Oh, the joys of misbehavior in the classroom. Don't get me wrong I have a wonderful class with only sixteen students, but even these "angels" have their bad days. I just want to tell you about the experiences that I have had the pleasure of being apart of while being in the classroom. This past week has seemed to present many obstacles concerning behavior for my students.
Situation 1:
Students were working on their research for the bulletin board, and two of the girls are the "Alpha Female", both of them have their correct way of doing things, and everyone else is wrong. We had a struggle over the pencil and who would write down the information about their farm animal. I had the girls to take turns on writing sentences for the information that they had gained.
Situation 2:
The students were playing a compound word game that are paper fly swatters and bugs. The students started to smack each other in the face with the fly swatters. Starting a ripple affect of being loud, and rambunctious. I had to make a rule that the students must leave their paper fly swatters on the table. I stressed this rule three times, and after the third time and one of the students wanted to see how firm I would stay with the rule, I made him clip down. The students seemed to learn from this action and they were able to complete the game with mastery.
Situation 3:
A group of above-grade level students were participating in a Contraction Bingo game. The students were doing well, and I was reading with a student in need, and my CE was working with another group. When I looked over to check on the group on student was propped up against the wall with her hands on her head and seemed to be having a hard time. I walked over to the group and sat in the floor with them and everyone got quite. I asked the group what was going on, and that opened up the flood gates. I finally gained intel that two of the girls in the group were mad at each other and one was wanting to fight the other. Of course the girl denied, and I had to reiterate to them that if we don't have anything nice to say we shouldn't say anything at all. Once the girls apologized to each other I told them that if this happened again that I would have to resort in having them stay at their desk during groups, and reading the whole time. This seemed to curb their desire to be uncooperative.
I have found while being in the classroom that there are many times that we have to think on our feet as teachers when it comes to behavior. We cannot send a child to the principal's office after every infraction. We must become the "Behavior Savior" of our classrooms. We are preparing students that will one day be apart of this big world, and we must be fair but consistent when dealing with behavior in the classroom. We want to make productive citizens that follow the rules and excel in everything they are involved in. We shouldn't let behavior hinder their learning because we fail to address it properly.
I feel as though you handled each of this situations appropriately. I know for me discipline is something I struggle enforcing, because I hate to be the "bad guy" I am learning through my 435 experience in my classroom, that sometimes being the "bad guy" actually helps your student learning improve, because if they are acting out they are not learning, and that is first and foremost why the students are in the classroom. I love this term, "Behavior Savior" because you are saving them from their poor behavior.
ReplyDeleteI love the approach of this blog, Taylor. You didn't blame the students for any misbehavior - instead, you accepted the challenge for finding other strategies you could use to help students stay on task.
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