TEN TIPS for CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
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HOW TO IMPROVE STUDENT ENGAGEMENT and BUILD A POSITIVE CLIMATE FOR LEARNING AND DISCIPLINE
Ten Tips for Classroom Management
How to improve student engagement and build a positive climate for learning and discipline
TIP LIST
WE’VE ALL HEARD THIS ABOUT STUDENTS: "If they are engaged, they are managed." And this is absolutely the truth. But we still need rules, routines, trust, and student ownership to make a classroom run smoothly and effectively. This guide will address those practical aspects of managing a classroom, with suggestions and resources appropriate for grades K-12.
Most of these tips are applicable to students of all ages, but the actual techniques will look different for the various grades. For instance, Build Community (tip #1), might mean playing name games with elementary students but involve setting up a photo booth for middle school students. Tip #8, Integrate Positive Classroom Rituals, may sound like it’s all about elementary learners, but look for suggestions to make the morning meeting an important part of the day for teens and tweens too.
During my first year in the classroom, a seasoned teacher told me, "You are as much an ethics teachers as you are an English teacher." What she meant was that literature brings along life lessons and themes, so it’s inevitable that you end up deeply discussing morals, what is right and wrong, and wise choices versus poor decisions. It’s no accident then that the ten tips offered here also give a noticeable nod to social and emotional learning, or SEL (http://www.edutopia.org/social-emotional-learning), an approach that teaches children how to handle challenging situations, manage their emotions, and form positive relationships.
And finally, we all know there are more than ten tips for great classroom management, so be sure to visit Edutopia’s Classroom Management Group and share what you do: http://www.edutopia.org/groups/classroom-management.
—Rebecca Alber Edutopia blogger, former high school teacher, and online education teacher at Stanford University
1. Build Community
2. Design a Safe, Friendly, and Well-Managed Classroom Environment
3. Include Students in Creating Rules, Norms, Routines, and Consequences
4. Create a Variety of Communication Channels
5. Always Be Calm, Fair, and Consistent
6. Know the Students You Teach
7. Address Conflict Quickly and Wisely
8. Integrate Positive Classroom Rituals
9. Keep It Real
Partner with Parents and Guardians
10.
visit edutopia.org
tip #1
Build Community
BUILDING CARING RELATIONSHIPS with students is the cornerstone of good classroom management. Building these relationships—teacher-student, student-student, classroom-community—and creating the time and space to do so in the beginning of the year and throughout the following months can make or break a classroom. Simply put, when there is care in the air, there will be significantly fewer behavioral problems.
Greet your students at the door: This simple gesture creates that moment when you and the student make eye contact, speak directly to each other ("good morning"), and have a connection. This may be the only one-on-one you have that day with the student, but it has great value. When you model a respectful way to greet another human being, you are implicitly telling each student that this is how we will communicate with each other.
Get to know one another: Teachers and students begin learning one another’s names the first day of school and should be able to address one another by name within two weeks. Use engaging, age-appropriate activities (http://wilderdom.com/games/NameGames.html) for learning names and for getting acquainted. As students learn more and more about one another, connections will begin to happen. This inevitably leads to more empathy and understanding and, ultimately, caring relationships with a lot less classroom conflict.
Student photos will help you connect names and faces. In this article from the NEA’s website, retired middle school teacher Phil Nast recalls some favorite photo tips, such as having students create their own passports as a first-day-of-school activity: http://www.nea.org/tools/getting-to-know-each-other.html.
With the right app, you can even set up a photo booth in a corner of your classroom—something that should appeal to tweens and teens. Here’s an example using the iPad: http://www.apple.com/ipad/built-in-apps/photobooth.html.
Veteran educator Peter Pappas recommends using the first day of school to encourage teens to multitask, to get students thinking at the same time they’re getting acquainted. He explains on his Copy/Paste blog how an engaging activity like solving a mystery can deliver multiple benefits: http://www.peterpappas.com/2010/08/first-day-school-engage-problem-solve-how-to-get-students-thinking.html.
Definitely take the time and energy to continue growing community and relationships in the classroom. The payoff is worth the effort.
Related Resources:
➔ Read "How to Develop Positive Classroom Management," an Edutopia article on the correlation between relationships and classroom management: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-relationships-strategies-tips.
➔ Edutopia’s Schools That Work series spotlights Louisville, Kentucky’s Jefferson County Public Schools to show how they integrate social and emotional learning into their curriculum. Get suggestions for building relationships with students: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-how-to-build-relationships-worksheet.pdf
➔ Are you looking for more examples of effective classroom-management techniques such as hand signals to use with primary or older students? Watch this Edutopia video, Classroom-Management Tips for Teachers: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-teacher-tips-video.
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tip #2
Design a Safe, Well-Managed and Friendly Classroom Environment
THE RIGHT PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT helps create a positive learning community. When students walk into a classroom, they need to feel ownership. Their writing assignments and projects should prevail on the walls, and they should have easy access to supplies and handouts and a place to turn in class assignments.
Ask students to be designers of their room: They choose where to hang the dioramas on photosynthesis or the book reports, and they get to do the hanging. Also, charts, directions—any permanent posters—should be written by student hands. The more they see themselves in the environment, the more they feel valued (and the fewer number of conflicts we teachers will have with them).
How’s the lighting in your classroom? Try making small adjustments, such as bringing in a few floor lamps and turning off some of the fluorescent lights. This can create a calmer, less institutional vibe. Learn more about lighting in this Edutopia primer, "What They See Is What We Get: A Primer on Light": http://www.edutopia.org/what-they-see-what-we-get.
Moving desks and trying different table configurations can also create a more friendly setting that’s better suited for collaboration. Social and emotional learning emphasizes student-centered, cooperative learning. This means you will cluster desks into groups or move students so they face one another. This may make your classroom a bit louder, but it helps grow a community of learners a lot more quickly than rows of desks facing the front of the class. Take the plunge and just do it!
Related Resources:
➔ Check out "How Can We Improve School Discipline?" from Educational Researcher: http://www.aera.net/uploadedFiles/Publications/Journals/Educational_Researcher/3901/048-058_02EDR10.pdf.
➔ Get more tips for good classroom design in this Edutopia article, "Give Your Space the Right Design": http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-space-design-feng-shui.
➔ Download this list of effective cooperative-learning activities from the Jefferson County Public Schools: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-collaborative-cooperative-learning.pdf.
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tip #3
Include Students in Creating Rules, Norms, Routines, and Consequences
RULES ARE DIFFERENT from routines and norms. Rules come with consequences whereas routines and norms have reminders. (Read Rebecca Alber’s Edutopia blog post for more on this: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/rules-routines-school-year-start-classroom-management.)
Social Contracts: When establishing both rules and routines, it’s crucial that students have a say in the matter. The teacher’s role is to facilitate and guide students through the steps to develop social contracts. What’s the result? Students have full ownership in what has been decided around class norms, expectations, and consequences.
The start of a new school year is the ideal time to draw up a social contract. Start by asking kids to brainstorm about all the things they see, feel, and hear in a classroom that make them feel comfortable, safe, and happy. Use this graphic organizer, http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-Y-chart.pdf, to create a chart as a whole class and then decide on rules, routines, and consequences together.
Developmental Discipline: How often do you notice the same student arriving late to class, making unkind comments to peers, or repeating other negative behaviors? Change the pattern with developmental discipline. This is a philosophy that has the individual examine why something happened and then consider what can be done to rectify the situation and prevent it from happening again. Developmental discipline encourages teachers to use community-building activities, along with appropriate consequences, to lead students to think about how they behave and how they treat one another. Instead of detention, a student may write a fix-it plan or apology letter or come up with his or her own suitable and effective consequence.
Watch this Edutopia Schools That Work video that demonstrates what developmental discipline looks like in the Jefferson County Public Schools in Louisville, Kentucky: http://www.edutopia.org/louisville-sel-discipline-behavior-video.
The Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, better known as CASEL, shares links to video examples and case studies about SEL schools: http://casel.org/in-schools/selecting-programs/programs-in-action/.
Related Resources:
➔ Whether it is informal chatter or academic conversations, students need examples of how to speak respectfully. Provide discussion stems (http://kms.sdcoe.net/getvocal/107.html) to help scaffold this learning. Also, to reinforce the types of talking that are appropriate, decide together on off-limit words and phrases.
➔ Learn more about the research on teacher-student relationships by reading "Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) and Student Benefits" from CASEL: http://casel.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/EDC_CASELSELResearchBrief.pdf.
➔ Jefferson County Public Schools shares a downloadable protocol for developing a social contract with students: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-protocol-for-developing-the-social-contract.pdf.
➔ The Developmental Studies Center has a good primer on developmental discipline: http://www.devstu.org/page/building-community-in-school-the-child-development-project.
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tip #4
Create a Variety of Communication Channels
HOW MANY DIFFERENT WAYS do students have for communicating with you? The more modes they have, the better.
Teacher-Student Communication: Having varied and reliable options for students to talk with you will help keep your class running smoothly. Here are a few ideas to try:
Encourage students to connect with you online. Provide them with your school email account so they can send you their questions, concerns, and suggestions, or use social-media tools to connect with students who are old enough to have Facebook accounts. To create a private back channel for real-time classroom discussions, check out tools such as TodaysMeet (http://todaysmeet.com/) or Chatzy (http://www.chatzy.com).
Offer a variety of times when you are available. This will make certain that all students are able to come and sit down with you privately for a chat if needed (before school, once a week at lunchtime, any day after school).
Place a suggestion box on your desk where students can leave anonymous notes. You might be surprised to get messages like these: "Please turn up the heat in the morning," "Richard is picking on Jessica after class," or "Please give more examples for writing a thesis statement."
Have students turn in weekly notebooks or project logs. Include one or two assignments for which students can just freewrite anything, including a letter to you if they wish.
Student-Student Communication: Students grow emotionally and socially as they share their intellectual thoughts and ideas with one another. As teachers, we must explicitly integrate as much time for this as possible. We can do so through such activities as think-pair-share, talking-triads, tea parties, and Socratic seminars. To learn more about various thinking routines (and the research behind them), visit the Visible Thinking website at Harvard’s Project Zero: http://pzweb.harvard.edu/vt/VisibleThinking_html_files/VisibleThinking1.html.
When it comes to student groups, be mindful to mix them up frequently to prevent cliques from forming. If you keep groups and pairs in heavy rotation, then in no time, all students will have spent some time with one another and the connections will be visible.
Finally, when you’re talking with the whole class, use phrases that are empowering rather than defeating, accusatory, or negative. As teachers, we must continually model the behaviors—and language—we wish to see in the children we teach.
Related Resources:
➔ Lisa Nielsen shares a post on the Innovative Educator blog about a first-grade teacher who uses Facebook to connect with students and their families: http://theinnovativeeducator.blogspot.com/2010/07/8-real-ways-facebook-enriched-ms.html.
➔ Check out the following chart for examples of empowering teacher language: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-empowering-teacher-language.pdf
➔ Edutopia blogger Nicholas Provenzano explains how he keeps issues from escalating in his high school classroom: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/effective-classroom-management-nick-provenzano.
➔ Edutopia blogger Gaetan Pappalardo shares tips on how he keeps his elementary classroom humming: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/classroom-management-strategies-elementary-teacher.
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tip #5
Always Be Calm, Fair and Consistent
TRUST IS THE BEATING, healthy heart of a functioning classroom. Without it, classroom management is nearly impossible, as is building relationships with students. A calm, fair, and consistent teacher is a trusted one. (Edutopia blogger Rebecca Alber shares more insights on this topic: http://www.edutopia.org/trusting-relationships-teachers-students.)
Calm: Always keep a calm and steady demeanor, even if your head and heart are telling you to act differently. (Don’t ever match a child’s rage, sarcasm, or anger.) Use those acting skills we all acquire as teachers! And when you feel the blood boiling, remember this: Kids do not trust reactive teachers, and often they don’t respect them. Fear should never be the great motivator in our classrooms.
Staying calm means never raising your voice or speaking over the class. If students are talking, wait. Wait longer. Wait until it becomes so uncomfortable that several students begin to shush the others. Then, even if you are feeling beyond annoyed, use a calm, quiet voice so they will need to lean in to listen. Now you’ve got them.
Fairness: Though you may not feel the same way about every student, they should never know or see this. Being fair means all students are under the same rules—and get the same exceptions to those rules.
To make sure you are being fair, remind yourself to do the following:
Avoid calling on or selecting the same students over and over.
Acknowledge to the class when there has been an exception (for a student, another class period, or a group) and, if possible, share why.
Keep a solid line between rules and routines. Rules come with consequences whereas routines come with reminders.
Consistency: If you are having an erratic day, stay the course and don’t change that day’s agenda or class structure. This helps children feel safe.
Modeling Positive Behavior: While you are teaching, you should be demonstrating compassion, caring, patience, and self-control every chance you get. Students’ eyes are on us at all times, even when we think they are immersed in the task at hand. They watch, they listen, they learn, and then they repeat the behaviors they see.
Related Resources:
➔ How well do you support the social and emotional growth of your students? Take this Edutopia emotional intelligence quiz to find out: http://www.edutopia.org/sel-quiz.
➔ Tribes is a research-based process for building positive, respectful learning environments. Watch these short videos to learn more: http://tribes.com/videos/.
➔ Want some help managing a specific classroom situation? Ask the experts at the NEA, and you can expect an online reply within 24 hours: http://public-groups.nea.org/discussion/forum/show/162197.
➔ Edutopia blogger Ben Johnson shares more common-sense classroom-management tips in his popular post "The Barbed Wire Model of Classroom Management": http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-barbed-wire-model. Join the discussion by adding to the comments.
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tip #6
Know the Students You Teach
ASK YOURSELF THIS QUESTION, "How well do I know myself?" Thinking about this question helps you to better know and understand your students. By looking at your own background (economics, culture, education, and gender), you will be able to acknowledge the lens through which you view your students. For example, if you grew up middle class but teach students whose families live mainly below the poverty line, you can take time to learn about their specific challenges.
The Education Alliance has produced an online guide to culturally responsive teaching: http://www.alliance.brown.edu/tdl/tl-strategies/crt-principles.shtml.
Take a moment to reflect on where you are with all this. Consider the following characteristics of a culturally responsive educator:
She challenges and confronts all stereotypes in the instructional curriculum and environment.
She strives to know her students and seeks professional development and reading materials to learn how to better serve all of them.
She helps her students gain hope and develop strategies for overcoming academic and societal barriers.
She uses texts that are relevant and speak to the lives and experiences of the students she teaches.
When we do our best to exhibit all of these qualities, we are including all children, especially those we most struggle to understand.
How are you doing when it comes to creating a culturally responsive classroom? As a way to invite feedback, consider asking a colleague or mentor to observe your classroom. The Coalition for Essential Schools has developed an observation tool and debriefing guide to make this process productive. Download the PDF: http://www.essentialschools.org/system/school_benchmarks/4/observation_tools/original/Culturally_Responsive.pdf.
Related Resources:
➔ Read more about culturally responsive education in this Edutopia blog post, "Culturally Responsive Education: Cultural Education Through Expeditionary Learning": http://www.edutopia.org/culturally-responsive-education.
➔ For practical pointers on how to become a more a culturally responsive teacher, read this article from the NEA website, "Sounds Great, But How Do I Do It?": http://www.nea.org/home/16711.htm.
➔ Pedro Noguera, in a thoughtful essay that draws on his own family experiences as well as academic insights, concludes, "Differences in race, gender, or sexual orientation need not limit a teacher’s ability to make a connection with a young person." Download this PDF and consider discussing it with colleagues: http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/metrocenter.olde/resources/PDF/Joaquin%27s%20Dilemma.pdf.
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tip #7
Address Conflict Quickly and Wisely
DON’T LET CONFLICT FESTER. That means you should be sure to address an issue between you and a student or between two students as quickly as possible. Bad feelings—on your part or the students—can so quickly grow from molehills into mountains.
Now, for handling those conflicts wisely, you and the student should step away from the other students, just in the doorway of the classroom perhaps. Ask naive questions such as, "How might I help you?" Don’t accuse the child of anything. Act as if you do care, even if you have the opposite feeling at that moment. The student will usually become disarmed because she is expecting you to be angry and confrontational.
And always take a positive approach. Say, "It looks like you have a question" rather than, "Why are you off task and talking?"
When students have conflicts with each other, remain neutral. Use neutral language as you act as a mediator to help them resolve the problem peacefully.
Educators for Social Responsibilities maintain an Online Teacher Center with a variety of resources and classroom-ready materials (free registration required) that focus on resolving conflict: http://www.esrnational.org/otc.
Not In Our School (http://www.niot.org/nios) showcases stories of students and communities that stand up to bullying and prejudice. Online resources include classroom discussion guides and lesson plans designed to create safe schools, free from intolerance.
Related Resources:
➔ Learning to resolve conflict peacefully is a valuable life skill. Watch this Edutopia video to see how students have become "peace helpers": http://www.edutopia.org/conflict-resolution-peace-helpers-video.
➔ Watch a series of brief Edutopia video clips that show positive discipline strategies in action: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-video.
➔ Watch an Edutopia video in which students learn the skill of conflict resolution: http://www.edutopia.org/forum-conflict-resolution-video.
➔ What do researchers suggest for addressing classroom behavior issues? Explore the multimedia resources on the Doing What Works site: http://dww.ed.gov/Reducing-Behavior-Problems/topic/?T_ID=25.
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tip #8
Integrate Positive Classroom Rituals
IT’S MORE COMMON in elementary grades that the day will begin with a community-building activity. But getting off to a good start is important at all ages. Here are some suggestions to make it happen.
Morning meetings: This is a brief forum during which each individual in the group is acknowledged. It creates a feeling of "we are all in this together." Edutopia blogger Suzie Boss describes morning meetings at a unique school in Colorado: http://www.edutopia.org/building-school-community-eagle-rock.
Good things: Ask for a few volunteers to share something good that has happened to them (getting an A on a test or having a new baby in the family, for instance). The student can also share an upcoming event that is positive (such as a birthday or trip).
Whip around: Ask students to say one word that describes how they are feeling today. Start with a volunteer and then "whip around" the room. Give students the option to pass if they like.
Related Resources:
➔ Watch this Edutopia video to see what a morning meeting looks like: http://www.edutopia.org/louisville-sel-morning-meetings-video.
➔ Go to Edutopia’s Classroom Management Group and share what you do: http://www.edutopia.org/groups/classroom-management.
➔ Watch an archived Edutopia webinar, "Social and Emotional Learning: Making a Case in an NCLB World," to get more practical tips for bringing social and emotional learning to your classroom: http://www.edutopia.org/webinar-february.
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tip #9
Keep it Real
DISCOVER THE THINGS your students are interested in—trends, music, TV shows, and games—and incorporate those as you teach the skills, concepts, and knowledge they need. You want to attach the learning to their lives as often as possible.
Tap Into Prior Knowledge and Schema: The father of critical pedagogy, Paulo Freire, rejected the notion that children are empty vessels. Instead, he promoted the belief that learners offer a wealth of knowledge —conventional and unconventional—for the teacher to build on.
Kids with "bad" behavior tend to get treated and taught as if they need to be "filled" with information and knowledge. This tactic, in fact, leads to more acting out. With a constructivist approach, the teacher encourages the child to actively construct new ideas or concepts based upon his current and prior knowledge and beliefs.
Use Essential Questions: Big, overarching questions are a fantastic way to launch a unit of study and to help connect learning with the lives of your students. Essential questions do not have a right or wrong answer, nor are they easy to respond to. They give meaning and relevance to what your students are studying, and they are meant to grab the attention and thoughts —and sometimes the heart—of a group of learners. They are not to be solved but to be discussed and pondered.
Here are some examples of essential questions (but remember to use them strategically and sparingly):
In what ways are animals human and in what ways are humans animals? (science)
What is love? (English/poetry)
When is it acceptable to rebel? (history)
What would life be like if mathematics did not exist? (math)
Authentic Assessment: Authentic assessment (http://www.edutopia.org/stw-assessment-school-of-the-future-introduction-video) measures student learning with relevant, high-level Bloom’s Taxonomy tasks —the kind students might be required to do if they were actually working in the field of study.
To do authentic assessment, you will need to backwards plan, starting with what you want the kids to know and be able to do for the assessment. Grant Wiggins, the acclaimed author of Understanding By Design, calls this "starting with the end in mind."
If the start and end of a unit feel "real" to your students, then they are more likely to be engaged during the important journey in the middle. Edutopia blogger Suzie Boss explains how to get projects off to a good start: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/summer-pd-starting-projects-suzie-boss.
Related Resources:
➔ Read this Edutopia article, "Ten Takeaway Tips for Using Authentic Assessment in Your School," for more on authentic assessment: http://www.edutopia.org/10-assessment-tips-for-class.
➔ Download Edutopia’s guide to assessing project-based learning: http://www.edutopia.org/10-tips-assessment-project-based-learning-resource-guide.
➔ What do other educators have to say about classroom management? Join the lively discussion in response to a post by Edutopia blogger Maurice Elias: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/good-classroom-management-secret-maurice-elias.
➔ Or you can weigh in on blogger Elena Aguilar’s schoolroom peace plan: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management.
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tip #10
Partner with Parents and Guardians
THIS IS THE LAST TIP FOR A REASON. Teachers know that partnering with parents is neither easy nor completely in our control. Returning a teacher’s call may not be the top priority for a parent or guardian. They may be more concerned with paying bills, putting food on the table, navigating the rough waters of managing a single-parent home, and so much more beyond our imaginations.
Yet connecting home and school is worth the extra effort because of the benefits for students. So here are some simple yet surefire ways to partner and connect with parents and guardians.
Intel First: Have kids fill out an "About Me" index card the first week of school. Ask them about their favorite books and school subjects and things they are good at. Also ask for their parents’ or guardians’ cell phone numbers.
Go Digital: Consider setting up your own website, wiki, or page on your school’s website so parents can take a quick look and get up-to-speed with topics of study and class and homework assignments. Edmodo (http://www.edmodo.com) offers a free platform for creating a secure social-networking site for your students and their families.
Face to Face: Make sure on open house and back-to-school night (or any other family night) that you have plenty of business cards or contact-information cards that include your email, cell phone number (optional), classroom room number, and the school’s phone number. This may seem basic, but that card not only makes it easy for parents to connect with you, it shows them that that you want them to call.
Calling Home: Make "good" calls home as often as you can. There is nothing more depressing than having to sit down after a day of teaching and call five students’ homes with bad news. Calling home with something positive will put a smile on your face and theirs, and it opens the door for a relationship.
When you do have to make that call with a concern, be sure to mention something positive about the student before you say, "One thing I am concerned about . . . ."
Related Resources:
➔ To set up a class wiki, check out Wikispace (http://www.wikispaces.com) and PBworks (http://pbworks.com).
➔ This Edutopia article, "How to Strengthen Parent Involvement and Communication," offers more ideas for increasing parent or guardian involvement: http://www.edutopia.org/how-to-strengthen-parent-involvement.
➔ Download Edutopia’s free "Home-to-School Connections Guide": http://www.edutopia.org/home-to-school-connections-guide
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➔
Bonus: More Classroom Management Resources
RESEARCH
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"Social-Emotional Learning Assessment Measures for Middle School Youth"
This 2011 report from the Raikes Foundation highlights ten useful instruments for assessing the social and emotional well-being of middle school students. The recommendations are based on an extensive literature review as well as an evaluation of 73 different SEL assessment tools:
http://raikesfoundation.org/Documents/SELTools.pdf.
"Social and Emotional Learning Study on the Contribution of the Responsive Classroom Approach"
The article describes the Responsive Classroom approach and the research findings on the impact of the approach on social development and academic performance:
http://casel.org/publications/social-and-emotional-learning-study-on-the-effects-of-the-responsive-classroom-approach/.
"The Key to Classroom Management"
In their article for Educational Leadership, Robert J. Marzano and Jana S. Marzano review the research on effective classroom management and suggest strategies to improve the quality of teacher-student relationships:
http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/sept03/vol61/num01/The-Key-to-Classroom-Management.aspx.
BOOKS
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Teach Like a Champion,
by Doug Lemov
http://teachlikeachampion.wiley.com/
The Morning Meeting Book
by Roxann Kriete
http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/product/morning-meeting-book
The First Days of School
by Harry K. Wong and Rosemary T. Wong
http://www.effectiveteaching.com/products.php?product=The-First-Days-of-School
Positive Discipline in the Classroom
by Jane Nelsen, Ed.D., Lynn Lott, M.A., H. Stephen Glenn, Ph.D.
http://www.randomhouse.com/book/120582/positive-discipline-in-the-classroom-revised-3rd-edition-by-jane-nelsen-edd-lynn-lott-and-h-stephen-glenn
Teaching Children to Care
by Ruth Sidney Charney
http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/product/teaching-children-care
Reaching All by Creating Tribes Learning Communities (30th Anniversary Edition),
by Jeanne Gibbs
http://tribes.com/2009/04/reaching-all-by-creating-tribes-learning-communities/
WEBSITES
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Collaborative for Academic, Social,and Emotional Learning (CASEL)
http://casel.org
Daniel Goleman’s Website
http://danielgoleman.info/topics/social-emotional-learning/
National School Climate Center
http://www.schoolclimate.org
WINGS for Kids
http://www.wingsforkids.org
Committee for Children
http://www.cfchildren.org
Responsive Classroom
http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/
National Education Association (Classroom Management)
http://www.nea.org/tools/ClassroomManagement.html
Tools for Teaching: The Fundamental Skills of Classroom Management
http://www.fredjones.com
Edutopia’s Classroom Management Group
http://www.edutopia.org/groups/classroom-management
13 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
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14
Ten Tips for Classroom Management
How to improve student engagement and build a positive climate for learning and discipline
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HOW TO IMPROVE STUDENT ENGAGEMENT and BUILD A POSITIVE CLIMATE FOR LEARNING AND DISCIPLINE
Ten Tips for Classroom Management
How to improve student engagement and build a positive climate for learning and discipline
TIP LIST
WE’VE ALL HEARD THIS ABOUT STUDENTS: "If they are engaged, they are managed." And this is absolutely the truth. But we still need rules, routines, trust, and student ownership to make a classroom run smoothly and effectively. This guide will address those practical aspects of managing a classroom, with suggestions and resources appropriate for grades K-12.
Most of these tips are applicable to students of all ages, but the actual techniques will look different for the various grades. For instance, Build Community (tip #1), might mean playing name games with elementary students but involve setting up a photo booth for middle school students. Tip #8, Integrate Positive Classroom Rituals, may sound like it’s all about elementary learners, but look for suggestions to make the morning meeting an important part of the day for teens and tweens too.
During my first year in the classroom, a seasoned teacher told me, "You are as much an ethics teachers as you are an English teacher." What she meant was that literature brings along life lessons and themes, so it’s inevitable that you end up deeply discussing morals, what is right and wrong, and wise choices versus poor decisions. It’s no accident then that the ten tips offered here also give a noticeable nod to social and emotional learning, or SEL (http://www.edutopia.org/social-emotional-learning), an approach that teaches children how to handle challenging situations, manage their emotions, and form positive relationships.
And finally, we all know there are more than ten tips for great classroom management, so be sure to visit Edutopia’s Classroom Management Group and share what you do: http://www.edutopia.org/groups/classroom-management.
—Rebecca Alber Edutopia blogger, former high school teacher, and online education teacher at Stanford University
1. Build Community
2. Design a Safe, Friendly, and Well-Managed Classroom Environment
3. Include Students in Creating Rules, Norms, Routines, and Consequences
4. Create a Variety of Communication Channels
5. Always Be Calm, Fair, and Consistent
6. Know the Students You Teach
7. Address Conflict Quickly and Wisely
8. Integrate Positive Classroom Rituals
9. Keep It Real
Partner with Parents and Guardians
10.
visit edutopia.org
tip #1
Build Community
BUILDING CARING RELATIONSHIPS with students is the cornerstone of good classroom management. Building these relationships—teacher-student, student-student, classroom-community—and creating the time and space to do so in the beginning of the year and throughout the following months can make or break a classroom. Simply put, when there is care in the air, there will be significantly fewer behavioral problems.
Greet your students at the door: This simple gesture creates that moment when you and the student make eye contact, speak directly to each other ("good morning"), and have a connection. This may be the only one-on-one you have that day with the student, but it has great value. When you model a respectful way to greet another human being, you are implicitly telling each student that this is how we will communicate with each other.
Get to know one another: Teachers and students begin learning one another’s names the first day of school and should be able to address one another by name within two weeks. Use engaging, age-appropriate activities (http://wilderdom.com/games/NameGames.html) for learning names and for getting acquainted. As students learn more and more about one another, connections will begin to happen. This inevitably leads to more empathy and understanding and, ultimately, caring relationships with a lot less classroom conflict.
Student photos will help you connect names and faces. In this article from the NEA’s website, retired middle school teacher Phil Nast recalls some favorite photo tips, such as having students create their own passports as a first-day-of-school activity: http://www.nea.org/tools/getting-to-know-each-other.html.
With the right app, you can even set up a photo booth in a corner of your classroom—something that should appeal to tweens and teens. Here’s an example using the iPad: http://www.apple.com/ipad/built-in-apps/photobooth.html.
Veteran educator Peter Pappas recommends using the first day of school to encourage teens to multitask, to get students thinking at the same time they’re getting acquainted. He explains on his Copy/Paste blog how an engaging activity like solving a mystery can deliver multiple benefits: http://www.peterpappas.com/2010/08/first-day-school-engage-problem-solve-how-to-get-students-thinking.html.
Definitely take the time and energy to continue growing community and relationships in the classroom. The payoff is worth the effort.
Related Resources:
➔ Read "How to Develop Positive Classroom Management," an Edutopia article on the correlation between relationships and classroom management: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-relationships-strategies-tips.
➔ Edutopia’s Schools That Work series spotlights Louisville, Kentucky’s Jefferson County Public Schools to show how they integrate social and emotional learning into their curriculum. Get suggestions for building relationships with students: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-how-to-build-relationships-worksheet.pdf
➔ Are you looking for more examples of effective classroom-management techniques such as hand signals to use with primary or older students? Watch this Edutopia video, Classroom-Management Tips for Teachers: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-teacher-tips-video.
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tip #2
Design a Safe, Well-Managed and Friendly Classroom Environment
THE RIGHT PHYSICAL ENVIRONMENT helps create a positive learning community. When students walk into a classroom, they need to feel ownership. Their writing assignments and projects should prevail on the walls, and they should have easy access to supplies and handouts and a place to turn in class assignments.
Ask students to be designers of their room: They choose where to hang the dioramas on photosynthesis or the book reports, and they get to do the hanging. Also, charts, directions—any permanent posters—should be written by student hands. The more they see themselves in the environment, the more they feel valued (and the fewer number of conflicts we teachers will have with them).
How’s the lighting in your classroom? Try making small adjustments, such as bringing in a few floor lamps and turning off some of the fluorescent lights. This can create a calmer, less institutional vibe. Learn more about lighting in this Edutopia primer, "What They See Is What We Get: A Primer on Light": http://www.edutopia.org/what-they-see-what-we-get.
Moving desks and trying different table configurations can also create a more friendly setting that’s better suited for collaboration. Social and emotional learning emphasizes student-centered, cooperative learning. This means you will cluster desks into groups or move students so they face one another. This may make your classroom a bit louder, but it helps grow a community of learners a lot more quickly than rows of desks facing the front of the class. Take the plunge and just do it!
Related Resources:
➔ Check out "How Can We Improve School Discipline?" from Educational Researcher: http://www.aera.net/uploadedFiles/Publications/Journals/Educational_Researcher/3901/048-058_02EDR10.pdf.
➔ Get more tips for good classroom design in this Edutopia article, "Give Your Space the Right Design": http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-space-design-feng-shui.
➔ Download this list of effective cooperative-learning activities from the Jefferson County Public Schools: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-collaborative-cooperative-learning.pdf.
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tip #3
Include Students in Creating Rules, Norms, Routines, and Consequences
RULES ARE DIFFERENT from routines and norms. Rules come with consequences whereas routines and norms have reminders. (Read Rebecca Alber’s Edutopia blog post for more on this: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/rules-routines-school-year-start-classroom-management.)
Social Contracts: When establishing both rules and routines, it’s crucial that students have a say in the matter. The teacher’s role is to facilitate and guide students through the steps to develop social contracts. What’s the result? Students have full ownership in what has been decided around class norms, expectations, and consequences.
The start of a new school year is the ideal time to draw up a social contract. Start by asking kids to brainstorm about all the things they see, feel, and hear in a classroom that make them feel comfortable, safe, and happy. Use this graphic organizer, http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-Y-chart.pdf, to create a chart as a whole class and then decide on rules, routines, and consequences together.
Developmental Discipline: How often do you notice the same student arriving late to class, making unkind comments to peers, or repeating other negative behaviors? Change the pattern with developmental discipline. This is a philosophy that has the individual examine why something happened and then consider what can be done to rectify the situation and prevent it from happening again. Developmental discipline encourages teachers to use community-building activities, along with appropriate consequences, to lead students to think about how they behave and how they treat one another. Instead of detention, a student may write a fix-it plan or apology letter or come up with his or her own suitable and effective consequence.
Watch this Edutopia Schools That Work video that demonstrates what developmental discipline looks like in the Jefferson County Public Schools in Louisville, Kentucky: http://www.edutopia.org/louisville-sel-discipline-behavior-video.
The Collaborative for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning, better known as CASEL, shares links to video examples and case studies about SEL schools: http://casel.org/in-schools/selecting-programs/programs-in-action/.
Related Resources:
➔ Whether it is informal chatter or academic conversations, students need examples of how to speak respectfully. Provide discussion stems (http://kms.sdcoe.net/getvocal/107.html) to help scaffold this learning. Also, to reinforce the types of talking that are appropriate, decide together on off-limit words and phrases.
➔ Learn more about the research on teacher-student relationships by reading "Social and Emotional Learning (SEL) and Student Benefits" from CASEL: http://casel.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/EDC_CASELSELResearchBrief.pdf.
➔ Jefferson County Public Schools shares a downloadable protocol for developing a social contract with students: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-protocol-for-developing-the-social-contract.pdf.
➔ The Developmental Studies Center has a good primer on developmental discipline: http://www.devstu.org/page/building-community-in-school-the-child-development-project.
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tip #4
Create a Variety of Communication Channels
HOW MANY DIFFERENT WAYS do students have for communicating with you? The more modes they have, the better.
Teacher-Student Communication: Having varied and reliable options for students to talk with you will help keep your class running smoothly. Here are a few ideas to try:
Encourage students to connect with you online. Provide them with your school email account so they can send you their questions, concerns, and suggestions, or use social-media tools to connect with students who are old enough to have Facebook accounts. To create a private back channel for real-time classroom discussions, check out tools such as TodaysMeet (http://todaysmeet.com/) or Chatzy (http://www.chatzy.com).
Offer a variety of times when you are available. This will make certain that all students are able to come and sit down with you privately for a chat if needed (before school, once a week at lunchtime, any day after school).
Place a suggestion box on your desk where students can leave anonymous notes. You might be surprised to get messages like these: "Please turn up the heat in the morning," "Richard is picking on Jessica after class," or "Please give more examples for writing a thesis statement."
Have students turn in weekly notebooks or project logs. Include one or two assignments for which students can just freewrite anything, including a letter to you if they wish.
Student-Student Communication: Students grow emotionally and socially as they share their intellectual thoughts and ideas with one another. As teachers, we must explicitly integrate as much time for this as possible. We can do so through such activities as think-pair-share, talking-triads, tea parties, and Socratic seminars. To learn more about various thinking routines (and the research behind them), visit the Visible Thinking website at Harvard’s Project Zero: http://pzweb.harvard.edu/vt/VisibleThinking_html_files/VisibleThinking1.html.
When it comes to student groups, be mindful to mix them up frequently to prevent cliques from forming. If you keep groups and pairs in heavy rotation, then in no time, all students will have spent some time with one another and the connections will be visible.
Finally, when you’re talking with the whole class, use phrases that are empowering rather than defeating, accusatory, or negative. As teachers, we must continually model the behaviors—and language—we wish to see in the children we teach.
Related Resources:
➔ Lisa Nielsen shares a post on the Innovative Educator blog about a first-grade teacher who uses Facebook to connect with students and their families: http://theinnovativeeducator.blogspot.com/2010/07/8-real-ways-facebook-enriched-ms.html.
➔ Check out the following chart for examples of empowering teacher language: http://www.edutopia.org/pdfs/stw/edutopia-stw-louisville-sel-empowering-teacher-language.pdf
➔ Edutopia blogger Nicholas Provenzano explains how he keeps issues from escalating in his high school classroom: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/effective-classroom-management-nick-provenzano.
➔ Edutopia blogger Gaetan Pappalardo shares tips on how he keeps his elementary classroom humming: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/classroom-management-strategies-elementary-teacher.
6 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
EDUTOPIA.ORG
tip #5
Always Be Calm, Fair and Consistent
TRUST IS THE BEATING, healthy heart of a functioning classroom. Without it, classroom management is nearly impossible, as is building relationships with students. A calm, fair, and consistent teacher is a trusted one. (Edutopia blogger Rebecca Alber shares more insights on this topic: http://www.edutopia.org/trusting-relationships-teachers-students.)
Calm: Always keep a calm and steady demeanor, even if your head and heart are telling you to act differently. (Don’t ever match a child’s rage, sarcasm, or anger.) Use those acting skills we all acquire as teachers! And when you feel the blood boiling, remember this: Kids do not trust reactive teachers, and often they don’t respect them. Fear should never be the great motivator in our classrooms.
Staying calm means never raising your voice or speaking over the class. If students are talking, wait. Wait longer. Wait until it becomes so uncomfortable that several students begin to shush the others. Then, even if you are feeling beyond annoyed, use a calm, quiet voice so they will need to lean in to listen. Now you’ve got them.
Fairness: Though you may not feel the same way about every student, they should never know or see this. Being fair means all students are under the same rules—and get the same exceptions to those rules.
To make sure you are being fair, remind yourself to do the following:
Avoid calling on or selecting the same students over and over.
Acknowledge to the class when there has been an exception (for a student, another class period, or a group) and, if possible, share why.
Keep a solid line between rules and routines. Rules come with consequences whereas routines come with reminders.
Consistency: If you are having an erratic day, stay the course and don’t change that day’s agenda or class structure. This helps children feel safe.
Modeling Positive Behavior: While you are teaching, you should be demonstrating compassion, caring, patience, and self-control every chance you get. Students’ eyes are on us at all times, even when we think they are immersed in the task at hand. They watch, they listen, they learn, and then they repeat the behaviors they see.
Related Resources:
➔ How well do you support the social and emotional growth of your students? Take this Edutopia emotional intelligence quiz to find out: http://www.edutopia.org/sel-quiz.
➔ Tribes is a research-based process for building positive, respectful learning environments. Watch these short videos to learn more: http://tribes.com/videos/.
➔ Want some help managing a specific classroom situation? Ask the experts at the NEA, and you can expect an online reply within 24 hours: http://public-groups.nea.org/discussion/forum/show/162197.
➔ Edutopia blogger Ben Johnson shares more common-sense classroom-management tips in his popular post "The Barbed Wire Model of Classroom Management": http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-barbed-wire-model. Join the discussion by adding to the comments.
7 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
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tip #6
Know the Students You Teach
ASK YOURSELF THIS QUESTION, "How well do I know myself?" Thinking about this question helps you to better know and understand your students. By looking at your own background (economics, culture, education, and gender), you will be able to acknowledge the lens through which you view your students. For example, if you grew up middle class but teach students whose families live mainly below the poverty line, you can take time to learn about their specific challenges.
The Education Alliance has produced an online guide to culturally responsive teaching: http://www.alliance.brown.edu/tdl/tl-strategies/crt-principles.shtml.
Take a moment to reflect on where you are with all this. Consider the following characteristics of a culturally responsive educator:
She challenges and confronts all stereotypes in the instructional curriculum and environment.
She strives to know her students and seeks professional development and reading materials to learn how to better serve all of them.
She helps her students gain hope and develop strategies for overcoming academic and societal barriers.
She uses texts that are relevant and speak to the lives and experiences of the students she teaches.
When we do our best to exhibit all of these qualities, we are including all children, especially those we most struggle to understand.
How are you doing when it comes to creating a culturally responsive classroom? As a way to invite feedback, consider asking a colleague or mentor to observe your classroom. The Coalition for Essential Schools has developed an observation tool and debriefing guide to make this process productive. Download the PDF: http://www.essentialschools.org/system/school_benchmarks/4/observation_tools/original/Culturally_Responsive.pdf.
Related Resources:
➔ Read more about culturally responsive education in this Edutopia blog post, "Culturally Responsive Education: Cultural Education Through Expeditionary Learning": http://www.edutopia.org/culturally-responsive-education.
➔ For practical pointers on how to become a more a culturally responsive teacher, read this article from the NEA website, "Sounds Great, But How Do I Do It?": http://www.nea.org/home/16711.htm.
➔ Pedro Noguera, in a thoughtful essay that draws on his own family experiences as well as academic insights, concludes, "Differences in race, gender, or sexual orientation need not limit a teacher’s ability to make a connection with a young person." Download this PDF and consider discussing it with colleagues: http://steinhardt.nyu.edu/metrocenter.olde/resources/PDF/Joaquin%27s%20Dilemma.pdf.
8 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
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tip #7
Address Conflict Quickly and Wisely
DON’T LET CONFLICT FESTER. That means you should be sure to address an issue between you and a student or between two students as quickly as possible. Bad feelings—on your part or the students—can so quickly grow from molehills into mountains.
Now, for handling those conflicts wisely, you and the student should step away from the other students, just in the doorway of the classroom perhaps. Ask naive questions such as, "How might I help you?" Don’t accuse the child of anything. Act as if you do care, even if you have the opposite feeling at that moment. The student will usually become disarmed because she is expecting you to be angry and confrontational.
And always take a positive approach. Say, "It looks like you have a question" rather than, "Why are you off task and talking?"
When students have conflicts with each other, remain neutral. Use neutral language as you act as a mediator to help them resolve the problem peacefully.
Educators for Social Responsibilities maintain an Online Teacher Center with a variety of resources and classroom-ready materials (free registration required) that focus on resolving conflict: http://www.esrnational.org/otc.
Not In Our School (http://www.niot.org/nios) showcases stories of students and communities that stand up to bullying and prejudice. Online resources include classroom discussion guides and lesson plans designed to create safe schools, free from intolerance.
Related Resources:
➔ Learning to resolve conflict peacefully is a valuable life skill. Watch this Edutopia video to see how students have become "peace helpers": http://www.edutopia.org/conflict-resolution-peace-helpers-video.
➔ Watch a series of brief Edutopia video clips that show positive discipline strategies in action: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management-video.
➔ Watch an Edutopia video in which students learn the skill of conflict resolution: http://www.edutopia.org/forum-conflict-resolution-video.
➔ What do researchers suggest for addressing classroom behavior issues? Explore the multimedia resources on the Doing What Works site: http://dww.ed.gov/Reducing-Behavior-Problems/topic/?T_ID=25.
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tip #8
Integrate Positive Classroom Rituals
IT’S MORE COMMON in elementary grades that the day will begin with a community-building activity. But getting off to a good start is important at all ages. Here are some suggestions to make it happen.
Morning meetings: This is a brief forum during which each individual in the group is acknowledged. It creates a feeling of "we are all in this together." Edutopia blogger Suzie Boss describes morning meetings at a unique school in Colorado: http://www.edutopia.org/building-school-community-eagle-rock.
Good things: Ask for a few volunteers to share something good that has happened to them (getting an A on a test or having a new baby in the family, for instance). The student can also share an upcoming event that is positive (such as a birthday or trip).
Whip around: Ask students to say one word that describes how they are feeling today. Start with a volunteer and then "whip around" the room. Give students the option to pass if they like.
Related Resources:
➔ Watch this Edutopia video to see what a morning meeting looks like: http://www.edutopia.org/louisville-sel-morning-meetings-video.
➔ Go to Edutopia’s Classroom Management Group and share what you do: http://www.edutopia.org/groups/classroom-management.
➔ Watch an archived Edutopia webinar, "Social and Emotional Learning: Making a Case in an NCLB World," to get more practical tips for bringing social and emotional learning to your classroom: http://www.edutopia.org/webinar-february.
10 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
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tip #9
Keep it Real
DISCOVER THE THINGS your students are interested in—trends, music, TV shows, and games—and incorporate those as you teach the skills, concepts, and knowledge they need. You want to attach the learning to their lives as often as possible.
Tap Into Prior Knowledge and Schema: The father of critical pedagogy, Paulo Freire, rejected the notion that children are empty vessels. Instead, he promoted the belief that learners offer a wealth of knowledge —conventional and unconventional—for the teacher to build on.
Kids with "bad" behavior tend to get treated and taught as if they need to be "filled" with information and knowledge. This tactic, in fact, leads to more acting out. With a constructivist approach, the teacher encourages the child to actively construct new ideas or concepts based upon his current and prior knowledge and beliefs.
Use Essential Questions: Big, overarching questions are a fantastic way to launch a unit of study and to help connect learning with the lives of your students. Essential questions do not have a right or wrong answer, nor are they easy to respond to. They give meaning and relevance to what your students are studying, and they are meant to grab the attention and thoughts —and sometimes the heart—of a group of learners. They are not to be solved but to be discussed and pondered.
Here are some examples of essential questions (but remember to use them strategically and sparingly):
In what ways are animals human and in what ways are humans animals? (science)
What is love? (English/poetry)
When is it acceptable to rebel? (history)
What would life be like if mathematics did not exist? (math)
Authentic Assessment: Authentic assessment (http://www.edutopia.org/stw-assessment-school-of-the-future-introduction-video) measures student learning with relevant, high-level Bloom’s Taxonomy tasks —the kind students might be required to do if they were actually working in the field of study.
To do authentic assessment, you will need to backwards plan, starting with what you want the kids to know and be able to do for the assessment. Grant Wiggins, the acclaimed author of Understanding By Design, calls this "starting with the end in mind."
If the start and end of a unit feel "real" to your students, then they are more likely to be engaged during the important journey in the middle. Edutopia blogger Suzie Boss explains how to get projects off to a good start: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/summer-pd-starting-projects-suzie-boss.
Related Resources:
➔ Read this Edutopia article, "Ten Takeaway Tips for Using Authentic Assessment in Your School," for more on authentic assessment: http://www.edutopia.org/10-assessment-tips-for-class.
➔ Download Edutopia’s guide to assessing project-based learning: http://www.edutopia.org/10-tips-assessment-project-based-learning-resource-guide.
➔ What do other educators have to say about classroom management? Join the lively discussion in response to a post by Edutopia blogger Maurice Elias: http://www.edutopia.org/blog/good-classroom-management-secret-maurice-elias.
➔ Or you can weigh in on blogger Elena Aguilar’s schoolroom peace plan: http://www.edutopia.org/classroom-management.
11 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
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tip #10
Partner with Parents and Guardians
THIS IS THE LAST TIP FOR A REASON. Teachers know that partnering with parents is neither easy nor completely in our control. Returning a teacher’s call may not be the top priority for a parent or guardian. They may be more concerned with paying bills, putting food on the table, navigating the rough waters of managing a single-parent home, and so much more beyond our imaginations.
Yet connecting home and school is worth the extra effort because of the benefits for students. So here are some simple yet surefire ways to partner and connect with parents and guardians.
Intel First: Have kids fill out an "About Me" index card the first week of school. Ask them about their favorite books and school subjects and things they are good at. Also ask for their parents’ or guardians’ cell phone numbers.
Go Digital: Consider setting up your own website, wiki, or page on your school’s website so parents can take a quick look and get up-to-speed with topics of study and class and homework assignments. Edmodo (http://www.edmodo.com) offers a free platform for creating a secure social-networking site for your students and their families.
Face to Face: Make sure on open house and back-to-school night (or any other family night) that you have plenty of business cards or contact-information cards that include your email, cell phone number (optional), classroom room number, and the school’s phone number. This may seem basic, but that card not only makes it easy for parents to connect with you, it shows them that that you want them to call.
Calling Home: Make "good" calls home as often as you can. There is nothing more depressing than having to sit down after a day of teaching and call five students’ homes with bad news. Calling home with something positive will put a smile on your face and theirs, and it opens the door for a relationship.
When you do have to make that call with a concern, be sure to mention something positive about the student before you say, "One thing I am concerned about . . . ."
Related Resources:
➔ To set up a class wiki, check out Wikispace (http://www.wikispaces.com) and PBworks (http://pbworks.com).
➔ This Edutopia article, "How to Strengthen Parent Involvement and Communication," offers more ideas for increasing parent or guardian involvement: http://www.edutopia.org/how-to-strengthen-parent-involvement.
➔ Download Edutopia’s free "Home-to-School Connections Guide": http://www.edutopia.org/home-to-school-connections-guide
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Bonus: More Classroom Management Resources
RESEARCH
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"Social-Emotional Learning Assessment Measures for Middle School Youth"
This 2011 report from the Raikes Foundation highlights ten useful instruments for assessing the social and emotional well-being of middle school students. The recommendations are based on an extensive literature review as well as an evaluation of 73 different SEL assessment tools:
http://raikesfoundation.org/Documents/SELTools.pdf.
"Social and Emotional Learning Study on the Contribution of the Responsive Classroom Approach"
The article describes the Responsive Classroom approach and the research findings on the impact of the approach on social development and academic performance:
http://casel.org/publications/social-and-emotional-learning-study-on-the-effects-of-the-responsive-classroom-approach/.
"The Key to Classroom Management"
In their article for Educational Leadership, Robert J. Marzano and Jana S. Marzano review the research on effective classroom management and suggest strategies to improve the quality of teacher-student relationships:
http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/sept03/vol61/num01/The-Key-to-Classroom-Management.aspx.
BOOKS
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Teach Like a Champion,
by Doug Lemov
http://teachlikeachampion.wiley.com/
The Morning Meeting Book
by Roxann Kriete
http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/product/morning-meeting-book
The First Days of School
by Harry K. Wong and Rosemary T. Wong
http://www.effectiveteaching.com/products.php?product=The-First-Days-of-School
Positive Discipline in the Classroom
by Jane Nelsen, Ed.D., Lynn Lott, M.A., H. Stephen Glenn, Ph.D.
http://www.randomhouse.com/book/120582/positive-discipline-in-the-classroom-revised-3rd-edition-by-jane-nelsen-edd-lynn-lott-and-h-stephen-glenn
Teaching Children to Care
by Ruth Sidney Charney
http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/product/teaching-children-care
Reaching All by Creating Tribes Learning Communities (30th Anniversary Edition),
by Jeanne Gibbs
http://tribes.com/2009/04/reaching-all-by-creating-tribes-learning-communities/
WEBSITES
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Collaborative for Academic, Social,and Emotional Learning (CASEL)
http://casel.org
Daniel Goleman’s Website
http://danielgoleman.info/topics/social-emotional-learning/
National School Climate Center
http://www.schoolclimate.org
WINGS for Kids
http://www.wingsforkids.org
Committee for Children
http://www.cfchildren.org
Responsive Classroom
http://www.responsiveclassroom.org/
National Education Association (Classroom Management)
http://www.nea.org/tools/ClassroomManagement.html
Tools for Teaching: The Fundamental Skills of Classroom Management
http://www.fredjones.com
Edutopia’s Classroom Management Group
http://www.edutopia.org/groups/classroom-management
13 TEN TIPS FOR CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT
EDUTOPIA.ORG
14
Ten Tips for Classroom Management
How to improve student engagement and build a positive climate for learning and discipline
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ABOUT EDUTOPIA
Edutopia is where The George Lucas Educational Foundation’s vision to highlight what works in education comes to life. We are a nonprofit operating foundation dedicated to improving K-12 learning by documenting, disseminating, and advocating for innovative strategies that prepare students to thrive in their future education, careers, and adult lives.
Through our award-winning website, videos, and growing online community, Edutopia is supporting and empowering education reform by shining a spotlight on real-world solutions and providing proven strategies, tools, and resources that are successfully changing how our children learn.
To find and share solutions, visit Edutopia.org.
SUPPORT EDUTOPIA!
WHAT WORKS IN EDUCATION
Donate to Edutopia and join with others who care about changing education. Your support will help us continue to do the following:
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Identify key attributes of successful learning environments
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Bridge the gap between those who are struggling and those who have solutions
*
Improve online tools and resources for educators to collaborate and share with one another
*
Highlight districts and schools that have impactful and replicable solutions
Please join us in ushering in a new world of learning. To make your tax-deductible donation, go to
edutopia.org/support.
visit us at edutopia.org
© 2011 The George Lucas Educational Foundation All rights reserved.
© 2011 The George Lucas Educational Foundation All rights reserved.
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