Classroom Management Guiding Principles

Classroom Management Guiding Principles


Principle 1 - Establishing Routines
My first principle for establishing good classroom management is having a consistent daily routine that students can rely on to know what is coming during class and to keep order in the classroom. I think this lends itself, in part, to behaviorist learning theory because students will know how it is appropriate to behave during different times throughout the day and students are conditioned to behave in certain ways as well. Routines that I have considered implementing in my classroom are having a "turn in bin", utilizing student mailboxes, and having morning journal time.

My reasoning for having a "turn in bin" is so that students know exactly where they need to put their completed work. That way, they are responsible for being sure it is where it needs to be and it creates less of a hassle than collecting papers individually. Along the same lines, I plan to have a mailbox system so that each student has their own mailbox (or cubby, if space allows). I think that this will lend itself tremendously to classroom management because students can check their mailbox at the end of the day to get back any work, I can be sure that each student is receiving any important information that needs to go home, and students know how they will be getting their homework back instead of returning papers to the student at different times and fearing that they may get lost. When passing back papers, this system will also be beneficial because I can return papers during a break or lunch so that students are not losing any instructional or educational time because I have to pass back papers.

Finally, I plan to implement a journal time at the beginning of each day. Students will know that they are expected to journal for 10-15 minutes right when they come in so that I can take care of logistics like attendance and lunch count, while they are getting into an educational mindset right off the bat. Some days I will have specific topics for the students to write about in their journals, while other days I will let them write about what they would like, or even draw pictures, to illustrate their thinking. Aside from buying me a little bit of time at the beginning of each day, it also gets the students ready to learn by hopefully engaging them right when they walk into the classroom. These journals can also be used as formative assessment for a particular subject we might be starting so that I can gauge what prior knowledge each student has and use what they already know to create cognitive dissonance and to inform my lesson plans (CLT).

Overall, I think that routines are especially important to classroom management because we are all creatures of habit and if things are continually changing in the classroom, chaos will usually occur and the explanation of new things will ultimately result in the loss of precious learning time. Routines are also extremely important for diverse learners because the routine becomes one less thing for them to figure out when they are struggling with the content. Routine helps to make ELL students more comfortable in their environment because they are able to figure out what will happen next, and special education students often have a very difficult time functioning without any routine, as a part of their disability.


Principle 2 - Having Explicit Expectations
My next guiding principle for classroom management is explicitly addressing my expectations with my students and holding them accountable to those expectations. I believe that all students have the ability to learn and that a student is more likely to feel they are able to meet expectations if the teacher believes that the students are capable of doing so. Expectations can be taken from two related, but different, perspectives: how students are expected to behave in the classroom and what the students are held accountable for with their own learning.

Clear expectations go nicely with a set routine because students know what is going on in the classroom and how to act throughout the day because of the behavioral expectations put into place (BLT). It is important to note though, that after setting those expectations, teachers need to be sure that they are following through will them accordingly every time so that students know that they will be consistently upheld to behaving in a certain way. These expectations would make clear that certain behaviors that are disruptive to class are not ok, and that if a student is misbehaving, there will be certain consequences for their actions.

Not only will clear expectations make the classroom run more smoothly, but clear expectations will also set up how students will view learning within a certain teacher's classroom. For example, if a student knows that the teacher expects the class to know facts for a multiple choice test, the student, depending on their views of learning, is more likely to simply memorize the information in order to get a good grade on that test instead of spending more time to create a deeper understanding of the material. If teachers are promoting cognitive dissonance amongst students (CLT) and recognizing the process of learning more than the graded outcome, students are going to perform differently in the classroom.

Hopefully, by setting high, clear expectations for my students, they will be more likely to put forth more effort in their learning because they know that my expectations for them are high. That being said, I think it is also important to note that some students, particularly diverse learners, may need more scaffolding and support than others to meet those expectations, but that they will be held to the same standards to a certain degree. I think that having clear expectations is important at every age level, but that they need to be appropriate for the levels of the students and for what their capabilities are at the time (DLT). I am still wrestling with how I want to address students who are acting out of line and are failing to withhold any expectations I may have, but I am leaning most strongly towards, at least at first, just having a conversation with the student to determine why they weren't acting how they are expected to act, and to ask the student what he thinks he needs to do in order to meet those expectations (CLT).


Principle 3 - Building Strong Relationships
Perhaps the most important of my classroom management guiding principles is building strong relationships in the classroom. This includes my personal relationship with each student, as well as the relationships of other students to each other. This guiding principle focuses mostly on CLT because it is focused on social interaction and the learning that social interaction promotes. I will promote student/teacher relationships by personally getting to know my students. This includes what they are interested in, what their home lives are like, what they view their talents are, and so on. By getting to know each student on a personal level, I think that a better level of respect can be reached between my students and me. By knowing students individually, each student will hopefully feel as if he or she is a part of the classroom and is valued and important. If each student feels like he or she has a place in the classroom, I believe that student is less likely to act out, especially if there is a mutual respect between the teacher and the student. If a student is acting out, then knowing what is going on in his or her life may be helpful in finding the source of the problem and working towards fixing that issue. A lot of the time problems at home can be a huge factor for why students are acting out in the classroom, but if I, as the teacher, have a strong relationship with my students, I can talk to them and figure out what is going on and help the students to understand why it is important to act in a different way.

I also plan on fostering relationships amongst students to aid in classroom management. SLT tells us that students learn from modeling and from interacting with peers and adults. Because of this, I plan to have my students seated in small groups so that they are encouraged to bounce ideas off of their peers and can help each other when necessary. Having students discuss in small groups will allow me time for other things I might need to do like run to the bathroom, pick up some copies, deal with an individual students, or write something up on the board. Of course it will take time to get students comfortable with sharing with each other, but after doing this consistently, students will know what is expected of them when they discuss in groups. Without those relationships with their peers, students may not feel comfortable talking about issues in their learning, which could eventually lead to classroom management issues like acting out or simply not paying attention because the student doesn't understand what is going on.

Building strong relationships with diverse learners will be especially important because they are the individuals that are more likely to need a little extra help. Knowing a student's background, particularly for an ELL students, will be a tremendous help in determining what prior knowledge the student has (CLT), and ways in which you can make that student feel comfortable in the classroom. For students who may have disabilities, knowing what they are capable of and also what they particularly struggle with is going to be very helpful when planning lessons. Particularly with diverse learners who have behavioral disorders, knowing that student is going to contribute tremendously to how you react if they do act inappropriately during class and ways in which you should deal with that issue. Building strong relationships with your students is important because those relationships demonstrate that you care about them as a person and not just about what grade they get on a test. From those relationships, students will hopefully respect me as their teacher, as well as respect what expectations I have put into place for their benefit.


Principle 4 - Active Mental Engagement
Active mental engagement (AME) is my next guiding principle because if students are actively mentally engaged, there will be fewer opportunities for classroom management issues. AME, an implication from CLT, is especially important to classroom management because AME is the time that students are actively thinking about what the teacher wants you to think about. This mental state is what is going to keep students on task during a lesson because they will actually be engaged in the material instead of not paying attention or goofing around. To create AME, it is possible to approach learning as a puzzle to be solved or as an investigation so that the learning is more interesting that simply reading from a textbook. I believe that my plan for a daily journal beginning the day will be beneficial in creating AME because I hope to make the journaling something for students to use in order to explore new ideas and to critically think about what we have been talking about during class. If anything, the journals will serve as a "brain warm up" so that students are in the right mind set to learn.

If a lesson is too abstract, then a student is less likely to be actively mentally engaged in class. Therefore, it is important to make concepts more concrete when necessary, as implied from DLT. However, it is also important to challenge students with more abstract ideas within a concept if a student is ready for that next level. This goes along with the concept of zone of proximal development (ZPD), as implied from social learning theory, because if the material being presented is either way above or way below a student's ZPD, they will either become very frustrated with the material and give up trying to wrestle with the concepts, or they will become bored with the material because it will be way too easy for them to grasp, with little cognitive dissonance or AME required to understand what is going on. When a student is bored or is frustrated, it creates an opportunity for that student to act out or to be off task because they are not actively mentally engaged. If, as a teacher, I can keep my students actively mentally engaged at least for a vast majority of the time, I believe that the number of classroom management issues will be limited.

Principle 5 - Making Learning Relevant
My final classroom management guiding principle is making learning relevant to the student. By doing this, I hope to be able to motivate students and to reshape student views on learning so that the students are more excited about the process of learning and are more likely to be actively mentally engaged in the classroom. A lot of the time, I think that students are uninterested in what is being taught to them, so they do not put forth effort in the classroom and do not pay attention. It is these kinds of behaviors that seem to lead to classroom management issues. So, by making information relevant to them, students will actually be interested in what is being taught and want to know more. To do this, it is essential to know your students because you have to understand what they find to be important and where they might use information later on in life.

Hot conceptual change theory discusses the different factors of motivation (goal orientation, control beliefs, value, and self efficacy), which I find particularly useful when trying to address learning. I believe that by making students see how learning can be relevant to their lives, they are more likely to find more value in the information and are more likely to want to learn. This motivation is what will hopefully lead to a more well managed classroom because students will see why it is important to learn the things we are covering and thus, will pay attention to what is going on. I think that one of the huge challenges that teachers face in the classroom is when their students' view on learning is that they just have to know something for the class and then they can forget it instead of realizing that they need to deeply understand the material because they will use it later on in life. By making learning relevant to the student, I think they will be more motivated to focus on deeper understanding and will possibly change their view on how things should be learned.

All of these different guiding principles overlap in some ways, but I think that the overlap is important because it demonstrates that all of these guiding principles support each other and can be used together in order to create a well managed classroom. Because I have not had the chance to apply these principles to an actual classroom, I know there will be a lot of trial and error in developing how I actually manage my classroom; however, I believe that these five principles will be a good start in keeping students on task and engaged while they are in my classroom, as well as good ways to keep students from acting out.