There are only two words you need to light the fire: “Your Mum !” It’s the worst cuss. Shouting breaks out, other pupils join in, then bags and punches are being thrown. Teaching and learning aims are forgotten. Nobody seems to notice you are in the room as you struggle to impose yourself. Inevitably you feel very angry as you try to shout your way to domination. The anger is a mixture of powerlessness, frustration, impatience and despair.

All teachers fear losing control of a class. Every so often that fear is realised to a greater or lesser extent, whether the teacher is experienced or not. But aggression and anger are a part of daily life in teaching. You will need to deal with angry young people, as well as your own anger and that of your stressed colleagues.

The first thing to learn is that you never really lose control if you keep control of yourself. But be careful about whose advice to take and whose styles to copy.

Beware mimicking the sergeant majors and the drama queens, who form a small minority of teachers. They can out-cuss the cussers and out-bully the bullies. Try to imitate and you’ll get into confrontations you won’t win. The “tough-cookie” teachers have usually won the battle before they open their mouths.

Body language is 95 per cent of communication. The pupils will read yours and ignore the unconvincing verbal power play, if your shoulders are hunched in defeat. So you’ll learn to be a successful classroom manager in fraught circumstances if you make a conscious effort to diffuse angry situations, not to stoke them. Learn from the teachers who don’t make punishment threats, but use a lot of rewards. Looking for the positive in negative situations forces you to notice pupils who are doing what you want. It is surprising that even in the most difficult classes, a passive majority is always waiting for you to take control. Looking for the positive also means catching the class disrupters when they are making a genuine effort to get on with their work, rather than strangling their neighbour. Acquaint them with praise as well.

However, you cannot steer a difficult lesson by praise alone. There should be sanctions, but they must be something manageable for you, the teacher. Five-minute detentions make the point just as well as 25-minute ones. Detaining the pupils who have been doing the disturbing, rather than the whole class, is also a sensible move, if you don’t want to add angry parents to your list of woes.

Paul Blum teaches in a London school and is the author of ‘A Teacher’s Guide to Anger Management’ Routledge Falmer, pound;12.99

HANDLING ANGER IN THE CLASSROOM

* Anger often builds up gradually. Look out for its earlier symptoms. The earlier you intervene, the better your chances of success.

* There are many strategies you can use to make an intervention.

Two of the easiest are distracting the pupil bytrying to get them involved in other things, or relocating the pupil to another partof the room.

* Avoid acting tough. There’s enough’macho’ behaviour in secondary schools without adding your contribution to it.

* Calming body language always helps. Good non-verbal language is absolutely vital.

* A well-timed joke can diffuse a situation. But you’ve got to judge the situation quickly and know your individual pupils well.

* If you can’t stop anger from exploding, never attempt to regain control of the situation by using aggressive and confrontational body language, or by using inflammatory phrases such as ‘Snap out of it’ or ‘Stop being so silly.’