Silence in November Rain

Imagine you have a bag of marbles.  You own that bag.  It is yours to manipulate, yours to control, and yours to make you feel superior.  Well now, suppose an outside force- such as lovely and curious cat or an impatient everyday person- decides to unsettle your bag and knock it right over.  Those marbles are no longer under your control.  You are no longer their leader.  As they bounce and roll all over the floor in a mass hysteria- you begin to lose track of them all.  Some will roll under the fridge- others will not bounce far at all.  Once the chaos has subsided, only then can the marbles be replaced in their bag.  The only problem is, this takes time.  The marbles under the fridge will be left their and never return to the bag.
In a class room, especially a large one, the students' collective cooperation- not to talk but rather to listen to the teacher is how the teacher can contain all of them at once.  Usually, this is done by teaching and commanding the attention of all of the students.  Once the teacher lets that go, or once a foreign factor decides to introduce itself- the students slip away.  That does no necessarily mean the students slip into chaotic chatter- though that is often the case; a teacher can lose students "under the fridge."  Chaos in the classroom is dangerous for two reasons. 
The teacher's lack of control will make the students realize that they can get away with whatever they decide they want to get away with.  Those that decide to talk will continue to talk and soon realize that even when the teacher is in command, teaching a lesson for example, they can talk regardless.  Those that do not actively talk, but rather zone out due to the undidactic chaos and associate that feeling of zoning out with that class.  Then, for all future classes, the zoner immediately disregards everything the teacher attempts to teach- regardless of the subject matter or interest.
In 1992, Guns N' Roses lead singer, Axl Rose, wrote a song called "November Rain" as part of the album Use Your Illusions I.  Though the overall meaning of the song is directed towards breaking up with a previous lover, one line holds true to the value of silence.  "And it's hard to hold a candle, in the cold November rain."  This applies to the teacher.  When a classroom descends into a manic fray of noise and sprawl, it is not entirely the teacher's fault.  A teacher is only human and cannot possibly expect to lead an entire group of students forever.  The Romans could not so why should we expect teachers to be able to?  As "November Rain" claims; a candle is hard to maintain in the rain because the water would constantly put it out.  This holds true for the classroom as well because a teacher can only do so much to maintain students' attention and teach.  Uncontrollable chaos in the class is like the cold November rain constantly trying to bombard the only currently available source of light- the teacher.
So then, how in the world is a teacher supposed to maintain control?  It is a large mixture of things that determines a successful classroom controller from a door mat schlub.  First, the teacher needs to have some sense of authority over the students that he or she is teaching. This is gained by distinguishing boundaries such as how to address the teacher- basically anything that sets the teacher on a higher imaginary level than the students.  Next, a teacher must be able to maintain interest.  In a large class, this is incredibly hard to do but in the smaller classroom setting- it can be easier to adjust teaching style to the combined group learning style.  Finally, a teacher must not allow exceptions to be made in his classroom "kingdom."  Order is the teacher's responsibility to ensure by eliminating key individuals- otherwise, the students who wish to learn suffer along with the talkative horde.
The students also have a responsibility.  In our society, there are three Cs: citizens, criminals, and cops.  The "citizen" student sits in each class, takes notes, occasionally distracts himself, and does nothing when the class goes to utter pandemonium.  The "criminal" is the student who pays no attention at all, simply attends the class to fulfill a graduation requirement, talks as much as he or she wants, disrupts the civilians and cops from learning, and initiates the imminent classroom chaos.  The "copper" student does all the things a "citizen" student does but rather then the occasional vocal slip up, he or she regulates his or her surrounding students to maintain order and let the teacher teach.  Thus, there is no sole responsibility as to who is in charge of classroom management.  It is a shared duty of trust between the teacher and the students to allow learning to happen.