Reflections on Week 8 Reading and Discussions

This week's reading focused on classroom management--making sure that students are able to learn through the implementation of structure, rules and procedures into the class. One of the most important elements of structure is using allotted teaching time for only that, not for trips to the office, pep rallies, assemblies, testing, behavior problems, and late arrivals to and early departures from class.  When a teacher guards his or her teaching time, students are more successful.

During my first year of teaching, my administration allowed a lot of classroom disruptions during the day. Intercom "all-calls," frequent meetings during instructional periods where a substitute would be sent to my classroom to relieve me while I talked to a parent, students being called out of the classroom without notice for testing, or to receive messages from their parents. I had a hard time keeping my children focused in all of that chaos.  In my second year at the same school, a new administrator took over. He promised to reduce the number of daily disruptions. He did this by installing phones in each classroom so that teachers could be reached without the intercom. He required that parents make appointments during teacher planning periods to discuss student progress.  Instead of calling students out of academic classes for individual testing, he had the school psychologist schedule testing during elective classes. This created an atmosphere that let the teachers and the students know that learning time was valued, and that nothing else was as important. The change in my students' focus was dramatic, and the faculty was grateful.

This week's discussion post was interesting, because I think it is important to share our failures as well as successes. Reading other teachers' posts reminded me that we all have common issues that we face--inattention, misbehaviors that disrupt the class--and we can all help each other to learn how to overcome these problems. Making sure that we teach rules and procedures at the beginning of the year, being consistent in our enforcement of rules and procedures, teaching the student, not just the subject, and teaching "bell to bell" goes a long way in solving a lot of the problems teachers face.