Lately we have been talking about classroom management in all my classes. I have been trying to research ideas and what really works and came across this behavior chart (seen below) on Pintrest and the whole blog is great actually :)

 Something we have learned from Jane Bluestein are those magic sentences like "That won't work for me" or "We will come back to that later." These ideas are used when we give students options to their learning and allow them to take responsibility for their actions. If they don't want to do a certain activity, ask them what they would prefer...they might surprise you. Dr. Bluestein gave a great example of how a teacher assigned spelling (writing each word 5 times) and a student stood up and told her he thought it was boring-she challenged him to come up with something different. He came back the next day with a story containing the spelling words, a crossword, and a word search. Creativity really shines when we allow it to.

Negative behavior is the worst, isn't it? How do we get them to do what we want?? Putting their name on the board when they misbehave is just encouraging the behavior--they are getting that attention of having their name on the board and therefore will continue the bad behavior. Sending your "bad" students to an desk by themselves on their own "island'? Do you ever give them the opportunity to come back to the group? Having faith in those students might be exactly what they need. Come up with a behavior plan that has consequences, but also time for improvements. You must, must, must be consistent with penalties as well as rewards.

I have learned that classroom management is really the basis for teaching...we have to create an environment for all students to be successful. Fair is not receiving the same instruction, but it is instead giving the instruction that every child needs at their level.

Click on the links to learn more about classroom management and get the download for your own class' punch cards :)

Until Later,
Amanda