Everyone needs advice. The classroom is a strange place, and you need to find your way around it. Here are our Top Five Tips for first time teachers.

1.  Win Their Respect

Don't try to make your students like you. This is particularly important for first time teachers – you're in a strange environment, you're wondering if you're really cut out for this, it's natural for you to want your students to love you. But remember, you're their teacher. They need to respect you, they need to trust you, and they need to know that when you say something you mean it. This is particularly important when you're teaching teenagers. Become their best friend, and you'll find it impossible to impose discipline later on. Be fair, but firm. Don't worry – if you're yourself in a classroom, and you're not a monster, your students will like you. Yo don't need to force it.

2. Respect Your Students

If your students are going to respect you, you need to respect them. It may not seem like it sometimes, but they are human beings. If you're teaching children and teenagers, their behaviour may not always be perfect, but understand that they've been at school all day, they're tired, they may not want to be here. It's your job to make them want to be here. Always be polite, and always try to understand.

3. Be a Human Being

There's another way of dealing with students, and that's shouting at them. The attractions of this are obvious: you're trying your hardest, you've put a lot of work into preparing this lesson, and it's all being ruined by the behaviour of one or two students. You shout at them and they shut up. So next time you shout earlier. And you find yourself shouting more often. It's addictive. It's keeps people quite, and – let's be honest – it gives you a nice feeling of power and control. But, ultimately, it doesn't help students learn, and it makes you a little less human. There's nothing wrong with raising your voice when the situation demands, but never lose your temper  and always ask yourself, is there some other way I can deal with this?

4. Enjoy Yourself

If you hate teaching, you can't teach. A teacher who doesn't love their job shouldn't be a teacher. Students know if a teacher is bored or doesn't want to be there, and they act accordingly. When your planning lessons, ask yourself: Do I find this interesting? If the answer is no, your students won't find the lesson interesting either. If you approach everything with enthusiasm and interest, your students will respond accordingly.

5. Be Self-Critical, But Not Too Self-Critical

There are two extremities of teaching personality. Teachers who tear themselves to pieces, who focus on all the negative aspects of their lessons, and spend half their life worrying. Then there are teachers who can do no wrong: if they teach in a certain way, that's the only way to teach; if there's a problem in the classroom, the problem is with the students, never the teacher. Obviously neither approach is ideal, and clearly the best teachers occupy the middle ground. If there's a problem with a lesson, don't assume it's because you're a bad teacher, but ask yourself: why is there a problem, what's causing it, what can I do differently? Be positive about your own abilities, but also recognise that no one is perfect, and there's always something new to learn.