Techniques for Addressing Student Discipline Problems Part I

Introduction

The one problem all beginning teachers struggle with is controlling inappropriate student behavior. Students have unique backgrounds and experiences, so every day the teacher needs to address a wide spectrum of individual student needs. On some days the needs of one student may conflict with those of another student or with the intent of the teacher. This makes life interesting for a typical teacher. Appropriate student behavior is critical to establishing and maintaining a learning environment. Student behavior must be under control and directed toward active learning. Some students arrive ready to learn, some arrive ready to disrupt learning, and some do little more than just arrive. It is the job of the teacher to move all students toward learning.

As a new teacher, it is helpful to visualize student problems in advance and prepare options for their remediation. Talking with peer teachers, mentor teachers, and administrators is a good place to start. This workshop will help you formulate your classroom management strategies to minimize student discipline problems.

A number of subtle discipline strategies are presented that are particularly useful for smaller, misdemeanor types of offenses. Why use a jackhammer to drive a nail when a normal hammer will do the job more quickly and efficiently? In many cases, subtle disciplinary responses are better suited to solving problems and preventing them from recurring because they provide opportunities for the teacher to remind the students of existing class rules in a non-threatening way, and they do so without affecting the flow of the lesson. A wise teacher can maintain class control so subtlety that the majority of the students in class are unaware she is even doing it.

For students who need more structure, models for a progressive discipline plan are presented in such a manner that they can be easily modified for use in any new teacher’s classroom. Additionally, a sample Student Daily Disciplinary Form and a Student Cumulative Disciplinary Form are provided that can be used to track continuing discipline problems when additional record keeping is required.

It is the teacher’s responsibility to create and enforce the rules. If the students help create the rules for their own classroom, they are more likely to remember and abide by them. Ideas are provided which allow students a modicum of ownership in the creation of these rules and the consequences for not abiding by them. Tactics are presented which allow the teacher to facilitate the development of their own rules that coincide with existing school rules.

Sometimes students do not want to do what is in their best interest. When that happens the teacher needs a tool box full of responses that vary from gentle and passive to confrontational and aggressive in order to deal with any discipline problems that arise. Additionally, a narrative is included that helps identify reasons for student misbehavior and how to tweak your disciplinary plan for maximum effectiveness. A sample Student Behavioral Contract and an Office Referral Form are available for use or modification.

Once you have completed this workshop, you will be able to develop a Progressive Discipline Model (PDM) and will understand strategies to manage student behavior in a wide variety of scenarios.

Starting the School Year on the Right Foot

Behavioral modification techniques must be used effectively and consistently throughout the school year in order to keep students focused. However, there are a few things you can do very early in the school year to minimize later student behavior problems:

• Learn the students’ names as quickly as possible. The sooner, the better, so the first day is the best. Experienced teachers often have an opening activity involving the use of their students’ names to help them to remember them more quickly. One such activity asks the student to name something they like that begins with the same letter as their name. An appropriate response would be, “My name is Megan and I like monkeys.” The teacher then calls on a second student and has her repeat the preceding student’s name and choice. The third student called must then repeat the information for the previous two students. This procedure repeats until all of the students have been identified, each student responsible for one more name than the last. The teacher ends the activity by naming all of the students before the instructional period is over. Calling a student by name is a powerful tool.
• Be positive. Teachers who expect and emphasize good things in class receive more of them, and vice-versa. Students need to know what the teacher expects of them. The teacher must then create lessons that direct the students to meet or exceed this level of expectation. Before, during, and after that happens, the teacher provides a positive outlook and expects success. An experienced teacher never misses an opportunity to praise a child for good behavior, quality work, or continued effort.
• Be prepared. Have a structured, student-centered lesson that requires students to remain attentive and active. Idle hands are the devil’s workshop; idle heads magnify the problem.
• Begin class with an introductory engagement activity (IEA). This is also known as a pre-operational set or “warm-up.” The IEA allows the class to begin as the students enter the room, not when the teacher decides to begin class. Most IEAs are displayed in the same prominent location every day so the students can see them as they enter the room. An effective IEA may ask the students to respond to a question from a previous lesson or begin previewing today’s lesson. It is designed to focus the attention of the students while preparing them to learn so that the teacher may complete clerical duties such as taking attendance. Most discipline problems occur at the beginning and the end of class, and IEAs help to get the class period started on the right foot.
• Have the students complete an information card on the first day. Make sure it contains the home and work phone numbers and names of their parents or legal guardians, as well as the best time to reach them. Make sure the students include their parent’s first and last names (in case the parent’s and student’s last name are different). Keep it on file for the entire year. If you have a phone in your classroom, verifying a parent’s work phone number during in class is a mild deterrent for student misbehavior.
• Be the first one in class or remain in the doorway to greet each student as they arrive to class. A lion tamer is always present in a cage before the animals are introduced. It shows that the trainer is in control of the space. Similarly, to tame your own savage beasts, you should be the first in and last out of your room in order to stake your claim that it is your territory and that peaceful coexistence with you in that territory requires abiding by your rules. Use in conjunction with an IEA.
• Familiarize the students with the class rules and penalties the first week of school. Students will usually give you a week or two to establish control of the classroom. During this “honeymoon period,” insist on proper student behavior, citizenship, and self-discipline. It’s the best time to set the tone and work ethic of the class. Teacher actions even on the first day form an impression with the students that will last for the entire school year.

Many new teachers make the mistake of waiting too long to identify and enforce their rules. The best first step to establishing classroom discipline is to take steps on the first day.

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Minimizing Discipline Problems Once School Has Begun

The benefits of beginning the year on the right disciplinary foot cannot be emphasized enough. However, the entire task of establishing an orderly classroom is not complete once the foundation has been laid. You must build upon that foundation for the remainder of the school year. Here are a few things to keep in mind:

• • Enforce class rules in a clear, fair, and consistent manner. All of the rules apply to all of the students. Do not enforce your policies for some students but not for others. Furthermore, ensure that equal punishments are meted out for equal behavioral infractions. Once students suspect that you favor one student over another, even if those suspicions are groundless, your leadership in the classroom has been compromised. Students expect you to be fair, and in their situation, you would expect the same.
  • Eliminate visual barriers between you and your students. This typically happens when the teacher is behind his desk and students approach to hand in an assignment or a test. The visual barrier prevents the teacher from full view of the class. When this occurs, watchful students may take the opportunity to create havoc. Position students so that they are always standing by your side, not directly in front of you.
  • Position yourself so you can always see the entire class. Often teachers circulate around the room (which is a good thing), but end up turning their back on parts of the class for a prolonged period of time while they help a student (which is a bad thing). Continuously move about the room in a manner that allows the teacher to see as many students as possible. Avoid prolonged standing in a position that places students at your back.
  • Use the document camera or LCD/overhead projector instead of the chalkboard/whiteboard. The overhead allows teachers to face the class and maintain eye contact with students. It also allows the teacher to use pre-made transparencies, eliminating the need to write in front of the class. If class control is a problem, avoid writing on the chalkboard because it requires you to turn your back on the class.

Be proactive. Check with your guidance department before school begins to identify students who may need special attention and then proceed to differentiate lessons accordingly.

• • Constantly circulate throughout the room. When a teacher moves around, the students sense that the teacher uses the entire space and the “front” of the room can be any location. When giving a test, it is helpful to sit behind the students so they do not know exactly where the teacher is located or where the teacher is looking. A student who is looking around while taking a test is either trying to find the teacher for help or they are looking to see if the teacher is watching.
  • Handle discipline problems promptly. If you wait too long to take action, that action will have little effect. Besides, the longer you wait to act, the worse the situation can get.
  • Adjust the location of student desks to promote or limit student-student interaction. Placing students in rows limits interaction; placing desks together in small groups enhances student-student interaction. Students working in cooperative groups are not as noisy if their desks are pushed together. The teacher can always direct the class to rearrange the seating before and after the activity. All seating arrangements must allow the teacher easy access and close proximity to all students.
  • Determine whether or not the student has been correctly assigned to your class. Guidance counselors have been known to make mistakes (usually from a lack of quality information or from a simple clerical error), like placing a student into an advanced class instead of an introductory or on-level class. These students are easy to identify and often ask the teacher why they are in that class. The teacher simply needs to connect with the appropriate guidance counselor to remedy the situation. Not correcting the error may doom a student to sit in a class for which the pre-requisites have not been met. This is especially difficult for student enrolled in sequential courses that require and build upon prior learning such as foreign language and mathematics instruction.
  • Ensure that your students are able to keep up with the curriculum. A student that is hopelessly lost, for whatever reason, is a potential classroom disruption waiting to explode. In this case, the teacher needs an intervention/remediation plan to bring the student up to an acceptable level of performance. This plan may include differential instruction, peer or professional tutoring, or make-up sessions conducted during lunch or after school.

A teacher unwilling to provide appropriate lesson plans for substitute teachers creates a position that cannot be defended by the administration. It also makes it difficult to recruit substitute teachers.

• Implement appropriate accommodations when necessary. A student physically unable to actively learn is at a severe disadvantage in subjects such as physical education and fine arts. Instructional accommodations are needed to keep these students engaged in the instruction. Other physical limitations, such as deafness and blindness, prevent affected students from complete and total access to the curriculum and may create a sense of frustration and hopelessness in the student. Fortunately, students with physical limitations are identified by the school and the information is shared with the teacher so that proper accommodations can be provided.
• Monitor students who are absent from the classroom for any length of time. New students or students returning from the hospital, home recovery of an illness, or extended vacations may lag behind the rest of the class due to missing too much instruction. A wise teacher shares curriculum, helps with lesson planning, and provides resources for itinerant teachers and arranges support for new students or students returning to class after a prolonged absence.Use Form A to communicate with a substitute or other specialized teacher. Note that this form may be amended to suit the particular needs of the user. It can be used as a monthly, weekly, or daily lesson plan. When completed, this document should communicate exactly what the substitute teacher should accomplish and how it should be accomplished, without any misinterpretation. It can also be used as an emergency lesson plan to be filed with the school administrator for those unfortunate days where unusual circumstances require the teacher to be out of school.

An organized and well-managed classroom is like a living organism, requiring constant attention and maintenance to ensure its continued good heath.

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Identifying Class Procedures and Expectations

As the leader of the classroom, you have to define what behaviors are acceptable. Whereas some rules and procedures are universal, the following classroom characteristics are not. All teachers are different, as is the learning atmosphere in each of their classrooms:

• • Define what acceptable class participation looks like. Does the teacher expect the students to sit passively as they absorb learning from the teacher or is it okay for students to roam freely about the room? Likewise, when are students encouraged to share in a whole class discussion?
  • Describe the rules that govern student interaction. When students work cooperatively or in groups, what are the rules? A clear reminder of pre-existing rules and classroom reorganization can prevent pandemonium and increase productivity.
  • Clarify what is implied by “independent work time.” Does it mean that students have to work alone? Do they have to sit by themselves? Are they allowed to talk? Until the pattern is established by the teacher, student confusion may escalate to and become student choice, which may strike against lesson intent. Make sure you define the parameters of your activities, rather than forcing your students to improvise as the activities unfold.

Different types of instruction and modality should come with a set of rules and expectations. The moments spent in transition between lessons are the ideal time to remind students of these rules and expectations.

• • Communicate the details of your homework policy. Homework extends the learning process and is an essential component of students’ academic and character development. Clarify in advance whether the students are allowed to have assistance—whether parent or peer—or whether each assignment is a solo event. The teacher may introduce specific limitations on particular homework assignments such as no internet surfing or references allowed. Note that if no limitations are clearly declared in advance by the teacher, then no penalty can be assessed if 21 assignments look identical.
  • Model the correct procedures for handling and storing equipment and materials before allowing the students to work with them. Subjects like art and chemistry have elaborate, expensive, and easily broken equipment. In certain subjects like industrial arts, the students may have to pass a practicum before using a particular piece of machinery. Included with these procedures are the appropriate times for wearing safety glasses, aprons, and other items of protective clothing as well as the location of the safety shower, eyewash, and fire extinguisher. A lack of rules or enforcement of rules can lead to a student and/or teacher injury and resultant lawsuits. An ounce of precaution is better than a pound of your flesh.
  • Define a clear policy for late assignments. Late assignments, whether from class work or homework, require exquisite record-keeping by the teacher. Late assignments will happen. Students get sick or leave on vacation and miss school; students daydream in class and forget to turn in their assignment; students don’t start on the assignment until after it is past due. Most teachers develop a plan for easy access and entry into their record keeping system. Some teachers code late assignments to note the reason, whether excused or unexcused. Other teachers allow a grace period for turning in late work while other teachers do not accept late assignments. Given evidence that demonstrates a legitimate reason for late work, most teachers will accept such an assignment without imposing a penalty.

Check with your school before deciding your late assignment policy method. Most schools have a procedure for accepting late work.

• Seize opportune moments to instruct students how to “play fair.” Whether it involves a classroom situation or an outside recess activity, specific instruction concerning how to pick teams, how to line up, how to pass in single file, and how to handle disagreements, when reinforced at the teachable moment, are effective in preventing future problems.
• Employ all of the above strategies in a judicious, timely manner, and in a sequence most effective for the given situation. The ability to make complex judgments based on the seriousness of a behavioral offense, the atmosphere of the classroom, and the previous history of a student comes with experience and forethought.

The clarity of communication between a teacher and his students is commensurate with his potential success in the classroom. After all, one cannot enforce rules that aren’t first understood by all parties involved.