Classroom Management

I had a really great professor at Longwood University (Farmville, VA) that focused on the area of Classroom Management.  He had great anecdotes to accompany each lesson.  I'll never forget the one about the "Claw of Death."  The important lesson was- don't ever leave a student in charge of the class.  I'll let you use your imagination to figure out how the "Claw of Death" came into play there...

My college professor stressed the importance of having a plan in place and documenting everything.  As a result, I have always had a classroom management system in place and my students and their parents have always read and signed a behavior management contract.

Last year, a colleague was telling me about the great success she had with the clip chart system she had in place in her classroom.  I have always used some form of the green, yellow, red "stoplight" system for classroom management.  (I've never tried to go without a management system.)  My colleague told me that she really liked the emphasis on seeking out and rewarding positive behavior, rather than solely looking for negative behavior.  Because of that, she used a 6 color chart system.  Students began in the middle of the chart each day, and could climb up and down depending on student choices throughout the day.

Classroom Management Clip System from previous school year

Since that conversation, I've spoken with other teachers across the state about their classroom management systems.  My sister, a first grade teacher, uses a clip chart system similar to that of my colleague.

I began searching Pinterest and Teachers Pay Teachers for ready made resources for this year's classroom management system.  I knew I needed to find the following: a chart to use in the classroom, a monthly communication calendar to document student daily behaviors, and a classroom management contract describing the clip chart system and the classroom rules.

This year's clip chart system from Creative Lesson Cafe

First things first, I started looking for a clip chart system.  I found several variations of the clip chart system- some started with purple for outstanding behavior at the top of the spectrum with red for parent contact at the bottom level, like Lesson Plan Diva's behavior chart, while others followed the traditional spectrum from red for outstanding behavior to pink for parent contact, like what I found on TeachersPayTeachers via the Creative Lesson Cafe.  There was also this adorable Rocking Behavior Chart from The Inspired Apple.

Ultimately, I decided to go with the really great printable chart from the Creative Lesson Cafe Teachers Pay Teachers site.  It was a free download at the time- catch it while it's free!  I printed on regular printer paper, cut down each section, laminated, and then taped in the correct order.  (My home laminator is limited to smaller pieces of paper.)

The next piece to search out or create was the monthly communication calendar.  In my searching, I came across this post from Lori at Teaching With Love & Laughter.  She has created monthly clip chart take home calendars for FREE!  For the most part, this is not a huge change from my previous monthly communication calendars.  I love the fact that the behavior chart is listed on each monthly calendar page.  The students get to color in the blank chart at the beginning of each month and the parents get a visual reminder of the behavior system.  This is AWESOME.

Download from TpT

Finally, I needed to create a behavior contract.  This is something I have always had my parents and students read and sign.  I like to begin the school year with clarity.  I believe I've put the finishing touches on my behavior contract.  I have my own Teachers Pay Teachers site, where I've only posted things that are free, because I haven't made anything I would want to pay money for as of yet.  Here's the link to my behavior contract.  It's free and it's a Word Doc.  Page 2 lists our class rules, which I modeled after Sara Cooley's 5 Bee Promises from First Grader at Last.

Here's to a successfully managed class in the 2012-2013 school year!

Traveling Nachos

Yummmm.... gross.  So, in elementary school, one of our school lunch choices was called "Traveling Nachos."  What it amounted to was ground taco beef scooped into a single serving bag of Doritos.  The food was actually tasty, but when you think about the name and the concept= very gross.

At my old school, the students had one choice.  At my new school there are 5 choices.  Students can have a salad on Wednesdays, yogurt or a peanut butter sandwich any day, or the other prepared options.  I knew that my kindergarten friends would need to make a choice daily, so I began formulating my plan for operation "lunch choice."

I began browsing pinterest and found this lunch choice board from Mrs. Wright.  I liked the concept and I'm all about using magnets and velcro!  I just didn't know how quickly my kindergarten friends would pick up on having a classroom "number."

A really nice first grade teacher at my new school was going through her room and was giving away things she no longer needed.  I was lucky to receive a 30 count set of these little "Chefs."  They came in a 30 count tub.  When I got them, I hadn't finished formulating my lunch choice plan.  I chose to sleep on it and came up with a plan in my dreams!

When I was organizing my room, I found several things that would eventually use to create my lunch choice area.  I found the lunch tray in my room, whipped out my hot glue gun to attach the 5 clear cups, and added velcro to each cup.  When I was organizing the "stuff" in my room, I found the yellow file box of all of the lunch choices, sorted in little folders with velcro already on the back of each card!  I also found the numbered pocket chart.  I pulled out my gold paint pen (every classy teacher needs a little bling in her repertoire) and numbered the back of each Chef.  

When I get my roster, I will be making new labels for the pocket chart.  Each label will include a student's name and a corresponding number.  My little friends will be able to make their lunch choice daily and I will be able to tell which little Chef belongs to which little kindergarten friend.

Bulletin Boards: the nemesis of every teacher

When I was a student, I loved bulletin boards!  When my second grade teacher let us help put them up, we were so lucky!  As a student teacher, I was eager to offer to put up bulletin boards for my cooperating teacher.  As a first year teacher, I happily put up my first classroom bulletin boards.  Now in my sixth year... bulletin boards are on the bottom of my "fun" list.  Why this change of heart?  Well, it all goes back to my lack of spacial awareness.  You have to be certain to get enough bulletin board paper to cover the entire board twice.  After trotting back and forth from the workroom where bulletin board paper is kept, you begin to lose a little bit of your soul.  How many times does it take before you rip off the perfect amount of paper?

Okay, back to positive thinking.  In order to make my bulletin boards stay up all year, I don't put up thematic boards.  Each of my boards has a purpose and my kindergarten friends will use the boards daily.  While arranging the furniture, I began putting up notes on each bulletin board.  I wanted my Word Wall to be on a long bulletin board that was visible to all students.  I needed a spot for our Classroom Behavior stuff and a LOT of space for morning meeting/ calendar time.

This bulletin board is located next to the coatracks directly beside the classroom door.  I like to keep my bus information near the door in a very obvious spot.  My mother always told me that during the first week of school if every child got on the right bus, you had a successful day.  So, if I'm ever not in the room at dismissal time, I want my substitute to easily be able to find bus information.  We haven't gotten our rosters yet, so when I get transportation information, that will be posted.

You'll notice my classroom management system is sharing the bulletin board space with transportation information.  I found the 5 bee promises while perusing pinterest.  Sarah Cooley of First Grader At Last is to receive the credit for this great manage system!  I am so excited about moving to a management system that doesn't require me to scrounge up treats for my treats box.  Let's reward positive and appropriate behavior with fun and free incentives!

My calendar area takes up 2 bulletin boards.  Located to the left of my calendar is an overhead sheet with the 100s chart, a hundreds, tens, and ones pocket chart, and a copy of the September poem from Maurice Sendak's Chicken Noodle Soup with Rice.  Why are these things included with my calendar?  Counting up to day 100 is a big deal in Kindergarten and we will color in a square for each day of school on our hundreds chart.  We will put a stick in the ones pocket for each day of school (and eventually move them to the tens and hundreds pocket).  I like to use the Chicken Noodle Soup with Rice monthly poems because it gives the students a daily opportunity to see the "ch" blend in action.  

This is part deux of my calendar/morning meeting area.  It includes a spot for the days of the week where we talk about yesterday, today, and tomorrow, a daily attendance area, and a weather spot. The daily attendance is a relatively new part of my calendar.  Each morning, each student will get a unifix cube.  As we begin our morning at the carpet in a circle, we will count together as we connect each unifix cube.  We will save the cubes for the students who are not present and make sure that they are represented and we will compare our final rod of unifix cubes with the rod with our total number of students.  The weather section will include making observations and graphing those daily observations.  I'm thinking about including daily temperature- what do you think?

In the background of this shot, you can see my Word Wall.  I found this great wrapping paper for a $1 in the Target Dollar Spot.  One of my friends (Gale) had turned me on to finding wrapping paper as an bulletin board paper.  It has changed my life!  Cheaper than fabric and offers more to the eye than the plain old paper. This roll of wrapping paper has a pattern using blue and white lines and is a great subtle background.  The black letters (made on my mother's Cricut machine with the Plantin Schoolhouse cartridge) contrast nicely with the paper.  

With Organization Comes Clarity

I'm not sure about you, but when I walked into each of my classrooms (I've had 3 in 6 years), I've been overwhelmed.  Just like any good reality organization show, I follow the practice of making piles.  There's always a "keep" pile, a "donate" pile, and a "toss" pile (aka trashcan).  But before I begin organizing the stuff, I like to develop a sense of order by arranging the furniture.

My first day in my classroom was spent shuffling furniture from one spot to the next.  My spacial awareness is somewhat... lacking.  Knowing that, I brought a yard stick and a tape measure and I borrowed some "moving men" from the teacher next door.  The "moving men" are made out of felt and are discs that can be placed under each corner of heavy furniture.  My new kindergarten teammates kept offering to help me move furniture, but I really had no idea where each piece of furniture would eventually end up.

Here is the view from my classroom door.  My student tables are front and center, in a kind of windmill arrangement.  Behind the student tables are 2 bookshelves that used to be connected to each other.  The bookshelf  facing the student tables will hold math manipulatives and the bookshelf to the left (hard to see in this photo) will hold materials for small group literacy centers (stamps, word games, leap frog, leveled readers, and more).  These bookshelves act as a barrier in front of my small group table.  I've never put up a divider like this in the room.  I usually like full disclosure- a nice, open classroom where I can see what everyone is doing at every minute of every day.  I've tested it out and from my spot at the small group table, I can see the entire classroom.  

Here is the view from the teacher desk.  You can see my small group table.  The bookshelf to the left of the dolly is where all of my small group literacy items will be stored.  In the top left of this photo, you can see the five drawer storage cabinet.  This will be a great spot to hide those posters and all of the various types of paper.

This is the view from the morning meeting/calendar time area of the room.  Not much to say here...

Earlier I mentioned that my first step is arranging the furniture.  As you can see in my photos, the second step is pulling out everything that's hiding in drawers, cabinets, and closets and sorting.  This is when those three piles (keep, donate, toss) come in handy.  I went through all of the manipulatives, reading materials, art materials, and miscellaneous items that were in the classroom and sorted.  All of my reading items went on the small group table, all of the math items went on a student table, etc.  

When thinking about organization, it helps to see everything you have... and boy am I blessed with a lot of stuff!  Just by looking at the piles, you might think that this was a blog about a hoarder.    Don't worry.  Like I always tell my husband, it always looks worse before it gets better.