After the first two or three weeks of school you may be lulled into thinking that you have a great class.
But too often, it’s the moment it all goes awry.
I see it year after year. Teachers beaming and chatty at early staff meetings, boasting about how much they love their new students.
Wide-eyed and smiley. Overconfident. Loudly sharing their success.
A month later they’re singing a different tune.
So what happened? Well, early in the school year students are on their best behavior. They’re attentive and excited. They’re eager and appreciative after a long, boring summer. Many are also trying to turn over a new leaf.
It’s all an illusion. It’s not really who they are, at least not yet and not without exceptional teaching and classroom management.
In this day and age, you’re never going to have a great class all on its own. Left to their own devices, your classroom will become Lord of the Flies. Just the way it is.
If you fall into the trap of believing that you have a special group, or that somehow you now have the magic touch, then without even realizing it you’re going to let your guard down. You’re going to become soft and comfortable, weak and inconsistent.
All the while you have no clue. Not yet anyway. You’re just cruising along, blissful and unaware, as storm clouds amass on the horizon.
One day, however, it will catch up to you. The air will feel different. Subtle at first, perhaps, but it’s there. Hints of tension and excitability. Voices on edge. Tinges of disrespect, entitlement, and a slow but sure takeover of your classroom.
Mere rumblings before the thunderstorm shatters your dream. And it does so with a vengeance that doesn’t let up until the end of the school year.
Yes, you can go back and start over anytime you like. But it’s twice as hard and now you have to prove to yourself and your students that you’re not who you first showed yourself to be.
The lesson is this:
All those early halcyon days – if you’re lucky enough to even have them – are no more than an opportunity to set your classroom management plan and its sharply defined rules and consequences in stone.
They offer a window of clear weather to prove that you mean what you say. They’re about establishing the principles and foundations upon which inspired learning and impeccable behavior is built.
And it is built. By you and you alone.
So that those wonderful students, that amazing class that you love after the first few days of school, not only stay that way, but become far more and better than your once-boastful colleagues will ever know.
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Hello!
My building is a Leader in Me school and I am looking to merge practices from your book, The Classroom Management Secret, and LIM. In LIM, students help set classroom norms/rules for ownership purposes. Would students still be able to help “create” the classroom rules? And the consequences would still be enforced for breaking those rules.
I believe he has addressed this in earlier articles, stating that letting the students decide the rules undermines you as the leader of the class. The intention behind letting them come up with the rules is to increase buy-in from students. But you can get their buy-in by clearly explaining the why behind each rule. If they understand why, they’ll buy in to the rule. Good luck!
While I am not familiar with the LIM program, the school district I worked at before I retired recently had a similar mandate in the last 5 years of my teaching career. The students had to set the classroom rules; we were told they would buy into and follow the rules they themselves had come up with. All I can say is I saw no change in classroom behavior because of this. It was neither better or worse. I handled the mandate in the following way: I continued on with my classroom management plan using Michael’s suggestions and advice and that meant I set up my classroom rules. However, as I went through the required “students set up classroom rules” procedure I pointed out how each point they came up with was really a part of one or another of my classroom rules. I kept it positive, pointing out that the similarities showed that we all knew what a good learning environment looked like and what it needed to stay that way. (One of the best things Michael says, in my opinion, is that you tell the students that your rules are there to create a space where their learning opportunities are protected.) And while I was required to post their rules, my own were also posted and my classroom management was implemented in its usual way. I hope this helps give you an idea of how to put this together.
Here is my experience. I worked at two “Leader in Me” schools for about ten years. The program has a good philosophy, but I felt that the main intent of the program was to make a lot of money for the Covey organization. I saw no improvement in student “ownership” or behavior. I had much better results incorporating management ideas from Michael Linsin and from Jim Fay. How many organizations are there in real life where we get to “make the rules?” I say few or none.
So I say, wonderful teacher, make a few simple rules, teach them ad nauseum, and be as consistent as you can. That’s my two cents (and 38 years of teaching experience) advice.
Carol, I came to say the exact same thing. TLIM has been in our city for well over a decade. By the time the kids reach us in high school, they have tuned it out.
Oh boy, are you right. I have 2 new members of my team and I’m trying to set them up with some ideas about discipline and some strategies I’ve been using. I just know from doing this specialist position for 13 years exactly what is in store.
This is spot on. I have slipped into the daze of the “honeymoon period” in the past and paid dearly just a few weeks later. I plan to follow your advice diligently this year and I look forward to a more successful school year.
Me too! That happened to me a few years and I realized I need a clearer set of rules and expectations and consequences
Wonderful! Totally on point
This year we were told we had to cocreate rules in Capturing Kids Hearts fashion. I wrote my rules and I asked the format questions by saying how do you feel when you make a mistake?, when a friend makes mistake? If your teacher makes a mistake? How do you feel when someone picks on someone makes a mistake? Then made a poster done.