Stroll through virtually any school and you’ll hear teacher voices spilling out into the hallways. You’ll hear them echoing above the clatter of their classrooms. You’ll hear them correcting and admonishing, directing and demanding for attention. If it were an office building, library, or … Read more
The easiest way to improve classroom behavior is one few teachers ever consider. It’s at once blatantly obvious and far off the grid. You won’t find it in modern professional books and are unlikely to hear about it at conferences. Yet, it’s as plain … Read more
Much of the stress teachers feel today comes from sources outside of the classroom. New curriculum, policies, and programs, tweaks and changes to this and that, and the near-constant call for flexibility—all zooming at you at an alarming rate—can feel like an ever-present dark … Read more
Spend a day visiting classrooms at your neighborhood school and you’ll find many buzzing with tension. It’s a disconcerting sensation that hits you the moment you step through the door, making you all but gyrate with heebie-jeebies. For students, who are unable to escape … Read more
A sharp, well-maintained classroom sends so many wonderful and powerful messages to students—from an expectation of excellence to personal pride in their work habits. It’s a slam-dunk, surefire, easy way to improve behavior in your classroom. Yet, remarkably, classroom organization is an area typically … Read more
Oh no, not again. At the worst possible moment, just as you’re homing in on your lesson objective, you notice a desperate hand waving at you from the edge your peripheral vision. Your first instinct is to ignore it and plow ahead, but then … Read more
It’s common for behavior to worsen during the final few weeks of the school year. Sensing summer break approaching, students begin to feel their age outpacing their grade level. They grow restless and excitable. They become bolder, testing the boundaries to see if they’re … Read more
Like so much of classroom management, the key to managing voice levels is to define for your students what you expect of them—and then hold them to it. Your students need to know during every minute of the school day whether it’s an allowable … Read more