“Classroom Management the Works” (Marzano, Marzano, & Pickering 2003)
Are Good Classroom Manages Born or Made?
The research is clear. The most important factor affecting student learning is the teacher. Although the effect the
classroom teacher can have on student achievement is clear, the dynamics of how a teacher produces such an effect are
not simple. Rather, the effective teacher performs many functions. These functions can be organized into three major
roles:
NOTE: Each of the three teacher roles below is a necessary but not sufficient component of effective teaching. That is, no
single role by itself is sufficient to guarantee student learning, but take one out of the mix and you probably guarantee that
students will have difficulty learning. Nevertheless, a strong case can be made that effective instructional strategies and
good classroom curriculum design are built on the foundation of effective classroom management.
The effective teacher performs many functions. These functions can be organized into three major roles.
1. Role #1: Making wise choices about the most effective instructional strategies to employ.
a. Effective teachers have a wide array of instruction strategies at their disposal.
b. They are skilled in the use of cooperative learning, graphic organizers, how best to use homework, etc.
“Classroom Instruction that Works” (Marzano, Pickering, & Pollock, 2001)
2. Role #2: Designing classroom curriculum to facilitate student learning.
a. Effective teachers are skilled at identifying and articulating the proper sequence and pacing of their content.
Rather than relying totally on the scope and sequence provided by the district or the textbook, they consider the
needs of their students collectively and individually and then determine the content that requires emphasis and
the most appropriate sequencing and presentation of that content. They are also highly skilled at constructing
and arranging learning activities that present new knowledge in different formats (e.g., stories, explanations,
demonstrations) and different media (e.g., oral presentations, written presentations, video presentations, Webbased presentations, simulations, hands-on activities)
3. Role #3: Making effective use of classroom management techniques.
a. Effective teachers employ components of effective classroom management techniques.
Effect Size: An effect size is a metric Marzano used in his meta-analysis. It tells you how much of a difference in behavior
you can expect between classes that effectively employ a given aspect of classroom management. Effect Sizes are the
best way of answering the question “what has the greatest influence on student learning?” An effect size of 1.0 is typically
associated with advancing learner achievement by one year, or improving the rate of learning by 50% and is defined as an
increase of one standard deviation. An effect size of 1.0 is enormous!
4. Factor #1 “Rules & Procedures” Effect Size of .763 (Chapter 2 CMTW)
a. A rule (expectation) identifies general expectations or standards. “Respect others and their property.”
b. A procedure (routine) identifies expectations for specific behaviors such as collecting assignments, getting
student attention, participating in class discussions, and so on.
5. Factor #2 “Disciplinary Interventions” Effect Size of .909 (Chapter 3 CMTW)
a. Punishment & Reinforcement: human beings do best in an environment of feedback – in this case feedback
to distinguish between appropriate and inappropriate behaviors. The research supports the effectiveness of
mild forms of punishment only. George Bear (1998)
b. Disciplinary Interventions…listed in rank-order of effectiveness. (figure 3.2, pages 29-30 CMTW)
i. Teacher Reaction: verbal & physical behaviors of teachers that indicate to students that their behavior
is appropriate or inappropriate.
ii. Tangible Recognition: includes strategies in which students are provided with some symbol or token
for appropriate behavior. When the student exhibits inappropriate behavior, the tangible recognition
might be taken away.
iii. Direct Cost: involves those interventions that involve a direct and concrete consequence for
misbehavior.
iv. Group Contingency: strategies are those in which a specific set of students must reach a certain
criterion level of appropriate behavior.
v. Home Contingency: strategies in which behavior monitoring occurs at a student’s home
6. Factor #3 “Teacher-Student Relationships” Effect Size of .869 (Chapter 4 CMTW)
a. One might make the case that teacher-student relationships are the keystone for the other factors. If a teacher
has a good relationship with students, then students more readily accept the rules and procedures and the
disciplinary actions that follow their violations. Without the foundation of a good relationship, students
commonly resist rules and procedures along with the consequent disciplinary actions.
b. The most effective classroom managers tended to employ different strategies with different types of students,
whereas ineffective managers did not.
c. Effective managers do not treat all students the same, particularly in situations involving behaviors problems.
Whereas some students need encouragement, others students need a gently reprimand, and still others might
require a not-so-gentle reprimand.
d. Note: Managing Yourself/Quality Components of Communication (Boys Town Education Model)
7. Factor #4 “Mental Set” Effect Size of 1.29 (Chapter 5 CMTW)
a. Some of the information in Chapter 5 in CMTW is based on research done by Jacob Kounin (1970). Arguably,
the first high-profile, large scale, systematic study of classroom management. He identified several critical
dimensions of effective classroom management. Those dimensions (among others) are…
i. “Withitness”: (Effect Size 1.294) which involves a keen awareness of disruptive behavior or potentially
disruptive behavior and immediate attention to that behavior; of the four dimensions, it is the one that
most consistently separates the excellent classroom managers from the average or below-average
classroom managers.
ii. Smoothness and momentum during lesson presentations
iii. Letting students know what behavior is expected of them at any given point in time, and
iv. Variety and challenge in the seatwork assigned to students
v. Of the four factors, Mental Set is probably the most unusual, at least in terms of its title. Marzano’s
research shows that this element has the largest effect size of 1.29.
vi. The construct of a mental set in classroom management is quite similar to the construct of
“mindfulness” in psychology. Mindfulness involves a heightened sense of situational awareness and a
conscious control over one’s thought and behavior relative to that situation. This frame of mind is not
easy to cultivate. We typically do not attend to all of what is happening around us. In fact, we
commonly operate with very little conscious awareness of our environment, particularly regarding
routine activities.
vii. The term withitness was coined by Jacob Kounin. He concluded that one of the primary differences
between effective versus ineffective managers was not in how they handled the disruptive behavior of
students, but in the disposition of the teacher to quickly and accurately identify problem behavior or
potential problem behavior and to act on it immediately. He referred to this disposition as withitness.
viii. The antithesis of mindfulness is “mindlessness” Langer (1989). Langer refers to mindlessness as an
automatic, unconscious way of interacting with the world.
b. Emotional Objectivity: (Effect Size .705)
i. An effective classroom manager implements and enforces rules and procedures, executes disciplinary
actions, and (even) cultivates effective relationships with students without interpreting violations of
classroom rules and procedures, negative reactions to disciplinary actions, or lack of response to the
teacher’s attempts to forge relationships as a personal attack.
ii. As Ron Nelson, Ron Martella, and Benita Galand (1998) note, emotional objectivity allows the teacher
to address disciplinary issues in an “unemotional, matter-of-fact” manner (p. 156)
iii. Robert and Ruth Soar (1979) emphasize the importance of emotional objectivity, noting that when
teachers are not emotionally objective, they run the risk of undermining their entire classroom
management system.
iv. Mental set as defined in CMTW is the classroom factor that is usually not addressed directly in
classroom management programs.
8. The Student’s Responsibility For Management (Chapter 6 CMTW)
a. Some researchers such as Raymond Wlodkowski (1982) & Jim Larson (1998) note that “discipline” in schools
tends to rely more on reactive administrative interventions such as suspensions and expulsions…” and
discipline is often applied as control, it comes across to the student as a form of direct or implied threat.
b. The Research and Theory
i. The research on the impact of teaching students strategies geared toward personal responsibility is
strong. Positive results using self-regulatory techniques range from increasing competence in specific
academic areas to increasing classroom participation to reducing behavioral problems (CMTW p. 77)
ii. The research on social skills training within the context of regular classroom management provides still
another perspective on teaching responsibility. Specifically, teaching social skills focuses on providing
students with strategies for controlling how they react to their peers. Research shows that his ability is
related to students’ attitudes, their peers’ attitudes about them, and academic achievement. With this
said, it is also important to note that a number of studies are able to establish a link between social
skills and academic achievement.
iii. Results of a meta-analysis for student responsibility
1. Teaching student responsibility: Average effect size .694 This means that responsibility
strategies are associated with a decrease of 25 percentile points in disruptive behavior.
2. Teaching self-monitoring and control strategies: Average effect size of .597 Techniques
are those in which students are taught to observe their own behavior, record it in some way,
compare it with some predetermined criterion, and then acknowledge and reward their won
success. Some researchers refer to approaches within this category as contingency=based
strategies.
3. Teaching cognitively based strategies: Average effect size .778 These strategies also
involve individuals observing and monitoring their own behavior. However, these strategies
typically do not involve keeping records of behavior, establishing a criterion level of behavior,
or rewards if the criterion is reached. Rather, cognitively based strategies involve examine
one’s thoughts as expressed in inner dialogue, considering the consequences of actions that
are being considered along with alternative actions, and then selecting the most effective and
positive course of action.