Competency 006
The teacher understands strategies for creating an organized
and productive learning environment and for managing student behavior.
Defense
The first thing that I recognized that I needed
to do was to have an bell ringer. My students can easily get into
trouble coming to class and having dead time. I am planning on purchsing
a book with a variety of mind teasers to start the thinking process at
the beginning of class. In addition to having a bell ringer, I realize
my need to plan my activities in a more timely fashion. I need to
make sure that there is little time at the end of class for students to
act out. In the past, I have finished assignments five to fifteen
minutes early and have allowed students to work on other assignments or
converse with one another. The time that I have left open at the
beginning and end of class are not good classroom management.
I love to decorate my classroom and make it a visually
stimulating environment. Students tend to have a bad attitude when
the classroom is plain and drab. This year I decided my theme
will be four seasons. I plan to divide my room into quadrants and
make each quadrant one of the four seasons. My classroom needs to
be a place where students feel warm and comfortable. I always encourage
students to let me know if there is anything I can do to help them be more
comfortable in the classroom. I also put my students into groups
of four and take caution to insure that they all are able to see the board.
This year I need to contact parents earlier and
keep contact with them throughout the year. It was amazing to see
how important parental contact and involvement is to the classroom.
I want to send a letter home each quarter and contact parents by phone
for positive and negative student actions. Parents need to hear positive
aspects as well as the bad. I want parents to feel as if they can
do something to help their child's education. Open houses are also
a great opportunity for parents to get involved. It is my goal to
make sure all parents see a display of their child's work when they come
to visit me.
I also plan to establish rules the first day of
school. My campus develops four rules as a staff and then allows
each classroom to create a fifth rule. The rule making process has
been beneficial for all of us. There is unity on campus because the
rules are the same for everyone. Each teacher enforces rules and
the students know what to expect the moment they step into the classroom.
A common set of discipline procedures are also in place when minor adjustments
in classroom management are not enough. Rules should be short, written
clearly, and written in a positive way. I find that we have done
a good job in preparing the rules, but closer to the end of the school
year we could have done a better job about being consistent in our enforcement.
Samples: