I was looking at the Teacher Circle poll and saw that Classroom Management had the majority vote so far. You will soon find articles on classroom management, but right now I wanted to share with you what I do as part of my classroom management, and it has been a huge success with much praise from the administration.
The first thing that I do has a very creative name of “Sticks” :). The class needs to work together as a team in order for them to achieve a stick. Depending on their behavior, the number of sticks given at one time varies. On the first day of school, my fifth graders and I work out rewards in intervals of 10 for achieving sticks. For example, this year, when the class achieves 10 sticks, they don’t have spelling homework for the night (they have spelling HW every night), when they achieve 20, they get to bring in snack the next day and have 15 minutes in the morning to relax, talk with their friends and eat snack. Thirty sticks gets them 20 minutes of free time on Friday afternoon. Then you get to say things like, “If the whole class lines up properly, you will achieve 2 sticks.” “If I see everyone listening and on task, you will achieve 3 sticks.” It’s amazing how well behaved they can be. These good behaviors start to become automatic and they start to remind each other how to behave. They absolutely love it! They feel so proud when they achieve one of the levels. This can work at any grade level.
If you have your class sitting in groups, here is another thing that I found to work beautifully. Let the group create a poster with a team name. Hang those posters up. When the group as a whole performs in a way that you expect, that group gets a paper apple, pumpkin, etc. (depending on the month) stapled onto their poster. I usually write on the paper apple why they received that apple. At the end of the month, or whenever you are ready to switch groups, each member of the group with the most apples receives a homework pass or whatever you find to be reasonable.
I have had much success with these, and if you have any questions, please use the comments and ask. I would also love to hear other ideas that are being implemented.
