Marie Morem

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Resources for EDUC 303: Teaching Children to Care by Ruth Sidney Charney

What were the key points of your assigned readings? These can be listed in bulleted format under each chapter. Section I Building a Learning Community Chapter 1 Intentions Children learn by doing, and find success in doing. Take the time to teach self-control, it will pay off. Disciplines goals: creation of self-control and community. Help our students to become contributing members of society. When we teach self-control in real life situations, the learning environment becomes that much richer. What is your job? To work? To work, and to take care of each other. SEE THIS RULE AS ABSOLUTE Chapter 2 I See You, I See Everything Teach the children how to behave in a school setting, it is the first curriculum (classroom management). To feel safe, children must feel seen. Get to know your students. Notice what they do right, and comment specifically on what you see (reinforcing, reminding, redirecting). Before we can expect children to do what is right we must teach them what right means. Stages of classroom management Whole class learning: listen, use kind language, ask questions, share solutions to problems, put things away, have fun and enjoy jokes, get ready in a timely way,

List any questions or discussion topics you would like discussed in class. I am just eager to converse and see it all in action. I am sure as we discuss, more questions will arise. I will not hesitate to fill them in.

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know everyones name, generate and follow the rules of the classroom, and carry out orderly transitions. Paradoxical groups: establishing expectations for work in small groups with the teacher and away from the teacher with some independence. Independence and responsibility (lasts the rest of the year): students should follow through with a plan for an entire work period, make appropriate choices, demonstrate voice and body controls, solve problems without the teacher, set up, care for, and clean up materials independently, be friendly in all aspects, care for the rules of the classroom.

Chapter 3 Making the Rules with Children All students are move invested in rules that they help create. Rules encourage reasoned thinking and discussion, not govern every last action. Rules should frame what we DO want. Rules come in stages and it depends on at which age the child is. Stage 1: Rules based on power of adults-I cant do this because _____ will get mad, and I will have to sit in time out. Stage 2: Rules based on social conventions-children see the rules as based on social conventions rather than individual authority. They become aware of what norms or rules make group dynamics work. Stage 3: Rules based on ethical ideas-children want to help classmates because they believe not only to benefit themselves but because they believe it is best to help other people. Give children an opportunity to grow into themselves and develop through life. Give real responsibility, one they will take pride in. Collaboration in rule making: teacher launches with broad vision, launch discussion involving childrens hopes and dreams, rules are refined and positively stated, rules are then posted and referred to. Hopes and dreams: reflect upon my own first for the year.

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See common teacher expectations and most important rules as absolute in this chapter. It is collaboration with much guidance from the teacher to create a classroom where care, respect and responsibility are the top priority. The final product is a combination of rules that reflect on the hopes and dream for the year, and is short and to the point.

Chapter 4 Teaching the Rules Teach rules proactively. Model expected behaviors in this format: demonstrate, notice, summarize and remind, repeat by noticing when students demonstrate behavior, every practice. Paradoxical modeling: how not to do the behaviors. Is this good listening? Role-play, and written responses are also effective ways of teaching the rules. As educators we need to be consistent. Also, we need to seize opportunities that require special attention to the rules and possibly confusing situations and discuss that. Referring to the rules and continuing to teach them is a part of a yearlong curriculum. Chapter 5 The Critical Contract: A Students Individual Goals for the Year Critical Contract: What do you most want to work on this year? What is most important to you? Look at these goals from three perspectives: children, parents, and teachers. Note to self: look back to text to see how the students perspective changes as they develop. Everyone is involved and everyones opinion is taken into account. These contracts help to build community, and present a positive vision for the year. The approach to making a critical contract differs with each student.

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It helps to set goals that are specific and are motivational.

Section II Making the Community Work Chapter 6 Using Logical Consequences When Rules are Broken In order to make children perform better, we should not make them feel worse. Instead we need to hold children accountable to their actions. Logical consequences encourage children to learn from their own mistake, they are reasonable and respectful. They help them to assume responsibility and try again. Use stop signals first for minor infractions. Logical consequences respond to choices and actions NOT character, be empathetic and structured, should describe the demands of the situation (e.g. that doesnt make our classroom feel safe), should only happen after the teacher has assessed the situation (are my expectations as a teach appropriate?). Last but not least, logical consequences help to restore self-control and self-respect through actions and not just words. There are three types of logical consequences: reparation (You broke it, you fix it), Breach of contract (If you are not responsible, you lose a privilege), timeouts (You must forfeit participation). Chapter 7 Time-Out: Establishing Boundaries and Promoting Self-Control SELF-CONTROL Power is the ability to frame purposes and follow through. We are trying to create self-disciplined little beings that can right their wrongs. Time-out is a useful way to teach children to refocus and return to successful participation in a class activity. Trust and connection need to be built first. The students need to understand that you are not using this as a punishment tool, or to shame, threaten, chastise or segregate them. It becomes ineffective when these are the motives. Keep the procedure familiar and consistent. Have a time-out chair (what Ms.

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Morem and BPES like to refer to as a take a break chair). Set a standard length of time depending on the misbehavior and age. There is a standard way to be released from time out and this responsibility is shared. Carefully introduce it, and practice it. Like everything else Model, role-play, share out! Time-outs protect the entire school environment and everyone in it (in a sort of all encompassing way). It is a direction, NOT a negotiation. Ask them why they thought they were in time out. I like you, but I dont like_______________________________________ Time out: the choice is either to follow the rules or to go to time out. Sometimes, it is appropriate for children to take a break or go to time-out in a different classroom. I like to call it taking a break opposed to going to time-out because I feel that it better suites the goal we are trying to accomplish with this time. Time-out often has a very negative association with it. Timeouts do not work for all children and especially ones who are engaged in power struggles.

Chapter 8 The Five Percent For the child who does the opposite of what is asked of them, you must reach for a whole new set of tools. We need to find ways that involve limits, direction, and guidance. Behaviors come from very different roots and all require very different strategies. These children are engaging in power struggles. It is hard to differentiate whether that power struggle is being engaged in intentionally or if the child lacks the emotional or cognitive skills to behave differently. In power struggles we need to find ways to give choices in situations where we might not typically have choices, and we need to do so in a way in which we are not totally turning over the controls.

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An idea: giving them a time-out place that they choose. They are to be quite and peaceful in this place of their choosing. Use bargaining: naming, emphasizing the students choice, bargaining, and sealing the deal. Keep these objectives in mind: be clear (know what you want), be specific about the bottom line (know what you wont accept), and establish a good mood and use a sense of humor. The steps to bargaining are more specifically outlined in the text. Behavioral skill deficits: we need to cue them to succeed by naming limited acceptable choices before they encounter situations we know will challenge them. Understand that these behaviors or reactions are not out of spite, or able to be controlled. Adapt the environment, and make it user-friendly. Create a support team; the last thing you need to feel is alone. Communicate with these students and let them know that you want to help them! Think K-Man Marie, I know it is hard. Develop strategies, create frameworks for solutions, and use the supports you get!

Chapter 9 Working Together to Support the Rules Some children require a support team approach. Useful tool: time-outs in a cooperating teachers classroom. The primary teacher is the ultimate decider in what makes the classroom function. Based on what the needs and situations are, they will decide what is best for the classroom. The team approach is great for when situations occur outside of the classroom. IT is not failure on your part when greater intervention is needed. Different situations have different demands. We need to help these children to be contributing and caring members of the learning community and often times it

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takes a team to do this. By including everyone, it tells a child that the classroom rules do not just stop at the door and reinforces expectations on a regular basis.

Section III The Voices of Teaching Chapter 10 Empowering Language: Say What You Mean and Mean What You Say We need to communicate our expectations. We also need to honor our words in doing what we say we will do. Use language precisely and honestly, that way we can expect that our students do the same. We need to think hard about our words and use them wisely when we are talking to children. Provide choices, but set boundaries. Use words that invite cooperation by making it fun, asking for help, and providing choices. Speak directly. Tell non-negotiables. Remind only twice. Keep your demands short and simple. Chapter 11 Stress the Deed, Not the Doer Use the I voice. I like you, but I dont like this behavior. Encourage children to follow suit. Stress the deed, not the doer. Help children through activity to use language precisely and intentionally, to express their likes and their dislikes, their satisfactions and frustrations in conducive ways. Constructive expression happens by noticing and naming details. Learn to note along with students what behaviors work and what do not. Build internal appreciation for self-motivation.

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Chapter 12 The Voices of Authority 3 different voices: personal, procedure, principal. These voices are our tools. Use the voice and principles of moral authority to help stretch childrens power to care and attend to others. Use the voice of procedure to provide the permission and constraint of an external order. Use the personal authority voice of the teacher to express both conviction and knowledge- use carefully and sparingly, as it is the most powerful Section IV Further Strategies for Difficult Classroom Behaviors Chapter 13 Problem-solving Class Meetings Hold problem solving class meetings to enable students at all grade levels to take greater responsibility for their academic and social life. Use preventative and reactive problem solving. Class meetings provide structure and order to help students sort through difficult times in school life regardless of the problem. They allow for different opinions to be heard and a chance for students to say what they really think. They learn to name their feelings, respect viewpoints of their peers, and negotiate to reach a solution. The students ultimately choose the solution to try, and they typically work because the students are invested in them. If the solution fails, it is a great opportunity for the students to reflect and to try again by analyzing what worked and what did not work. Chapter 14 Teachers as Mirrors: Using Social Conferences Children will bring baggage to school that compromise their capacity to learn

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with others. Know what your students need coming into the school day. Listen, hear, and offer a word or gesture of comfort. Notice and seek solutions by going above and beyond the school walls. Responsiveness is the answer, not the solution. Serve lovingly, the person known.

Chapter 15 Individual Contracts They bring child, parents and teachers together to work on behavioral problems. Collaboratively the teacher establishes goals for conduct that convey realistic expectations for improvement and helps the student achieve that improvement with different approaches and strategies. Firm and matter-of-fact approach to expectations will allow for built up negativity about reminders to diminish. Set a goal and name a concrete marker in the contract. Celebrate meeting goals. Emphasize internal motivators. At the end of the contract, set-up the next steps of action to take whatever they may be. Section V Clear Positives Chapter 16 Teaching by Clear Positives: Revisiting Ideals Be intuitive! Share materials. Teach with conviction, solve problems, and present a consistent approach to childrens intentions and actions. Know our own roots! Trace actions back to our reasons for teaching.

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Chapter 17 Clear Positives in Action Why do we teach? Why do we do what we do in the classroom? Know the answer to these questions and be prepared to answer them. These are the Clear Positives. We need to establish our own clear positives to provide guidelines for our social arrangements and expectations for groups and individuals. Establish ideals continually and routinely. Use resources to do so. Let individual ideals inform you teaching. We are at our best when that happens.

Resources for EDUC 303: The First Six Weeks of School by Paula Denton and Roxann Kriete
What were the key points of your assigned readings? List any questions or discussion topics you would like discussed in class.

Introduction Using this Book Key Terms Morning Meeting: 4 components- greeting, sharing, group activity, and news and announcements. Guided discovery: focused, playful technique of introducing new materials and tools to students. Academic choice: the students are informed on how to make choices in their learning and set goals, execute and evaluate them. Hopes and Dreams: a starting point for establishing rules with students. Modeling and role-playing allows for students to know what is expected and practice it. Logical consequences foster responsibility for the students own actions and choices. Quiet time helps children to feel calm, relax, and to reflect and restore.

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Chapter 1 Week One Community building and tone setting: greetings, making nametags, morning meeting, singing, news and announcements. Build community through these activities. Exploring the school environment: games (simple and familiar), tour the school, play cafeteria. Help the kids to know their environment. Rules and routines: basic signals (attention getters, silence, etc.), bathroom visits, meeting rules. Hopes and dreams- introduce and talk about their own hopes and dreams. Guided discoveries-keep materials basic so they can be built on in later discoveries. Activity time: outline choices, students choose which one they will do. Academics: must be accessible to all levels within the room in the first week. Chapter 2 Week Two Our goal is to slowly and intentionally turn over some of the reigns to the students while still maintaining our constant oversight and monitoring. Create a set of classroom rules. Daily academic choice will be established. Children will work in a variety of different way cooperatively. Games and group initiatives will occur along with reflection time. Curriculum sequences will begin. Children will work, play and socialize in structure, teacher-supervised activities with a range of classmates. Chapter 3 Week Three Children will successfully and independently participate in the routines of the classroom with little direct teacher supervision.

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Children will critically think about ways to follow the classroom rules they created, and engage in role-play as well as modeling to practice following the rules. Students will work independently while the teacher is working with small groups. Logical consequences will be discussed introduced and rehearsed. The curriculum will be in effect in each content area. They will succeed at social and academic expectations. Supports will be breaking in to create integrated expectations and knowledge about the children and to set up schedules to assist in a way that supports student learning.

Chapter 4 Weeks Four to Six Most children will work independently while the teacher focuses on individual s or small groups. Children work together productively and kindly in ALL groups. Students are familiar with a large number of tools and resources for learning and expressing learning, and locate and use them independently and constructively. Children show that they are beginning to internalize classroom rules by generating and discussing strategies for following the rules independently in problematic situations. All children experience logical consequences for misbehavior. Students show their understanding of logical consequences by participating in discussions centered on independent conflict resolution, and apology of action. Children are increasingly independent in leading the classroom routines and following them. Conclusion Ordinary Moments Basic familiarity is established with routines and it is beautiful. They know expectations of how to treat one another. Everyone attempts unfamiliar tasks.

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Internalization of expectations that will help each other learn. Translate the rules they have established about community throughout their day.