Classroom management

I'm still plugging along with Blog Hoppin's Teacher Appreciation Week.  Today's topic is Classroom Management.  By the way, if you stop by this blog, even if you don't read the entire thing, can you please leave a comment to let me know you were here?  I've got two comments IN TOTAL so far and I'd really like to end the week with at least five.  (High expectations, no?)

Twenty-two years later, I've tried a bunch of those classroom management systems. I've taugh middle school for all but three of those years (when I taught high school), and I can definitely tell the moon cycle based on student behavior! For the past few years I've been using a combination of 1-2-3 Magic and Love & Logic, but I did that old name-check-consequence public humiliation, Assertive Discipline, red card, all those trends. I'm too old for trends now, so I just adapt what I feel comfortable with.

Rewards - I teach 7th grade and I do not support the idea of a token economy at this age. (BTW, when The Princess is this age, I totally plan on continuing our token economy as an allowance. What works at home may not always work with 125 students!) my school has a P*sitive Behavi0r system(trying to throw off search engines with the symbols) where students get a ticket for doing the right thing. Categories in our school are cooperation, accountability, tolerance, and safety. For the most part, I only issue these when I notice a bunch of kids NOT doing the right thing (like too many chatty kids during the warm up or many missed homeworks on Monday), and I give the tickets to kids who were accountable for their learning. If everyone is perfect during a drill (or most kids are), I'll give a ticket.

Consequences - With 1-2-3 Magic, consequences are built into the program.  One means "stop what you're doing," two means "this is your last chance," and three means "time out."  Most of the time, I just have kids sit alone in the back of the room; in honesty we hardly ever get to three.  It's really only when a student is continually disruptive to the point other students can't get their work done that I send students out of the room.  Generally, I go by the rule of thumb that it's a bigger punishment to deal with ME than to sit in the air conditioned office and overhear the gossip.  I also like that Love & Logic offers students choices, both are acceptable to you as the teacher but one is much more along what you would like them to do.  For example, you can finish the work in class and not have any homework, or you can keep playing this game for five minutes and finish alone for homework (usually said when the game is clearly producing too much "excitement").  I'm not a fan of detention and only assign it when students misbehave for a substitute teacher.  My reasoning is that, if a student misbehaves in my absence then I need to send a message to that student AND to the rest of the class that it is unacceptable so a harsher-than-usual consequence is applied.

On task behavior - The old adage, the best way to avoid behavior problems is to have good lessons, definitely applies!  I do several activities each period and I try to order them so there is some kind of fun, engaging, interactive thing in between two more boring things.  YouTube is one of my best friends, simply because I can put on a two minute content-driven video that the kids will laugh at and then we can get back to something else.  There are some GREAT student-created verb conjugation videos!

Some people say Middle School is the worst age to teach because the kids are "walking hormones."  Once you figure out that they are extremely self conscious because they ARE walking hormones, all you have to do is work with that knowledge.  Don't embarrass them, don't call them out, acknowledge the good and sometimes overlook the not-so-good.  They are still kids and the like to have fun, but they think they are adults so they think they want responsibility.  They are MIDDLE kids in every sense.  And I love it!