Classroom Management
and Communication
What Teachers Need to
Know about Classroom
Communication and
Positive Discipline
Dreikur’s Democratic Principles
Basics of Adler and Dreikurs’ social theory
Adler’s Basic premises (Dreikurs, 1972, pp. 8-9)
i) Man is a social being and his main desire (the basic
motivation) is to belong.
ii) All behavior is purposive. One cannot understand
behavior of another person unless one knows to which
goal it is directed, and it is always directed towards
finding one's place.
iii) Man is a decision-making organism.
iv) Man does not see reality as it is, but only as he perceives
it, and his perception may be mistaken or biased.
Basic Assumption
All misbehavior is the result
of a child’s mistaken assumption
about the way he can find a
place and gain status (Dreikurs, 1968, p. 36).
Attention Getting
Students who are looking to belong and be
recognized in the class. This is more often
identified with disturbing behavior. Many times
this occurs because students are not getting
the recognition that they feel they deserve.
If students cannot get attention for their
positive behaviors (being on task, completing
work, arriving on time, etc.), they will seek it
with inappropriate behaviors (continually
calling out, refusing to work, asking irrelevant
questions, etc.)
Power and Control
(power struggles)
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Students feel inferiority, so they try “to be your
boss.”
Once the battle has been joined, the child has
already won it.
Behavior characteristics consist of the student
repetitively doing a behavior to make him or
her the center of attention. When asked to
stop, he or she becomes defiant and escalates
his or her negative behavior and challenges
the adult. The teacher will feel annoyed at the
students' actions.
Revenge
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Students who think the only way to get
recognition is to retaliate against adults for the
way they feel they have been unfairly treated.
This is formed after a long series of
discouragement by failing trials for attention
getting and power.
Behavior characteristics consist of a student
who hurts others physically or psychologically.
The teacher will feel hurt in relation to the
student's actions.
Teachers’ Role
• The teacher must recognize students’
inner goal and then help the students
change to the more appropriate goal of
learning how to belong with others
(Wolfgang, 2001, p. 115).
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Techniques of modifying the
child’s motivation
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Observe the child’s behavior in detail.
Be psychologically sensitive to your own
reaction.
Confront the child with the four goals.
• The purpose of confrontation is to disclose
•
and confirm the mistaken goal to the child.
Use the four "could it be…" questions:
1. Could it be that you want special attention?
2. Could it be that you want your own way and
hope to be boss?
3. Could it be that you want to hurt others as
much as you feel hurt by them?
4. Could it be that you want to be left alone?
Dreikurs, 1972, p. 34, 41)
Encouragement
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The essence of encouragement is to increase the child's confidence in
himself and to convey to him that he is good enough as he is not just
as he might be. It is directed toward increasing the child's belief in
himself.
Avoid discouragement.
Work for improvement, not perfection.
Comment on effort rather than results.
Separate the deed from the doer.
Build on strength, not on weaknesses.
Show your faith in the child.
Mistakes should not be viewed as failures.
Integrate the child into the group.
Praise is not the same as encouragement.
Help the child develop the courage to be imperfect. Dreikurs, 1972,
pp. 49-59)
Differences between praise and
encouragement
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Praise can be discouraging.
Praise recognizes the actor,
encouragement acknowledges the act.
Too much praise makes a child
dependent on the teacher"
Logical Consequences
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Every act has a consequence, and if we are to
avoid unpleasant results of our acts we must then
behave in a way which will help to guarantee more
favorable results (Dreikurs, 1968, p. 62).
Logical consequences should offer the child a
clear and logical choice of behavior and results. The
child must perceive that he has a choice and accept
the relationship of his choice to what followed (Dreikurs,
1968, p. 82).
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It is structured and arranged by the adult, must
be experienced by the child as logical in nature
(Dreikurs, 1972, p. 62).
Classroom Meetings
Students need to practice democratic principles in
school in order to learn how to contribute later to
society as a whole. The central process for carrying
out this modeling of democracy is the use of the
class meeting. Any problem child is a problem for the
whole class, and the solution to the problem grows
most naturally out of the helpful involvement of all
class members (Dreikurs, 1972, p. 78).
Purpose of classroom meetings
Open classroom meetings create a
context for developing empathy and group
membership. Group discussions provide the
teacher with an opportunity to help the
children understand themselves, and to
change their concept of themselves and
others which will eventually change their
motivations from hostile to cooperative living
(Dreikurs, 1972, p. 79).
Eight building blocks of
effective classroom meetings
1. Form a circle
2. Practice compliments
and appreciation
5. Learn about separate
realities
6. Recognize the four
purposes of behavior
3. Create an agenda
7. Practice role playing
and brainstorming
4. Develop communication
skills
8. Focus on non-punitive
solutions))
(Suggested by Jane Nelson--a Dreikurs-Adlerian writer
Books by Dreikurs
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A Parent's Guide to Child Discipline by Rudolf Dreikurs
and Loren Grey
The Challenge of Parenthood
Children: The Challenge -- by Rudolf Dreikurs, Vicki
Soltz
Coping With Children's Misbehavior, a Parent's Guide
Discipline Without Tears -- by Rudolf Dreikurs, et al
Encouraging Children to Learn by Rudolf Dreikurs, Don,
Sr. Dinkmeyer
Assignments for Next Session
Read Charles :
 Chapter 3 - Canter’s Assertive Discipline.
 Chapter 4 - Jones’s Positive Classroom Discipline
 Chapter 5 - Positive Discipline in the Classroom.
Be prepared to contrast models of assertive discipline
with models of positive discipline
Review the Rubric on the Classroom Management Plan
that we will be working on the latter half of the
course.