If you haven’t already, make time to organise your classroom ready for your first week as a teacher. You need to make the room yours so that you and your new class know where everything is. It needs to be clearly signed and labelled for the children so that they feel secure and confident in their new learning environment.

Effective organisation in the classroom is an important step in creating a solid learning base for the year. Make sure your first week’s planning is in place too. The main function of your first week’s planning should be to establish your expectations and to learn about the children.

The sooner you learn your new colleagues’ names and roles in school, the better. It will help you navigate through the who’s who of the school and give you some clear direction and guidance when you need to seek advice. People become much more helpful and open when you remember and use their names.

This is a very powerful teaching tool, and it should be every new teacher’s priority. You can’t bring a child’s attention politely back to you if you don’t know their name. “Oi you!” doesn’t help foster a positive pupil/teacher relationship.

Good teachers will also learn the names of children in previous year groups and spend time talking to them at breaks and other ‘downtime’ in order to create a connection before they reach their class. Using a person’s name demonstrates respect and this is a vital ingredient of a happy and productive classroom environment.

Use each child’s name as early as possible every day. Taking the register is obviously the first opportunity and using a welcoming comment can get the day off to a great start.

As a young teacher, I remember having difficulty with the behaviour of Jason for the first few weeks of a new year. I discovered the solution quite by accident. Jason played in the football team the night before and I decided to watch the match. Jason had a really good game and I told him this as he came into the classroom next morning.

His behaviour was perfect all day. I employed this tactic every day and it (more or less) cured his inappropriate behaviour. I didn’t always need to compliment him – often just a simple question (using his name) worked equally well. Just explicitly acknowledging Jason’s existence was enough to transform his self-esteem and consequently his behaviour.

This applies to every situation in school. Get off to a great start with your new class. Plan how the first half hour/ hour/morning/day will go. Find out in advance the nature and timing of the daily routines.

Do the children come straight into class or do they line up in the playground and wait for you to go out to meet them? Ensure you are absolutely familiar with these routines. Decide how you want the children to come in to class.

Personally, I would advocate a silent entry into class using lots of smiles and positive sign language. This isn’t to be done in a dictatorial way and a clear explanation of your reasons will make the children feel secure and accepting of the rule. A silent entry is almost always a calm one, and this gives you an opportunity to praise the children for the way they have come into class.

This sets the tone for the day. If you don’t establish the silent entry, it’s likely that the noise may increase to unacceptable levels. This may mean you have to raise your voice or admonish the whole class or individuals and this can set a negative tone for the rest of the day.

Give lots of attention and thought to the start of every day, every lesson, in fact every time you meet your children afresh.

Work hard on ensuring you finish the day on excellent terms with your class. You will have some difficult times, not just at the beginning of your teaching career, but throughout your time as a teacher.

Whatever incidents have made the day difficult, aim to agree with your class to finish the day on a positive note. If necessary, wipe the slate clean at the end of every day and wish them a good evening. Let them know that you are looking forward to seeing them, working with them and enjoying their company the next day.

Children do not mind being guided or even sanctioned if appropriate. They know whether this is just and deserved and, if it is, their respect for you will increase. Always take time to ‘repair’ with the child as soon as possible if you need to give strong advice or a sanction. Make it clear to the child that it’s the behaviour or the incident that you don’t like and don’t want to see repeated.

If they know you still like, respect and care for them as a person, they will not feel any resentment and your relationship will be strengthened.

It will be necessary to ask for help in the first few weeks of your new career.

Simple things like school procedures and policies will need to be clear to you so that you don’t make very basic mistakes. Hopefully, you will have a mentor in school who will help you with this. This may not happen however, so find someone who is willing to help out – someone who will let you know what to do and when to do it.

In the longer term, genuinely asking for advice (and acting upon it) is a great way to build relationships with colleagues and to improve your effectiveness as a teacher. A good teacher will be delighted to give you advice and if you listen, take the advice on board and thank them, they will then be very willing to help if you encounter difficulties in future.

Experienced teachers who make their job look easy can only do so because of what they have learnt, usually over many years.

When you observe a great teacher at the top of their game, they are completely in control without dominating, they are relaxed but very focussed and there is palpable positivity manifested through all the classroom relationships.

Good behaviour and confident learning develop via security and respect. When observing a great teacher, someone who hasn’t ever taught a class of children might think that teaching looks easy. The easier it looks, the more skilful the teacher is. An observing layperson will just see beautifully behaved and respectful children learning at their full potential.

The teacher will appear to be unobtrusive in the classroom, whilst very subtly supplying large quantities of emotional support, guidance and self-belief to pupils. I have often observed lessons where children are all learning at desks and then are ‘suddenly’ all sitting on the carpet, their full attention given to the teacher. The seamless strategy the teacher has used to achieve this movement of children can be almost invisible to an observer and will have been fine-tuned over many years.

If you get the opportunity, ask if you can observe teachers in school. You do however need to know what to look for. The best possible learning situation is to observe a good teacher alongside another good teacher in a dual observation. They will then guide your observation so that you get the most out of it. There are so many different skills at work in a good lesson, that you will need to be clear which aspect it is you are looking at.

You will make mistakes, and lots of them. The first rule is when you make a mistake, don’t beat yourself up too much about it. However, do your best to learn from it. The worst teachers repeat the same mistakes over and over again and blame the children for their shortcomings.

Good teachers never blame the children, even those with very challenging behaviour, and they just look for a better way to deal with situations that arise. They self-evaluate constantly. The teacher that does this honestly and consistently will undoubtedly become a good teacher and very probably a great one.

I believe that you are embarking on a great and rewarding career. Of course, as with everything, you get out what you put in. You have the power to change people’s lives for the better and to be remembered. It’s hard work, sometimes unbelievably hard, but it is possible to maintain a good work/life balance.

In fact, it’s not only possible but vitally important since a good role model has a balanced, purposeful existence and the whole point of being a teacher is to prepare children and young people for a better life. Enjoy the journey.