Management Style and Philosophical Beliefs

Effective classroom management is crucial to successful teaching and learning. Without the ability of teachers to physically manage their classroom, including monitoring and controlling students behaviors, classrooms would essentially be a waste of space where no learning would occur. Imagine students are consistently displaying disruptive behaviors and teachers have poor classroom management. The entire class would be spent in a complete whirlwind, with negative interactions between teachers and students. As someone with a psychology/mental health background, I sincerely believe positive reinforcement is the key to effective classroom management. In my future teaching practices, I intend to USE positive reinforcement significantly more than any type of punishment. Due to this, I tend lay between the authoritative and democratic classroom management styles. With students, I tend to be fair. I tend to find areas to compliment and reward students. I think this is especially important working in special education. While I tend to be fair with students, I recognize that fair is not always equal. I believe this statement is especially true when working with students with behavioral disorders. Disciplinary consequences (which I already stated I aspire to use sparingly, because I prefer reinforcement) for students with behavioral disorders may be different than typically developing peers. For example, a student with a behavior intervention plan who frequently lashes out verbally in class may receive simply a nonverbal prompt for his/her action, while a student who is not on a plan may acquire a more severe consequence. This is a concept that I struggled with early on, but after several teachers and administrators have modeled how effective this concept can be, I have grown to establish it as part of my philosophical classroom management beliefs. In conclusion, I intend to have effective classroom management by using traits of an authoritative leader and democratic leader. In addition, I will use positive reinforcement often and punishment sparingly. When I do need to use punishment techniques, I will use a fair-fair isnt always equal mindset.

Establishing a Positive Classroom Culture

I plan to develop student-teacher relationships and establish a positive classroom culture immediately upon meeting my students. I believe it is extremely important to create a safe place within my classroom, which means I must establish a comfortable classroom community off the bat. I believe students need to feel safe and comfortable around their teachers AND their peers. The ABCs of Me activity truly appeals to me, because it allows students to share personal details about themselves. In addition, it allows students to see and learn details about EACH OTHER, as the final products will be placed around the classroom. To encourage students to be comfortable with their teacher, I will plan to model the activity using my own name and details prior to the students completing the assignment.

Developing Classroom Rules and Procedures

Prior to coming up with my complete set of classroom rules and procedures, I intend to use the above checklist to help give me ideas of how to do so. Once again, I have to think about this from the angle of working with special education students. Generally speaking, students with special education needs prefer structure over flexibility. Due to this, I will have a sketched out idea of all rules and procedures prior to the first day of school. In addition to structure, however, students with

special education needs also enjoy the freedom of choice. This is why I decided to have a sketched out idea not a set-in-stone idea. Students will be told the rules and procedures that I have come up with, and they will be allowed to edit them to allow themselves to be held accountable for their actions. The rules in class will be relatively flexible, as students will be given a 3 strike policy before having any repercussion or consequence. Expectations will be VERY clear for students ahead of time, and students will also be reminded of expectations throughout the year. I believe that it is important to have the expectations posted around the classroom, as it will provide a visual for my students. I will be incredibly organized and in-tune to what is going on with my students. Again, I believe from a special education standpoint, it is ESPECIALLY important to develop relationships with students. In addition, my roster will be smaller than general education teachers, which will give me an opportunity to REALLY know what is going on with my students. In addition, I will be required to progress monitor students with academic goals, which will allow me to keep track of student learning throughout the year.

Classroom Layout

Some things to note on my classroom layout include that the teachers desk faces the door. This will allow me to help monitor students behaviors, as I will be aware of who is coming in and leaving the classroom. I will also be facing students and walking around while teaching. In addition, students will be asked often to work together, so they will be organized as four students to one table. Since often times students with special education needs have difficulty with sustaining attention AND/OR behavioral difficulties, I have also provided individual desks that students can work at (and face the wall to eliminate distraction). During my approach to classroom management section, I spoke a lot about positive reinforcement. I have provided two computers in my classroom to reward students who are on behavior intervention plans by allowing them to use 5 minutes of tech time for meeting their goals.

Monitoring the Classroom and Responding to Student Misbehavior

Once again, the category of responding to student behavior will be slightly different for me as a special education teacher (compared to general education teachers). First, it is extremely important to realize that many of my students will likely be on behavior intervention plans. Due to this, it is ESPECIALLY important for me to monitor the classroom constantly. I think this will be a relatively easy feat for me, as I will have a smaller classroom, AND I have experience in this area as an associate. When students are off task, I will begin with a nonverbal prompt, such as a headshake or a glance. If the nonverbal prompt doesnt work, I may say the students name out loud. If that doesnt work, I may have a private conversation with a student. I am a firm believer that a private conversation with students works significantly better than calling students out in front of the entire class. If the behaviors continue after the private conversation, then it may be time to consider further consequences. For students who are on behavior plans, I will follow the plan and have the student complete a processing sheet, such as the one above. The processing sheet will include the student looking into what happened and thinking of how to change the behavior for the next time. I will generally have filling out this sheet be the main consequence for misbehaviors. The only types of behavior that I will have zero tolerance for in my classroom will be violent behaviors or sexualized behaviors. In the case of these behaviors, students will be sent directly to the principal and parents will be contacted.

Parents as Partners

I firmly believe that parent involvement in education is crucial to student success. In special education, it will be very important for me to update parents on how their children are performing. This is especially important in relation to IEP goals. I will plan to communicate with parents however they feel most comfortable email, phone call, meetings, etc. I will frequently contact parents with good news, to lesson the negative impact of calling with not so good news. If a parent is overly involved in his or her childs schooling, I will find ways to invite the parent in to volunteer. As a special education teacher, I will often be overwhelmed with paperwork which would be a great option for a parent to help with. If a parent is NOT involved, I will continue to send good news home in hopes of encouraging the parent to become involved. I will also invite the uninvolved parent into the classroom and encourage participation in his or her childs homework. As the picture above (which I love!) suggests, family is truly at the center of being a responsible student and overall human. Parent involvement is so important, that communication with families will be one of my main goals as a teacher. If some of my students are not fortunate enough to have caring families, I will provide a safe place at school and be very knowledgeable of community resources.