Each student is a unique individual and thus responds differently to different forms of discipline in the classroom. In general, there are two categories that student’s fall into – those who respond well to rewards and those who respond well to threats/punishments. Within those categories, one punishment or reward might work best for one student but not another. Because of this, it is important to have a plethora of ideas in your bag of tricks.
Here are some ideas shared by teachers who found the ideas helpful in their classrooms:
- Write a Brief Constructed Response
Teacher Megan Hartman uses the BCR as a discipline method that works well. The BCR is assigned for homework when the student receives a second warning for behavior. If the student receives a fourth warning, the student is asked to leave the classroom, and must complete the BCR while out of class. A completed BCR is the student’s ticket back into the classroom.
- Using Recess Time to Make Up for Wasted Instructional Time
One teacher, who wished to remain anonymous, uses a stop watch to keep track of the time that she spends addressing discipline problems in class. This time spent away from classroom instruction is then made up at recess time. She either finishes a lesson that was not able to be completed or assigns a quiet activity for the class to complete during this time. One benefit to this method is that the peer pressure from other students helps keep all students in line.
- Write a Letter of Apology
This method of discipline works especially well when one student mistreats another student in the classroom. The offending student must write a letter of apology, have the parent sign it at home that night and then bring it back and read it in front of the class the next day. This idea was created by a class, not a teacher, and the teacher found it extremely effective and only necessary to implement one time during the entire school year.
- Expand Student’s Proper Language in Place of Bad Language
This idea was provided by Jody S. from New York. When a student uses poor language in reference to an assignment, she will simply translate the student’s language into more appropriate language. For example “this is difficult and is frustrating me”. She does not address the student directly and remains calm while translating the student’s expressions into appropriate behavior. She finds that this throws her students off guard and helps students to learn to stay calm and express themselves more appropriately in class.
- Random Rewards for Being Good in Class
Teacher Crystal Alfano-Gallegos submitted this idea: she uses raffle tickets throughout the day, placing them on desks of students who are acting appropriately. This idea of “catching students being good” helps reinforce the positive behavior she wishes to see, and then she will raffle out prizes at various points during the week – sometimes daily. It does cost some money to provide rewards that appeal to students, but Crystal has found that her students are often very well behaved as they attempt to collect as many raffle tickets as they can prior to the next drawing. She also uses the reward method to teach her students about probability.
These are just some discipline and reward strategies that worked for an individual classroom. The idea is to provide teachers with a variety of ideas to use in the classroom, keeping in mind the fact that not all ideas, even those that seem to be the best in theory, will work best with each group of students. Often, asking students to come up with the type of reward/discipline can be one of the most effective methods of creating a classroom management plan that works.
