Class Rules

There’s great debate about the list of rules and consequences approach. You might go to www.teachers.net for some feedback from the many teachers who post there as well.

These days more people are saying that starting the year with a list of consequenes encourages children to understand themselves as natural rule breakers.

I think children are in school to learn how to get along in a group. I think making a few mistakes is part of the learning - it’s how they learn. Encouraging children from the start to be respectful of each other is always appropriate but detailing what is and what is not respectful behavior takes away from that.

We shouldn’t respect others because it’s a rule. I don’t like classroom rules and consequences because to me it encourages children to understand these things as temporary when really respecting others should be something far more important than a classroom rule.

Congratulations on your shiny new degree and your shiny new job!

I prefer to think in terms of procedures rather than rules- because procedures are something you learn and practice- not something you break. If you mess up- well- that just means you need more practice.

In addition to the teachers.net/mentors bulletin board on management- which was Sara’s good suggestion- I would suggest hopping over to Amazon.com and checking Love and Logic (I lent my copy out and the author escapes me right now) and The Responsive Classroom. Both are excellent books that are all about designing your management system to respond to the needs of your group and your own. Good luck:)

Robin

There’s great debate about the rules and consequences approach to teaching. Teachers tend to fall in one of two camps on the matter.Some believe that rules and consequences are essential to good teaching and others like me believe that each child should be seen as an individual and each situation dealt with on its own.

There’s a great site called www.teachers.net with a BB devoted specifically to classroom management. You might consider posting your question there as well.

Dear Sara,

I am one of the teachers who would fall into the other camp. Dealing with each and every situation as if it were an isolated and individualized incident would seem to encourage lack of transfer of knowledge from one situation to another—a problem with many of our children in the “Jerry Springer Age Of
Reason”. I believe that most children benefit greatly from an environment which allows them some semblance of what to expect in a given situation—otherwise everything is neither “good” nor “bad” simply convenient, and convenient is only convenient to ME not the people I may be inconveneiencing.

Hey Sara, congrats and good luck to you! Now, I would highly encourage you to read Harry Wong’s book, “The First Day of School”. It talks about teaching procedures, establishing rules, everything you need to know as you walk into that first year! Good Luck!

There’s great debate about the list of rules and consequences approach. You might go to www.teachers.net for some feedback from the many teachers who post there as well.

These days more people are saying that starting the year with a list of consequenes encourages children to understand themselves as natural rule breakers.

I think children are in school to learn how to get along in a group. I think making a few mistakes is part of the learning - it’s how they learn. Encouraging children from the start to be respectful of each other is always appropriate but detailing what is and what is not respectful behavior takes away from that.

We shouldn’t respect others because it’s a rule. I don’t like classroom rules and consequences because to me it encourages children to understand these things as temporary when really respecting others should be something far more important than a classroom rule.

Congratulations on your shiny new degree and your shiny new job!

I prefer to think in terms of procedures rather than rules- because procedures are something you learn and practice- not something you break. If you mess up- well- that just means you need more practice.

In addition to the teachers.net/mentors bulletin board on management- which was Sara’s good suggestion- I would suggest hopping over to Amazon.com and checking Love and Logic (I lent my copy out and the author escapes me right now) and The Responsive Classroom. Both are excellent books that are all about designing your management system to respond to the needs of your group and your own. Good luck:)

Robin

There’s great debate about the rules and consequences approach to teaching. Teachers tend to fall in one of two camps on the matter.Some believe that rules and consequences are essential to good teaching and others like me believe that each child should be seen as an individual and each situation dealt with on its own.

There’s a great site called www.teachers.net with a BB devoted specifically to classroom management. You might consider posting your question there as well.

Dear Sara,

I am one of the teachers who would fall into the other camp. Dealing with each and every situation as if it were an isolated and individualized incident would seem to encourage lack of transfer of knowledge from one situation to another—a problem with many of our children in the “Jerry Springer Age Of
Reason”. I believe that most children benefit greatly from an environment which allows them some semblance of what to expect in a given situation—otherwise everything is neither “good” nor “bad” simply convenient, and convenient is only convenient to ME not the people I may be inconveneiencing.

Hey Sara, congrats and good luck to you! Now, I would highly encourage you to read Harry Wong’s book, “The First Day of School”. It talks about teaching procedures, establishing rules, everything you need to know as you walk into that first year! Good Luck!