Classroom Management Strategies

1. Small Classroom
Management
Strategies

2. Successful classroom management relies on
a handful of fundamental strategies and a
larger number of quick interventions.

3. • Not Communicating Expectations Clearly
• Being Inconsistent
• Not Creating an Action Plan
• Waiting Too Long to Intervene
• Going Big Too Quickly
Not Following Through
• Not Establishing Relationships
Common Mistakes Teachers Make

4. FUNDAMENTAL PRINCIPLES OF CLASSROOM
MANAGEMENT
Teachers, like hypnotists, can string along a series of requests by asking
students to do something most are already doing, then waiting for 100
percent compliance, and finally issuing another directive, etc.
It’s better for teachers to say,
“Point your eyes toward me”
and wait for compliance, instead of saying,
“Stop talking, turn around, turn to page 237, take out a pencil, and head
your paper with ‘Geology Frame.’”

5. Keep your consequences as minimal as
possible
When a rule is broken, assign the smallest consequence possible and see
if that gets the job done. Don’t use up big consequences too fast.

6. Appropriate curriculum is a classroom
management strategy
For some students, being thrown out of the room for backtalk has a
lower social cost than appearing dumb in front of peers. Assigning
appropriately difficult work (which often means differentiating)
eliminates that risk.

7. Rehearse transitions
Most disruptions occur before the bell rings and between activities. “Silent
30” is a signal for all students to clear their desks and sit silently within
half a minute. A class reward occurred after 30 transitions were completed
successfully. Kids will love how visitors witnessing the routine would drop
their jaws in surprise.

8. Make positive phone
calls home and send
letters
Another important classroom management technique is the positive phone
call home. Many teachers fall into the trap of only calling home when there
is an issue to report. While these calls are necessary and worthwhile, calls
for celebration are equally, if not more, important. Every parent wants to
hear positive news about their child, and this reinforcement almost always
makes its way back to the student. Try to make one positive call to a
different student’s home every single day, even if it’s simply to report on a
nice comment a kid made in class. This means so much to parents and
students and usually translates to positive classroom behavior as well.

9. Anticipate problems and be creative
At the beginning of one year,
my middle-grade students
would charge into class like
Mel Gibson and a thousand
Scottish warriors. To solve the
problem, I asked my kids to
line up for class outside my
door with their left arm against
the wall and a foot of space
between them and the person in
front of them.
To enter class, each child had to
answer either a content-related
question or a random dumb
question like,
“What type of weapon would you
use to battle Aqua man?”
The dumb questions kept the line
entertained. After answering,
students were directed to take a
seat, quiet as moonlight, and
follow instructions on the board.
Students talking or violating any
part of the protocol were sent to
the back of the line

10. Celebrate your students’ hard work.
Show students that you value the work they put into learning. Identify
milestones in the work everyone accomplishes each day. Once a week, choose
one particularly hardworking team or student to share their story. Let the class
ask them how they accomplished the work. What a valuable lesson kids learn
when they hear peers talking about what hard work means to them. Kids who
know their work will be celebrated instead of just their grades will pay more
attention and stay focused.

11. Never punish an entire class
Even when you feel like the entire class is misbehaving, there are always
some kids following directions. Punishing the class as a group only
incites further resistance.

12. Make sure that students understand the why
and how behind your rules.
Just because you’ve stated, shared,
and posted your classroom rules
doesn’t mean students know what they
mean. Your version of no talking
might be different from theirs. Human
beings talk for lots of reasons, so keep
appropriate expectations. It might
even be OK to joke around a bit as
long as a student is staying focused on
the task at hand. Some teachers find
great success with acting out ways of
talking that are effective

13. Have an actual plan for behavior issues.
When you get your driver’s license, you are taught all the consequences of
poor driving behavior. This helps put you in control of how things go
down. Make a plan for what will happen if a student does something
outside the norm or breaks a classroom rule. Try to come up with very
specific things that might happen and what you will do. In the heat of the
moment, it can be tough to hand out a consequence. Enforce the
consequence without any emotion. “You did this, and the consequence is
this.” This helps students see that the behavior is unacceptable, but the kid
is still valuable

14. Keep track of what you know about your
students
Let’s end where we started. Building relationships with kids is necessary,
but be realistic about how much information you can hold in your head.
Keep a chart or notebook about things you learn from your students. Who
swims on Wednesdays? Who lives with their grandmother? What kid loves
to pick strawberries? Review this chart regularly before you meet with
your students so you can ask them personal questions that show you care.

15. Notice the good things happening in your
classroom
Classroom management techniques that focus on positive reinforcement are very
effective. All too often we spend our days telling students (and ourselves!) what
went wrong. Just as it takes practice to notice things that aren’t going well in our
classroom so that you can course-correct, you might need to work on noticing
things that are going well. Why will this work? We don’t always need to be
problem-solving. Instead, we can be building on the positives, which will then push
out the negatives. For example, if you see kids working together to solve
something, notice it out loud. “Nice teamwork, you two. Can you share why you
decided to do this together instead of on your own?” This way you’ll get to hear
their thinking, and other students will get to learn that it’s OK (and encouraged) to
do things differently.

16. Accommodate All Types Of Learners
Design lessons that take into
account a wide range of
different learners. Some
students learn best with
lectures, others with graphs and
visual presentations, others with
hands-on assignment, and
others in groups or in individual
learning time. Creating lessons
that include a wide range of
learning methods allows every
student the chance to engage
with the material in the best
way for them.

17. Be Enthusiastic
Students can tell when their
teachers are excited about the
material, and it is more likely for
students to be engaged and
interested when the teacher is
enthusiastic. Students naturally
feel the emotions of the teacher,
whether they are excited or
bored, and they are likely to
follow these cues and be more
engaged when they sense
excitement or interest.

18. Give Tangible Incentives
This can include rewarding individual students for good behavior or
rewarding the whole class with a party or special activity for good
behavior or reaching a milestone in learning.