Classroom Management and Literacy Development
Classroom Management Techniques
Classroom Management refers to the wide variety of skills and techniques that teachers use to keep students organized, orderly, focused, attentive, on task, and academically productive during a class. Adapt what you like to your classroom.
Personal Relationships & Class Climate (Teacher)
The teacher must create a warm and trusting community of learners by:
- Getting off to a good start
- Establishing rules
- Over-planning lessons
- Being firm and consistent
- Using effective teacher commands
Addressing Inappropriate Classroom Behaviors
- Correcting errors: Give brief, specific statements when a pupil displays an undesired behavior.
- Giving performance feedback: Help pupils to visually analyze changes in their behavior to get them to understand what a situation might be like if they behaved differently.
- Planned ignoring: Withhold attention from a pupil when they are exhibiting undesired behavior.
- Time out: Remove the pupil from the situation to a different environment, such as an empty classroom.
- Group reinforcement: Set expectations for the whole class in order to influence either the behavior of the whole class or a particular group of pupils within the class.
Effective Instructions
- Be direct: Make statements rather than asking questions.
- Be close: Give instructions when you are near the child, rather than calling out from across the room.
- Use clear and specific commands: Ensure instructions are easy to understand.
- Give age-appropriate instructions: Speak to your child at a level he will understand.
Four Types of Leadership
- Task leadership: The student is concerned with the process.
- Intellectual leadership: The student offers a new idea to the group.
- Emotional leadership: The student gives encouragement to a member.
- Coercive leadership: A student gives negative feedback to disrupt the process.
Personal Relationships & Class Climate (Student)
- Leaders: These students “run” all facets of the group and initiate virtually all dialogue between members.
- Followers: These students readily answer questions and participate, but usually only at the instigation of one of the leaders.
- Non-participants: These students never offer information unless asked; they never volunteer for anything. However, they normally will do whatever task is assigned to them.
Designing Your “Labeled” Classroom Environment
- Effective classroom labels support the (bi)literacy development of young (dual) language learners. These labels serve as visual references and also help keep the classroom structured by assisting young children in identifying where to find materials, where to put them away, and how to keep the environment organized.
- Labels may be placed in different places and on resources throughout the classroom to create a print-rich environment that stimulates reading and writing.
Morning Meeting Components
Greetings:
- Sets a positive tone for the classroom and the day.
- Being greeted provides a sense of recognition and belonging, which meets a universal human need.
- Greeting helps children learn each other’s names.
Sharing:
- Helps develop the skills of caring, communication, and involvement with one another.
- Sharing extends the knowing and being known that is essential for the development of community and for individuals’ sense of significance.
Literacy
The current definition of literacy is reading and writing at a level for communication, which implies understanding and communicating ideas in a literate society.
- Phonemic Awareness
- Decoding
- Fluency
- Vocabulary
- Comprehension
Phonological Awareness
It is the ability to identify that spoken language is made up of smaller parts.