment included duty on the playground, where he observed a group of boys gawking at photos of naked people in an issue of National Geographic.

Walsh, 56, of Mission Viejo, confiscated the magazine and was unwilling to ask another teacher if he should take additional action. After the training, he said, he realized that getting help doesn’t mean he’s a bad teacher.

Some sort of training should be mandatory before substitutes set foot on a campus, Walsh said.

“It’s scary to be the new kid on the block every time you enter a classroom,” he said. “A program like this supplies some structure to deal with that anxiety.”