Samantha Hess

K. Suk
EDUC 230-02 Education Field Experience
Spring 2019
Classroom Management and Routines Rationale Statement

Standard 9- Professional Learning:

The teacher engages in meaningful and appropriate professional learning experiences aligned

with his/her own needs and the needs of the learners, school, and system (New Jersey

Department of Education, 2014, pg. 12).

Artifact: Classroom Management and Routines observations

Date: March 21, 2019

Course: EDUC 230-02 Education Field Experience and Field Experience and EDUC 212-01
Foundations of Education

Rational Statement:

Both artifacts are observation papers discussing classroom management and routines. During my

time at the private school in Gladstone, I have been observing the class’s daily routine and how

they are able to manage their time for all their lessons and activities. I have also been recording

my observations on classroom management and how their classroom runs. In my Foundations of

Education course, I also observed a preschool classroom and recorded my findings on their

classroom management and their daily routines. I related these artifacts to standard 9.i.2, “The

teacher engages in meaningful and appropriate professional learning experiences aligned with

his/her own needs and the needs of the learners, school, and system” (New Jersey Department of
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Education, 2014). Throughout my observation at the private school I was discovering how “age

appropriate” does not just relate to items or toys or even lessons, but it goes into every aspect of

teaching. Their schedule needs to be appropriate and enriching for these second graders. If a

lesson goes on for too long, they get antsy. Even that behavior is seen as age appropriate if they

are sitting for too long. Even aspects like reward and discipline need to fit their age and the

school systems rules. The first day I went to observe there was a boy who kept interrupting,

would constantly get up while they were sitting for a lesson and just could not stay still for long.

I thought to myself, why is the teacher not telling him to sit down? Why doesn’t he tell him to

stop talking? Maybe they do not have strict discipline at this school. A few weeks into observing

I find out that this boy does have special needs. The teacher does a great job giving him space to

do his own thing when he feels the need to, but also keeping him on track when they are doing a

lesson or working on an assignment. The teacher takes his teaching tools and implements them

differently for each individual student. A teacher has needs as well as the students. Main needs of

a teacher are trust and connections to their students. When this teacher accommodates to his

students, they know they can trust their teacher because he is doing what is best for them. By

putting their needs first, he is ensuring that he will do what he needs to for his students. Through

his specific schedule and his classroom rules, these students are able to bond with the teacher and

make connections with him. The classroom management observation from Foundations also

related back to the same standard. In that two/three-year-old preschool classroom, these students

are just beginning to learn classroom rules. It is the teacher’s job to reinforce these rules in a

positive way. Again, it is crucial for the teacher to make bonds with these students. It is mutually

beneficial for everyone’s needs. The more of a connection the teachers made with these

students, the more the students were listening.

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These artifacts have reinforced for me the fact that having a routine is crucial for

students. They thrive off of having a set schedule. They feel more comfortable knowing what is

coming next. This promotes effective learning because they can focus and be involved in their

work knowing that they will not be interrupted and there will be no surprises. When students do

not know what is happening next, they will always have a rough transition into the next lesson or

activity and feel uneasy about when that will happen again. These artifacts also showed me that a

teacher needs to be able use their teaching skills and implement them differently to work for each

students’ individual needs. The teacher I work with is able to keep all his students involved and

paying attention. This gives less room for bad behavior. They are always actively engaged and

excited about what they are working on. This keeps them well behaved. I have never heard the

teacher raise his voice. At the private school, the few times my cooperating teacher has had to

talk to any of his students, he uses a soft, yet stern tone. The students always straighten out after

having been talked to. When the students respect their teacher, as they do in this class, they want

to please him. They act well behaved and they want to prove that they are good students. The

teacher praises good behavior and points it out to the rest of the class as an example. I even saw

this when I observed in the preschool room. The teachers were stern, but never yelled at the

students. From working in a preschool room, I have learned these teacher tools myself. Getting

another view of it in a different school, watching a different teacher, I learn different ways to

implement these skills.

I can use these artifacts in the future as a reference to set up an age appropriate schedule

for my class. I can also look back at this to get an idea of proper classroom management. Both

classes have routines that work well with their students. In the private school, even the way they

get together and plan for the morning as a class is a great idea, and this artifact has all of these
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ideas in it. This artifact also gave a different perspective on how schools handle behavior

differently. With different students you may need to handle situations differently and these

artifacts have those skills noted in it. I can always look back at these artifacts to try different

methods of running a classroom.

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Reference:

New Jersey Department of Education. (2014, April 1). New Jersey Professional Standards for Teachers

Alignment with InTASC. Retrieved March 20, 2019, from

https://www.state.nj.us/education/profdev/profstand/ProfStandardsforTeachersAlignmentwith

InTASC.pdf