Browsing by Author "Meismaa, Lotta"

Objectives. The goal of this thesis is to examine methods in which a teacher can prevent challenging behaviour of the students in the classroom and intervene in challenging behaviour in the classroom. Previous research has shown that it would be important for the teacher to try to keep a safe environment in the classroom and to create a warm relationship with the students. Teaching distinct models for interaction in the classroom has been proven to be effective. A goal was to find out how teachers understand and perceive challenging behavior in the classroom. Methods. The research for this thesis was done as a qualitative study based on interviews. The research material contained 8 interviews, with 4 subject teachers and 4 special education teachers. The interviews were made with Zoom, Skype or teams and the teachers who took part were found from different facebook groups that teachers use. The questions about different methods were analyzed through content analysis, and the questions about the teachers’ perceptions about challenging behaviour were analyzed by using discourse analysis. Results and conclusions. The teachers’ perceptions about challenging behavior varied a lot. Some of them brought up factors about the different students when others thought more about their own ways to support the behaviour. The answers were categorized into categories or discourses based on their answers. The results cannot be generalized since the nature of this study, but many different methods were mentioned. A warm relationship and respectful attitude from the teacher towards the students has been proven to be important in preventing challenging behaviour in the classroom.