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Chapter 9 Authority and Discipline

Do not doubt that there will be moments when your students will mis­behave. Although disruptions are normal, it is imperative that you learn how to effectively address disruptive student behavior. As we have dis­cussed in the previous chapters, effective teachers have a clear system for responding to student interruptions. Their responses gradually increase in severity, while always respecting the dignity of students. They instinctively know when to let things pass and when to draw the line, when to make an exception, and when to make an example. These instincts will develop over time. At first, you may find yourself doubting which behaviors are annoying, but benign, and which are truly disruptive and unacceptable. Effective teachers also pick the appropriate time to address misbehavior and consistently re-teach and revisit classroom expectations.

This chapter will discuss the components of your classroom manage­ment that are of a more corrective nature-those methods by which you will assert your authority and apply consequences when a student does not meet your high expectations for behavior. Sometimes a student will fla­grantly choose to break a rule and knowingly receive the consequence, due to a variety of factors ranging from a teacher's slow lesson to the eruption of a pre-existing student conflict to a stressful event in the student's per­sonallife. Other times, the student won't dramatically act out but may still

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disrupt learning in a more passive aggres­sive way-perhaps by rhythmically tapping her pencil and humming during silent work, or by passing notes. You must respond to these disruptions in order to maintain the classroom culture that you have worked so relentlessly to build. Ultimately, you want your students to see misbehavior, both their own, and that of their peers, as a disruption to learning.

The Difference Between Authority and Discipline

As defined by Webster's Ninth Collegiate Dictionary, authority is:

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The power to influence or command thought, opinion, or behavior.

Warning: Control Freak Alert

An all-purpose warning: control for control's sake is destructive and counter-productive. Bathroom privi­leges, for example, are one area rife with potential for abuse. Allowing a student to go to the bathroom or denying them that right is a strange power to have. You are essentially wielding authority over another per­son's bodily functions. Think dearly about how you will achieve a balance between firm boundaries and the obvious need for flexibility. Abusing your authority will undermine any effort you might make towards earn­ing the trust and respect of your stu­dents. Always keep yourself in check by ensuring that your rules have a dis­tinct and valid purpose and are relat­ed to the ultimate goal of student achievement. Anticipate, however, that periodic assertions of your authority will be necessary.

Discipline is defined as:

Training that corrects, molds, or perfects the mental faculties or moral character; orderly or prescribed conduct or pattern of behavior; selfcontrol; a rule or system of rules govern­ing conduct or activity.

Authority is about you and refers to the control you are implicitly granted. Discipline is about your students and refers to the appropriate behavior that is expected of them. Students will try to argue over who is in charge of the classroom. This mat­ter is non-negotiable. You must always be the one in control of the classroom. Know that an "in-control" classroom does not mandate rigidity, inactivity, or joylessness. To the contrary, we hope your classroom will be infused with energy and enthusi­asm. However, there is a fine line between enthusiasm and chaos. You must address potentially out of control energy before it becomes out of control. Important distinc­tion: a particularly lively classroom activity might become momentarily out of control­that's okay as long as you remain in control.

There are three common categories to the approaches to discipline that first-year teachers often embody. They are:

1. Those who reflexively fear abusing their authority to the point where they become reluctant to assert the disci­pline that will make their lives man­ageable in the-classroom.

2. Those who over-assert their authori­ty-out of an excessive fear of losing control of the classroom- to the point where valid student involvement is suppressed.

3. Those who, due to a lack of confi­dence and/ or inexperience, vacillate between the first two, mostly because they simply don't know how to appropriately exert authority.

In political terms, do you want your classroom to be a democracy or a dictator­ship? Neither in its purest form will work

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effectively. The goal, of course, is to find a happy medium. Mastering this balance will take time and continual self-analysis.

Why Do Students Misbehave? Students have their own sometimes sim­

ple, sometimes complex reasons why they choose to behave appropriately or misbehave in class. Like a doctor who can choose to treat the symptoms or the disease itself, teachers face similar options. The short-term benefit of ignoring the underlying causes of disruptive behavior may be self-evident, but the long­term consequences cannot be ignored.

Your students have·emotional needs that will surface time and time again. Those needs cannot be underestimated and will, like it or not, eventually have to be addressed. Always remember that your students, as inconvenient as it may be, have a point of view. Some businesses display signs which read, "Our customers are not impediments to our jobs- they are the reason for our jobs." This concept must apply at all times to all students. Their personal and intellectual growth is the sole focus and purpose of your job.

That said, you and your class have rights and needs too. The challenge you face in establishing the rules of your classroom will be striking the right balance between respecting your students' rights and needs and respecting those of the entire class.

Your search for the root causes of misbe­havior should always start by examining your own planning and instruction. While this is by no means always the case, inci­dents of disruptive or off-task behavior are often tied to weaknesses in the teacher's les­sons. You should not be surprised, for example, if students become disengaged ini­tially- and off task eventually- if you ask them to sit at their desks and simply watch one another complete math problems on the board day after day. Students who finish an

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independent activity and don't have any­thing else to work on will find other things to occupy their attention. The "other things" that students find to do are rarely what the teacher wants him or her to do. When you plan, you should ask yourself not just, "What will I be doing every minute of the class?" but more importantly; "What will my students be doing every minute of the day?"

In fact, you will realize that on a daily basis, an important classroom management tool will be an engaging lesson plan that holds your students' attention. Think about your own reaction to the all-purpose busi­ness meeting. If it's stimulating and rele­vant, you're more likely to be actively present and on-task. When it's boring, drag­ging or lacking purpose, you doodle, day­dream, or pass notes; so will your students. Content-driven management should be both a goal as well as a pleasant by-product.

As you refine your lesson plans, you improve your ability to design engaging les­sons that decrease the risk of the off-task behavior that eventually becomes disrup­tive. For example, perhaps you want your students to practice multiplying fractions. Your first thought is to have two or three students at a time come to the chalkboard to practice. Your second thought is, "What are the other thirty students going to be doing?" Having three students at the board at a time is not only inefficient and uncre­ative, it also leaves you with a class of thirty disengaged students, who are likely to become restless and disruptive.

To head off this problem, you change your plan. You go to a home-and-garden store and purchase a large sheet of dry erase board, which can be cut to create small wipe boards for each child. You distribute dry­erase markers and paper towels. Each stu­dent completes the problem in big numbers. Everyone then holds up his or her boards when the timer dings. With that adjustment, you have greatly increased your lesson's

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effectiveness and efficiency and greatly decreased the likelihood of disruptive behavior. While this solution requires the teacher to spend money on supplies, it may be a worthwhile investment for the long run since the purchased materials can be re­used for all classes throughout the year.

While quality lesson plans alone do not guarantee disruption-free lessons, a poorly planned lesson virtually guarantees off-task or disruptive behavior. After examining whether student misbehavior could stem from your own instructional deficiencies, you will need to examine other potential contributors to off-task and problematic behavior.

Adapted from Curwin and Mendler (1988), the following are some of the com­mon "causes" of misbehavior in classrooms:

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11 Unclear Limits. You may be shocked to hear that Shaun, your third period angel, shouts out answers constantly in another teacher's room (a teacher, who, incidentally, does not think it is important for students to raise their hands to speak during class). Or, when you see your fourth period class sitting quietly with another teacher during the school assembly; you may realize that they are indeed capable of self­control, and that you will need to raise your expectations of this class' behav­ior. Students cannot violate rules that haven't been communicated, and they will "code-switch" from classroom to classroom depending on the limits that each teacher has- or has not- estab­lished. To this end, new teachers will find it very helpful to observe their own students with other teachers. You must inform students of your stan­dards of acceptable behavior upfront, remembering that establishing rules and procedures is a vital form of pre­ventive discipline.

• A Sense of Powerlessness. Rules per­ceived as arbitrary and unfair are like­ly to result in students acting out their

sense of frustration and powerlessness. Be sure that all rules and procedures are reasonable, and that the rationale behind each rule is explained to the students both up front and as conse­quences are implemented. Needlessly rigid procedures, like requiring 5th graders to move through the class­room like first year naval academy stu­dents turning at sharp right angles, or a rule such as "complete all assign­ments in blue ink or receive a zero," will only serve to alienate students and instigate rebellious misbehavior. An anecdote in the book Starting Small: Teaching Tolerance in Preschool and the Early Grades (1997), asserts that:

.. . blind obedience is not the goal. 'Last week, a child came up to me and said, 'If this is a free world, why do we have rules?' I thought it was a very good ques­tion. I asked him to tell me a rule that he didn't understand, and he said, 'Running. I don't know why we can't run.' I said, 'You can run - outside,' and he said, 'But not in school.' So we acted out what would happen in certain situations if you ran instead of walked. And then it made sense.

11 Attacks on Dignity. Chronic behavior problems sometimes stem from the loss of dignity that occurs when stu­dents believe they cannot and will not be successful in school generally, or in your classroom in particular. As a way to protect his or her dignity after expe­riencing repeated failure, a student may give up academically. Instead, he or she will attempt to gain a sense of mastery from disrupting your class and receiving negative attention. Such students often pretend they don't want to succeed. This underscores the importance of two ideas:

1. Never compromise the dignity of a student, even a misbehaving one. Address student behaviors, not the students themselves. Say, "Rosalyn,

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you need to face forward in your chair and focus on your reading," rather than: "Rosalyn, don't be such a pest. Can't you see you're annoy­ing Joe and everyone else around you? Why can't you just behave?"

2. Create a classroom in which all stu­dents can succeed, in which all stu­dents can define themselves as peo­ple with positive contributions to make. If you sense that a student has lost hope, create some .. Sometimes students convince them­selves that unless they can do everything right, nothing is worth doing right. An effective way of cre­ating some hope and confidence involves helping students realize a series of small wins. Breakdown complex tasks into smaller chunks, communicate exactly what you want the student to do with the chunk, and then praise or acknowl­edge the job well done. If the stu­dent still cannot master the smallest chunk, then breakdown the task further. Consider J ermaine' s strug­gle to write a paragraph. His teacher assigns him to work on one sentence each day. When his sen­tence meets the criteria specified in the rubric, Jermaine's teacher rewards him and helps him focus on how the sentence is a smaller part of a paragraph. The teacher repeats this process until Jermaine completes a solid paragraph. The goal is to help Jermaine experience a series of wins to inspire confi­dence for the next task, rather than focus on the time it takes to com­plete the assignment. Hopefully, as Jermaine' s confidence increases, the time it takes to complete tasks will decrease.

11 Student Boredom. Boredom can arise for a number of reasons. First, the stu-

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dent could be under-challenged aca­demically. Do not discount the notion that your biggest "troublemakers" may actually know, or at least think they know, the material before you teach it. They may sleep or they may lash out. Second, students might not be engaged with the lesson because they are not invested in the academic goals, because the lesson is dull, is beyond their academic abilities, or because its pacing is too slow. Chapter 4, on Differentiated Instruction gave you specific strategies for challenging all levels of learners. Strive to engage all students at all points in the lesson. This can be as easy as sprinkling stu­dents' names throughout a lesson, and as complicated as individualizing each student's assignment by interest and readiness level.

11 Inability to Express Feelings. Imagine that Donnell starts to verbal­ly attack the student sitting next to him. When you move in to mediate, Donnell hurls profane words in your direction. You erupt in anger and send Donnell to the office. No one ever finds out that Donnell discov­ered lewd graffiti about his sister in the bathroom before coming to class. Scenarios like this highlight why a teacher should help students learn appropriate ways to express anger and frustration. We must model and teach students healthy methods of communicating emotions. Elementary teachers might discuss and practice appropriate expression of feelings through puppet shows, drawings, stories, or community meetings. Secondary teachers can plan journal writing, group discussions, literature­based reflections or simply seize "teachable moments" to emphasize appropriate self-control.

11 Peer Pressure. Sadly; academic sue-

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cess and popularity do not always go hand in hand. Older students espe­cially may gain social capital by defy­ing the teacher or playing the role of "class clown." They either reject their abilities in order to "fit in," or feel incapable of completing academic work and find easy acceptance in entertaining others rather than attempting to tackle their challenges. In either case, it is crucial to create a culture of achievement in which suc­cess in school is considered "cool."

It will be important to reflect regularly on your students' behavior and the root causes of that behavior. This reflection not only prevents you from taking the misbe­havior personally and letting your ego get the best of you (we'll expand on this later), but it also sheds light on adjustments you might make to prevent misbehavior in the future. Sometimes, misbehavior occurs when a student has an emotional disability and requires more support in learning to control her behavior and develop self-disci­pline. The next section will discuss how to respond to students who need additional behavior support.

External Factors that Produce Student Misbehavior

In many cases you will be able to affect the causes of misbehavior by adjusting your lessons, consistently and respectfully upholding reasonable limits, and helping students express their feelings appropriate­ly. However, there will be some rare situa­tions or phenomena that are simply beyond your immediate control, or perhaps even your immediate understanding.

You may be teaching students for whom violence has been a tragic and intensely affecting part of their lives. Childhood trau­ma includes experiences that go beyond normal life stresses. These experiences can be physical, sexual, or emotional abuse; neglect; parental alcohol or drug abuse;

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death in the family; witnessing violence; fre­quent changes in primary caregivers; and physical injury. Some teachers in high-need schools deal with students who have been diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as a result of the violence they have witnessed or experienced.

As a classroom teacher, it is important to be aware of the behavior problems that could be manifestations of trauma:

111 Hurting others without seeming to care can be a sign of overwhelming pain and suffering. Children who have suffered serious pain can shut down their feelings and lose touch with their sense of empathy.

111 Aggressiveness beyond what is typical in the students you teach is highly cor­related with being victimized by abuse or witnessing the abuse of another.

111 Deliberately annoying others. can be a sign of a student's sense of helpless­ness, also common when a student is accustomed to being abused or neg­lected.

111 Hyper vigilance, or a tendency to always be on the lookout for potential dangers, can be a sign of exposure to an unexpected traumatic event.

111 Jumpiness or hyperactivity can be a sign of trauma, as well as a possible indicator of Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD).

111 Unusual "spaciness" can indicate both a physical disorder and a detached state resulting from an overwhelming traumatic experience.

On the other hand, it is important not to assume that an unusually spacey student has experienced a traumatic. incident-he might be distracted by the upcoming school dance. An aggressive child might simply require help channeling her energy and strength, and a child who exhibits annoying behavior might be in need of more positive

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reinforcement for good behavior. We do not offer these examples to minimize your vigi­lance, but only to remind you to analyze

· students' behaviors critically. And, although many students bring symptoms of their stressful worlds to the classroom, this does not mean that these students cannot achieve academically or behave appropriately in your classroom. ·

There are many things you can do to have a profound, positive impact on a trau­matized child without assuming the role of therapist. Victimized children, perhaps more than other students, benefit from structure, routines, positive empowerment and positive attention- all practices you should implement as an effective teacher regardless of who fills your class. You have the responsibility to provide all of your stu­dents with a structured, secure environ­ment.

That said, some students would benefit from attention and intervention beyond the scope of what you can provide as a class­room teacher, and childhood trauma is one cause of student misbehavior that requires extra attention. If you have attempted to handle a particular student's misbehavior with consistency; persistence, reflection and revised strategies, and the behavior persists, perhaps something else in the student's life must be addressed. Set up a meeting with the student and the school counselor. If journal entries, bruises, welts or cuts, or statements made by the child lead you to suspect that he or she has been traumatized and/ or victimized, it is your legal obliga­tion to seek outside intervention, perhaps with the help of the school counselor, nurse, or principal. Available resources will depend upon your school and community. Be persistent in seeking the information you believe you need. As a classroom teacher who sees your students regularly, you may be the school representative best positioned to observe the signs of distress, and you can do students a great service by helping them access the support and services they need.

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Ideally; understanding the potential "causes" of misbehavior can fortify you to resist indulgent and overly emotional responses to student misconduct. As we will discuss in the next few sections, you will need to work hard to maintain a calm, firm, respectful demeanor whether respond­ing to minor or more severe student inter­ruptions.

When Do I Respond to Student Misbehavior?

The first thing to decide when an inter­ruption occurs is, "Do I respond?" Unfortunately, there is no set formula for when to respond. Every teacher has differ­ent standards for what constitutes an order­ly classroom environment. For example, one teacher may allow food in his classroom while another prohibits classroom eating. One teacher won't care if a shirt is tucked in, while another may consider an untucked shirt to be a personal offense. Although expectations for student behavior can vary; consider these general guidelines for deter­mining whether a response is advised:

11 If a student is disrupting the learning environment for herself/himself or others

11 If a student is physically or verbally threatened

111 If a student has violated a basic behav­ioral expectation

It is also important to note that different students will evoke different reactions in you. The same behavior might elicit a differ­ent response if it is a student's first viola­tion, in which case you might be tempted to let it pass, versus a student's third violation, in which case you might have to resist the temptation to respond with a vengeance.

Once you have made a decision to respond, you need to decide whether that response should be immediate or delayed . Sometimes a delayed response is more

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effective than an immediate one. The advantages are:

111 If you inform the student you will be speaking with him after class, he or she is likely to behave, out of trepida­tion, until the meeting takes place.

111 You don't lose the momentum of your lesson.

111 You have a one-on-one confrontation or interaction with the student, there­by lessening the potentially cruel effects of public admonishment and decreasing the student's need to "save face" in front of the class.

Other times, an immediate reaction is preferable. The benefits include:

111 Immediate reinforcement of the rules to the student (i.e. "nipping it in the bud").

111 Immediate reinforcement of the rules to the entire class (but be wary of pub­lic humiliation-more on this later).

Once you have considered if and when to respond to a particular student behavior, you need to determine how you will respond. This is where it gets tricky. You have to balance the sanctity of the learning environment with the individual needs of students. These decisions are not always easy and you will make mistakes. How you respond will be dependent upon the type of interruption. Interruptions can be catego­rized into three types-minor, chronic, and major.

Responding to Minor Interruptions

A student rhythmically taps a pencil during silent work. Another child simulta­neously takes lecture notes while finishing homework for another class. A third mouths something to a friend across the room while you give directions. When students do not meet your behavioral expectations, and yet

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are not exactly breaking the rules, those stu­dents still need to know that their behavior compromises learning for themselves or others. To prevent that interruption from escalating into behavior that does break a rule, you must address it immediately. When doing so, consider the following rec­ommendations:

11 Make your response shorter in duration than the interruption.

111 Minimize your verbal response.

111 Do not interrupt the lesson flow.

111 Invest very little emotion; your action should be a reminder, not a confronta­tion.

For example:

It is sixth period. Your lesson identifies the components of poems. Victor has just arrived from a heated basketball game in gym class. He loves basketball, and he is hyped up from the minute he walks in the door. When you start the lesson with a poetry reading, Victor rhythmically drums his hands on the desk and looks around the room in a distracted manner.

Table 9.1, on the opposite page, offers specific suggestions for addressing this type of minor interruption.

These methods are effective only when applied to minor interruptions. Nervously kicking one's desk chair, humming during silent work, or mindlessly snapping gum are not malicious infractions and do not constitute insubordination. Try not to let yourself get drawn into conflicts with stuc dents over relatively minor issues. A stu-

. dent may be looking for a fight; do not make yourself available as a willing spar­ring partner. Remember, you are the adult in the room. Whenever possible, work to avoid conflict, rather than instigate it Use the non-confrontational techniques above to gently remind students of your expecta­tions. Be mindful of the limitations of these techniques.

If you use these same methods in

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TABLE 9.1: Methods of Addressing Minor Interruptions

Method Explanation of Method The Method in Action

Physical Proximity Be mobile. Movement communicates You move closer to Victor's that you are focused on all parts of seat so he knows that you the room, and it can get a single stu- heard his drumming. While dent's attention without interrupting moving closer to Victor, you the entire class. When a student ere- continue reading the poem ates a minor interruption, immediate- and maintain the flow of the ly move closer to his or her seat. lesson. You remain by his

desk for a short period before moving on.

Sudden Silence When a student is disruptive while Mid-stanza, you sharply you are speaking, stop and wait for pause your reading. After a the disruption to cease. few seconds Victor stops

drumming and you contin-ue the poem.

Physical Cues Simple physical cues can often com- Without a significant pause municate better than words without in your reading, you look up, disturbing the lesson flow. make eye contact with Victor

and make a 11 calm down" gesture with your hand.

Post-It Notes Some teachers carry a clipboard with As you continue reading the pre-written Post-It notes that say poem, you walk by Victor "please focus" or "please throw out and place the note that says, your gum." If a student needs a "please focus" on his desk. behavior reminder, choose the appro-priate note and place it on the stu-dent's desk.

Individual Signals Some students need an individual While reading, you hold up reminder when they are interrupting. one finger and make eye Taking them aside and agreeing upon contact with Victor. Because a method can be very effective. you both agreed upon this

signal in advance when Victor was disruptive in the past, Victor knows that he is creating a distraction and that one finger means he needs to stop what he is doing.

Touch the Desk A quick touch on a student's desk is You approach Victor's seat (Do not touch the often effective at curbing minor dis- while continuing to read the

• student) ruptions . poem. As you pass him you

' tap his desk.

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(Table 9.1 continued)

/ The 11Teacher Look" This is a more direct approach to You look up from the poem

address minor interruptions. When a and give Victor a direct look student interrupts instruction; you that clearly communicates lock eyes and communicate displeas- your intentions. You main-ure with your facial expression. "The tain eye contact for a few Look" doesn't have to be angry, just seconds, smile and nod serious (even a raised eyebrow can your head in thanks when suffice). Be sure to acknowledge the Victor gestures his under-student's compliance. standing. You then return to

reading the poem.

Quickly State Stating a student's name is effective if When Victor starts drum-Student's Name you feel that you need to immediately ming on the desk, you

catch that student's attention. Don't immediately say, nVictoru overuse this technique, however, and make eye contact with since students quickly become him. immune to hearing their name called. This method is slightly more con-frontational because you have pub-licly asserted your power over him and publicly singled him out.

Ignoring There are specific situations when you may believe that a student is acting out to get attention. You may choose to ignore this behavior if it is not creal-ing a classroom disruption. This should be done carefully, because students may assume that you are not aware or do not care about the behavior. You would later raise the issue with the student in private.

' response to a more serious interruption (e.g., derogatory comments, aggressive actions, etc), your students may lose respect for you- perhaps feeling that you aren't willing to be tough enough. Also keep in mind thi.lt using the same method repeated­ly can minimize its effectiveness. If minor interruptions persist and dominate your les­sons, take that as a signal that you need to re-develop or re-teach classroom rules and procedures, and, as always, assess the quali­ty of your lessons.

11 What are the long-term risks?

11 What are the potential risks?

11 Can you envision a scenario where this approach might turn out well?

For the second approach:

11 What are the short-term benefits?

11 What are the long-term benefits?

11 What are the potential risks?

11 Can you envision a scenario where this approach might turn out badly?

Let's look at one more example, in Table 9.2 on the opposite page. This time, we'll contrast two different ways of dealing with the same situation.

Think about Ms. Sheehan's competing approaches.

For the first approach:

II What are the short-term risks?

Responding to Chronic Interruptions

If students continue to disrupt class, you must employ different methods. Effective teachers develop a system for addressing

'\

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TABLE 9.2: Comparing Responses to a Minor Interruption

Maximizing Conflict

Terence enters Ms. Sheehan's 4th-grade classroom visibly upset. As Ms. Sheehan begins class, she notices that Terence is purposefully breaking his pencil. Ms. Sheehan looks at Terence and says, "Terence, get up and throw away all of those pencil pieces. I can't stand it when you children throw trash on ~y floor! Litterbugs! Now, let us get back to the lesson. Terence, do you have something to write with or do you need a crayon?"

Minimizing Conflict

Terence enters Ms. Sheehan's 4th-grade classroom visibly upset. As Ms. Sheehan begins class, she notices that Terence is purposefully breaking his pencil. As the class begins to answer the morning journal question, Ms. Sheehan slowly moves toward Terence, places her hand on his desk for two seconds, and then continues to circulate.

As the class begins to share journal entries, Ms. Sheehan notices that Terence has his head down. Wanting to avoid a confrontation that would disrupt student sharing, Ms. Sheehan taps Terence's desk or speaks his name.

chronic disruptions. These systems should be:

1. Clear. Students should understand and be able to articulate your process for responding to inappropriate stu­dent behavior.

2. Consistent. Your responses should be consistent and predictable. Unpredictable reactions make it very difficult for students to know what the consequences for their behaviors might be and will lead to accusations of favoritism.

3. Gradual. Your responses to student behavior should gradually increase in severity. You should not implement draconian responses for small infrac­tions the first time they occur. Again: think about being predictable and logical in how you respond to student behavior.

4. Respectful. Your responses should be considerate of student needs and emo­tions. Your tone should always reflect a respectful tone that neither compro-

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rnises the dignity of the student nor intends to humiliate the student.

5. Educational. At some point, your sys­tem should cause students to reflect upon and learn from their infractions. If a student is having a particularly tough time with a specific behavior, you should help teach that student an effective strategy. Your student's needs must be at the center of any response to a conflict situation.

6. Reflective. You should always analyze all potentially relevant factors to determine the root cause of classroom disruptions or confrontations, includ­ing your own personal role. Is the stu­dent having a particularly bad day? Are you? Is something going on in the student's personal life? Is something going on in yours? What is your per­sonal history with this student? Have you spoken with other teachers to determine what their recent experi­ences with the student have been? Is your lesson plan up to par? Do you

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notice patterns as to when this student exhibits this behavior and what tends to set it off? How do other students react to the behavior? Are they enter­tained by it? Or are they aggravated by it? There is virtually no end to the possible factors that might be coming into play. Consider as many of them as possible.

Whether you address minor or chronic interruptions by students, be sure to focus on the behavior rather than the person. Don't tell a student he's a "bad boy;" tell him, rather, "That was a bad thing you did." Differentiate between the person and the action. When you focus on the behavior, the student is much more likely to abide by your requests. If a student feels you are attacking her value as a person, she is likely to become defensive. Over time, she may internalize your insults, negatively affecting her self-esteem and sense of identity.

Implementing Consequences Effectively

A positive, achievement-oriented class­room culture does not magically materialize by virtue of the teacher simply presenting the rules on the first day of school; rather, it evolves by consistently enforcing conse­quences for those rules. Here, we will dis­cuss how to effectively impose conse­quences when misbehavior occurs; hesita­tion to do so is one of the fastest ways to undermine your own authority in the class­room.

There are three keys to successfully implementing consequences:

1. Provide students with control over the outcome.

2. Implement consequences consistently.

3. Implement consequences respectfully.

These three principles, applied effective-ly over the long-term, are prerequisites for a

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functional and productive classroom cul­ture. Let's consider each in more detail.

Provide Students with Control Over the Outcome

It is important to communicate to your students that they are in charge of the out­come of their behavior. They can choose to follow the rules, thereby receiving at least intangible benefits, or to break the rules and incur the consequences. Many teachers use the following strategies to reinforce this notion to students:

111 Classroom signs that read,

"If you CHOOSE to break a rule ... " (hung over a list of consequences)

"Look here to see how we have CHOSEN to behave" (hung over a behavior chart)

111 Language that repeatedly conveys the choice at hand, such as:

"I was so impressed by your choice to peacefully resolve that conflict with Tatiana. That was extremely mature of you."

"Andre, since you chose to get up and walk around the room without asking for per­mission, please go and flip your card to yellow."

"Michael, I already gave you a warning for turning around and talking to Juan dur­ing the warm-up. Since you chose to con­tinue that behavior; you will now be required to remain in the room during hallway time. I'm putting your initials on the board as a reminder."

Another way to ensure that students feel a sense of control and hope is to give them a "clean slate" after the consequence ends. Some teachers, especially at the elementary level, start their series of consequences over each day or halfway through the day. For example, a teacher will put each student back to "green' on the traffic light after they have served the consequence for moving to red. Secondary teachers, who usually see

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TEACHING TOOL #9.1

Questions to Consider When Consequences Don't Seem to Work

Ask yourself the following questions when your consequences fail to alter students' behavior.

1. Was your consequence inunediate? That is, did you apply it soon after the student misbehaved?

2. Was the consequence applied in a consistent manner? That is, did you do what you said you would? Did you do the same thing the last time a student behaved this way and the time before?

3. Did the application of the consequence allow the student to maintain a sense of control? For example, once the consequence was applied, was it completed and followed by a clean slate of forgiveness, or did the student continue to suffer even after the misbehavior ceased?

4. Was the consequence logically related to the misbehavior? Did it allow the student to learn appropriate behavior?

5. Did the consequence allow the student to maintain his or her dignity?

6. Do you model appropriate behavior to the class? Have students observed you acting inconsistently with your behavioral expectations?

their students for an hour each day, allow students to return to the bottom rung of the consequences ladder for a fresh start every Monday.

Implement Consequences Consistently

When a group of students does not meet behavior expectations, it is most often because the teacher has failed to enforce those expectations consistently. Vigilant con­sistency will pay off in the long run; when consequences appear random, students begin to feel powerless. Students must see consequences applied each and every time a rule is broken. Avoid ignoring infractions by some students but then punishing others when they break the same rule. It is crucial that you catch and deliver consequences for the first offense, immediately, to prevent more serious offenses from taking place.

Once a student has developed a pattern of misbehavior, you may find yourself watching that student particularly carefully, looking for him or her to act up. You may

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well be tempted to send the student out of your classroom the first chance you get, just to rid yourself of the hassle the student has become, rather than following your ladder of consequences. Control these impulses. What message do you send a child when you con­sistently throw her out of your room? Once you start eyeing certain students with suspi­cion even before they've done anything wrong that day, you've imploded the notion of universally high expectations. Kids can smell mistrust a mile away and may even play the role you've cast for them. For chil­dren who are weighing whether to follow the rules, they may decide that it's not worth trying to behave if their teacher simply expects misbehavior anyway.

Teaching Tool #9.1, above, offers some helpful questions to ask yourself when your consequences seem ineffective.

Implement Consequences Respectfully

It is hard to over-emphasize the impor­tance of addressing misbehavior in a way

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that allows students to maintain their digni­ty. First, you must be aware of your tone. Everything should be said in a firm and calm, rather than hostile and confrontation­al manner. Another tip is to keep your lan­guage as descriptive as possible and mini­mize the degree to which you make judg­mental statements. Judgmental language, which is often full of negative emotion, ver­bally labels behavior, achievement, or a per­son. For example, you turn to Brandon, who has just interrupted Jose while he was speaking, and say, "Don't be so rude! We'll be discussing your rudeness after class." Descriptive language verbally portrays a sit­uation, behavior, achievement, or feeling. Notice the difference: you turn to Brandon, who has just interrupted Jose while he is speaking, and say "I cannot concentrate on what Jose is saying while you are talking. Please stop interrupting him."

Descriptive language focuses everyone on the task and situation, and avoids label­ing particular students as "smart," "slow," "well-behaved," or "problem students." In other words, as we have repeatedly men­tioned, you address the behavior, not the student. In situations in which a student misbehaves, descriptive language allows you to assert your authority while maintain­ing a positive relationship with the misbe­having student.

Table 9.3 on the opposite page, explores how these guidelines might play out in the classroom.

These scenarios demonstrate consistent and respectful administration of conse­quences. If you find that Nicole constantly turns around to talk to Kia, you will want to work with her to get at the root of the prob­lem-and to involve her in that process. When she stays after class, you might have a conversation like the following:

Teacher: Nicole, I've noticed that in the past few weeks you've had a particularly hard time staying quiet when you are supposed to be doing independent work. Today you

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repeatedly turned to talk to Kia. Last week I remember you talking to Stanley. I'd like to understand why this is happening.

Student: Well, I guess I just like to talk. My grandmother always tells me I talk too much. And today I had something I needed to tell Kia.

Teacher: I see. Was it something that you could have told her during hallway time?

Student: Yeah, I guess.

Teacher: Okay, so how can we help you stay focused during the class period?

Student: I don't know. (teacher waits) I guess ... well, with Kia right behind me it's really tempting to talk to her. Maybe if I sat farther away from her, and couldn't even see her, it would be easier for me.

Teacher: So looking at the seats in the class­room, there are empty ones here and here. This one would put you far away from Kia. You can move to this seat tomorrow.

In the situation with Dexter, you should seek to understand Dexter's frustration with the book. Again, rather than just responding punitively, you want to have a solution-ori­ented approach to student misbehavior. "Empathetic listening" requires teachers to avoid taking student complaints personally (as we are often tempted to do) and instead focus on "hearing the intent and emotions behind what another says and reflecting them back by paraphrasing" (Woolfolk, 2001). That exchange might go as follows:

Teacher: You said the book was really dumb and seemed pretty frustrated that you had to read it. (teacher paraphrases the student's statement)

Student: Yeah. I hate it.

Teacher: You sound like you're not enjoying the book at all, Dexter. (again, paraphrasing)

Student: I'm not. I can't keep track of what is happening in it. And I have to stop every two sentences to look up all these stupid words. I hate it!

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TABLE 9.3: Disruptive Student Behaviors & Instructor Responses

Student Behavior

During silent independent work, Nicole turns around and says something to Kia. Kia simply . shakes her head and continues working. You catch Nicole's eye and write her initials on the board, signifying a warning. Ten minutes later, Nicole turns around in her seat again, talking audibly to Kia.

Later, Kia turns to her left and says something to Miwa.

You notice Luis stealthily eating chips during your explanation of how to solve a second order equation.

You walk the class down the hallway to the library. You turn around and watch as Alisha lags behind the line, stopping to wave at friends in Mr. Ferrar' s class and do a little dance in front of Ms. Baker's class.

During a whole group discussion, James answers a question. After James gives his response, Curtis mutters, "What a fag." The other students near Curtis laugh.

During small group reading time, Dexter throws his book on the floor and exclaims, "This book is so DUMB! Why do I have to read it?"

Your Response

11Nicole, because you chose to tum around and talk to Kia after my warning, you have chosen to stay after class for three minutes once everyone else leaves to explain what is preventing you from focusing."

You write Kia' s initials on the board.

Once students are working independently on the equations you have written on the board, you walk over to Luis and say quiet­ly, "Luis, please leave the chips for after school.n

"Alisha, please get back in line and plan to speak with me when we arrive at the library" Once there, you speak to her indi­vidually. "Because you chose to play in the hallway on the way to the library instead of walking quietly in the line, you have chosen to write a letter of apology to the teachers whose classes you have disrupted with your antics. I expect you to deliver a letter to Mr. Ferrar and Ms. Baker by 3:30 today. While in the library. I know you will make better behavioral choices."

"It upsets me that you would use such a hurt­ful word and that others would laugh. Hurtful words, and laughing about their use, damage our goal of making this class­room a space where everyone feels welcome. "Fag," is a hurtful word that refers to gay people. Curtis, I want to speak with you pri­vately during independent work time."

You move Dexter's clothespin to the yellow light and say, "Dexter, it sounds like you need a cooling off period. We don't treat school materials that way. Please pick up your book and put it on the table, and then move to the timeout chair and fill out a behavior reflection form. I'll be over in a moment to discuss your frustration with you."

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Teacher: It's difficult to understand, and that bothers you. (paraphrasing once again)

Student: Yeah, and I'd rather read a book about aliens anyway. That's what I want to do my book report on.

Teacher: Well, there are a few other books in our class library about aliens. Let's see if we can find one that won't have as many frus­trating vocabulary words. Tiwnk you for telling me what you were feeling, but next time you don't have to throw a book to let me know how you feel.

Remember, the ultimate purpose of your rules and consequences is to help your stu­dents meet your behavioral expectations, which in turn enables all of you to meet your academic achievement goals. If you find that you implement consequences more than you reinforce excellent behavior, you may need to reflect on whether your conse­quences are purely punitive and not suffi­ciently solution oriented.

Responding to Major Interruptions Situations that jeopardize student safety,

such as students physically fighting, a stu­dent having a medical emergency, a student being overtly physically threatened, or a fire, may arise in your classroom or school. As much as is possible, you should prepare for these major incidents. In order to respond calmly and effectively to serious situations, we suggest the following steps:

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1. Find out your school policy for various emergencies. Most likely, your school has a handbook that describes at least a basic procedure for a teacher's response in the case of a fire, intruder, fight, or other emergency. Pay particu­lar attention to the steps for notifying the school administration in the case of an emergency in your classroom. Many classrooms have an "emergency button" that connects you to the main office via the P A.

2. You should also seek the advice of vet­eran teachers regarding the best course of action in the case of a major inci­dent. They might be able to share sto­ries or events that have occurred and ways in which they responded.

3. If possible, you should review stu­dents' medical records to see if any have specific health issues, such as serious allergies to chocolate, bee stings or a history of seizures. If med­ical records are not available to teach­ers, consider asking parents to contact you regarding any medical conditions at the beginning of the year, or add such a question to a Parent/Guardian Survey.

4. Finally, think through how you might handle situations such as a medical emergency, fire, student fight, or intruder ahead of time. Consider what you would do and to whom you would turn if a student suddenly col­lapsed in your presence, or what steps you would take if a small fire started in your classroom. We do not mention these situations to frighten anyone, though if you do not have children of your own, you have probably never thought of some of these scenarios before. Having a plan should help to put you at ease, and, more important­ly, allow you to act in a more decisive manner if a serious situation did occur in your classroom.

Because fights between students, while relatively rare, are probably the most com­mon of the major incidents that would arise in your school or classroom, it's important to discuss possible responses. Most schools have policies for this type of situation, so you should work with your administration to clearly determine your course of action. You should also think through the specifics of your response. Remember that in this sce­nario, your response does not need to be gradual, even if your general consequences utilize a gradual approach; you'll recall that

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many teachers include a "serious offense" clause in their consequences that allows the teacher to take any step necessary to defuse a situation.

There is no precise protocol for handling a fight between students. In most cases you have other options besides physically inter­vening with the students. When students are fighting, you should first use your voice to intervene. Use a strong, calm, clear voice and direct the fighters to stop fighting. Repeat this message, like a broken record. While you are doing so, send another child to get help from other adults. Remember that anger, excessive panic, or unnecessary volume on your part will only exacerbate the situation. However, it is also possible that you will weigh the risks of injury to the students and to yourself and decide to break up the fight. If you are significantly larger and stronger than the involved students, and it is not in direct violation of school policies to do so, you should try to separate them rather than allow either one to get seriously injured. If you are smaller or weaker than the students, it may be better to wait for help. Knowing the policies of your school, knowing your students, and thinking through the response with which you are comfortable will allow you to act decisively in the heat of the moment. Also know that beyond school policy, and city or state law, there can be possible legal ramifications for intervening. You should inform yourself about legal liability in these situations.

It is also possible that as a teacher you will find yourself having to respond to a potential threat of violence. You might hear a rumor that a student has a knife or gun in school or that a student is high or under the influence of alcohol. If you hear such a rumor, take it seriously. Keep the student within sight while immediately sending for help. Ideally, your school will have a plan set up for such an incident specifically addressing who will confront the student. If not, speak with experienced staff and/ or an administrator ahead of time to learn

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what you should do in such a circumstance.

Threats to physical safety do happen on school campuses. By discussing the possibil­ity of school violence and teachers' personal safety, we do not mean to feed the stereo­types propagated by the media. Your school will most certainly be, first and foremost, a community of students, teachers, and fami­lies, working together against a number of social ills that affect all communities, not just theirs. Still, vigilance about physical safety is a component of many of your students' lives, and it should be a component of yours. All teachers in all schools should be concerned and vigilant about personal safe­ty, for the sake of their students and them­selves. While crime on school campuses remains very rare, and while no amount of preparation can guarantee any individual's safety, complacency about the possibility that you will need to respond to a danger­ous situation can increase your risks of being in one.

We do not raise these issues to alarm anyone. Rather, we want to acknowledge that assaults and weapons are sometimes a part of some of our students' lives and com­munities. As a member of that community, there is the possibility- however remote­that you will encounter these issues your­self, even if only indirectly. For many teach­ers, these issues rarely, if ever, arise. At the same time, the reality is that all teachers must be vigilant about fighting, weapons, and threats in school. The School Violence section starting on the next page discusses strategies for dealing with such events.

Classroom Management Styles: Choosing an Approach to Classroom Management

Committing to high expectations, setting rules, defining consequences and establish­ing procedures are essential to effective classroom management. However, the types of rules, consequences, and procedures you

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develop will not be randomly selected. Rather, they will likely reflect an overall approach to management. Teachers tend to have a particular management style and, consciously or not, lean toward manage­ment strategies aligned with that style. This section will help you to recognize your management style and to familiarize your­self with the classroom management approaches aligned with it. As you begin exploring the various approaches we describe, try to keep an open mind, and weigh the advantages and disadvantages of each. Also, try to consider how the different models might fit within the context of a high-need school.

Selecting, learning, and perfecting a model will take years. During your first few months an efficient classroom may feel like an impossible goal. Most new teachers will share your despair. Experience is invaluable; so is an unwavering belief in your ability to create a safe and orderly classroom.

Teacher Power

The teacher is indisputably the most important person in the classroom. Think of how incapacitating a teacher's absence is; rare is the substitute who can actually take a teacher's place. How teachers share, keep, and give power characterizes every disci-

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Understanding School Violence

Despite the recent focus on school violence, there is little agreement on how to define it or pre­vent it. When asked to define pornography, Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously replied, "I know it when I see it." Defining school violence is similarly imprecise. What one might consider an act of kids being kids, another might consider a blatant form of school vio­lence. Do all forms of bullying, fighting, sexual harassment, or the presence of a gun constitute school violence? What if the bullying goes two ways? What if the sexual harassment is an iso­lated incident? What if brawling students insist aftenvards that they were just playing around? What if a student brings a fake gun, but pretends it's real?

Which of these would you consider to be school violence? Or, could all of the cases be consid­ered examples of school violence? Do you think the opinions of veteran teachers would differ from yours? Herein lay the challenge of defining school violence. Since reactions and interpre­tations are subjective, and tolerance levels vary, strict definitions with absolute prescribed con­sequences are near impossible to create.

Here we describe each form of school violence and offer you a few strategies or ideas for pre­venting and handling it in your classroom.

Fighting In many schools fighting is a daily occurrence. Fights can happen virtually anywhere in a school, but occur most frequently when students are least supervised (lunch period, before/ after school, hallways, lavatories). The reasons for fights vary. Thefts, threats, taunts, relationship problems, and frustration can all result in fighting. Fights usually occur as a response to some stimuli versus a random act of school violence. The number of fights at schools has been decreasing from 1993-1999, and interestingly, students in elementary and middle school were more likely to fight than students in grades 9-12 (The National Center of Educational Statistics, 2000). .

How to Handle Fights In some schools, teachers are strictly forbidden to touch students no matter the reason. In other schools teachers are given more latitude to break up fights. Find out from your administrators how they prefer you to handle fights. Above all, consider your safety first.

The Missouri Center for Safe Schools (2001) suggests the following steps for dealing with fights:

1. Verbal Intervention. Use the students' names. Tell students what youwant them to do

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in a calm, firm voice. Do not enter the students' physical space. For example, "Monica and Joan. Please move to the back door. Monica. Keep your hands down. Joan. Put your hands down."

2. Send for Help. If the verbal intervention does not work, ask a responsible student to go get help from a specific person. Continue to use the fighting students' names and let them know that you are in control of the situation. Focus on the attacker. Keep your voice firm, calm and direct.

3. Physical Intervention if Necessary. When assistance arrives, continue with verbal com­mands. Tell the helper the students' names. Be sure that someone works to prevent other students from joining a fight. Restrain students only if previously trained and requested to do so. Try not to appear overly frazzled or frustrated.

When Parents Approve of Fighting One dimension of school fighting that new teachers find surprising is how many parents tacitly give their children permission to fight-usually, as a defensive measure. This poses several challenges to your authority. Discerning what is defensive and what is offensive can be subjec­tive. Most schools acknowledge parents' beliefs about this, but still insist on treating all fight­ing as inappropriate. A teacher might address this situation by saying, "Sometimes there are different rules for different places." Or, "In school, we don't fight under any circumstances. If you feel threatened, you need to tell an adult" '

Bullying Bullying is a universal problem that can create an unwelcoming and unproductive school cli­mate. Bullying is defined as, "physical or psychological intimidation [that] occurs repeatedly over time to create an ongoing pattern of harassment and abuse" (Banks, 1997). Bullies tend to be individuals with high self-esteem, low anxiety, display defiant or oppositional behavior to adults, and come from homes where physical punishment is used and striking back physically is the primary way of solving problems. Further, bullies don't bully because they feel bad about themselves as was commonly held; rather, it is the victims who tend to feel badly about themselves (Banks, 1997).

Haw to Handle Bullying It may be helpful to review first what doesn't work and then focus on what does. Stan Davis (2003), a bully prevention expert, explains that the following actions are NOT helpful:

• Asking the victim to solve the problem. This misguided advice involves encouraging the victim to be assertive, blend in, and ignore the problem ("sticks and stones ... "). This advice problematically places the responsibility of the attack on the victim rather than the perpetrator.

• Whole population education. Having students attend an assembly where they are "preached" to about the ills of bullying rarely works. Even specific curricular programs like the popular TRIBES program, are insufficient to stop bullies. Davis argues that bul­lies in these programs either become bored or feign ignorance of the problem.

What does seem to work is a multi-level approach that integrates school, classroom, and indi­vidual-level responses. The Olweus Bullying Prevention Program is a highly successful bully­prevention model that utilizes a multi-level approach. Developed by Dan Olweus and Sharon Mihalic (1999), the foremost scholars in bully prevention research, here are the key elements of the program:

Intervention Levels School-wide Interventions:

• Administration of the Olweus Bully /Victim Questionnaire about bullying (filled out anonymously by the students)

• Formation of a Bullying Prevention Coordinating Committee

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11 Staff training 11 Development of school-wide rules against bullying 11 Development of a coordinated system of supervision during break periods 11 Adjustment of indifferent or accepting teacher attitudes toward bullying

Classroom-level Interventions: 11 Regular classroom meetings about bullying and peer relations 11 Group parent meetings 11 Adjustment of indifferent or accepting student attitudes toward bullying

Individual-level Interventions: 11 Individual meetings with children who bully 11 Individual meetings with children who are targets of bullying 11 Meetings with parents of children involved to both monitor the targeted childrens' emo­

tional states, and to "out" the bullying behavior and make public the bullying student's actions

Keep in mind the following statistics about bullying (Source: National Mental Health Association, 2001 http:j jwww.nmha.org):

11 Bullying occurs most frequently from 6th to 8th grade, with little variation between urban, suburban, town and rural areas.

11 Sixty percent of male bullies will be arrested by age 24. 11 Victims say teachers ignore harassment of students 97 percent of the time. 11 Three million US teenagers have serious problems in school because they're taunted with

anti-gay slurs. Four out of five gay and lesbian students say they don't know even one supportive adult at school.

Sexual Harassment in Schools Sexual harassment seems quite prevalent in schools. In a national survey of students in grades 8 through 11, 54 percent of the students say they sexually harassed another student and over 80 percent experienced sexual harassment (AAUW, 2001). Hall (1994) defines sexual harassment as: "Any unwelcome conduct that is sexual in nature." Much debate has surrounded who defines 'unwelcome' and 'sexual'; the courts have definitively decided that the person receiv­ing the overtures decides.

Forms of Sexual Harassment Include: 11 Sexual comments, jokes, gestures, looks 11 Exposure to sexual pictures or notes 11 Sexual messages or graffiti • Sexual rumors 11 Touching or grabbing in a sexual way II Blocking the way or cornering someone in a sexual manner 11 Forcing to kiss or do something sexual

Sexual harassment in schools can be viewed as teacher-student or peer-to-peer. Both are equal­ly menacing. Peer-to-peer harassment includes victimization of male students by female stu­dents, female students by male students, male students by male students, and female students by female students. As students enter puberty and become more sexually active, the risk of sexual harassment increases; however, it occurs at all ages. For example, a fourth grade girl might be teased for having big breasts. A middle school girl is called a "dyke." A boy in high s.choo! pats a girl on the behind. Although some incidents of sexual harassment are easy for adults to spot, it is often difficult for adolescents to discern between "flirting and hurting."

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Preventing Sexual Harassment Sexual harassment is against the law. If you suspect that either you or a student in your care has been a victim, you should report it immediately. To avoid accusations of sexual harassment by students, closely monitor what you say and how you say things. Be careful of using humor with sexual punch lines, making suggestive remarks, or discussing aspects of your private life with students. Whenever possible make sure that you are not alone with a student. If you touch students, and in some districts any form of touching is prohibited, consider the possibili­ty that even students you know well might misinterpret your actions. This applies to all teach­ers, even those in the lower elementary grades where students tend to show greater physical affection for their teachers. Some schools and districts have a strict "no touching" policy. Determine your school's policy.

Gun Violence Gun violence is less prevalent than bullying, sexual harassment, or fighting; yet the string of school gun-related crimes over the last decade has brought the issue to the forefront. Interestingly, all of the most violent and deadly school shootings, like those at Columbine High School, have occurred in middle and.upper-middle class white suburban districts.

Preventing Gun Violence Prevention of gun violence requires an integrated multi-level approach. On the policy level, gun control has been a prominent strategy. At the school district level, common measures focus on developing and carrying out sanctions for students who bring weapons to school. These deterrent-type actions are necessary, but hardly sufficient to prevent guns in schools. Preventative measures, like requiring students to carry see-through mesh or plastic backpacks, metal detectors, random locker searches, surveillance equipment, and limiting locker visits, are also used. Education programs and student pledges are symbolic strategies to address gun vio­lence, but their value is minimal. At the classroom level teachers should listen to student chat­ter about weapons, and consistently acknowledge and address bullying, fighting and harass­ment to prevent escalation. If you suspect a student of having a weapon, discretely inform an administrator. Never try to disarm a student without proper training.

James Fox (1999) also advocates harder, more costly measures such as:

• Increasing the length of the school day or after-school programs since most juvenile vio­lence occurs between the hours of 2 p.m. and 7 p.m. The likelihood of violent acts increases when students are unsupervised.

• Bring back the "frills" ("violins instead of violence"). Students enjoy extracurricular activ­ities and are more satisfied with school when such activities are available. Students who find school to be a satisfying place are less likely to offend.

• Decrease class size. Smaller class sizes in schools promote a sense of community. When peer relationships and student-teacher relationships are strong, violent acts decrease.

• Increase faculty to student ratios. • Teach conflict resolution skills early on. • Provide alternative education programs to students who bring weapons to school, rather

than just expelling or suspending them.

School violence is a very real part of students' lives and your life as a teacher. Avoidance and denial will only exacerbate the problem for the offending student and for the entire school community. If you suspect that a student might have violent tendencies, either because of evi­dence you have overheard or witnessed firsthand, it is your professional duty to act on that suspicion. If you witness behavior that has not yet culminated into violence, but conceivably could, it is your moral duty to do whatever is possible to prevent escalation. Students with vio­lent tendencies need help; try to get them that help before they act out, not after .

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Figure 15: Teacher Behavior Continuum

Teacher Behavior Continuum Teacher retains power Students gain power

Interventionist Interactionalist I Non-Interventionist I

plinejclassroom management approach. We define "teacher power" as your authority to influence the behavior of your students. Wolfgang and Glickman's (1986) teacher behavior continuum, in Figure 15 above, reflects this notion of power. They argue that teachers can be interventionist (keeping power), non-interventionist (giving power) or interilctionalist (sharing power). Let's explore e<1ch part of the continuum in greater depth.

Inten>clllioll i,;t,;

Because the interventio~ist teacher keeps power, he or she generally uses carrot-and­stick approaches to influence student behav­ior. The interventionist offers students rewards and punishments to influence stu­dent beha\·ior, believes that unmotivated students can be motivated by the teacher's actions, and tend towards an omni-present existence in the classroom. Although this type of teacher can appear intimidating and uncaring on the surface, most students of interventionists find the clear structure they provide helpful.

Interactional isis

When conflict arises in the classroom, interactionalist teachers view themselves as both part of the problem and the solution. Problem solving and conflict mediation is the responsibility of the teacher and stu­dent. While the teacher has inherent power,

that power is used to engage students in making wiser choices in the future. After this dialogue begins, the teacher shares power with the student(s) to resolve con­flicts. The interactionalist is unconcerned with being right or saving face, but rather wants to strengthen the teacher/student relationship and believes that the need to use coercive discipline tactics is greatly reduced by strong relationships.

Non-interventionists

The non-interventionist teacher believes that students are naturally motivated to learn and to behave appropriately. The non­interventionist teacher considers it his or her responsibility above all to nurture, rather than control, students. As learning facilitators, these teachers provide experi­ences for children to explore their own interests. Some educators have argued that schools have the effect of stifling students' natural curiosity and intrinsic motivation to learn. While an effective non-interventionist emphasizes student empowerment, he or she is hardly a hands-of£ teacher. Since the potential clearly exists for a chaotic class­room with impossibly demanding planning requirements, and possible student abuse of freedom, in many ways, non-interventionist teachers must work several times harder than the interventionist or interactionalist to manage the classroom.

We will now examine specific classroom management/ discipline models that cover

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these three management types. Our sum­maries offer mere introductions; we encour­age further study on your part.

Interventionist Models Interventionist models usually appeal to

teachers who have a need to retain power in class and provide hands-on management of nearly all classroom functions. Although these approaches can seem autocratic and overly strict, teachers skilled at implement­ing these models are rarely considered over­bearing or controlling. Rather students appreciate the clear structure, consistency, and fairness that these teachers value. Two prominent interventionist models are Canter's (1992) Assertive Discipline and Jones's (1987) Positive Discipline.

Canter's Assertive Discipline Model

Lee and Marlene Canter (1992), develop­ers of the Assertive Discipline Model, argue that teachers can be assertive, hostile, or nonassertive classroom managers. Assertive teachers insist on student compliance of requests through calmly delivered state­ments and actions, with pre-specified conse­quences when students fail to comply. Hostile teachers intimidate students into compliance with sarcasm and threats. These teachers often yell and needlessly escalate conflicts rather than solve them. Non­assertive or permissive teachers are those who relinquish their responsibility to man­age the classroom. They naively hope that students will comply, and rarely follow through with any action, positive or nega­tive, with misbehaving students. The Canters believe that assertive teachers are the most effective classroom managers. Hallmarks of this model include (Wolfgang, 1999) the following elements:

A Rules and Consequences Plan

Establishing rules and consequences is

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an affirmative and assertive approach to discipline. Students will misbehave; the best defense is a good offense. Chapter 7 on rules and consequences is essentially based on the Canters' discipline plan. For review, the discipline plan should include four parts:

1. Rules. Rules should be concise, clearly stated, and positively phrased.

2. A Record Keeping System. Record students' names on the chalkboard/ clipboard, and place checkmarks next to names to signify rule infractions. Or drop marbles into a jar to acknowl­edge good student behavior. When the jar fills students are rewarded with, for example, five minutes of free time in a high school class, or stickers for an elementary class.

3. Escalating Consequences. The Canters recommend a five-level conse­quence scale.

4. Rewards that Matter. This behavior modification system only works if students value the rewards attached to good behavior.

Positive Recognition

If a teacher is going to rely on rules and consequences for misbehavior, the Canter model also emphasizes deliberate positive recognition to promote productive behavior. Generally, the positive recognition plan includes three parts (Wolfgang, 1999):

1. Praise. Tell students exactly what they did well. Instead of "Good work," it is more effective to say: "Jermaine, understanding the periodic table is hard even for college students. I'm impressed that you've mastered it in high school. Great job!"

2. Positive Notes Home andfor Phone Calls to Parents/Guardians. Keep par­ent notes and conversations specific, honest, and genuine. Specify exactly

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what the student did to earn the call or note. Some secondary teachers commit to contacting a certain number of parents per week.

3. Tangible Rewards. The Canters advo­cate using behavior awards (student of the week, lunch with the teacher), per­sonal notes to students, and special privileges (free time, choosing any seat, extra bathroom passes, homework passes, etc.). The rewards should be easy to implement and frequently used.

Assertive Messaging

Many discipline problems can be solved with simple verbal and non-verbal mes­sages to students. What you say and how you say it is very important. Assertive mes­sages should be delivered in a confident, businesslike manner, with a tone conveying that you expect nothing less than compli­ance. Consider the following factors to max­imize the effect of your verbal messages (Tauber 1999):

1. Tone of voice. Exude confidence, avoid sarcasm, and watch out for weak or wavering tones that imply lack of commitment.

2. Eye contact. Make eye contact with students when delivering messages. It is unnecessary for students to make eye contact with you, so don't require it. Doing so often invites conflict rather than encouraging compliance.

3. Gestures. Gestures are an effective way to add emphasis to your verbal mes­sages, or to communicate silently. The "teacher look" is a classic example of gesturing, encompassing the teacher's body language, facial expressions, and a slight leaning-in toward the student to subtly emphasize control. Carefully consider whether a gesture will dis­courage or encourage conflict.

4. Use Names. Aside from being respect­ful, using students' names directs the

message to the right person(s) and personalizes it. Hearing one's name instantly commands attention.

Assertive Discipline falls into the inter­ventionist category because of the emphasis on teacher power regarding rules, rewards, and consequences. Many teachers often gravitate to this model early in their teach­ing careers because it provides a tangible method of managing student behavior in the classroom. Studies of the program sug­gest that the model reduced off-task behav­iors for elementary school students (McCormack, 1986; Ferre, 1991). The model has, however, been criticized for being too "pre-packaged" (Curwin and Mendler, 1988). For many, the "jar of marbles" sym­bolizes the seemingly overly simplistic way the Canter Model approaches discipline.

Jones's Positive Discipline Model

Fredric Jones developed his Positive Discipline Model after observing a classroom of emotionally and physically handicapped students. He noted that this classroom seemed to work better than any other class­room in the school. Students were engaged in learning and exhibited productive behav­iors, as opposed to the majority of other classrooms he observed. His model consists of four layers: (1) Classroom Structure, (2) Limit Setting, (3) Responsibility Training, and (4) Back-up System. Let's examine each element more fully.

Classroom Structure

Jones emphasizes building both the affective and physical components of the classroom. Teachers in this model learn to "work the crowd" as opposed to the "crowd working them." Students feel the sanctity of the classroom environment much like the reverence one might have walking into a church or an art museum. The physical room arrangement allows easy access for the teacher to move about the room, with

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students' desks facing the front of the class­room. Jones believes that proximity (physi­cal and emotional) is an effective strategy for productive behavior. Jones also believes that specific routines governing behavior need to be established and consciously taught. These routines can range from how students put their names on assignments to how they line up. The important thing is that the routines and procedures are mod­eled and practiced until students perfect them. The insistence on getting it right helps reinforces expectations.

Limit Setting

Limit setting is about becoming the "silent giant" in your classroom and com­municating to students that you "mean business." Communicate this intent by tak­ing a deliberate approach in the following three ureas:

1. Teacher's Priority. Teachers make dis­cipline the number one priority in the clussroom, even over instruction, since you cannot instruct an unruly class. Consequently, teachers following this upproach invest a significant amount of time early in the year and through­out to reinforce behavior expectations.

2. Teacher's Emotional Response. Teuchers tend to respond to discipline issues emotionally. Instead, Jones truins teachers to be relaxed and steady when conflicts arise and to hundle themselves in a calm and deliberate way. By remaining even­tempered, teachers communicate that their response is "not personal," but is "just business."

3. Teacher's Physical Response. Effective teachers physically convey that they "mean business." This doesn't mean standing like a drill sergeant, but rather developing an awareness of how to adjust your phys­ical presence when handling discipline

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issues. While your response may be only directed at one student, 30 others will be watching and critiquing that response. Jones trains teachers to use the "turn," a distinct physical pause interrupted by a slightly exaggerated turn of the body; and an abrupt stop. (See http:/ /www.tpr-world.com for more details.)

Responsibility Training

This aspect of Positive Discipline is chiefly about helping students, both indi­vidually and as a class, learn to be responsi­ble for their actions. Since this model is interventionistic and thus carrot-and-stick in nature, Jones reasons students can only learn to be responsible when they have something to be responsible about. Therefore, Jones encourages the use of trad­ing preferred activity time (PAT) for produc­tive student behavior. For example, a Spanish teacher might begin the week by offering her class 15 minutes of PAT on Friday. She also gives them opportunities to earn additional PAT minutes. During PAT time students participate in competitions (like vocabulary Jeopardy), enrichment activ­ities (like Spanish cuisine tastings), or fun and games (preferably, but not exclusively related to academic material). When stu­dents misbehave they don't lose their PAT time, but they fail to earn more of it. Thus, students monitor each other's behavior and use peer-pressure to ensure the build-up of PAT time.

Backup System

When positive incentives do not work, Jones suggests that you have a backup sys­tem in place-like calling parents, sending a student to another teacher's room, or send­ing a student to the office. A backup system generally utilizes external assistance. Jones cautions users that the backup system applies to egregious offenses as opposed to

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those that are simply annoying. Part of keeping power means you don't cede it to another teacher or the principal. Teachers actually have much more power than the principal in shaping student behavior (more on this shortly).

Like the Assertive Discipline Model, many teachers like the Positive Discipline Model because of the predictability of the approach and the tight control teachers have in influencing student behavior. The model seems to resonate with many teach­ers who sense that their students need a structured classroom environment.

Interactionalist Models In the interactionalist models reviewed

here, teachers share their power with stu­dents to solve conflicts that arise in the classroom and to help students make wise choices about their behavior. This model appeals to teachers with a more humanistic view of behavior. The interactionalist mod­els reviewed here are from Dreikurs' s Social Discipline Model (Dreikur & Cassell, 1972) and Glasser's Reality Therapy Model (1969).

Social Discipline Model

Rudolf Dreikurs sees children, like all humans, as social beings with a strong need for affiliation, recognition, and status (Wolfgang, 1999). In his view, misbehavior ()CCurs when students' needs are not met. Dreikurs argues that corrective action can only be effective when a teacher under­stands the goal of a student's misbehavior. '[o that end, Dreikurs suggests four root ¢auses or goals of misbehavior in order from least to most serious:

1. Attention Seeking. This behavior encompasses both the class clown and the excessively pleasant student.

2. Power Seeking. New teachers often fall victim to the power struggle. The goal of power seekers is to escalate

conflict in order to challenge authority in the classroom. If you are a teacher who likes to keep power all the time, you can expect these challenges to be frequent. Think of power struggles like a tug-o-war game with you pulling on one end and students pulling on the other. It is best to avoid the game entirely.

3. Revenge Seeking. Revenge seeking behaviors are probably the most frightening and range from assault to theft. Take revenge seeking behaviors seriously but don't over-react. The goal of the revenge seeker is to harm others physically (fighting), verbally (swearing), or psychologically (bully­ing, harassment).

4. Inadequacy. When students believe they are inadequate-socially, aca­demically, emotionally, or otherwise­they may misbehave. These students "wish not to be seen, are passive and lethargic, reject social contact, refuse to comply or try most educational demands" (Wolfgang, 1999).

Table 9.4 on the opposite page lists sug­gestions for dealing with these behaviors.

Once you figure out the goal(s) of a stu­dent's misbehavior, Dreikurs believes you can then address the behavior with three types of consequences:

1. Natural Consequences. These conse­quences occur as a direct result of one's behavior. If a student fools around in class, he or she will miss essential instructional information.

2. Logical Consequences. These conse­quences are imposed by another per­son, with respect to what a natural consequence might be. If a student fools around in class, and misses essential instructional information, he or she should have to complete sup­plemental work to ensure that they learn the material, a logical conse­quence.

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Attention Seeking Behaviors Example: A student repeatedly kicks the back of another students' desk.

Minimize the Attention Ill Give the "teacher look." 111 Stand close by. Ill Ignore behavior. 111 Use the student's name.

Legitimize the Behavior 111 Use behavior as a "teachable

moment. If 111 Have the whole class join in

the behavior. Ill Extend the behavior to its

most extreme.

Do the Unexpected Ill Turn out the lights. Ill Change your voice. I'M Lower your voice

to a whisper.

Distract the Student Ask a direct question.

Ill Ask a favor. 111 Change the activity.

Notice Appropriate Behavior 111 Thank the behaving students. Ill Write well-behaved

students names on the board.

Move the student Change the student's seat.

Power & Revenge Seeking Behaviors Example: A student purposely knocks something off the teachers' desk.

Make a Graceful Exit Ill Acknowledge student's

power. 111 Remove the audience. Ill Change the subject. 111 Shelve the matter.

Use Time Out Ill Time in the classroom

(silent seat, or silent table).

Ill Set the duration of time out. Ill Time out in a "buddy"

teacher's classroom.

Restitution 111 Require students to pay

or fix damages.

Exercise Logical Consequences

Relate the consequence to the misdeed.

111 Make the consequence equal in severity to the misdeed.

Avoid Power Struggles At All Costs 111 Do not get emotionally

involved. Do not take the behavior personally.

Inadequacy Example: A student, intimi­dated by a project assignment, avoids starting the project and misses the first deadline.

Provide Tutoring 111 Extra help from teachers. Ill Peer tutoring. Ill Learning centers.

Teach Positive Self-Talk Ill Post positive classroom

signs. Ill Encourage positive

self-talk before activities.

Make Mistakes Acceptable 111 Talk about mistakes. Ill Equate mistakes with

effort. 111 Minimize the negative

effects of making mistakes.

Build Confidence ftil' Focus on improvement. Ill Show faith in students. Ill Build on strengths.

Go for small and big wins.

Focus on Past Success Ill! Analyze past success. Ill! Repeat past success.

Adapted from Charles Wolfgang (1999) and Linda Albert (1989) in Charles Wolfgang's Solving discipline problems: Methods and models for today's teachers.

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3. Contrived Consequences. Dreikurs views contrived consequences as pun­ishments that run counter to individu­als' need to feel a sense of belonging. Autocratic and coercive punishments sever relationships. Punishments can range from paddling students to send­ing them home with a negative note.

Dreikurs's model suggests that the teacher and students can agree on logical consequences to help the student learn from his or her mistakes. Determining suitable consequences can be difficult, but the process entails the valuable relationship building on which this model is based. Many teachers are attracted to the Social Discipline Model, because of its democratic overtones and its focus on the teacher-stu­dent and student-student relationships and the underlying causes of misbehavior. Despite these advantages, many teachers find the demand to consult with misbehav­ing students onerous.

Reality Therapy

William Glasser's Reality Therapy Model emphasizes the control individuals have over their choices and their lives. Reality therapy follows eight implementa­tion steps, described below (Tauber, 1999):

1. Secure Student Involvement. Stud-ents must perceive school as good place to be, where: adults are courte­ous; there is genuine joy brought about by involvement with caring people engaged in relevant work; open communication is not just preached, but practiced; and reason­able rules exist, beneficial to both the individual and the group.

2. Identify the Problem Behavior. Try to understand what a student is doing rather than why a student is doing something. Asking students "why" they are doing something signals that you have already made a (negative) judgment about the behavior. For

example, Shondra comes to you and says, "Talia took my pencil!" Rather than asking Talia why, or whether, she took the pencil, ask: "Talia and Shondra, what seems to be the prob­lem focusing on your quiz?" By prob­ing the matter neutrally, you decrease the likelihood of escalation.

3. Call for Value Judgments. Although it's probably easier to judge for a stu­dent why his or her misbehavior is wrong, Glasser argues that it is more productive for students to identify for themselves how their actions affect other people. The role of the teacher becomes helping students to under­stand the cause-and-effect relationship of their behavior. Recall the example above. Instead of telling Talia to keep her hands off Shondra' s pencil (the cause of the conflict), you might emphasize the effect, by responding: "Talia, Shondra can't finish her quiz without her pencil."

4. Plan for New Behavior. This step is straightforward. Invest students in fig­uring how to make sure the misbehav­ior doesn't reoccur. In the example above, you might say, "Talia, what's your plan for making sure this doesn't happen again?" Wait for Talia to come up with a plan rather than suggesting one for her. If Talia fails to do so you might ask her to sit out of an activity until she can think of a genuine response or to meet with you later for further discussion.

5. Get a Commitment. You not oniy want to make sure Talia has a plan, but you want to make sure she "works her plan." Whether the commitment is verbal or written, make sure that both you and Shondra get a commitment. You might say to Talia: "Okay. I agree with your plan. Now work your plan." The essence of sharing power means taking that leap of faith to trust Talia to enact her plan.

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6. Accept No Excuses. Since reality ther­apy deals with future actions, teachers must be willing to let go of past stu­dent behaviors. If you are the type of person who holds grudges, this model is probably not for you. The goal is to let students take responsibility for their future actions. You cannot ensure that Talia won't take Shondra' s pencil again, but you must expect it. However, having faith in your stu­dents does not require you to accept, or encourage, excuses.

7. Don't Punish. Punishment is counter­productive to reality therapy. Punishment can potentially damage the trust and supportive classroom cli­mate that you have built. While there needs to be consequences for misbe­havior, Glasser argues that those con­sequences should not be punitive. Rather, corrective measures should be geared toward supporting students in "working their plans."

8. Never Give Up-Be Persistent. Glasser suggests you "hang in there longer than the student thinks you will." If you have to tell Talia five times to stop taking other people's belongings and she stops for good on the sixth time, then you have accom­plished your goal.

Shaping student behavior will not hap­pen overnight. If you think of misbehavior (or responsibility) as a habit, you begin to understand that habits can't be broken or developed instantaneously.

Non-Interventionist Models Non-Interventionist models focus on giv­

ing power to students. Teachers who use this approach believe that in order for students to learn responsibility they must feel fully empowered to make important decisions about their lives. The role of adults is to sup-

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port students' decision making. This does not mean giving students free reign to do anything they want to do. Rather, non-inter­vention approaches require thoughtful, cre­ative, and deliberate involvement of adults. In many ways, the non-interventionist model is the most difficult to skillfully implement. Therefore, the techniques described below are not advisable for the new teacher; proper implementation generally requires a very skilled educator. We offer this brief introduc­tion of thought-provoking options for the future, and actively discourage you from adopting them in your first year or two in the classroom. We feature one non-interven­tionist model: Thomas Gordon's (1974) Teacher Effectiveness Training (T.E. T).

Gordon's Teacher Effectiveness Training

This classroom management model emphasizes excellent communication between the teacher and student. Students are viewed as rational human beings, who do not need to be coerced into behaving appropriately.

T.E.T. Problem Solving Measures

One of the first skills teachers learn in T.E.T training is to assess who "owns prob­lems" as they arise in the classroom. Do you (the teacher) own the problem? Does the student own the problem? Or, do the teacher and the student jointly own the problem? For example, imagine watching an interaction between Marcus, a seventh grader, and his math teacher, Ms. Kirk, on videotape. You view Marcus completing a math activity while tapping his pencil on the desk. Ms. Kirk has reminded him sever­al times to stop tapping his pencil. Finally, Ms. Kirk stops the lesson and says emphati­cally, "Marcus! Please stop tapping your pencil." At this point she goes over to Marcus and takes his pencil away. Marcus responds with a stunned look on his face. Your T.E.T. trainer asks you, "What is the problem? Who owns it?" How would you

309

respond to this question? A teacher trained in T.E.T would identify the teacher as own­ing this problem. From the videotape it looks like no one else is bothered by the tap­ping except the teacher. Furthermore, the teacher's response of taking Marcus' pencil seems extreme and reactionary.

T.E. T. teachers are trained to dig deep to evaluate their own internal reactions and emotions. In the example above, the trainer later explains that the noise was personally annoying to the teacher, while the other stu­dents seemed undisturbed. The teacher therefore "owns" the problem, because she is the one aggravated by the tapping. The teacher's reaction causes the most signifi­cant disruption.

Teachers' interventions need to distin­guish between student behavior that they find personally annoying, and student behavior that genuinely constitutes a disci­plinary matter. In this case, Ms. Kirk's response was based on personal annoyance, and she could have responded less emotion­ally, by sliding a folded tissue on Marcus' desk where the pencil was landing, or by gently explaining to him that his tapping was annoying.

By understanding who truly "owns" problems, teachers and students are in a better position to resolve them. By taking a "brief moment, perhaps just seconds, to 'determine ownership, a teacher can

;"C r1im]JrC•ve his or her chances of responding 1;%;;i!J1ti<m<tlly, rather than emotionally. To do so,

i~ordlon proposes the following process:

1. Define the Problem. Remember, if you're doing all the talking to define the problem, then you still "own" it. Participate with students to under-

. stand the problem.

Generate Possible Solutions. Rather than deciding on a quick solution, brainstorm several possible solutions with students.

Evaluate Solutions. Which solution Will best solve the problem?

4. Decide on the Solution. Choose a solution, collaborating with the stu­dent if possible.

5. Implement the Solution. Agree who will do what to implement the solution.

6. Evaluate Solutions. During the imple­mentation, reflect on how well the solution is working.

Verbal/Communication Skills

When misbehavior or conflict occurs in class, what teachers say and how they say it can usually diffuse and resolve a situation without having to resort to elaborate disci­pline plans, such as consequences and pun­ishments. T.E.T provides teachers with key verbal skills to both facilitate lessons and to manage student behavior. A few of these techniques include:

11 Critical Listening. The teacher remains silent, makes eye contact, and listens to the student. She does not try to inter­pret what the student means or make judgments about what is being said. She simply lets the student speak. Critical listening allows the student to be heard. Even when students refuse to speak, the teacher uses non-verbal cues to prompt the student to respond, without forcing speech. Teachers remain silent and give the student an opportunity to speak. For example, Mr. Barnes stands with an open posture (palms open, slightly off center, making friendly, but concerned eye contact) to Kim, a 10th grade student; who is refusing to complete her history quiz. He is silent and waits 30 seconds, before Kim responds, "I don't want to take this fuckin' quiz!"

11 Active Listening. Although most peo­ple have heard of active listening, few use it correctly, misguided by the notion that active listening just parrots back what is heard. Instead, active lis­tening clarifies and acknowledges

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what is heard, or restates what the stu­dent has said in the teacher's own words. In the example above, Mr. Barnes says, in a matter of fact tone, "You don't want to take the quiz." Notice he does not ask a question, but makes a statement.

11 !-Messages. The teacher makes a "matter-of-fact directive statement containing the word T that expresses to the student a description of the stu­dent's behavior" and its negative effect on the teacher or fellow students (Wolfgang, 1999, p.23). Continuing with the example above, Mr. Barnes says, 'T d like you to use another word to describe the quiz. I try hard not use profanity in class; you should too [injecting humor]. I'd like to record a grade for this quiz. I can't if you don't take it." Kim responds by rolling her eyes but seems less frustrated.

11 Influencing Statements/Questions. This set of verbal skills helps students to change behavior. These statements can express approval or disapproval, suggest a new course of behavior, or seek a greater understanding of the problem. Mr. Barnes can use a combi­nation of influencing statements, like, "Kim, can I talk to you by my desk for a minute?" Once they are talking pri­vately, he can say, "I think you may be too frustrated to take the quiz now, how about a break [new course of action]. Here's a bathroom pass. Get some water. Would you like to take the quiz after school?" Kim explains, "Mr. Barnes, my manager put me on the schedule wrong. So I have had to work two days in a row, and I can't lose my job. I want to do well on this quiz, but honestly I didn't study. Hey, you really cuss outside of class?" Mr. Barnes smiles and hands over the pass.

You may question whether this teacher has done the best thing. Does Kim get an

CHAPTER 9: AUTHORITY & DISCIPLINE

advantage of having one more day to study for the quiz? Will other students tell her the exact quiz content? Is she telling the truth? Is it okay to tell students that you use pro­fanity outside of class? Remember, Mr. Barnes does not own the problem in the example above; Kim owns it. He, does how­ever, choose to share in the solution. Gordon stresses that teaching is about rela­tionships, not when students should take quizzes. Mr. Barnes knows that Kim's job is important to her. It signals responsibility on her part. If the problem becomes chronic then Mr. Barnes might suggest a different solution. Mr. Barnes' goal was not to punish Kim but to ensure that she completed her quiz. If his goal had been conformity (i.e. all students finishing the exam at one time), then he might have insisted on her taking a failing grade, a solution that would benefit neither Kim nor Mr. Barnes.

T.E.T has many supporters and has been used for decades. Many teachers find its focus on communication over elaborate rules, consequences, and incentives very satisfying. Know that T.E.T. requires an intensive five-day training, so our brief explanation merely scratches the surface. The internet offers several resources for more information on the model.

This section reviewed several classroom management/ discipline models that have proven to be effective. Table 9.5 on the next page, summarizes each of the models we have discussed. As you choose a model, make sure it benefits students, fits within the overall culture of your school, aligns with the school's discipline approach and reflects your core beliefs about teaching and learning. Arguments can be made for blend­ing one or several approaches above, and for experimenting with bits and pieces of each approach. However, don't treat the various management strategies as a bag of tricks. Results seem more promising for those who develop a repertoire, and use the techniques purposefully with the develop­er's intent.

311

TABLE 9.5: Summacy of Classroom Management & Discipline Models

Model Description Key Strategies

Interventionist

Assertive Discipline Effective classroom managers are Rules and Discipline Plan (Canter) assertive and use clear rules, proce-

Positive Recognition dures, and rewards to manage student behavior and classroom activities. Assertive Messaging

Positive Discipline Layered approach to management Classroom Structure (Jones) founded on building rapport with

Limit Setting students in a tightly controlled classroom environment. Responsibility Training

Back-Up System

Interactionalist

Social Discipline Students seen as social beings Four Goals of Misbehavior: Model (Dreikus) with a strong need for belonging. Attention, Power, Revenge,

Misbehavior stems from not feeling Withdrawal a sense of belonging.

Natural and Logical Consequences

Reality Therapy Focus on how to help students deal School is a "Just" Place. (Glasser) with immediate problems and build

Eight Steps for Handling responsibility.

Misbehavior

Non-Interventionist

Teacher Focus on ownership of Problem-Solving Effectiveness classroom problems and Measures Training-T.E.T communication skills. Verbal Skills (Gordon)

'- /

Behavioral Interruptions in the Context of the Larger School Culture

play out within your classroom and the school at large. To be effective within your school environment, you need to understand the culture in which you are operating As we have mentioned in the previous

two chapters, you will need to take into ac<:oumtthe broader school context as you dPtrPlnn and set your behavioral expecta­tions and classroom procedures. The culture of your school has a significant impact on

way discipline and routine practices will

and become familiar with the standard approaches used by the school. To the extent possible, you should align your responses to student misbehavior with those used by your colleagues so that your classroom is consistent with the environment in which

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your students are used to operating. This will not always be easy. For example:

You and a fellow teacher are sharing hall duty at your middle school when two stu­dents start arguing after one accuses the other of cutting in line at the water fountain. Your colleague has a more aggressive, "in­your-face" disciplining style than you do, and she proceeds to angrily yell at the stu­dents, in a bullying and threatening tone. She makes no effort to mediate. You feel that her approach is unnecessarily combative and ineffective. One of the students is yours, and looks to you pleadingly to intervene. How might you respond?

Remember that you must weigh dual responsibilities; the students' needs remain paramount, and yet it would be inappropri­ate to openly conflict with your colleague in front of students. Should you intervene at all? What is the best possible conclusion you can envision? What is the worst possible conclusion you can envision? A successful compromise might be a solution in which you manage to avoid offending anyone without sacrificing your own ideals, or what you perceive to be your students' emotional well-being.

In this situation, it might be best to lower the intensity of the situation by calmly say­ing something to the effect of: "If you are both finished arguing, then this can be over. If you feel the need to talk about it more, you're both welcome to stop by my office after class. In the meantime, are you both willing to let this go?" With this response, you haven't openly conflicted with your col­league, but you have let the students know that you're available to them for any help they might need resolving the conflict.

How to Avoid Power Struggles­Let Go of Your Ego

Once a teacher is involved in a power struggle with a student, they will both be stuck in a no-win situation. When disciplin-

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ing takes a wrong turn, as it often does, learn to identify the moment that went wrong.

When students misbehave, it is essential to remind yourself of your objectives. You might feel personally insulted by the behav­ior. You might feel frustrated by a student's repeated aggravations. You might even, if you let yourself admit it, feel embarrassed or humiliated in front of the rest of the class, afraid of your students watching you get pushed around. Regardless of how you feel, or how bruised your ego might be, you must focus on the objective of any confrontation with a student-to continue your lesson and to discontinue the disruptive behavior in both the short and long term. You must deliberately maintain self-control and focus on teaching in every conflict situation. Your ego can play no helpful role in disciplining your students.

Resist taking student behavior personal­ly. If a student says something hurtful like, "Ms. Rodriguez, that is a nasty dress!" keep your response focused on your students' learning needs and try to keep your sense of humor. You might respond, "That's a pretty rude comment, Michelle, but how much do I owe you for the fashion advice?" You must remember at all times that you are the only professional adult in the room.

Phrasing matters. Accusations beginning with "you" leave a student feeling attacked, and readily invite argument. Finger pointing is considered a belligerent and rude motion. Pay attention to the signals your words and your body language send, and be sure they are consistent with your intentions.

Your job is to defuse potentially volatile situations, not to ignite them. In the follow­ing excerpt, from David Kobrin's In There with the Kids (1991), a young teacher strug­gles with this exact challenge:

"Philip. What are you doing?" Ms. Coles asks.

"I'm not doing anything," Philip replies in all innocence. He looks pointedly at the conspicuous piece of paper on the floor

313

by Arthur's feet.

Ms. Coles sighs, "What is that, Arthur?"

T7w young man in question leans forward to retrieve his work. "It's nothing," Arthur mumbles, putting the paper somewhere in his notebook.

"T11ey've been passing notes," the ever-help­ful Philip explains. "Copious notes."

"Big mouth," Lee says, followed almost immediately by Arthur's condescending half-smothered- but unfortunately not entirely smothered- "Asshole!"

Ms. Coles, who hears it all too clearly, can­not pretend she doesn't.

"We weren't passing notes," Arthur adds, mockcn; of Philip rich in his voice. "That was 1111 old note from another class that slipped ou I of my notebook. Philip was tn;ing to grab it."

Phi I ip laughs.

"That's enough, Philip!" Ms. Coles says. She kw>il'" frmn past experience he won't cause an up roa r.

"What' .. he exclaims indignantly.

"That's mough," Ms. Coles repeats, trying hard I<> sound definite but not angry. She walks to<mrds Arthur's desk. He, unlike Philip. <l'ill argue and deny and try to nego­tiate no 111atter how obvious to everyone in tile roo111 that he has no legitimate ground to stand on. Confronting him would cause e1'e11 111orc disruption, Ms. Coles reasons. Tile f<~l' seconds she's been thinking are a! ready beginning to feel like a silence preg­nant u>ith tension. How to take care of Arthur ami Lee and get the class back on track as soon as possible?

Ms. Coles leans over Arthur's desk, speak­ing in a quieter voice but still loudly enough for Arthur's neighbors to hear. "I want yes­terday's note," she says, purposely empha­sizing her sarcasm, "kept where it is in your notebook."

"It is!" Arthur proclaims.

"Open your notebook right now to a fresh page," she continues, ignoring Arthur's comment, "and take careful notes on the rest of this class. And I want to see both you after class," Ms. Coles adds. Her eyes make

. it clear who "both" are.

Ms. Coles immediately resumes walking and lecturing, hoping that for the moment the problem is sufficiently dealt with. When the bell rings to end class she will have to decide what to ask of them. An explanation, for sure, and an apology if that's called for. Perhaps detention? She first needs to find out what's going on. Ms. Coles restrains herself from looking at the boys, to avoid another reaction. And she forswears the temptation to tell Arthur "Sit up straight!" He's a terrible slouch.

There is a lot going on in this scene. How do you think Ms. Coles handled the situa­tion? Did she aggravate it or pacify it? How do her personal views of her students affect the decisions she makes? Do you think she is conscious of the ways her personal views of her students come into play? What specif­ic methods of disciplining does Ms. Coles employ? Does her ego interfere with her approach? Does the situation ever escalate into a power struggle? Does she come across as firmly in control of the situation? Does she allow her inner doubts to become appar­ent? Does she seem to have a clear system of consequences in place?

In a second version of the same episode, Ms. Coles makes different choices. The incident, as you will see, plays out quite differently:

Ms. Coles sighs, "What is that Arthur?" she asks.

"Ifs nothing," Arthur mumbles, putting the paper somewhere in his notebook.

"They've been passing notes," the ever-help­ful Philip explains.

"We weren't passing notes," Arthur says, mockery of Philip in his rich voice. "That was an old note from another class that

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•

slipped out of my notebook. Philip was try­ing to grab it."

Philip laughs.

"I want yesterday's note," Ms. Coles says in a loud voice, emphasizing "yesterday's" so her sarcasm won't be missed by the class. "Give it to me now."

Arthur shakes his head. "Why do you want yesterday's notes, Ms. Coles?" he asks, sounding genuinely puzzled. "Here are today's notes." He holds his notebook at an angle so Ms. Coles can't read what he's written. "I don't know where yesterday's notes are." He also says "yesterday's" in a loud voice, imitating Ms. Coles' sarcasm.

This gets a chuckle from some of the boys in the class.

Ms. Coles feels as though the rest of the class is waiting for her response. "Give me that note right now!" she says. She will not be shown up.

Arthur smiles, closes his notebook, and stands up.

"And just where do you think you're going?"

Arthur look surprised. "You told me to get my notes," he explains. He starts for the door.

"Come right back here. And sit down."

Ever the model of obedience, Arthur politely retraces his steps and takes his seat. Then he murmurs something under his breath.

"What was that?" Ms. Coles demands. She is aware that she's losing face before her other students.

"I said, 'I was just doing what you told me.' You're always angry at me, even when I do what you want!"

"You were not doing what I want. I told you I want that note. And I still want it. Give it to me right now, or you're off to the Assistant Principal's Office."

In this scenario, Ms. Coles has obviously let the situation get out of control. What

CHAPTER 9: AUTHORITY & DISCIPLINE

began as a simple note-passing incident has escalated into a power struggle. What is the exact moment that the exchange with A ..-~h,,.' becomes a power struggle? When does her ego start affecting her judgment?

When students "talk back" in a disre­spectful way; remember that they are not attacking you personally- they are rebelling against the authority you represent. For example, an African American male high school student, after an angry classroom exchange, called his young, white, female teacher a "white honky bitch." She replied: "That's Miss White Honky Bitch to you." While there were a multitude of other poten­tial responses at her disposal, and many educators might disagree with her response, she did manage to accomplish the following:

11 She reasserted her authority; without attacking the student.

11 She managed to avoid an escalating racial conflict.

11 She reiterated the need for him to show her respect.

In short, for better or for worse, she beat the student as his own name-calling game. If you were the name-calling student, how might her response have affected you? If you were another student in the class, how might her response have affected the way you viewed your teacher?

Remember there are many "right" responses and many "wrong" responses. There are myriad possible reactions that you might consider or instinctively experience in a given situation. Students will be emotion­al- the more you can remove your own emotions from the encounter, the better.

The Role of the School's Administrators in Handling Discipline Issues

Just like our young Ms. Coles, many new teachers are tempted to rely on the threat of

315

a visit to a Principal's office. Many adopt the attitude that "discipline is not my issue. That is what the principal does." Tradition­ally, the school's principal was the lead disciplinarian and authority over student behavior. However, in the age of standards and accountability, the principal's role has become that of the principal teacher in a school. Several policy reforms are underway to redefine the role and duties of the princi­pal with a particular emphasis on being an "instructional leader," as opposed to chief disciplinarian.

In many of the schools in which we work, the principal or assistant principals are consumed with a variety of tasks that teachers rarely see or often do not appreci­ate. Additionally, principals are under incredible pressure to meet rigorous state and local performance standards, sometimes without robust financial or tedmical sup­port.

Although most principals are charged with creating a safe and orderly learning environment, dealing with minor and chron­ic student discipline issues are actually low priorities. Clearly, some discipline issues require the immediate attention of school administrators; however, teachers, within the confines of their classrooms, must han­dle the majority of student discipline issues themselves.

Consider that students interpret sending a classmate to the office as a sign of weak­ness and ineffectiveness, while teachers interpret sending a student to the office as a sign that the student has behaved especially inappropriately. When you send a student to the office for a minor or chronic infraction, you communicate to all students, and to your principal, that you are not capable of managing your classroom.

Once students perceive, rightly or wrongly, that you are an incapable class­room manager, they typically respond by ignoring any future attempt you make to manage it; once you have given up your teacher power, don't expect a student to

316

return from suspension and give it right back to you. Chances are you will get stuck in the cycle of always needing an adminis­trator to handle your problems.

The fact of the matter is that each time you send students to the office for minor or chronic infractions, the strategy becomes less effective. You may then have to work twice as hard to maintain control, because stu­dents do not expect you to handle disrup­tions. Also keep in mind that once you send a student to the office, you must accept the judgment and actions of the school's admin­istrator. The administrator may speak with the student, send him immediately back to class, or suspend the student. However, administrators use this last option sparingly because suspending students from school rarely solves discipline issues and worsens the student's academic achievement. Additionally, suspension requires a lot of paperwork, and numerous suspensions worsen the school's record. Furthermore, it seems that the same five percent of students are always being suspended, begging the question as to whether or not this sanction is appropriate or effective.

Also keep in mind that once a student arrives in the office she may be there with several other students sent by other teachers. Naturally, students with more pressing issues will receive greater attention. For example, although you may have sent the student for name-calling, the administrator may be dealing with a student showing signs of abuse. Since an administrator's time is very limited, the student you sent might only get a brief consultation before being sent back to the classroom-something the teacher could have easily done herself.

Typically, new teachers want to be able to send the student out of the class for some­one else to deal with and to dictate an appropriate punishment. In actuality, this response rarely happens and instead often leads to frustration and a belief that the administrator is being "unsupportive."

You must also consider your feelings

CHAPTER 9 : AUTHORITY & DISCIPLINE

•

about your school administrator. Do you admire and respect him or her? In some cases you will, in some cases you won't. If you are lucky, you will have an administra­tor with whom you share general education­al philosophies, and from whom much can be learned. It is also possible that you will consider your administrator's methods and views to be in direct conflict with your own. In this case, without discounting his or her formidable experience, you might work to take from this person the valuable lessons to be offered, while simultaneously striving to exist as an alternative to some of his or her more contentious views.

When you need assistance from an administrator for a student whose behavior, while annoying, does not rise to the level of an administrative referral, you have several options. Consider one of the following:

11 Discuss the situation with other col­leagues. Avoid gossiping about student misbehavior with other teachers. Instead, enlist the help of a trusted col­league and collect a variety of sugges­tions for how to handle the disruptive student.

11 Create a behavior plan with the stu­dent. Work with the student individu­ally to create a behavior plan, and stick to it. Often student misbehavior stems from the student's perception that she or he is not fairly receiving your atten­tion. You might try a system of rewards and incentives. Find out what moti­vates students and incorporate that into the plan.

111 Enlist the help of the student's par­ent/ guardian. A student's family can be a very useful source of support. Keep in mind that parents may be experiencing the same struggles with their child as you. Consult with parents rather than demanding their support. Prepare for the possibility that parents or guardians may become defensive on their child's behalf. Also consider that

CHAPTER 9; AUTHORITY & DISCIPLINE

they may take a more severe approach with their child than you might have preferred or anticipated.

11 Discuss the student's behavior with the administrator informally. An adminis­trator's day is filled with bad news about student behavior. Take the time to let administrators know when things are going well in your classroom, and use that discussion as an entry point for discussing the disruptive student. It is important for administrators to view you as a proactive problem solver, rather than a teacher who "skirts" on her disciplining responsibilities.

11 Discuss the student's behavior with the administrator formally. Schedule a meeting to discuss the disruptive stu­dent. Often, teachers approach admin­istrators in the heat of the moment. Instead, cool down and schedule a time to talk with the administrator. Make sure to bring documentation of the stu­dent's behavior record and the specific actions you have taken to correct the situation. Once you've proven that you have exhausted all of your options, the administrator will be in a better posi­tion, and better frame of mind, to help you.

111 Concretely communicate with all stu­dents that you value good behavior. It is easy to focus on the misbehavior of a few students, while ignoring the stellar behavior of the others. Show all your students that you care about their behavior in class. Taking the time to hold a five-minute class meeting to thank students is a simple and effective way to genuinely acknowledge good behavior and progress toward academ­ic goals. You many want to end class five minutes early after a particularly productive session to reward students for their attention and performance.

Managing student behavior is one of the most difficult aspects of a beginning

317

teacher's job. Avoid the mistake of giving up your "teacher power" by making others deal ~'l'ith issues for which you are best suited and expected to handle. You'll earn substan­tial credibility with your administrators and other teachers by handing over only those problems that truly require an administra­tor's help. Remember the adage, "Don't run to the well too many times, or the water will run dry"; enlist your principal's help strate­gically and sparingly.

Connecting with Students

In the end, the success of your disciplin­ing efforts may well come down to the qual­ity of your relationships with your students. To connect successfully with them, think about the following:

111 Create a safe environment for them.

111 Have students identify and acknowl­edge their behavior, and, ultimately, own up to it.

111 Help students realize the difference between their actions and their desires. Ask, "What do you want? Is your behavior getting you what you want?"

111 Have students evaluate the behavior with their own value system, as opposed to inilicting your values on them. Ask: "Is this against the rules? Is this something you want to work on?" Then have students evaluate the con­sequences of the behavior and make sure they realize that the acceptance of those consequences is a choice.

111 If the student is willing to change the behavior, make a plan to change it and get a commitment from him or her. You might use a contract, or you can even ask them to give you "their word." Older students especially appreciate the power of one's word.

111 Make contact with your student by sharing something to establish a con­nection. They need to know you care about them and not just about keeping them in line.

111 Avoid arbitrary punishments or consequences.

Conclusions and Key Points This chapter discussed how to assert

your authority and apply consequences when faced with student misbehavior. The following key points were emphasized:

111 Effective teachers have a clear system for responding to student interrup­tions and remember that every conflict offers an opportunity to teach.

1111 Common causes of classroom misbe­havior include: unclear limits, a sense of student powerlessness, attacks on dignity, student boredom, inability to express feelings, and peer pressure.

1111 First consider if and when to respond to student misbehavior; then depend­ing upon the type of interruption­minor, chronic, or major- decide how to respond.

11 Teachers tend to have or develop a unique management style, which can be classified as interventionist, interac­tionalist, or non-interventionist.

1111 Resist taking student behavior person­ally.

11 When disciplining, seek the assistance of school administrators sparingly and selectively.

Finally, never give up on your students. The more they push, the more they are ask­ing for your help. Make sure they know you are in this for the long haul.

CHAPTER 9 ; AUTHORITY & DISCIPLINE

•

TEACHER SPOTLIGHTS

@;AMYO. The greatest thing I learned was how to just be comfortable with my own authority. One teacher told me the first year: there has to be someone in charge, and that person is you. Get used to it. It's not a democracy. It can't be a democracy. It's a benevolent dictatorship and that's the way it has to be. I can still empower the kids. I can still give them choices. I can still make sure they feel safe so they feel free to express themselves, but that has to be done in a controlled and effective way.

4f/!J' LAUREN I raised my voice a lot that first year. And what I learned was dmz't yell. For me, when I don't yell at them, and I have patience, but I'm stern and quiet, it's more effective. Now I use a counting system­! count down from five down to one and by the time I get to one everything has to be quiet I take my time between each number. The first year it was hard, but this year I never have to go past four. Now when I do yell, however rarely, it's taken seriously. If you yell all the time, it loses its effect.

Kids are mouthy. They're energetic and mouthy. When they talked back to me I would talk back to them. I had to remind myself that I was the adult They would cuss at me and I was offended so I'd jump back at them. It was my defense mechanism in the beginning because I wasn't used to being talked to that way. Now it doesn't even phase me. I was acting like a 12 year old instead of being the adult I tell myself now that I have to be a good role model and that I have to be careful about every single thing I say because they study everything I do. \1\Then I'm not mouthy with them and when I treat them with respect, they are more respectful to me. I know now that I can't be their friend. I'm not their peer. I'm their teacher.

4flO CAROL I had one conversation with a child that I wished I hadn't had. It wasn't horrible but I think he took it the wrong way. It was dismissal time and it was pandemonium. And I turned to him and asked him to sit down and I said, "Would you get a life and just sit down?" It's something I would say to my friends, and they wouldn't think twice about it, but it was a mistake to talk to a student that way. He misinterpreted it and was really upset by it. It's an age thing, but I have to be really careful about what I say to them, and I understand that now.

4flOJ~A_Y __________________________________ _ The subject matter was easier than I expected. The classroom management was much harder than I thought it would be. I had no trouble with the mathematics. I'm a second career guy. I was worried about getting back into algebra, but that was easier than I thought. Kids love me. That's not ego. They just take to me because I'm a kid at heart. I'm 47 and I still play Nintendo. So 1 thought that would be enough to get me by in classroom management. I thought that part was going to be a cakewalk. I heard people say how hard it was during the training, but I really didn't think it was going to be a problem for me. I was shell-shocked when I got in there.

You take it one day at a time. Today was a rough day and I didn't have great control today. I've had to become more consistent in terms of my behavior in the classroom, following up on obedience prob­lems rather than letting them slide. You yell and scream a lot in the beginning and then you learn that that rarely works. I still find myself yelling every now and then. It doesn't work They told me that in the beginning. It works for a second, but then it stops working. I wished I had yelled less and tried to understand them more that first year. My first advisor told me, you have to take your ego out of it It's hard to do. We all have egos. But you have to take your ego out.

Mostly, I got better at teaching math. It's the lesson plan that gives you control. If you can keep them busy and on task, you can keep them managed. It's great when a kid comes to you before class and says, 'Tm having a bad day and here's why," so you know to cut them some slack That's what you shoot for-to prevent their misbehavior, rather than letting it happen and then getting angry during class .

That first parent-teacher night, a lot of the parents are wonderful, but a lot aren't. And you begin to

CHAPTER 9: AUTHORITY & DISCIPLINE 319

(continued)

understand that some of their backgrounds are such that they need you. I had a kid who used to flip me the bird every time I went to the board and it used to make me absolutely crazy. So I would just go off on her in the beginning-screaming, yelling-as opposed to taking her out of class and talking to her about how hurtful her behavior was. Most of them will react positively to that stuff- to being talked to, rather than yelled at. I wish I had done more one-on-one and less making it about me.

JON I had a really hard time with one class last year. They were wild and confrontational. I worked real­ly hard with them and then one day I was observed and I was really nervous about that one class. My kids turned into little perfect philosophers that day. It was a great observation; they behaved, they asked questions, they smiled and they were involved, and I felt so proud. I felt like it was a real turning point. And of course the next day was one of the worst ever. And when I asked a fellow teacher why they would have done that, purposely behaved weli for my observation, she said, "They did that because they like you." It was the first moment I realized they liked me.

DILEEP Maintaining control easily took until the second year. I didn't do it my first year. I'm still not a nat­ural at it. Once you're an adult you forget what it's like to be a student. You were there once but you forget. How they think, how they feel, the volatility of teenagers. My biggest regret that first year was not taking charge more in my fourth-period geometry class because I didn't see myself as the authority figure in the classroom. It's up to you to take charge. Not being polite. Being young, male and polite doesn't necessarily work all the time. These are chal1enging classrooms. You have to be young, male and tough as nails. It's against my nature to be impolite. I have to force myself to speak directly, in just two words: "Don't move."

My last name is Raj an. My first year a student had the gall to introduce me as Osama bin Rajan. It set the whole class off. I didn't react quickly enough. My reaction should have been immediate and drastic. It sounds very authoritarian and that's against my nature. I'm not a control freak, but I now consider myself "politely authoritarian." My summer training actually set me off on the wrong path in terms of social conditioning. They told us, "Don't have rules that say no cursing, don't phrase the rules in terms of what not to do. Phrase rules in positive terms." So I started to speak that way also, but I wasn't being clear enough. It wasn't direct. It was too much talking. I started to parse sentences. Now I use commands, and short, curt, direct responses.

fiJ{O COLLEEN I used to teach elementary school, but I switched to middle school. I've had a much harder time with classroom management in middle school than I expected. I was not at all prepared for their lan­guage, their complete disrespect, their defiance, their not caring about turning in homework. Their parents seem tired of hearing from the school so my calls don't seem to have an effect. When I called for elementary students, parents seemed to take it more seriously and respond faster. And with power struggles- younger kids were afraid of getting into a power struggle with you, but older kids aren't; they don't fear power struggles, they seek them. Everyone kept telling me to watch out for power struggles, but I didn't understand it until! got here. With younger students if you stop the conversation and look at them or say their name, they just stop the behavior. Older kids challenge everything I say. They have no fear of authority- none at all. Everyone kept trying to tell me that but I really didn't understand until I got into the class itself. Overall, I feel my six years teaching experience in kindergarten and first grade don't matter at alL I feel like a brand new teacher.

I have learned that I have to just walk over to them and quietly say, "I really wish you'd be paying attention." Then there's that whole psychology of saying "please" or not saying "please." Sometimes it's respectful, but sometimes you need to be more direct. Quieter confrontations are much more effec­tive-nothing in front of the entire class. And my physical presence is key. I have to walk around the room. I can't just stay at the board. I have to physically know what they're doing a lot more. They actu­ally do still care somewhat what I think and don't want me to see them doing wrong things.! have written on the board: "I will continue this lesson when you are quiet." And then I just sit down and start grading papers. And it freaks them out and they say, "What are you doing?" But it gets their atten­tion In every circumstance a less confrontational method works better than a confrontational one.

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•

TR@TC2 Intensive Summer Institute

Calamari Desiree

Doscher Emily

Ogechi

Jimenez Alfonsina

Lifschutz Sara

Doll Mariah

Cimaglia Joseph

Kaon Angela

P.S. 08Xll9

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P.S./I.S. 210

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Brooklyn School for Collaborative Studies Brooklyn School for Collaborative Studies Brooklyn School for Collaborative Studies

P.S./M.S. 279

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P.S./M.S. 279

Monday, June 08, 2015

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1075 Pugsley Ave, Bronx, NY 10472

1075 Pugsley Ave, Bronx, NY 10472

503 W 152nd St, New York, NY 10031

141 E 11lth St, New York, NY 10029

503 W 152nd St, New York, NY 10031

610 Henry St, Brooklyn, NY 11231

610 Henry St, Brooklyn, NY 11231

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610 Henry St, Brooklyn, NY 11231

610 Henry St, Brooklyn, NY 11231

2100 Walton Ave, Bronx, NY 10453

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