Chapter 6: What makes a teacher effective?

    The single most important characteristic of an effective teacher is classroom management. A teacher has to create a learning environment and be the manager in the classroom. A teacher can be knowledgeable on a subject and lecture about it but that does not make him/her an effective teacher, because he needs to gain the students attention and maintain them engaged with the lesson. A teacher has to be prepared with materials, resources and activities to enhance the students learning. I was once in a class where the professor was very knowledgeable about the topic but the students in his classroom where talking all the time, sleeping or working on something else. It was stressful for the students that wanted to learn because he did not manage the classroom. I was also in a classroom where the teacher had the whole day filled with lesson plans and activities and the experience was very positive. I like the definition of classroom management in the book, "actions taken to create and maintain a learning environment conductive to successful instruction."