I’d been a teacher for five years when our school got a new headteacher.
This is a big moment in the life of any school; my colleagues and I sat expectantly in the hall on that first day back in September, waiting to get the measure of our new leader.
They spoke incredibly persuasively for 45 minutes (a lesson in making a first impression that I have never forgotten). And one thing they said, in particular, sticks in my brain:
“The single most effective thing you can do to improve behaviour in your class is to have a seating plan.”
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Looking back on that statement now, I am not sure if it is strictly true, but I do believe it to be important.
There is good research on seating arrangements (how and where you arrange your desks, as opposed to who is actually sitting in those places).
Unsurprisingly, it has found that off-task behaviour is reduced if children sit in rows when working independently (I emphasise this point as it is often lost in Twitter spats on the topic) in order to make inappropriate interactions between peers more inconvenient and more readily apparent to teachers.
Wannarka and Ruhl (2008) conclude: “There is no single classroom seating arrangement that promotes positive behavioural and academic outcomes for all tasks, because the available research clearly indicates that the nature of the task should dictate the arrangement.”
Think of drama, PE and early years colleagues, for example - along with those of us who teach in science labs with hexagonal tables fixed to the floor because of gas and water supplies.
Who, where and how
This research is informative, but it seems to me self-evident that who is sitting where and who they are sitting near and next to is at least as important as where those seats are - and probably more so. This is why seating plans are a good idea.
Schools seem to operate in one of three ways:
- There is no school policy and teachers are free to decide.
- The school policy is that all teachers will have seating plans, but the teacher retains autonomy over the details.
- The school has a rule on how children will be seated.
For the record, I prefer the middle option. The third one is rare, but two colleagues I know run schools with strict policies: in one, children sit alphabetically; and in the other, they sit alphabetically but also boy/girl.
I suspect in both cases that there needs to be a degree of flexibility. Not just because of a likely imbalance in boys and girls, but also for children like my daughter who require specific consideration over where they sit (due to a visual impairment, in her case), or where one child has been bullying another.
Unplanned plan
So I recommend a seating plan, but I admit that, in my 19 years of teaching, this plan has sometimes been to allow children to sit where they liked.
In each case, though, I have made it crystal clear that I always retain the right to seat people where I choose without consultation or notice. Interestingly, the older I’ve got, the less I do this, preferring to avoid the disruption or standoff that sometimes occurs when moving children.
I have found it easier to adjust my own plans, and children tend to be more accepting than to overturn the decision of another child. There is the added benefit for secondary teachers that it can significantly speed up learning the names of all the new children you’re teaching.
Lastly, don’t forget support staff. If you’re lucky enough to have a colleague with you, where in the room they work can make a big difference.
Yes, they are likely to be working with some children more regularly, but precisely where they place themselves can really help to minimise disruption and maintain on-task behaviour.
Jarlath O’Brien is a school leader and physics teacher in Oxfordshire. His latest book Leading Better Behaviour: a guide for school leaders will be published by Corwin in March 2020
