DELPHOS — “Johnny continually disrupts the class with wisecracks” or “he always wants to be in the spotlight and doesn’t seem to know when to stop.” These are remarks a teacher may make to the parents of the ever-present “class clown.”
“You’re going to have that in about every class,” said Landeck Elementary School Principal Mark Fuerst.
Also a teacher, the veteran educator has dealt with humorous students throughout his career and knows how to handle the behavior.
“As a teacher, you can give him a few comebacks and let him know humor is okay but there’s a time and place for it. I love humor in the classroom and I enjoy students who have a good sense of humor but it’s when it begins to interrupt education that a student becomes a class clown,” he said. “My first reaction would be to laugh right along. However, if it were to continue and I were to see a pattern, I would pull the child aside and talk with him one-on-one.”
Fort Jennings Local Schools Guidance Counselor Sue Apple says the payoff a class clown receives comes from other students as the jokester looks for attention and acceptance. She says a teacher can curtail the behavior by letting other class members know not to laugh at the disruptive student.
“The group of students has as much to do with it as anything else and how much of a reaction they get from their peers. A lot of times, ignoring the behavior and not the student tends to be pretty effective; particularly if other students learn to do that, also,” she said.
Fuerst says most class clowns are boys who crave the attention but have difficulty with boundaries.
“The class clown is the type of child who wants the attention constantly and doesn’t care if he interrupts a lesson to get a laugh. That’s the difference; you can have a great sense of humor and not be a class clown,” he said.
Apple adds that how a student seeks attention will vary.
“They want to get attention and it varies from situation to situation in terms of how they do it. They may do something ‘corny’ or give ‘corny’ answers in class — it will vary by the student and the situation because students may not react the same way in each class,” she said.
Apple says when students establish this behavior in elementary school, they may mature enough by high school to behave differently but have made friends on the basis of making others laugh at appropriate and inappropriate times.
“By the time they get to junior high or high school, they think it’s expected of them because they started that way in elementary school and it got them attention,” she said.
Apple and Fuerst both say they don’t have too many students who display this behavior in their respective schools.
“We have a veteran staff that handles things very well and it’s not much of an issue here. Teachers can turn the behavior in a positive direction by rewarding it when it is appropriate,” she said.