Transcript: Challenge

Classroom Behavior Management (Part 2, Elementary): Developing a Behavior Management Plan

For the past two years, Ms. Amry had been working as a substitute teacher in upper elementary classrooms while completing her degree. She enjoyed subbing and had a positive experience overall. Now that she has graduated and been hired as a third-grade teacher, she’s quickly realizing that she took some things for granted, like the rules and routines that were already in place. For the most part, the students understood the expectations and there were few behavioral issues. But as a teacher in her own classroom, she’s having a hard time getting things to run smoothly. Even after a month of school, her students have difficulty completing routine tasks. For example, something as simple as lining up for recess has become a time-consuming activity: some students blatantly ignore directions while others take advantage of this opportunity to talk loudly or goof off. One student even accused her of being unfair after she reprimanded them for not lining up correctly. Ms. Amry is frustrated and eager to get things on track, but she’s unsure how to get her classroom to run smoothly.

Here’s your challenge:

What should teachers understand about effective classroom behavior management?

How can teachers develop a classroom behavior management plan?

For more resources about evidence-based instructional and behavioral practices, visit iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu or iriscenter.com.

Transcript: Lori Jackman, EdD

For an individual teacher who’s just been hired to be able to walk in with a plan of what are you going to do when a kid misbehaves, or what are you going to do for the kids who behave, and what are your expectations, and how are you going to teach it to the kids, so to be able to walk in with that that first day kind of helps them cross the threshold of their classroom a bit more confident than the teacher who’s, like, “I’ll figure it out. I’ll figure it out,” which is what I was told in my teacher prep programs. “Don’t worry. You’ll figure out that discipline thing once you’re there.” I think it gives them an air of calmness when they stand up and introduce themselves to their students those first days of “I’m your teacher, and here’s the plan for helping us all behave.”

Transcript: Melissa Patterson

I think the biggest piece of advice is to have that behavior management plan, but then to make sure that you leave room for flexibility. Because you can create the best plan but then go in and find that it’s not going to work in that specific classroom. So leaving room for flexibility, understanding that things change at the drop of a hat, and that you’re going to have to make changes. But I think the flexibility has to be there for student input as well. You can create a plan, but if you go in and you set all of these hard, concrete rules you’re going to have a lot of student pushback. But if you involve students in creating their environment, you’re going to have a lot more success when the students feel like they have some kind of control over their own space.

Transcript: Lori Delale-O’Connor, PhD

Cultural Capital

Cultural capital is this idea that students and their families are familiar or are unfamiliar with what is deemed the “legitimate” culture within a society and in particular within a school. So it’s do you know how to engage the way the school expects you to? And if you do you’re rewarded and rewarded in the sense of you might get better grades. You are going to get opportunities because your teachers are going to say, oh, wow, what a great behaved student, what a high-achieving student. And a lot of that stems from not necessarily a student’s ability to do something but their understanding of how school works essentially, and their families understanding of how school works. When I think about families, some great examples are do you know how to contact a teacher in the way that the teacher expects and is deemed appropriate? And you’ll see cultural differences in that. In some cultures, it’s really believed that education is meant to be left to teachers, and there’s a high amount of respect. And so, as a parent, I’m going to trust that you know your job. You’re really good at it. And it would be an insult to you if I came in advocating for my student. Or, similarly, that actually the education is meant to happen between young people and the teacher. And so if there needs to be any intervention or if there needs to be conversation about it, it’s the role of the young person. In white, middle- and upper-class schools, there is a strong expectation that parents know how to intervene on behalf of their children. And the outcome of that often is that families might get what they want. And that might be an intervention in terms of my child needs something else. Perhaps reconsider my child’s grade. And similarly for young people there is an expectation of how you might advocate for yourself. And so they learn to argue in a polite and respectful way for what they want, and they learn to advocate for themselves from a very, very young age. And these sort of things are unstated. And if you are a young person coming from a family where you’re told to be deferent to the educator or to adults in general, and you’re really told not to speak unless you’re asked a question then you’re not going to know to advocate for yourself. And so basically with cultural capital, the idea is that it’s passed through families, and it helps them do better in school. If the ways that families know and value education aligns with the ways that the schools, their young people grow to also know and value education.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

Discrepancies between classroom and students’ cultures

The culture of schools and classrooms is really important for teachers to consider, particularly in thinking about the structures that make up education and schooling. What we already know about the cultural gap within the classrooms between teachers and students, we need to think about ways to alleviate that gap and allow primarily minority students to learn within a predominantly white and female school. The discrepancy means that the faculty and the teachers need to actively consider the environment that students are placed in and then think that it comes from mostly one or two traditional ways of understanding learning but more specifically as it relates to classroom management. One or two specific ways of how to behave and how to act within a classroom or a school environment, those sort of ways of acting and behaving does not necessarily always align with how other cultures think about or process appropriate behavior. The idea of misbehavior has multiple different definitions, and the way it can look in one certain classroom or within one certain school can differ, and without specifically aligning that or coming to an understanding of what that can look like there’s going to be discrepancies. And for teachers to be more culturally responsive, they need to understand that there are traditional structures within the school and within the classroom that need to be addressed, whether it needs to be changed directly or incorporate students’ voices and their opinions and perspectives so that the students can succeed within that environment.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

Developing a culturally sustaining classroom behavior management plan

Many teachers are often wanting to establish a certain type of classroom without any sort of flexibility. They have an idea of the classroom, and they want to stick to that and make all students within that classroom abide by that particular structure. Beginning teachers in particular, they’re often focused on maintaining authority and being able to essentially control the kids, be able to have them listen and do what they want to do in order to follow through on their lesson plan. But that’s not necessarily culturally responsive in the sense that it’s not necessarily considering what the students need in order to succeed within the classroom. So in order to consider a culture within these behavior management plans, often the easiest way to integrate that is through student input, being able to allow for opportunities for students to help create some of the structures, whether it’s the rules or procedures, and thinking about what it is that not only allows the teacher to succeed in the classroom but also what it takes for those individual students to engage with the material and be able to be as successful as they want in the classroom.

Other ways that behavior management plans can be more culturally sustaining would be to have the teacher build relationships with the students or to have the students have positive interactions with one another. In order to incorporate student input, the teachers really need to know their students and be able to understand what helps them to learn. And so, in order to do that, teachers often just rely on a beginning-of-the-year get-to-know-you paper, but students’ needs are individual and they are evolving and developing over the course of the year, and so the teacher constantly needs to check in and to get to know them and even share bits about themselves with the students so that they can build a strong bond that can then allow the teacher to understand what allows those students to engage with the material. And the same goes for allowing opportunities for the students to build relationships with each other, to get to know one another so that they can collectively learn, as well. It’s difficult for the teacher to be able to differentiate one lesson 20, 30 different ways for each individual within the classroom, but if they can think about collective similarities across students and see how they interact with one another and how they can help one another to learn and grow, that will allow for opportunities to change and adapt these structures within the system. Then the last bit would be to also consider families and community and peer teachers in considering additional factors that can help teachers succeed in building an effective classroom management plan.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

In terms of a statement of purpose, all teachers should think about what they want to accomplish in the classroom, but they also need to consider what the students and the parents and others, the actual constituents of the classroom, want to accomplish as well. And there should just be a merging of those goals and objectives, as opposed to having the teacher create something and assuming that one box fits all students. Being able to allow space for it to incorporate the individuals that it’s working with will allow it to be more respectful and responsive, as opposed to creating a definitive statement that does not allow for the flexibility of those who it is currently teaching.

Transcript: KaMalcris Cottrell

My classroom statement of purpose aligns with our school-wide statement of purpose. It gives us our expectations for the day from the student side and from the teacher side. And this mission statement covers our four Be’s: respectful, responsible, ready, and safe. There are the things that we’re saying we’re going to be every single day. And with this in place, I also incorporate myself into this. I tell the students, I will be respectful, I will be safe, I will be responsible, and I’ll be ready. So when you come to my group, I’m going to be ready for you, and we’re going to be responsible, and we’re going to work on the skills that we need to work on. And I think this is important because this is throughout our entire school. So even when we come together as an entire school body, everyone knows what the four Be’s are. So if we say, “I will be ready,” students start to check themselves. Oh, am I ready? Am I sitting safely? Is my voice off? Am I paying attention? Are my eyes on the speaker? So just the four cue words. But I think it also covers individual work in the classroom. It covers group work in the classroom. It also covers outside of the classroom.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

Strategies to ensure that rules are culturally sustaining

One thing that teachers can do is spend time to define different words. So the word “respect,” what does that mean for each individual, and how can those different definitions be shared and encapsulated within a specific rule? One person may define respect as keeping your hands and feet to yourself, whereas another student can define it as in not talking while the teacher is talking. And so being able to hear all of the students’ beliefs and being able to create something that is comprehensive enough that all students feel heard throughout. Another word could be “engagement.” What does it look like for these students to engage? Some students may want to shout out their answers. Other students may want raised hands. And so providing spaces for each of those types of students to be able to participate in the activity without it being a detriment to others and being able to find compromises throughout that allow all students to feel like they’re in a safe learning environment so that they can learn and grow as much as possible. Students often just want to be heard, and I think the teacher has an obligation to provide the students voice in the classroom and be able to build an environment based off of their needs, rather than focusing specifically on what the teacher wants to accomplish.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

Strategies to ensure that rules are not culturally biased

Oftentimes, I see rules that are biased when they define structures only one way, whether it’s the idea of engagement or learning or respect or interactions. It’s only when the teacher accounts for the students and thinks about multiple ways for things to be accomplished do I then consider things to be a little bit more culturally considerate. But beginning teachers in particular, they want to establish one type of authority, one type of control. And in order to do that, the students must follow one way of doing it. Oftentimes, that’s the way of being silent, quiet at your desk with only the teacher’s instruction being heard and being the one to delegate information. It may be easier in the sense that it’s quiet and silent and what the teacher had always envisioned. But just because they’re silenced doesn’t mean students are learning. They need to really think about what it is the students need to succeed and to engage with the material. I think students can share what it takes for them to engage and to learn. But I think if you have the opportunity to also ask them, what does it take for others within your classroom to learn so that they can kind of step outside of themselves and really consider their peers and being able to recognize that most students are pretty honest in saying, “Well, I know for me I need this, but I know other people, they may need something a little bit different.” So is there a way to bridge and compromise those sort of differences? I think another way would be to have the teacher consider certain times that prioritize certain structures and other times that prioritize other structures. So the idea of engaging in classroom, some students like to yell out the answers because to them they’re so excited they have it they just cannot wait, as opposed to others who want the opportunity to raise their hand and be able to be called on. I think there’s value in both, but I think there is a time and place for both. And so the teacher can preempt lessons or discussions and saying, “At this time, we are going to accept hands raised only” or “At this time, I just want to hear you shout out the different answers.” I think that allows students to be able to feel accepted in certain places. And I think the teacher also has the opportunity to share with the students the pros and cons of both types of modalities, because to some extent the students need to be able to understand these different structures. They need to be able to recognize that it’s appropriate to do certain types of actions and not so much in the others. Being able to work between different environments can equip the students to be able to succeed in multiple contexts, but also recognize the value of different types of participation in this example so that they can continue to grow as learners.

Transcript: Lori Jackman, EdD

When I was in the classroom, one of the things I would have posted on every wall was a list of the rules, positively stated. If I had someone who was doing an exceptional job at one of the rules, I could say, “Hey, so-and-so is doing a great job with rule number two. They’re following directions, and they’re on task,” and I could just touch and point to that poster to remind them of what they’re doing right. But also to use that “Hey, class, let’s take a look at rule number three. What are we supposed to be doing? That’s right. Get back on track.” And I could nonchalantly, as I walked around the room and as needed, point to it to remind them either what they’re doing, what I want them to continue to do, or what it is that they should start to do so that they can get back on track.

Transcript: KaMalcris Cottrell

I think it’s important to set rules early in your school year and maintain a consistent basis for these rules. I believe it creates an effective learning environment by setting expectations and structure for how the class will flow and proceed. I do have a few rules that are staples, but I give my students the opportunity to share what they would like to see happening in our classroom, ways that we can be respectful, responsible, and we list out things. And it allows students to have a conversation. If Johnny says, “Oh, I think we should chew gum in school. I don’t think that should be against the rules.” Sally might say, “Well, if we chew gum at school, what if it falls out of our mouth and gets stuck on a desk or stuck on shoes?” So it allows within the peer group a conversation of pros and cons. And I think it’s great because they both have valid points. So we talk about it as a class and we say, “Well, as a school, the rule is we cannot chew gum,” and it covers safety issues and cleaning issues. So we agree upon the no-gum-in-school, but I love the opportunities that pop up with the students giving their suggestions and students agreeing or not agreeing. And we do talk about it’s OK not to agree, but we’re going to do it respectfully, and if you have something you would like to say, we don’t have to agree with you. We will respect you, but we don’t have to agree with your statement, such as the gum incident. But it gives the students ownership for the classroom that they’re going to be in all year. So they’re setting these expectations. I hold them to those expectations. And, of course, I make sure that the foundational ones are in there, but they do a great job of covering most of them. And it gives an easier redirect to say, “Look, we agreed we’re going to do this. Are you doing this right now? Take a minute and think about it,” and I’ll leave it at that because they have the chance to see the rules that are in our room hanging on the wall for everyone to see. We write it nice and big as a reminder. It is an easier redirect, even it could be non-verbal, which is even better because then everything keeps flowing. There’s no interruption.

Transcript: Ashley Lloyd

Classroom rules are the key to maintaining an effective learning environment. When children know what is expected of them, introducing and teaching classroom rules is a multi-step process in my classroom. It always starts with explicitly teaching the rules through words and pictures and then we take some time to role play, and that includes examples and non-examples. So we make sure that everyone understands what is appropriate and what is inappropriate. Then we move on to the guided practice steps where children are guided through the rules and expectations and then rewarded for those small things, whether it be a high-five, whether it be some extra time outside because everyone figured out that rule. But it really is important to give them that guided practice. We make sure that we hit back on these things after every transition, every time we’ve been out on a break. Every Monday when we come back children need to be taught. So we make sure that we’re going through those things and that the expectations are visual and posted at all times so they can always be referred back to. I invest instructional time in teaching rules because it actually saves so much time throughout the year. If children know what’s expected of them and we can just get to work, we don’t have to take time to stop, reassess, and get back on track because everyone knows what is expected of them.

Morning arrival

Procedure:

1. Greet teacher and classmates
2. Hang up backpack and coat in your area
3. Place homework folder in desk and book to read on desk
4. Get breakfast and quietly read while eating
5. When breakfast ends, gather trash to put in bin

Morning meeting

Procedure:

1. Eyes are watching
2. Ears are listening
3. Hands in lap
4. Legs are crossed

Dismissal

Procedure:

1. Clean up area around your desk
2. Grab coat and backpack
3. Teacher will call on row (or group) that is packed up, silent, and ready to line up first
4. Walkers and car riders exit through hallway A
5. Bus riders exit through hallway B

Walking in the hallway

Procedure:

1. Eyes forward
2. Hands to self
3. Voices silent
4. Feet walking

Turning in Assignments

Procedure:

1. Double check for name at the top
2. Pass assignment forward
3. Student at front of the row collects assignments and hands to teacher

Restroom use

Procedure:

1. Raised hand with fingers crossed
2. Wait for teacher to nod yes
3. Take bathroom pass
4. Walk to the restroom quickly and quietly
5. Wash hands
6. Return to class and begin working again quietly

Throwing away trash/recycling

Procedure:

1. Make a pile on your desk
2. Wait for the trash helper to come around
3. Gently put your pile into the trash can

Asking for help

Procedure:

1. Silently raise hand
2. Wait patiently for teacher
3. If teacher is busy, try working on the next question or problem

Getting/Returning Laptops

Procedure:

1. Quietly stand and walk to the cart
2. Gently unplug/plug in your laptop
3. Hold it with two hands
4. Walk back to your seat

Lining up

Procedure:

1. Facing forward
2. Silent mouths
3. Hands to yourself

Going to lunch

Procedure:

1. When called, get your packed lunch, and get in line
2. Walk down the halls quietly, keeping feet and hands to self
3. Enter cafeteria and if getting lunch get in line
4. Once served, sit at your assigned table
5. Remain seated until signaled to clean up
6. Throw away trash on way to lining up by exit door

Sharpening Pencil

Procedure:

1. Silently hold up one finger
2. Wait for your teacher to nod yes
3. Walk to the pencil sharpener and sharpen pencil
4. Return silently to your desk

Fire and disaster drills

Procedure:

1. Stop what you are doing
2. Voices off, ears listening
3. Quickly and quietly line up at the door

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

The main goal for procedures is ways to expedite regular processes within the classroom and being able to maximize the time students have to learn and to engage. I think that requires student input not for all procedures, but for certain ones that are particularly difficult or challenging or may just benefit from having other perspectives in order to solidify some of these classroom procedures. The one that really stuck out to me is the idea of tardies or absences because it’s going to happen within the classroom and teachers need to really consider what that may mean for student learning. Oftentimes, teachers just outright penalize students for coming late to the classroom. But I think it’s different when you start considering the student and the root of that challenging action. Maybe their parents are working multiple jobs and getting them to school in time isn’t a possibility, or there’s just some lag in terms of the priority of being right on time. And so being able to work with that student and work with the family to share your view of punctuality but also being flexible and saying, “Well, I understand you just can’t come on time because you’re getting off of a night shift.” Is there a way to not penalize the student? Can we spend additional time after school? Can we spend time during lunch in order to make up for the missed learning or the curriculum that is occurring? I don’t think students should be penalized for things that are definitely out of their control. And so the more the teacher can work with them in order to solidify things and understand the background of what’s happening will allow for structures within the classroom to be more culturally responsive.

In general, being culturally responsive towards aspects of classroom management really comes down to understanding the root of these behaviors or potentially misbehaviors. To you, it may be a misbehavior, but the more that the teacher can dig in and understand why things are happening, that can allow for changes to happen within the classroom that are more responsive to those students. So part of it is an individual consideration, but it can be a cultural difference that is occurring that certain groups of students are acting a certain way. And so it’s up to the teacher to understand why, as opposed to forcing those students to learn or to engage in the way that only the teacher wants. And so the more that they can find out the why of things happening, the better they will be at being able to manage the classroom.

Transcript: Lori Jackman, EdD

How to decide when to put a procedure in place: If there is a process that would make your teaching life easier, would help things run smoother in your classroom—for example, you know, a student getting permission to use the restroom on an individual basis—if you can think about the task analysis of what you would need to have done as a classroom teacher in order for a child to be able to let you know, sign out, use the bathroom, check back in again, and return to their seat, that can save you a lot of time throughout your teaching day.

So if you see there’s a way to come up with a process to make your life easier, let the kids know the steps that need to happen, that’s a good place for the procedure. Some real common procedures are having kids use a pencil sharpener, using the lavatory, how to sign up for lunch, checking in for attendance in the morning, turning in homework—are all things that if you can come up with the steps and sequence to have it happen successfully, once you work with the students to help them understand it then it just becomes automatic, and it saves you actually a lot of correcting of behavior and earns you back some teaching time, because they know what the process is. They know what the steps are. If you’ve already started your school year and maybe had a procedure for walking in the hallways or signing up for lunch and realize that things are not going as smoothly as you’re transitioning from one class to the next, or that getting them lined up at the end of the day to walk the hallways to get their buses isn’t going as well as you think it could, that would be indication of that it’s time for a procedure.

It’s not uncommon when you put a procedure in place that there might be the need for refinement down the road, but doing the task-analysis, working with the students so that they understand what’s expected, having them practice it before they ever need it, and then rewarding it, recognizing when people are doing what you need them to do and in that prescribed order can help smooth things out.

Transcript: Melissa Patterson

At the very beginning of the year, we take the first two weeks really hammering in, practicing classroom procedures so that they understand how it’s going to work going forward. When they come in and the bell rings, I start the day over again. We all go back outside. We practice coming into the room. What does that look like? Going to the front desk, grabbing your notebook, sitting down, starting your warm-up. If we’re using computers that day, how do we get the computers? At the beginning of the year, I’ll assign them a numbered computer. They will go up. Number one goes first. They sit down. Number two goes. We practice putting them back. Even if we haven’t used the computers yet, we’re just practicing that routine. They get a schedule of what to expect both every week and every day. This is what we’re going to do first, second, third, having that schedule on the board for them to see so that they can get used to that idea. So, as painstaking as it could be, we practiced those procedures every day for at least the first two weeks of school. They knew what the warm-up would look like, how it would be structured, how long they’d have to complete that warm-up before moving to the next activity, what to do if they didn’t complete it in time, how to schedule makeup work time, how to contact me if they had questions. They were all things that were super annoying for them at the beginning of the year but then after that first quarter really helped the class room learning to flow. Whether it was 45 minutes or an hour-and-a-half for that class time, they knew how to accomplish what they needed to do.

Transcript: Melissa Patterson

One of the big ones we found to be very successful is calling home to tell parents that their students are doing well. It’s one of the strongest positive consequences, especially for students who do have trouble regulating their behavior, is having their parents hear that they’re doing well, because their parents hear that they’re doing badly all the time, and they don’t often hear that. Even just praising out loud in the classroom: “Thank you so much for raising your hand and letting us know that you understand what you’re learning. That’s really great. I hope at some point everyone has that opportunity.” And so not just praising the person who did the positive thing but then encouraging others to do the same, because hearing that Sally did really good every single day is not necessarily going to in turn make me want to behave well. So reminding the rest of the class that they can do that, too, works really well.

I keep special snacks that I just toss out, even for small positive behaviors, so that it encourages students to do the right things. Like, “Oh, you raised your hand instead of shouting out the answer. Here are some fruit snacks for you.” “You entered the classroom without announcing your presence. Thank you so much. Here’s your fruit snacks.” And it seems silly, but some kids don’t get fruit snacks every day. I mix up the snacks, and they’re really small, and I try to avoid candy as much as possible. Sometimes it’s extra pencils. Sometimes I have them at the beginning of the year make a list of three things that are meaningful for them, that would encourage them to follow the everyday expectations. Giving them that power as to what their positive consequences could be really helps them to want to reach those high-level expectations.

Transcript: KaMalcris Cottrell

I’ve noticed that positive consequences are well received when it’s in front of peers. They love to be praised or rewarded in front of their peers. And I think it definitely helps them to build a sense of trust within the adult because they’re being rewarded. They must have followed through on one of our rules. So I think it builds trust within that adult that you’re going to do what you said you’re going to do. If I’m following the rules, here’s what I receive. I think it also accomplishes a scenario where other students can see this student and say, “Oh, Johnny raised his hand. I’m going to raise my hand instead of calling out next time.” And not to say that every positive thing is rewarded every single time, but it helps build and boost the morale of your classroom if these positive things are happening. I also love to find out what the students are interested in. If your favorite football team is the Ravens, maybe I can find some Raven football erasers. If you love unicorns, maybe I can find unicorn pencils. So little things like that, and put them in a grab box that they can go and choose what they would like. I think that also says a lot from the student’s point of view that the teacher cares about things that I care about. And I think that’s another important piece to build trust towards the adults.

Transcript: Angela Mangum

Students love stickers. They will go crazy for them. I’ll hand them out like candy, and I’ll be silly and put them on their forehead, and they think it’s hilarious. So if you’re feeling like I have to pay for things–I have to get candy, I have to get food because they want more stuff–they love stickers. Other positive consequences that I have found to be really helpful are letting them pick their partner or letting them pick their seats for the day. And these are all free. I think there’s a lot of struggle sometimes to find ways to motivate kids or to give them prizes that are free, but they really like silly videos on YouTube. So if it’s appropriate, and they say we can do all this, you get to be the person that picks our two-minute video that we can all watch today. Things like picking partners or having a moment where they can showcase something they’re really interested in. A lot of them love to draw, so they want to put the drawing on the board today. That’s a really big deal because then they can show off their artwork to their classmates. And it’s little things like that that help them to feel like their talent or their skill is seen and appreciated. Those little motivators are a really big thing or a fun thing for them to share with you. I noticed that my students respond in a really joyful way when they earn a positive consequence. They’ll smile or they’ll say, “Thank you, Mrs. Mangum.” They feel like they matter, and I think they love to feel like you respect them, and they love to feel important to you.

Transcript: Ashley Lloyd

Negative consequences sometimes are just necessary. Children need to know what’s going to happen if they choose not to comply. If activities can be as engaging as possible, it sometimes makes negative consequences a lot easier so that they can be connected to whatever activity is happening. So if children are doing an activity where they are painting, and a child cannot comply with using paint appropriately, simply having them understand that if you cannot comply with the expectations of painting then you will have to do this activity with crayons. Something as simple as understanding that this fun, engaging part is going to be taken away if I cannot comply helps them make a better choice when it comes to completing the activity in a positive way. It’s important to keep in mind that negative consequences should always be connected to the behavior. It’s also very important that the negative consequence be fairly close in timing to the behavior. So saying something like, “You haven’t finished your morning routine. You’re going to have to stay late at the end of the day,” especially for young children that can become very disconnected for them. So if a consequence can be given fairly close to when the behavior is occurring, it tends to be more effective.

Transcript: Angela Mangum

My negative consequences help to maintain an effective learning environment because students know when I say I’m going to call home, I am going to call home, and it often shows them that when I say something, I mean it and I will follow through. I think that’s a slippery slope a new teacher could fall down if you say, “I’m going to contact home,” but you don’t. I like to say. “You’re choosing to do this behavior, and this is what happens when you do this” and being firm with that and following through. And I think when you follow through, you see those behaviors change because they know, “Oh, she’s going to call home.” And now with all the technology available to teachers and after a pandemic where everything was done via email or even text message, it opened those lines of communication more than it has ever before, at least from my experience. For me to say, “I’m going to text mom,” they know it takes me two seconds to pull up mom’s cell phone number and text mom. I’ve done it in the middle of class, and then the students get a text from their mom and the whole class is like, “Oh, she really did it.” Yes, I did. I said I was going to do it, and I did it. And I think when you say you’re going to do something and you do it, the behavior changes. And then when the kid comes back another day and has a really good day, I text mom again and say, “Today we had a great day, and this was what Johnny did, and it was awesome.” Making sure that the parents are getting both, because not any person, not any kid is all bad all the time or all good all the time. That second text, I think, is more important than the negative one, because they might be used to getting those negative text messages or negative emails all the time, but that one positive one might be the only one they’ve gotten in three years, and that’s the one that makes the bigger difference.

Transcript: KaMalcris Cottrell

Negative Consequences Should Be Equitable and Appropriate

If the boundaries are broken, a negative consequence should be assessed. The consequence should fit the infraction. If Sally is going to not raise her hand and yell out, she shouldn’t be sent to the office. That consequence doesn’t fit the infraction. So I think it’s important that we have steps for negative consequences, and if they are followed through, hopefully we don’t get to the point of an office visit or having to leave the classroom. But if your boundaries are broken, I think it’s important to give that negative consequence and be consistent with it and be equitable with it. So if a male is out of his seat running out of the classroom, they will receive the same consequence as a female. So I think with your negative consequences, remember to keep them equitable, most importantly, and make sure the consequence fits the infraction.

The negative consequences shouldn’t be based on anything outside of the classroom. Majority of the time, that student has no control over what’s happening outside of the classroom. This is their safe space. So we want to maintain it and keep it their safe space. So we don’t want to reference things that they don’t have any control over that might make them feel less than because that’s truly not the case. So as you’re delivering a negative consequence, make sure that it’s equitable, make sure that the consequence fits the infraction. You don’t want to be any more harsh to a person of color or any more strict with a boy than you are with a girl. Just make sure that your consequences are, across the board, level. If you have a calm-down space, it should be comfortable for a male or female. It should be in a space that’s safe, and the color of the skin should never factor into your consequences and for that matter should never factor into your positive consequences. Really try to check yourself. And it might be something that you have to really self-reflect on to see if that’s one of your implicit bias, because you may be doing it and not be conscious of it, and the student may realize it but not quite understand it. So, again, that could give that feeling of less than, so we want to make sure that we’re equitable with our positive and negative consequences.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

Considering Intent of Consequences

When delivering consequences, teachers should always consider the intent from the students. They need to think about why a student acted a certain way in order to get to the root of the issue and be able to address it from that sort of manner. In general, teachers for dealing with negative consequences need to always consider the severity and the background that led to those specific actions and the type of consequence that needs to occur afterwards. The idea of to praise loudly and to correct softly is super helpful for all teachers. It’s so easy to only focus and then draw attention to negative actions that happen in the classroom. And so it’s up for the teacher to turn the page and focus on the positive and to make that known to others. Oftentimes, there’s one or two students that is misbehaving, but that also means that there’s 20 or 30 students who are behaving positively. And to be able to highlight and to publicly celebrate those who are doing the correct things oftentimes helps to correct the misbehaving student to recognize that they are not on-task or doing what’s necessary. And so the more teachers can focus on that, the easier and the more positive classroom environment they are creating. One thing that teachers should consider is that the consequences should always be logical to the action. Teachers should have a set understanding of consequences that they provide, such as an increasing ladder of actions that happen as a result of misbehavior or of positive behavior, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that each and every misbehavior should automatically follow suit with that. It should be a guide, and it should allow the teacher some flexibility in terms of dealing with the behavior or the actions that happen within the classroom. One thing that often happens is that beginning teachers can often get themselves in trouble because they escalate things within the classroom by solely following through on these specific charts, as opposed to not considering the severity of the action or failing to recognize the root of that misbehavior. Teachers need to think about what best can help those students to get back on track with the learning.

Transcript: Andrew Kwok, PhD

Restorative Justice

So, one thing to consider in terms of implementing consequences is not just providing that consequence, but also what is the next step and how can you restore things and make things right afterwards. Students obviously don’t like to receive consequences and they could potentially hold anger or resentment or frustration against the teacher, which could then exacerbate things even further. And so the more the teacher can work with that student to figure out why did that behavior happen in the first place, how can we prevent it moving forward, and then work from a clean slate moving forward can allow for that teacher to be successful.

Restorative justice is the opportunity for teachers to work with students, particularly the one that has caused harm in the classroom through a misbehavior or something of that nature and helps to restore that individual with the teacher and the classroom environment by opening up discussion of why that misbehavior or action happened, and who did it harm and how can things be changed moving forward? So even though it may be just from that teacher and the student, you could also have harmed other individuals. And so it brings into a safe space of discussing the action that occurred and the consequences that it had on potentially multiple parties and being able to then utilize that information to restore what has happened within the classroom to help make things whole again and be able to integrate them back into a safe learning environment.

That also depersonalizes things a little bit more because it’s easy for the teacher to take those actions as a personal infraction on them as opposed to a child is just being a child. And when you take things personally, you often will respond in a defensive mode and cause an escalation of that interaction moving forward. So the more that the teacher can work through these steps of trying to restore and build that trust again and build the opportunity for that student to participate back into the safe learning environment, the easier it will be to consistently give that consequence and work with those students moving forward.

Transcript: Melissa Patterson

I try to keep negative consequences to the individual student. I think we’ve all learned that shame is not the appropriate way to end negative behaviors and encourage positive behaviors. So instead, I will address it immediately. “That’s not an appropriate behavior. We’ll talk about it in a minute” and then finish whatever lesson or piece of the learning that we’re doing in that moment and then have a separate conversation with that student outside of the classroom. Quiet, levelheaded, level-toned conversation. “Why do you think we’re having this conversation? Do you understand why that behavior is not appropriate? What can we do together to make sure that that behavior isn’t repeated?” That doesn’t always work, but in approaching it in that way they understand that I’m there to help them reach that level of expectation. I’m not there to discipline them, I’m not there to punish them, but to make them realize why the expectation is important, how they didn’t meet that expectation, and what they can do going forward to meet it. Sometimes that ends the behavior, and that’s great. They’ve recognized their situation, and they’ve remedied it. Sometimes I call home with them in the room so they can immediately speak to the parent and have an opportunity to give their side once again, always giving them some kind of power back. I try very hard not to call home at the end of the day, but to call home as soon as I have the opportunity to do so, so it’s fresh in the child’s mind, it’s fresh in my mind, and so that they know there’s an immediate consequence for that behavior.

Having that immediate response helps the student regulate the behavior going forward. “Oh, I remember that when I did that last time this happened, so I’m not going to do it again.” But also that cool, calm, and collected tone when assigning a consequence, giving yourself time to regulate your response. A lot of times, we get heated in the moment when assigning a consequence, and it can come out really negative. But we want to make sure that when we’re assigning a consequence, when we’re talking about those expectations that need to be met, that we are doing so in as calm of a manner as possible so that the student understands, “You’re not a terrible person. You just didn’t reach the expectation that I asked for.” It’s really important to reflect on how we would like to be corrected in a situation. I would never want my principal to call me out in front of 120 other teachers to say that I didn’t do the attendance correctly or I wasn’t on time to school. I would much rather my principal pull me aside and have a separate conversation about the expectations that I should be reaching and how I’m not. It’s really important to have those conversations, not necessarily privately, but definitely in a reduced setting so that they understand that this isn’t about embarrassing you in front of your friends. This is about making sure that our environment is a safe and comfortable as possible.

Transcript: KaMalcris Cottrell

I think it’s important to let the class know what the expectations are at the beginning of the year, mid-year, and at the end of the year. So that follow-through, the consistency of maintaining our rules. So if you didn’t allow call-outs at the beginning of the year, don’t let them start to call out in the middle of the year, because the end of the year is going to be either you fighting to get them back to not calling out, or at that point, sometimes you just want to throw your hands up. But I think it’s important to maintain the rules, the consistency throughout the year. With our different holiday breaks that come in, I think it’s important to review the rules, when we come back, touch base, make sure that everybody’s on that same page. And I tell them, Ms. Cottrell’s ready. Are you ready? Here’s what I’m going to do. Here’s what I’m expecting you to do. And we can get back into the flow after the holidays. It seems like students benefit from reminders, so I don’t mind giving reminders. And non-verbal is great, or verbal if it has to be. A few verbal within a short time, something else needs to happen. So that next action step, we need to know what’s going to happen in the meantime. I don’t want to throw that action step on the fly. I want to make sure it’s thought out. OK, if Johnny is calling out consistently, and I’ve given him four reminders in the last half an hour, something else needs to happen. What’s going to be my next action step for calling out, whether it’s Johnny or Susie or Kevin, Jerome, Nancy, it doesn’t matter. This is my next action step for my call-outs. What’s going to happen next? Because the reminders are not working.

I think it’s important to avoid the power struggle within your classroom, so have a system set up. So maybe the calm-down corner is the best case, and it’s nice to have a reflection sheet there, depending on what level you’re working with. Some kids can usually break down what the infraction is and maybe one of their ideas to change it. And within that time—I wouldn’t give it all day—but somewhere in that time I would touch base with them to say, all right, thank you. Yes. You’re acknowledging that you were calling out, and, oh, I love your idea. You should try raising your hand. Let’s work on that. OK, and the first time that kid raises his hand, I call on him to say this is what you said you were going to do. You’re trying it. I’m going to acknowledge your effort. What do you have to say? Thank you for raising your hand. It always comes with a thank you for raising your hand, because you’re acknowledging their action steps to change their behavior in a positive way. And I always use short directions. Too many words get things mumbled. It can overwhelm a child, so short directions and leave it there.

Transcript: Lori Jackman, EdD

There are times when our students may get the best of us, and we may not follow the system as closely as we should. I’m guilty of sentencing a child to lunch detention for the rest of 7th-grade, which after a couple days of cooling off realized that really did me no good and did him no good. I think there’s times when our emotions get caught up in the interaction with our students, and we may say or set up some kind of consequence that isn’t really connected to the management system and isn’t really beneficial in helping change that student’s behavior. The best thing that I have found to do when I did sentence that child to lunch detention for the rest of 7th-grade is to talk to him and say, “I was really upset, and I didn’t really mean to do that, and this is what we’re going to work out from here.”

Transcript: Michael Rosenberg, PhD

For the most part, students, when they do engage in disruptive behaviors, tend to engage in minor attention-seeking types of actions. When a student may engage in a pretty severe acting-out behavior, one that threatens themselves or other students, it is very useful to have a behavior crisis plan. In many cases, these behavior crisis plans involve having a preselected series of actions of what you’re going to do if a student engages in a crisis type of action, such as throwing a dangerous object, jumping on desks, things like that. One might be a signal that one would have to go and get support from other people in the building. Another action might be a room-clear, where all of the other students know to clear the room to maintain safety for everyone involved.

Transcript: KaMalcris Cottrell

It is imperative to have a crisis plan in place, because it’s going to happen. So if we have it in place, everyone’s going to be on the same page during the crisis, because there’s usually not much time to communicate in the crisis. The most important thing is the safety of the student, the safety of the staff that will be interacting with the student. It’s important to know who’s going to be in the lead when dealing with this crisis. Many times, if you have multiple adults talking to one student who’s already escalated, it doesn’t go well. They don’t receive it well. They’re at a point where even one adult speaking to them is not always received well. So I think it’s important to know who will lead, who will be the speaker. I think it’s also important to have a place where the student can go to de-escalate, a safe space within the school that the person can be walked to. Usually if a student is in a heightened state, use short, direct statements—”Please follow me. Can we go down this hall?”—and then give time to process. I mean, of course, it all always depends on the level of the escalation, but usually they’re willing to get out of the situation to go somewhere else, and that’s what you’re affording them to do.

So as long as you have that safe space for the de-escalation is great. The teacher should have a chance to say what happened, but not in front of that student and hopefully not in front of her classroom either. That debriefing should happen away from the student. So within that response team, if there’s someone who can stay with her class, if it’s that important that that message needs to be delivered right away, that would be great. If it can wait until the end of the day, also wonderful. But that information should not be given in front of the classroom or in front of the student who was in the crisis mode. Within that classroom for the de-escalation, it’s important to allow the child to go through the entire cycle. You can’t explain to them when they’re at the top of their crisis mode. It’s important to let them come back down so that emotional and that physical intensity has released. And that may be them crying. It could be them being super lethargic now, even to the point of falling asleep. But I think it’s important to let that process take place and then go back to revisit before we do our restorative practices so you can touch on what happened, why it happened, what to do next time, and how do we do that, and who do we need to apologize to? So within the construct of the cycle of escalation/de-escalation, we let that happen and then we can speak with the student. And, again, it should be a one-on-one or small-group setting just so you’re not overwhelming the student.

Transcript: Michael Rosenberg, PhD

We think of the action plan as being the to-do list for rolling out the comprehensive behavior plan in one’s classroom. Think of it as the components of a task analysis. As you’re completing this task analysis, what are all of those things that you need to do in order to make this plan happen? First, it’s important that you give the plan a chance to work. Your students are going to test you at every interval. Remember, be consistent throughout the plan. Second, re-teach the management plan at regular intervals. This is important if you want the students to remember all of the elements of the behavior plan. Third, directly teach the plan to new students. Many of us work in environments where there is a high degree of students transferring in and out of the building. New students coming in don’t necessarily know the plan, and that plan needs to be taught to those students. Fourth, share the plan with others. Make sure that the administrators in the building know the plan. Prepare a way for a substitute teacher to implement the plan. Be sure that related service personnel are aware of the plan, and that they can share in administering the plan. Finally, show the positive side of the plan to parents. Parents enjoy knowing that their children are being recognized for appropriate behavior while they’re at school. As you have found, comprehensive behavior management takes time and effort. The important lesson here is that this can be done, and our classrooms can be responsive to all children.

Transcript: Lori Jackman, EdD

One of the items that you could think about putting in your action plan would be a summary to a substitute. In most classrooms, you have to have a substitute folder, and that could be one of the opening documents that would let that substitute know that you had a classroom management system in place, and here is the basis of it. Even maybe design an opening lesson for that substitute teacher to let the students know they’re on board with your management system. Certainly, we’ve all had, “No, no, no. My teacher doesn’t do it that way!” It can be a little bit awkward, but by the kids seeing that the substitute is on the same page as much as possible with the classroom teacher and that the systems are still in place can really be beneficial to having a better substitute day. And, ideally, if you’ve got a management system in place where kids are starting to learn to regulate their own behavior, not behaving because you’re standing over them, not behaving because they are afraid of you, they will rise to that occasion.

Transcript: Lori Delale-O’Connor, PhD

I always like to say the action plan is a living, breathing document that changes and is updated to reflect the needs of the classroom, and that those needs of the classroom, of course, come from the teacher, but also come from the students and the families. So you may find not even in the middle of the year, but a few weeks in that as we get to know each other better, there’s some needs that we didn’t recognize or address, or there are some things that we didn’t expect. Part of that is just being transparent and saying that families can expect communication about it. And for the students you can expect that we’re going to talk about this sometimes, but then connected to that is thinking about the ways this is communicated. There’s, I think, a lot of work done more recently on what school or teacher communication with families can and should look like to better support families in both understanding what’s going on and feeling included and in feeling like they can participate. Part of that is engaging in that communication in a variety of ways, finding out how do parents best communicate and respond. Is it by way of course management systems? Is it by way of a letter home, although those often end up crumpled into the bottom of backpacks? Is it by way of a direct phone call? I know that some teachers are engaging in TikTok videos or other modes of short, to-the-point communications with clear opportunities for feedback. And so what is an opportunity that if I’m a parent in a classroom or I’m a caregiver in a classroom that I can say I can just text you back? I can leave a voicemail. I can send an email. And then also, of course, taking into consideration language needs. Is this available in all of the languages that are spoken among your students and in your classroom? Recognizing that for some schools and for some teachers, that’s going to need a little bit more lead time because things are going to need to be translated. Another really, really strong way to support this is engaging parents or caregivers as partners early on. If you have parent liaisons who are getting the word out, they would be a source that might have already gained the trust of other caregivers. You might have parent liaisons who share information and make sure not only that it gets out but there are clear ways to get feedback if it’s needed.

Transcript: Michael Rosenberg, PhD

An effective behavior management plan should make explicit a number of components in order to be effective. What we want to start off with is a statement of purpose or a mission statement, and this is a brief, positive statement that conveys to all of the stakeholders—parents, students, related service personnel—why the various components of the plan are necessary. What we would hope is that this statement is focused, direct, really clearly understood by all involved, and free of educational jargon. We also hope that it would be inspirational, that people see this statement as important because it leads to a positive outcome.

Rules are explicit statements of the expectations for the classroom. When developing these classroom rules, we want teachers to limit them to four or five, not a large number, and make sure that they’re stated positively, that they use simple, specific terms, that they’re observable and measurable, and that they convey the expected behavior to the students. These should be clear; understood by the students. And, in many cases, we urge teachers to model those behaviors that the rules convey.

Procedures are how teachers expect students to perform certain classroom routines. It’s a description of the steps for successfully completing such things as walking in the hallway, going to the cafeteria, responding to fire drills. But in considering the development of procedures, teachers need to decide why the procedure’s needed, under what circumstances the procedure is needed, when the procedure is needed, and most importantly how the procedure is built, specifically step by step, how do we want the students to behave in that circumstance.

Consequences are the actions that teachers take when students behave appropriately or inappropriately. It’s very important that when students follow rules or procedures that teachers provide a positive consequence. This positive consequence, we expect, will reinforce that rule compliance. In contrast, when students choose not to follow the rule or violates a rule or procedure, the teacher provides a negative consequence. What we expect or what we hope for is that negative consequence will decrease the likelihood that students will engage in that rule violation in the future. Now, the very important thing about consequences is that they be applied with consistency. If we lack this consistency, students will not know exactly how to behave. And in an inconsistent environment, student behavior tends to go and take the path of least resistance and we see large amounts of problem behavior.

When a student may engage in a pretty severe acting-out behavior, one that threatens themselves or other students, it is very useful to have a behavior crisis plan. In many cases, these behavior crisis plans involve having a preselected series of actions of what you’re going to do if a student engages in a crisis type of action, such as throwing a dangerous object, jumping on desks, things like that.

Finally, an effective classroom management plan must have an action plan. And this is a method for implementing all elements of the comprehensive plan. Think of it as a toolkit of forms and supports that one can use to make sure that the plans that are made actually happen. Elements of this action plan include how we are going to teach the comprehensive plan to students? How are we going to share the plan with other personnel or colleagues? How are we going to disseminate this plan to parents? And one thing that’s often overlooked is how are we going to review elements of this plan in the future to ensure the maintenance of the success of the comprehensive plan?