http://www.latimes.com/local/education/la-na-teacher-discipline-20151029-story.html Upon looking for classroom management articles for this week's blog prompt, only the biggest current headline in classroom management gone wrong popped up. First of all, it makes me thankful I do not teach high school. That said, kids are kids. I have teenagers at home. The issues get bigger, but they are still the same issues. Teenagers still need boundaries and love and guidance. I can apply this situation to my first grade classroom. As the article indicates, a student violated the clearly stated cell phone policy. After refusing to hand over the phone, security was called. The problem came when the security officer used excessive force to gain compliance. From what I can tell, I do not think the teacher was in the wrong. But other teachers have weighed in that the teacher may have been too quick to call security. Perhaps she should have had a backup plan. Maybe asking a responsible student to walk the child to the office would have set a better tone than bringing in security. If there is one thing that gets my blood boiling, it is disrespect. That is a hard pill to swallow. As a teacher, I must be ready to face it calmly, however. It happens. I have seen it in my class. My response wasn't the best. A child was refusing to put some pencils away and showing disrespect, so I took them out of her hand and put them in the community bucket. After she had her recess time out, I talked to her about the incident. She told me her mom had bought the pencils for her and that they were special. I told her she could have them back as long as she doesn't play with them when she is supposed to be listening. I apologized to her for losing my cool. I have apologized to my class a few times for getting into reactive mode and taking things personally. I shouldn't let their behavior get under my skin. I also think it is important to model how to admit when you've blown it and move on. I want them to feel safe and loved at school. I can't be perfect all the time, and they can't either. The important thing is to be consistent with the rules and own up when we have blown it. Every day is a new day!

This week we are talking about assessment. I was thinking an assessment was a formal test, so I am happy to find out it does not have to be. I do informal assessments frequently in the classroom. That said, I do not do them enough. I would rate myself around a 5 on this. I'm a very intuitive person. I tend to figure people out fast. My perception of a situation is usually very accurate. So I was relying a lot on this natural ability and my detailed gradebook to keep track of my students. I know which ones are struggling. I have them sitting next to stronger kids for help and always pull them aside first during small group time. But I know I need more formal records and actions. This week I started a log to monitor each student as they work through our decodable books. I am pulling them aside one by one and having them read the books to me. When they finish each one independently, I will check it off and start them on the next one when it is their turn again. My students are funny. They sometimes act like they know more than they do. This decodable assessment actually indicated that their skills are not as far along as I thought they were. Now I see why this is a step I should never leave out. During our lesson times, I will often have the students come up with answers by tables and help each other. I plan to do more individual answer time so I can see how many kids really know the answer. If it is just one at each table, the rest still have a lot to learn!

Second quarter, here I come! I finished the first quarter strong, but there were certainly a wide range of emotions up to that point. Physically, I took two sick days- one for an upset stomach and one for laryngitis. After watching most of my kids go down with something or other, two sick days wasn't so bad. Emotionally, I started the year feeling excited but also behind and overwhelmed. I was learning technology at the same time I was getting my classroom and lesson plans together. Adding the college classes really put me over the edge for a couple of weeks. The classes were fine, but I was tired. I didn't know how many hours I would need to put into my job. I was frustrated at the number of wasted hours I spend learning technology as well. But now I am really thankful for all the new skills I have learned. I love what I am able to do with computers in the classroom. We have an Apple grant, so the kids each have an iPod, and I teach with a Macbook and iPod. The hardest thing so far has been classroom management. I tried to do things exactly like another teacher, but that didn't work for me. Everyone was getting in trouble, and I wasn't happy. I got some other ideas from a couple of mentor teachers which worked much better. First I needed to get my procedures under control. Then I needed to find a way to make them want to follow the rules. My favorite classroom management strategy was to introduce table competitions. Every time I give the students directions, the first table on task gets a point. At the end of the week, everyone at the winning table gets a small prize. My hardest students have their good days and bad days. We have a lot more good days now, though. We use Dojo for individual behavior, so the parent notifications help. I also remind the students that every day is a new day. The student with the most Dojo points at the end of the day gets a small prize. It makes me so happy when a student who has never gotten it before wins the prize.

I made it to Fall Break! What a whirlwind this has been. My job has been a lot more intense than I expected it to be. Adding classes and family obligations on top of that has left me feeling overwhelmed. The thing that really put me over the edge was having to ask for extensions on my midterms. I felt like I was failing at life. But then I talked myself down from the edge. What was the worst thing that could happen? I know things are going well at work. They want and need me. I feel supported (even if I am pretty much expected to train myself). I know there is a teacher shortage in Arizona. Again, I am wanted and needed. I know I am not at risk of being fired from my job. So the worst thing that could happen is failing a class and having to repeat it. Again, this would not be the end of the world. It is just something I have never experienced before. I don't like that scenario at all. As it turned out, my teachers were happy to give me an extension. The first midterm has been graded, and I got an A. I don't think I am going to fail. On the job front, I just finished parent conferences. I went five days in a row with the class under control. I definitely ended the quarter on a high note. I had a 100% turnout from the parents. Even more exciting is that it was all positive. I got some really nice feedback from the parents. One said how much her daughter loves me. Another said they like the way I communicate. I did have to have a hard conversation with a couple of parents whose kids are pretty far behind academically. Nobody wants to hear that, but they needed to know. I talked about how we were trying to help at school and begged them to work with their kids at home with materials I send home weekly. The only negative feedback was from a mom who hasn't made any effort to contact me. She doesn't empty the weekly folder and read the notes. She hasn't signed up for Class Dojo, where I send positive messages and pictures on a regular basis. Her daughter is a behavior problem. I had to send an email one day because she poked another kid with a pencil and showed a disrespectful attitude toward me. Instead of responding to the email, she returned a school wide survey saying the teacher doesn't send home positive communication. (She didn't come to the conference either, Dad came.) That rattled me a little. It is difficult to get on the phone and check in with parents with positive feedback on top of everything else I'm doing, but I know some parents will get really offended if all they hear is negative. That was the one setback after a very good week. I am not going to lose sleep over it.

Let's talk about what has worked and what hasn't. The beginning of the year was all about getting organized. Not being organized doesn't work. I had a lot of organizational ideas, but they required going and buying things. Thankfully, a couple of my colleagues saved the day by giving me some all important supplies like baskets. Transitions were a real problem as we began to chaotically pass things out. Now I have a basket ready for each table, and transitions are going much more smoothly. Another thing I quickly discovered was that students like to find excuses to stall and avoid work, even if it means breaking their pencils in half. I found that supplies are best pooled in a central location for each table. Nobody can make the excuse that they don't have what they need, and nobody can get out of work by spending lots of time at the pencil sharpener. I still have trouble keeping up with the pencil needs. Sometimes I sharpen pencils after school, so we have a ready supply for the next day. Whenever I can, I will assign a quick working student to the task once a day. One thing that has worked well is ClassDojo for behavior and communication with parents. I have over half of the parents connected. I'm hoping to get many more this week when I have conferences. It is a virtual behavior chart. The parents see everything going on, both good and bad. I can also share pictures and reminders with the parents through the website. It is a great tool. My principal encourages all the teachers to use it. Focusing on the positive and making things fun works. I started out getting frustrated because they were too loud and slow at following directions. Now we make it fun by having table competitions and singing a line up song. They are on task, and everyone is happy.