School Discipline
Responsive Classroom discipline is founded on clear and concise rules that create a safe, orderly, predictable, joyful, and caring classroom community.
Rules frame an ideal and help everyone work toward a positive community. They are positive statements that guide behavior toward what we want rather than what we don’t want.
Our rules help us all envision and work toward a positive community and affirm our goals; if we don’t throw or hit, what do we do in our classroom so everyone can feel safe and learn?
Download Tips for Using Quiet Time as a Strategy for Managing Transitions
What are classroom rules?
Rules are general guidelines—stated in global rather than specific statements. That is because it is the intention of education to help develop reasoned and critical thinking that can be applied to, but doesn’t prescribe, every situation.
They need to cover only three categories:
A rule that says, “We will take care of ourselves” might require real thinking about critical choices, such as whether to do or not do homework, sit next to a chatty friend while instruction is happening, or bring a change of clothes for your PE class.
How many rules does a classroom need?
While it depends very much on the age, stage, and other developmental factors of the class, in general, three to six rules are enough. The concrete details of each rule—what it sounds like and looks like at each grade level or subject type—become part of the rich and ongoing learning of the year.
Keep in mind that it’s better to have a few rules we will remember rather than many we will forget.
Rules Require Action
The rules must be lived each day to become a reality rather than just being nice words on a wall. They are lived when they are thoroughly integrated into the routines and habits of classroom life.
They are lived when they are:
Holding Expectations
We need to be able to reinforce the efforts children make to follow the rules and when they speak respectfully. When a child is rude, we must be able to say, “I do not speak to you that way. You may not speak to me or others in that tone either.”
Responsive Classroom has five discipline workshops that will meet you where you are in your specific need to build safe, orderly, caring classroom communities where students learn, achieve, belong and behave.
Strategies to Stop Disruptive Behaviors
Disruptive behaviors are a range of off-task distractions and misbehavior that negatively impact learning for some or all of the students and/or interfere with maintaining a safe, orderly and joyful classroom.
In this workshop, you will learn evidence-based, teacher-tested, and proven strategies to prevent and stop disruptive behaviors.
Verbal conflict creates an unsafe learning environment. It occurs when disagreements are characterized by raised voices and yelling, verbal aggression, threats, name calling, or cursing, and when there are disparaging remarks that hurt, insult, or disrespect another. While there are common causes that lead to verbal conflict, a primary aim of discipline is to prevent it from happening and to reduce and deescalate it quickly when it starts and reduce the chances of it recurring.
In this workshop, you will learn strategies to prevent verbal conflict from happening, de-escalate when it does, learn skills for conflict resolution, and build a classroom community where the norm is for adults and students to talk respectfully and reason together.
When a student’s behavior escalates to an emotional outburst or persists in a way that creates a clear challenge to safety and loss of instructional time, removing them from class to a place where they can de-escalate, reset and regain control is the safest and most respectful option for the student that has lost control, the other students in the classroom and the teacher.
In this workshop, you will learn strategies that help students regain control, identify their need for developing skills to stay in control when experiencing stressful or uncomfortable emotions, recognize how can they repair harm and return to the classroom and be a productive member of the learning community.
Classroom Management that Works
Classroom management is a proactive strategy that places the focus on preventing off-task and misbehavior that results in discipline problems and distracts from teaching and learning.
In this workshop, you will learn strategies for setting up a predictable, orderly, organized classroom that helps students make pro-social choices, meet expectations, and build strong relationships that reduce discipline problems and increase ease and friendship.
Classroom Management that Works for Music, Art, PE and Other Special Area Teachers
Classroom management in music, art, PE and other humanities, performance and creative classes differs from that in core academic classrooms because of physical movement, noise level, storage, materials, student autonomy, classroom configurations, frequent shifts in the floor space and so much more. The shared assets, supplies, instruments, and specialized materials all require a different system of management.
In this workshop, you will learn strategies and structures for managing lively energy, making smooth transitions, building strong relationships and setting up routines and procedures that increase safety, reduce confusion and prevent common problems that can lead to increased disciplinary actions.
