Thinking Through my Classroom Management Plans

This year I wanted to work hard on classroom management. A well-managed class makes teaching a pleasure. So...I set about to research and learn more about classroom management. I wanted to brush up my skills and set up a new system for managing my classroom this year. 

Classroom Management Resources

To help myself along, I picked up a couple of old books that I have that have been sitting on my shelves for many years that have been read or partially read and forgotten. Where did my research lead me first, but the guru Harry Wong. Harry Wong's book, The First Days of School is considered a classic in the teaching world and he is at the top when it comes to educators who can manage a classroom. He is the expert! I read through most of his book in just a couple of days, taking notes along the way on things I wanted to remember or try. I also found an old interview by Harry Wong and listened to that. I checked out his website and several articles he had written through the years. There were so many treasures in his materials. 

Another book I read was called, The Classroom Management Secret by Michael Linsin. This book was so great and basically put the problem of classroom management right in the teacher's lap. being inconsistent is the worst thing you can do when upholding classroom behavior in your classroom. It starts to form a hole in your strategy when you do not consistently hold students accountable and students misbehave more and more. 

One last place I looked to was the teacher Mrs Munch's Munchkins on Instagram and YouTube. She is amazing with lots of fresh ideas. 

My Classroom Management Plan for the School Year

This year I took things from all three of these sources, and others, and added my own spin to create an effective plan for my classroom. 

1. First, we spent a ton of time on procedures, and continue to go back over those procedures on a regular basis as needed. 

2. Next, I spent some time on a plan for whole class behaviors, which are basically the expected procedures for how to do needed things together as a class such as our quiet signals and when we line up or come to our class campground/campsite (circle area). 

    Students are expected to follow procedures for line up or going to the campground like this: 

        a. stand up

        b. get ready (either empty hands or bring what is asked of them)

        c. when I give the secret word, students move silently to line, campground, or desks. 

      For our quiet signal, we do two different ones. I might say, "If you hear me clap once!" The students should clap and turn their eyes my way while remaining quiet. The second option I use is used in the same way, but it is a call and response I believe I learned at Get Your Teach on a few years back. It goes, "Hey, Hey, Hey! Listen up, Listen up!" Students shout it back to me while looking and listening. 

For our procedures, we use a whole class scoreboard. If students follow the procedure correctly, we get a point on our scoreboard under the words "Oh YEAH!" Then I will say, "Let me hear it. 1,2,3..." and they say "Oh YEAH!" If one student does not follow but the rest do, I make that one student show me the correct way to do it, but we do not get or lose a point. If several students to do follow the directions, I will give them an oops point and make them practice correctly. At the end of the day, we look at our points and compare the Oh Yeah points to the oops points. If we have more Oh Yeah points, we reveal a mystery letter to a secret prize. When all letters are revealed, the class earns the prize. If we have 5 more Oh Yeah points than Oops points, we reveal two letters. We reveal no letters if students get more Oops points. The prizes are simple things and do not have to cost anything at all. I use things like extra recess, stinky feet (no shoes for the day), bring a stuffed animal, etc. 

I also have a plan for individual management. This is where our classroom rules and consequences come in. First, I taught my students the four simple rules that I call Our Campground Rules (since we have a camping theme).

 

        1. Respect God

        2. Respect Adults

        3. Respect Students

        4. Respect Property

Under each of the rules, we have simple explanations that show what respect looks like in each situation. I also teach at a private Christian school, so we can have a rule about God. 

For the first week, after teaching my rules, I did not enforce consequences. This was a period to get used to these new rules for the year. I would remind students of which rule they broke and what the consequence would be in a few days. As students got used to the rules, I introduced the following consequences:

        1. Warning (verbal warning of the rule broken)

        2. Time Away ( either time away from friends in class or a time out during recess)

        3. Note Home

         4. Principal

While students understand that these are the consequences, they also know that the level of consequence can be skipped if the degree of rule breaking is serious. 

That pretty much sums up my classroom management plan. I do try to communicate with parents and build great communication. If you are interested in getting some ideas for parent communication and making your year run smoother in that aspect, check out that post over here. Here is another fun way to help with behavior management...click here.