Positive reinforcement is more important to
classroom management than consequences, in my opinion. Don’t get me wrong,
there is certainly a place for the turned card and the parent phone call, but I
believe that positivity begets positivity. Because of this, I want to spend a
few hundred words discussing the behavior management strategies in my school
and classroom.
The most important
thing to remember according to Smith (pg. 2), is that “what may be extremely
motivating for one student may be entirely useless for another.” That’s why teachers must
have many different routes to travel as far as their behavior management. Here is my typical mental process when I need
to discipline students.
A
closer view of this diagram is included at the end of the blog.
In my class, I use a lot of token reinforcement which, according
to Smith (pg. 1) “involves awarding points or tokens for appropriate behavior.
These rewards have little value in themselves but can be exchanged for
something of value.” So you will see a few examples of this below.
Here
are a few examples of what I would do in specific situations.
Misbehavior
1) A female student isn’t working. She isn’t
bothering anyone, but she is sitting in silence and creating origami stars out
of paper.
For this student, I need to act quickly, but I
do not need to address it aloud. I’d walk up silently. If she didn’t change her
behavior, I’d tap her desk quietly. When she looked up, I would take the paper
then tap her class work.
2) A male student is taking the pencils off other
student’s desks and breaking them. He has just snapped a pencil during math.
For this student, I need to address it immediately.
I’d tell him, in a quiet but firm tone, to put it down and clip his card. I
would then give the other students a problem to work independently. If he did
not comply, I would tell him that he needed to do what I asked, or he would
face further problems. If the student continued to refuse, he might end up with
a write up or phone call home.
Appropriate
student behavior.
1) A female student is on task, working hard to complete
her assignment in spite of some quiet chatter around the room.
I would walk up and place a paw-sitive slip on
her desk and when she looked up, I would give her a smile or nod to show her
that I approved of her behavior. I might then walk around with a few
paw-sitives held very obviously in my hand, looking for more students who were
on task to encourage other students to improve their behavior.
2) A male student is waiting as the class line as
they return from specials. As the class enters the room, the student in front
of him drops her backpack and he stops to help her pick them up.
When we enter the classroom, I would say to the
class that I saw a student being an exemplary model employee. I would then say
what he did and add give him a bonus slip he could use to buy something from
the class store. This might get him a no homework pass or a physical object.
Here are examples of positive student reinforcement;
school-wide and class-wide.
Resources
Smith, K., (n.d.) Positive
Reinforcement... a proactive intervention for the classroom. Retrieved from http://www.cehd.umn.edu/CEED/publications/tipsheets/preschoolbehavior/posrein.pdf
