Classroom+Management+Theory

=**CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT PLAN**=

**__Description of Universal Level Classroom Management System __: **

**The first day of school:** The first day of school is the most important. On this day we will establish our classroom seating, rules, consequences, token economy, and other behavior reinforcement strategies. My plan for seating the students on the first day of class is to have two decks of playing cards. I will use the face cards from each deck. Each desk will have a face card taped to it. As the students enter the classroom, I will greet each one at the door and hand them a face card from the second deck. I will instruct each student to sit at the desk with the matching face card and to begin working on their “student interests” sheet. This sheet will be a survey so that I can find out the interests/likes/dislikes of my students. Each student will also write their name on a popsicle stick which I will use as a random way to call on students. It is good for a first assignment because all students can complete it successfully. I may continue the passing out of face cards each day so that seating is random and I can determine who works well sitting next to each other. Depending on my students’ behavior, I may let them sit where they want during each day of class. If their behavior is inappropriate, I will assign seats and have a seating chart. I will let them know that it is up to them as to whether or not they choose their own seats each day.

**Classroom Rules and How They Will Be Taught:** On the first day of school, I will share our schedule for the day with the students. This will be posted at the front of the room. We will decide what the rules for our classroom will be, through class discussion guided and directed by me. We will devise our classroom rules based on the general school rules. Some rules, for example, could be:

1) Raise your hand to speak or ask a question.  2) Keep your hands, feet, and body to yourself. 3) Listen when others are speaking.  4) Always have two pencils sharpened //before// the start of class.

We will, as a class, go over these general rules and fill out a Rules Within Routine Matrix to show what those rules would look like in different situations. We can also do some role-playing to demonstrate the desired behavior. We will try to have as few rules as possible and rules will be short and to the point. I know that some think that it is a bad idea to have students come up with the classroom rules, but I feel that if the students have some say in the rules – with my guidance, of course – they are more likely to follow them and less likely to argue about them.

**Classroom Consequences and How They Will Be Taught:** We will then go over our classroom consequences (both positive and negative). We will go over the consequences for desired behavior as well as consequences for when a rule is not followed. These consequences will be developed by me before the start of class and will be put on a “What If?” chart at the front of the room. This chart will show the order of consequences for students who follow the rules, as well as what happens for students who do not. It will also contain a “serious behavior clause”. We will role-play the process of these consequences. I will put the students in groups of two and have each pair role-play some of the consequences in order, for both desired behaviors and undesired behaviors. Some of these consequences would be:

=__Positive Consequences__ =

Teacher will read for an extra 10 minutes

Class eats lunch in a special place

Extra PAT minutes are added

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">(will explain PAT minutes later)

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">Tickets given out to students

=<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">__Reductive Consequences__ =

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">Verbal warning

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">Name on board

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">Checkmark next to name on board

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">2nd checkmark next to name and student fills out note for home

<span style="display: block; font-family: Arial,Helvetica,sans-serif; margin: 0in 0in 0pt; marginbottom: 0pt; marginleft: 0in; marginright: 0in; margintop: 0in;">Next, I would like to break up the day by doing an “ice-breaker” or “getting-to-know-you” activity. (This is for the first day of school only.) One activity I have is called a Classmate Scavenger Hunt. In this activity, students have a list of quests. They must walk around and talk to their classmates and find someone who has, for example, slept in a tent, likes to swim, been to another country, etc. When they find someone who fits the quest, they write that student’s name in the box. (I will walk around and fill in my own quest list also.) After a few minutes, we will all sit down and share our quest lists and see who has something in common. (We can use these later, during math, to create charts and graphs.)

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">**Reinforcement Strategies and Monitoring Procedures:** I have two main universal reinforcement strategies. One is a token economy using tickets and the other is called PAT (Preferred Activity Time). The token economy is based on individual students’ behaviors and PAT is a group contingency system. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The first universal reinforcement strategy, the token economy, is where students will earn tickets for preferred behaviors and lose tickets for undesired behaviors or breaking the classroom rules. For example, students will earn two tickets each time they go directly to their seat and begin working quietly on the morning activity. They will also earn tickets each time they follow the classroom rules. Alternatively, tickets can be given out intermittently instead of //every// time they follow the rules. Students will also earn bonus tickets for being courteous and respectful to their peers or adults. Students will lose tickets for things such as breaking classroom rules and/or wandering around the classroom when they should be working. The tickets will be the type of tickets you get at a fair or carnival. I will stamp the back to avoid counterfeit tickets and students will need to write their name on the backs of the tickets so that no one else can use them. These tickets can be redeemed at the beginning of each week or save their tickets until the end of the month. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The rewards that the students can redeem their tickets for will be on a list. Alternatively, each student could have their own personalized list of rewards developed by me and the student together. Each reward will cost a pre-determined amount of tickets and will be rewarded immediately after all students have redeemed their tickets. To prevent “hoarding”, all tickets must be either redeemed or relinquished to me at the end of the month. I will keep a chart with each student’s name and the amount of tickets they earn each week. The whole process then begins again. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The second universal reinforcement strategy is called PAT. I learned of this group contingency strategy from a fellow teacher. PAT stands for “Preferred Activity Time”. PAT is a way for the class as a group to earn minutes for being on-task, following rules, and displaying desired behaviors. They also lose minutes for being off-task, not following rules, and displaying undesired behaviors. Here is how it works: <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Displayed on the wall in the classroom is a PAT chart. It has three columns: START, +/-, END. At the beginning of each day, the class starts with 5 minutes of PAT time. Throughout the day, minutes are added and/or subtracted for class behavior. At the end of the day, the minutes are added and/or subtracted from the 5 minutes they started with and a total is put in the END column. The PAT time the class earns is used at the end of the day (or added up to be used at the end of the week, if the students are OK with delaying that long). I will begin by letting my class cash in on their PAT time at the end of each day. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">It is important to note that PAT time is **not** free time. It is structured time that is fun for the students and still contains learning. PAT time can be used in a variety of ways. It can be used to play an in-class game, do a fun learning activity, play cooperation/team-building games, or go outside and do an activity. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">The point is to make it fun, so that it is actually //preferred// by the students. One idea for PAT time would be to put the class in teams and play a Jeopardy game using science facts, math problems, vocabulary words, etc. (In fact, on the first day of school, you could use PAT time to play a game to review the classroom rules and consequences.) I will also use the idea of Public Posting using a line chart so that the students can see their progress of PAT time earned throughout the month. Of course, both of these strategies would be coupled with praise and excitement. It is also important to be consistent and remember the IFEED-AV rules for reinforcers. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Other general types of reinforcement I will use are the Wandering Social Reinforcer (wandering around the room giving praise for desired behaviors while teaching and while students are working), pre-correction (telling students what behavior is expected before students make errors), and developing an attention-getting signal for the class, such as clapping a pattern, saying “knock-knock” and students answer “who’s there”, or holding up two fingers (“signals on”). I will also use response cards within my lessons in order to engage all of my students in the lesson/activity. I really like the idea of the Mystery Motivator and I might incorporate that into my classroom reinforcement program also.

**Transitioning Between Activities:** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">In order to make transitions between activities smooth, quick, and orderly, I will use a timer and make it into a game. First, I will use pre-correction such as, “I know all of you want to beat your record transition time and will move quickly, orderly, and quietly in order to do that.” I will remind them of what they need for the next lesson/activity and will then say, “Good luck!...1, 2, 3, go!” and start the timer. I will time their transition and keep it on the board. Each time they equal or beat their record time for transitioning, they will receive PAT minutes and praise and I will write the new record on the board. Kids are very competitive and I feel that this will get my students excited about transitioning as quickly and orderly as possible. Also, when we need whole-class supplies such as markers, the overhead projector, calculators, etc., students who are “employed” in the job as “distributors” (from the employment board) will know to hand those supplies out while the other students are getting ready for the next activity/lesson. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">To transition into groups and/or teams, I plan to have popsicle sticks with each student’s name on them. I will draw these randomly to construct the groups/teams. I can also use this as a strategy for choosing students to read aloud, answer questions, run errands, etc.

**__<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Conclusion __:** <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 12pt; line-height: 115%;">Many new teachers make the mistake of thinking that their students will simply come into class and sit and listen. In order to be effective teachers, we must have a plan in order for our classroom to run smoothly and for our students to be engaged and eager to learn. While it is possible that problem behaviors will //not// occur in our classroom, having a plan is the number one element that will determine whether or not our classroom will run smoothly and whether or not our students will feel that they are in a safe and secure learning environment. By having a plan, we as teachers will be more prepared and will in turn be better and more successful teachers for our students.