Classroom Management
Presented by:
Hope Stuart – Principal
Tara Hart-DeBold – Fifth Grade Teacher
August 20, 2009
The ability of teachers to organize classrooms and manage the
behavior of their students is critical to achieving positive outcomes.
Although sound behavior management does not guarantee effective
instruction, it establishes the environmental context that makes good
instruction possible.
Disruptive classroom behavior is a significant reason why teachers
leave the profession.
The inability of teachers to effectively manage classroom behavior
often contributes to the low achievement of at-risk students and to
their excessive referrals for special education.
National Comprehensive Center for Teacher Quality Dec. 2007
Do Now:
Find your group mates using the stick provided.
Discuss the reasons you feel behavior issues occur.
The person whose birthday is closest to May 6 (Hunter’s birthday)
will write these ideas down on the index cards provided.
Let’s take time to discuss:
It’s All About Being Proactive, Not Reactive!
Establishing procedures that are consistent and familiar encourages
students to be self-managers and therefore reduces discipline issues.
This is KEY to establishing a Literacy Collaborative classroom.
•Students know what is expected of them and want to be successful.
•Students must know from the very beginning how they are expected
to behave and work in the classroom.
•There is relatively little wasted time, confusion, or disruption.
•Students are deeply involved with their work, especially with
academic, teacher led instruction.
•The climate of the classroom is work-oriented but relaxed and
pleasant.
Procedures must be:
Explained
Rehearsed
Reinforced
Honing Habits:
It takes about 26 days to make or break a habit,
so start the very first day of school establishing good
habits with your students.
The easiest way to accomplish this is by having your
students help you establish about 5 positively stated rules
that will be followed in your classroom.
Meeting Area
An example of a whole class behavior management system is:
Go for the Green.
Go for the Green!
Each student must follow our classroom rules
in order to stay on green for the entire day.
1st Notice-Blue
A verbal warning will be given.
2nd Notice-Yellow
The student will take a 5 minute time-out.
3rd Notice-Orange
The student will miss recess time.
4th notice-Red
The student’s parents will be contacted.
An effective way to encourage
students to have ownership over
their classroom environment is to
design a system for classroom
helpers.
Here is just one example of how
this can be done…
Line Leader
Center Helpers
Chair Helpers
Substitute
Weather
Calendar
Mailers
Lunch Count
Janitor
Attendance
Material Managers (M & M’s)
Proactive Procedures:
•Paper Management-collecting and passing out
work, no names
•Bathroom Breaks
•Pencil Problems
•Student Seating-desk or carpet
•Calling on Students
Tricky Transitions:
Many behavior issues occur during unstructured times of
the day, including transitioning from one activity to
another. Ineffective transitions not only invite behavior
problems but eat up valuable instructional time.
Transitions add up:
If 4 minutes is wasted each day, that becomes 20 minutes a week,
which translates to 800 minutes or 13 hours of lost instructional time
a year.
Tricky Transition Techniques:
Table Points
Count Down
Clean-up Time-bell
Recess time-they waste your time, you take away their
time.
Center Areas:
With Literacy Collaborative, comes centers. Centers
encourage students to be self-managers but can be a
nightmare if not managed correctly. The key is to be
prepared as a teacher and establish expectations for each
center with your students.
Workboard (describes each child's center activities for the hour)
Text
Writing Center: Literacy Collaborative Style
Text
ABC Center
Text
Math Center
Classroom Library
Reading Center
Tips to Take with You…
We know we have shared a great deal of ideas with you
today. Do you have any ideas to share with your
colleagues at this time? If so, write them down on your
exit ticket.
Take a couple of minutes to jot down some ideas you
would like to incorporate into your classroom on the postit provided.
Did You Know:
It takes 26 days to make or break a habit.
4 minutes a day of wasted time can translate
to 13 hours of missed instructional time.
The most lavishly appointed classroom may turn into
shambles if routines for using it have not been established.
Classroom management is KEY to student achievement.