I realize I'm dreaming and then can't do anything about it.

Part of the way through a dream last night, I realized I was dreaming. I decided to try out some “lucid dreaming” skills. I looked down at my hand and could tell I was asleep. In my dream, I was teaching a class and one of the students was being difficult. When I suddenly realized this was all a dream, I told the kids, “I’m dreaming. All of you sit down and be quiet”. They did so. Then I decided to test out my ability to control the course of the dream. So I said, “Everyone, put a red tea cup on top of your head”.

Now this the problem I have with lucid dreaming. I realize I’m asleep, but then this realization just becomes a part of the dream. A red tea cup?

But all the students did it. They all put red tea cups on top of their heads. They looked very funny. I started giggling, and then another teacher entered the room. She said she was also a lucid dreamer. She was disappointed that I was using my lucid dreaming experience to control students. I told her this doesn‘t make any sense as the students aren‘t real and in real life I wouldn‘t do something like that to students. Then she became violent and started chasing after me. At first I did not run. I just looked at her and said, “I’m dreaming. You aren’t real. You can’t hurt me.” But she hit me and it did hurt. So I ran.

The rest of the dream, I was alternately running away from this violent woman or trying to stand my ground to make her disappear. I knew I was asleep and I kept telling her that she needed to stop or that I wanted to wake up, but no dice. When she caught me, it was painful. She scratched me up with her nails and suffocated me- I had to struggle to get away. The fact that I knew I was asleep didn’t help one bit.

Eventually, I ran into another room where there was a CD player that was supposed to be an elevator. Someone explained that I needed to insert myself into the CD tray to get away. I told him that was crazy as I was clearly too big to fit inside the CD tray. He explained that since I’m asleep and dreaming, I can do whatever I want. So I tried, toe-first, but couldn’t get myself to fit inside the CD tray, dream or not. I also could not wake up or change the course of my dream.

I don’t remember how this dream ended, but eventually I forgot about the realization that I was asleep and some elaborate plot with horses took over. That’s neither here nor there.

So the knowledge that this was all a dream just became a part of the dream itself despite the fact that I kept checking my hand and verifying that yes I am asleep.

It's best not to expect a poor reaction from dream characters. Since dreams are 99% about expectations, you can expect the student to apologize and back away; if you really "know" it will happen, it will. Same goes with flying; expect yourself to come off the ground and you will. Summoning chocolate or other people, just turn around and expect them to be behind you. Visualization during the daytime helps so you can solidify what they're going to look like.

As for your lucidity, I'm guessing you lost it when you started arguing with the student. If you become lucid and get too involved with the current dream plot, it's a surefire way to lose your lucidity, which isn't what people want. Try ignoring things and making your own plot, but don't feed the scenario that the dream's already going through.

No I never lost lucidity. It's just like the lucidity becomes a part of the dream. Does that make sense? I'm constantly saying "I'm dreaming, you aren't real" etc but that doesn't mean I can do anything about it. I did try to stop and ignore the crazy woman, but then she attacked me and it hurt despite the fact that I was saying, "you aren't real, you are just a dream" etc.

It sounds like you just didn't have good dream control at the time, then. It happens to everyone.

I've seen there is a whole tutorial section here so I'll read about dream control before asking more questions. This is all new to me. Thank you so much!