Teachers enter their class with a clear idea of what they want to do and how they want to do it: contents, activities, materials, timing, pupils grouping... But of course for all that to become a reality there has to be an adequate working atmosphere. The creation (but also the modification and improvement) of the work atmosphere in class constitute a basic competence for the teacher who goes beyond the contents of the syllabus.
The construction of a class atmosphere is a fundamental factor in the students' learning and in the teachers' professional satisfaction, paradoxically, it constitutes a hidden/occult wisdom that each teacher keeps as a kind of “black box”, and therefore very little is known about it.
In the work Ser profesor de secundaria hoy/ Being secondary school teacher nowadays we analyse the different factors to be considered (first impressions, interpersonal relationships, class norms, habits and rituals, control and watchfulness habilities...) in the creation of the class atmosphere, we establish some guidelines and ideas to go into action that must be adapted to each situation and we analyse some challenges and questions that teachers often ask themselves.
An English version of that work already exists, “ Teaching English in today's high schools. I try to teach them... but they learn little. What can I do? Some answers to English teachers' identity crises ” that we can find in Humanising Language Teaching, 6, http://www.hltmag.co.uk/nov03/ (2003)
The works “Gestió d'aula”/ Class management were elaborated by secondary school teachers during the period 1999-2003. More recently we have done an adaptation for Primary Education in La Gestió de l'Aula a Primària/ Class Management in primary schools.
