Parenting and Teaching

I began taking an online class on classroom management a few weeks ago.  (Amazingly our local public library offers a set of local university classes for free and this is one of them.)  Around the same time, I read a review of a parenting book that looked interesting so I downloaded that and began reading it.  I have a class full of first graders and a house with a 2 and 4 year old so both seemed like good ideas.  As I begin moving through both I realize they say almost the same thing!  I don't know why this is surprising to me.  I mean the basics of love and discipline really don't change regardless of who gave birth to the children.  I guess I just expected... something else.  I am not done with the book or the class yet, and some ideas seem more obvious, but some very interesting things I have learned so far...

Take the "I like" or "I love" or "I appreciate" out of your praise.  Unless a child does something directly for you...say draws a picture or makes you a ceramic cat... do not connect their achievements to your approval.  This just teaches the child to do things because they want to please you instead of learning that they should be responsible and behave correctly in society or they should work hard to get where they want to be.  I was blown away by this because in the classroom I am always saying things like "I love the way Ann has her safe body and voice off."  or "I really appreciate the way Jack is working hard on his writing."  Instead I should say things like "Ann, great job on remembering to have a safe body and voice off."  or "Jack, this is good writing.  I can see you have been working very hard on it."  The parenting book says the same thing!  All this time I thought I was doing well by pointing out the positives (which is good) but I always, always connect it to myself.

Second (and I knew this, but it was a good reminder AND showed up in both resources) give choices anytime you can and put them in a positive light so the positive consequence shines through.  For example, instead of saying "If you don't eat dinner you can't have desert." say "Sure, you can have desert as soon as you finish dinner!"  The outcome is exactly the same but the way you say it highlights the positive.  In the classroom, "You may go outside when your work is through." instead of "If you don't finish your work you will have to stay in for study hall instead of going outside to play."

So maybe all of you knew all of that already, but its been great for me.  I am a parent to so many children!  I feel I still have some learning to do to really handle a classroom with ease, set all of my boundaries, and enforce consequences in a way that just comes naturally.  Any other great tips you can give me for seamless classroom management?

Tattle Box

This post was here, and now it is gone.  The only thing left was the comments, title, and labels.  How strange is that?  I was writing about my tattle box.  I have one in the classroom so the kids can write down all their tattles.   Basically in all my ramblings, I said that this is the best way to keep the kids from interrupting the class for tattling and have them practice writing all while feeling like they are still being heard.  Here's a picture of my tattle box.

The kids each have a pad of paper in their desks so they can write down what they need to tattle about.  They are only allowed to put tattles in the box when we line up.  The box is conveniently located on a shelf just by the door.

If anyone has the original post in an email, please let me know!  I will repost.  I can not remember all of my witty remarks from the first time around.  

A Piece of Classroom Management

I realize classroom management is more then just the consequences (good and bad) but that is my focus today. Last year my kids were jumping off the walls.  Literally.  I had an observation by my principal and during the lesson one student got up, ran across the room, jumped off the wall and ran back to his desk.  I was mortified! I needed a better system.

Our school all goes by a color system for the most part.  "Green" is good, "Yellow" is a warning, and "Red" is a call home, or note, or whatever the teacher decides.  Nothing wrong with this system, but over the summer I found one I liked even better.  I actually saw it in several different places so I don't know where the idea originated exactly.  It is the same basic idea as the green, yellow, red - it just has more levels.

My kids had a great day today!  Anyway, every one starts on Green "Ready to Learn".  If they make good choices they go up to Blue "Good Choice".  If they do a great job they go up to Purple "Great Choice."  Should students decide to make poor choices they go down to Yellow "Warning", Orange "Loss of Privilege", then Red "Call Home."  I like this system because the students can go up as well as down.  It makes it easier to make an example of the good kids.  

Some logistics... I had the banner printed at Vista Print (great site if you have used it... you can get loads of free stuff, though I did pay for the banner).  It was their small banner.  I just uploaded a PDF document that had the colors and definitions on it as my image. Click on the link below to access the PDF.

https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B0niKLdbTCbGOTlhZjM3ZmUtYWRmYi00YzdjLTkxYmYtNGFkZTBiMjYxMjFk

If my kids end on Purple they get a Money Card

These are again from Vista Print... 250 free business cards!  I just used one of their already made templates and changed the wording so it worked for me.  They also get a sticker to wear home (again Vista Print free address labels)

If they are on Blue they get two tickets (like the carnival tickets at a fair) and a sticker to wear home...

If they are on Green they get one ticket.  5 Money cards or 10 tickets buys them a prize from my prize box. It seems like a lot, but really, it takes a few seconds at the end of the day to hand out the money cards and tickets.  The kids like it.  They are sooooo excited to get the stickers and end up on purple or blue.  

This is individual behavior.  The class as a whole has the challenge to fill up a hundreds chart.  Each time they get a compliment in the hall from another teacher, or I think they have done an exceptionally good job at something as a class, they get to pick a random number from a bag and put it in the hundreds chart.  If they get 10 in a row we have a Popsicle party.

We have had one so far this year... we are working on our second!  Anyone else have a great system they use?  I'd love to hear about it!  I'm always looking for ways to make mine better.

Whole Brain Teaching

Picture a classroom full of chatting 6 year olds.  Their attention in a million different places... how do you get them back to you?  I've tried it all.  I clapped my hands, I rang a bell, I counted down, I asked them to give me five, I turned off lights, I used all the techniques I had heard of in books and conferences.  They were wild, crazy, non-respondent (ok, maybe not wild and crazy, but certainly not ready to give me their full attention).  I had an 80% success rate at best!  I was wasting valuable time just getting their attention so we could move on.  Then, I spent one morning observing a first grade teacher in our district.  She talked to me about Whole Brain Teaching.  Its an entire system, an interesting approach, to classroom management and teaching skills.  I saw some of it in action and I was inspired!  Since she didn't have the time to teach me everything, I did what I always do - head to the internet!  Sure enough, I came across wholebrainteaching.com.  The website is full of information, videos, instructions, research, processes, and more.  Its free to sign up and have access to everything.  There are a ton of YouTube videos as well of teachers all across the country teaching every subject using this method (from kindergarten to college!)  The amount of information was overwhelming to say the least.   Still I forged ahead.

The website conveniently has a seven step "starter" process.  When I saw this I decided this might be good place to begin (I know, smart cookie alert.)  It begins by telling you to teach your class the "Yes" response to "Class."  You say "Class" the class responds with "Yes."  Keep this interesting by changing the way you say class and they repeat that to say yes.  For example, if I say "Class, Class"  they say "Yes, Yes" or "Classy, Classy, Class" they say "Yesy, Yesy, Yes."  If I use a low voice, they use a low voice.  If I sing, they sing.  I thought, "This is too easy - I've heard about this before... right?  Why haven't I done this..."

I taught it to my class the next day.  It took a few times of them getting it (by a few I mean about 5 minutes), but it has been heaven ever since!  I never have to shout, whisper, turn off the lights, find my bell, or put down things to clap, or anything.  I just say "Class" ... they immediately stop and say "Yes" like a beautiful chorus of angels waiting for their next assignment.  It has yet to fail.  Of course, the system has been in place only a few weeks, but I am thoroughly impressed.  Over break I plan to look more into this entire system of teaching...this seemingly seamless form of classroom management.  Maybe there are more parts that I need to implement into my classroom.  Until then... "Class!"