April 24th-BIP Powerpoint

Case Study

Here’s my powerpoint!  Let me know if you have any questions about it!!

April 11th-BIP Update

Right now I’m working on collecting information, data, and examples for my BIP.  While I full-time taught for 9 weeks, I didn’t implement the BIP until around week 4.  So, I only have 5 or 6 weeks where I used the BIP.  I do think it was quite successful, especially for one student in particular (I used it for 4 students…3 by the end).  The area where I am lacking is the notes.  I took notes whenever I could, but it was never easy while I was teaching.  I think I am going to write down some of the content of my conversations with the student as well since that also gives a lot of insight into who he is and why the BIP worked for him.  Hopefully between the conversation notes and the few notes I took while I was teaching I will have enough! 

I think I’m pretty clear as to what the Philosophy of Classroom Management should include, but does anyone know what the Classroom Community section is supposed to include? I’m sure the directions are somewhere..I just can’t find them!  Thanks!

April 4-Article Reflection

This week I chose to read the article, “Collaborative Preteaching of Students at Risk for Academic Failure”.  I wanted to read this article simply because ‘academic failure’ is not something we talked about much this fall.  I feel like we discussed students with disabilities and ELL students in depth, but not students who just simply are not doing well academically and need help.  This article gave some really great ideas for how to help these students.

The article focused on preteaching, which is teaching some of the material from a unit before a unit is started.  The authors suggest teaching key vocabulary and key concepts to students who struggle a week or so before the material is discussed in class.  That way, they are preexposed to it.  The authors are specifically targeting students with learning disabilities, however I can see this being very helpful for students who simply struggle academically, without any diagnosed disability.  The article suggests a method in which the students who really need the extra teaching are sent out of the classroom to work with a specialist on the preteaching.  However, I think that a teacher could easily spend 15 minutes in class doing the preteaching.  Either the teacher could pull students in small groups during Independent Reading time, or she could do the preteaching to the whole class.  I think that every student could benefit from it.  The article also suggests having an image to accompany each key word and concept.  Perhaps a teacher could keep a ‘key ideas’ area on the board where she displays the images/words after they have been discussed and keeps them up throughout the unit.  I wish I had thought of this a month ago when I was teaching rocks and minerals…I have no doubt it would have helped all of my students remember and better understand the key ideas.  I will definitely try it in my class next year!

March 21st-BIP thus far…

So far, I have implemented two behavior systems in my classroom.  One for the whole class, and another for 4 boys.  The whole class behavior system is a positive behavior system in which the class has the ability to earn a paper clip for each subject throughout the day.  If they earn the clip, they attach it to another clip that hangs on the front board.  The first paper clip is attached to the top of the whiteboard.  When the paper clip chain reaches the whiteboard tray, the class receives a reward (extra recess, popsicle party, etc) that they decided on.  It is working very well in the class and has helped the students learn to work together to achieve a goal.  The other behavior system for the 4 boys is an individual system in which each boy has a goal for the week.  They earn points for positive behavior to reach their goal each week.  This is also going very well, especially in the last two weeks.  I am using the individual behavior system for my BIP.  The implementation of the BIP is going wel…it is the note-taking that I’m struggling with.  I have tried to hold a clipboard with me so that I can take notes during class, but even that takes too much time away from my students.  I end up trying to jot things down during lunch, but I often forget specifics at that point.  I am monitoring the implementation of the BIP, and making adjustments to it as I see necessary.  In that respect, the project is going well.  I just need to find an efficient, less time-consuming way of gathering notes and observations.  Any suggestions?

March 7th-Specific Behavior Challenges

I chose to read the first two sections of the article on disruptive and noncompliant behavior.  I have a handful of students in my class that fall into these categories.  While nearly all of my students fall into the ‘disruptive behavior’ category at times, there are several students who nearly always display disruptive behavior.  They climb under their desks, call-out in class, do and say things to get laughs, hum and make noises, play constantly with anything they can find in their desks, and get out their seat to ‘get water’ every chance they get.  Unfortunately my CT did very little to address the issue.  She would just constantly tell them to ‘stop’ and give them silent lunch.  This wasn’t improving the behavior.  I decided to implement a system where the students receive a point for positive behavior.  Based on the total number of points they receive each week, they get a reward that they choose.  They set their point goal at the beginning of the week and work toward it throughout the week.  This system has been working well for 3 of the 4 students using it.  However, there is still one student who is very defiant and noncompliant.  He smiles and laughs when he gets in trouble, out-right refuses to do things when asked, and shows little concern when he is punished.  On Friday, I decided to have him write a letter to his mom and then call her and read it to her over the phone.  I also spoke with her on the phone.  This was the first time I saw him react to his punishment.  He was upset that he had to tell his mom all of the things he had done.  I talked with him for a long time and we decided on a slightly different behavior system to begin tomorrow. We’ll see if it makes a difference.  For the first time, he seemed sincere when he told me that he wanted to improve his behavior.  I hope that is the case!

February 21st-BIP thus far…

This past Monday I took over the classroom full-time.  It’s been a crazy week, but a good one.  Throughout the day I find myself always busy with something, never even having time to sit down.  Because I was so busy last week, I didn’t eat lunch once.   I was always calling parents, working one-on-one with kids, etc.  That being said, my behavior plan was not at the forefront of my mind.  I chose  my student and did my best to observe him, but I have no idea when I will have time to actually take notes on him.  The few times I did notice something, I went to write them down but was sidetracked with student questions and never made it to my desk to write down the note.  I am really struggling with when I am going to have the time to take notes.  I have actually already implemented a behavior system with this child, with four students actually.  I started them on a point system, where each week they have a goal number of ‘points’.  If they reach the goal, they receive a reward of some-sort (5 min computer time, eat lunch with me, etc).   The goal is always something that they choose.  It seems to be working.  However, this system is not one of the options mentioned in the book for the BIP, so I will have to implement another one for my case study, based on the notes I will take…assuming I find the time to do so!  Is anyone else struggling with finding the time to take observation notes?  It’s just so hard to focus on one student when you have to teach 24 students and need to focus on all 24 equally.  Especially when four of those 24 are already on individualized behavior systems!

February 7th-Chapter 7 of Salend

I enjoyed this week’s reading because it gave several really great examples of positive behavior systems and how to implement them in the classroom.  I unfortunately am not seeing an effective system used in my classroom so enjoyed reading about these in the chapter.  The first system that I really like is the self-recording/self-evaluation system.  In this system, students have to monitor their own behavior based on conditions decided upon between the student and the teacher.  There is a student in my classroom this year that I think would really benefit from this system.  He knows when he is off task and acknowledges it when asked.  However, it doesn’t ‘click’ with him that he needs to focus until the teacher points it out to him.  I think it would be good for him to record these instances and eventually get to the point where he can monitor his own classroom behavior. 

I also liked the Good Behavior Game.  In this game, the students are put in groups (I think this would work well if they are sitting in their groups).  The groups receive points on the board for each misbehavior and receive reinforcement based on the number of points received.  If I were to implement this in my classroom I think I would alter it just a bit.  Instead of students receiving points for misbehaviors, I would award them points for their good behavior.  At the end of the week, students who reached a certain number of points would receive some sort of reward.  Once the class reached a certain number of points the class would get a party of some sort.  This way the system would focus on the positive behavior instead of negative behavior.

I have seen tokens used in several classrooms and have always really liked the concept.  Most recently I was subbing in a 3^rd grade classroom.  They follow a token system, but instead of calling them tokens they call them ‘warm and fuzzies’.  Whenever the class receives a compliment from another teacher (in the hall or in specials), or if a student does something that warrants a reward, they put a colored pom-pom (a ‘warm and fuzzy’) in a glass vase.  When the vase is filled, the class gets a surprise from the teacher (generally a popsicle party, movie party, etc).  This is very similar to the token system described in the book.

I really enjoy hearing about classroom behavior systems because it is something that I worry about for next year in my own classroom.  I don’t want to implement a system that confuses the students, singles them out, or focuses on negative behavior.  I want to be sure that I focus on positive behaviors and whole class rewards.  Hopefully I will find one that works!

Jan 31st-Classroom Management in my 4th grade classroom

The classroom management in my 4^th grade classroom is unique from most systems I have seen before.  My teacher uses a ‘fix it yourself’ system.  When a student is disrespectful to another student, they have to ‘fix it themselves’.  They do this by calling a ‘foul’ on the other student.  When they call a foul, the student who was disrespectful must give two ‘put-ups’ (nice comments) for the other person.  They also have their own system of keeping each other in line.  When someone is not paying attention or listening either in class or in the hallway, other students can flash them the ‘check’ sign.  This reminds them to check that they are following all of the directions.  While this system seems like it would work well and encourage self-responsibility, it does not work well with 4^th graders.  They try, but in the end it just doesn’t work.  They don’t do well having to worry about other people all the time…they have enough to worry about with themselves!  They also don’t like it when other students reprimand them.  It has caused several issues between students.  

It surprises me that there is no positive behavior system used in my classroom.  Once in a while my teacher gives out ‘popcorn points’ to students who are following directions.  Those students than get popcorn for snack once they reach a certain number of points.  However, this system is not used on a regular basis so it’s not very effective.  There is no whole-class positive behavior system.  While the class on a whole is fairly well-behaved, they are quite chatty.  I think they would really benefit from a positive behavior system, as they are very goal-oriented and motivated to do well.  Instead, my teacher just constantly tells them to be quiet and calls out individual students who are misbehaving.  I really would love to see a positive-behavior system used in the classroom, and hope to implement one this spring.

Jan 24th-Classroom Management in Inclusive Settings

I think that this article was a great review of what we discussed in class last semester.  The focus of the article was on how to handle behavior management in inclusive classrooms.  This is something that I have thought a lot about in regards to inclusive classrooms.  Ever since we watched the video, “Educating Peter”, I have wondered what behavior management should look like in inclusive classrooms.  When students like Peter are in your classroom, standard rules and punishments obviously won’t always hold firm.  However, there still need to be clear-cut rules that apply to both students with disabilities and without.  This article discussed a type of behavior management system that works well in inclusive classrooms, for both students with and without disabilities. This type of behavior management is called a positive behavior support system. 

 I have not been in a school that uses a school-wide positive behavior support system, so I have not seen how they work.  However, I have heard a lot about them.  It seems that the focus of these behavior management systems is on rewarding positive behavior, and not punishing students for negative behavior.  Instead of students being punished, the context and specifics of the negative behavior are considered in order to come up with a solution to fix the problem.  There does not seem to be a ‘one size fits all’ punishment.  It is based on the individual student, the problem, and the context.  I could see how this system would be very appropriate for students with disabilities.  It allows them to learn from their mistakes, rather than just ‘getting punished’.  I also could see how this would be beneficial for students without disabilities.  It seems to give everyone a fair chance.  However, in order for this to work, I think there still needs to be clear and specific classroom rules in place.  Students need to know that there will still be consequences for their misbehavior, even if it is not the ‘typical’ punishments.  I could see how this system would work very well when adopted school-wide.  When everyone in the school is onboard, I imagine it would be very successful.  However, I have a feeling it would not be as successful on an individual classroom basis because students would be coming from traditional behavior management systems into one that may seem very different.  I think some students would take advantage of it.  Nevertheless, I do see the benefits to this type of behavior management system and would love to see it used in an inclusive classroom.  I am curious what the classroom ‘rules’ look like and how the system is explained and presented to the students.

Literacy Reflection-Edmonson Article

                                                                        

The Edmonson article titled, “Taking a Broader Look: Reading Literacy Education”, was an interesting article to read.  Prior to this year I had no idea how much politics played into education.  However, having spent a semester in Durham County during a curriculum change has really showed me just how much politics effect education.  I am constantly hearing about the ‘people downtown’ who make the decisions for the district.  According to the teachers and administration at my school, many of the heads of curriculum were never teachers and have political agendas that affect every decision they make.  Whether or not this true, it has shown me how much politics surrounding education effects and frustrates teachers.  Teachers are forced to teach curriculum that they often do not agree with.  They know that what they have to teach is not best practice and will not successfully benefit every child, and yet they have to teach it anyway.  This is very stressful and frustrating to have to deal with.  This article echoed the sentiments of the teachers at my school. 

The article stressed the fact that nearly every education policy that is put into action has a political agenda behind it.  The author suggests teachers do three things regarding new education programs.  First, follow the money.  Know where it is coming from and where it is going.  I think this is really important because it may seem like a great program on the surface but knowing where your money is going may not be as great as it seems.  Second, teachers need to ask themselves, “Who are the players?  Where did they come from?  What are their values?”  Oftentimes the values of the policy makers do not align with your own personal beliefs.  Knowing who created the policy, what they believe, and what their goals are is very important in order to understand the policy itself.  Finally, teachers need to know who the program is likely to benefit.  The program may have a goal to benefit a certain group, but in the end that group may not benefit as much as another group.  Knowing who the policy/program benefits is key in understanding the policy as a whole. 

Dealing with politics is something that really does not interest me.  I do not enjoy getting in the middle of political discussions and arguing with people over their beliefs.  I do follow politics, but prefer to keep my beliefs to myself.  However, I understand that it is very important for teachers to stand up for what they believe in if they ever want to see change in education policies.  Even though it is going outside of my comfort zone, if there is a policy that I adamantly disagree with, I will do something about it.  As the article points out, education policy affects the lives of too many children to just ignore it.  In order to give all children a fair education, they need teachers that will advocate for them.  Being aware of education policies and taking part in policy discussions is one way to do that.