Discipline through Pragmatic Classroom Management Blair Carson EDUC 531 Dr. Patty Williams

The Wongs:  The Wongs’ approach is eminently pragmatic, built from practical ideas gleaned from myriad sources, with no attempt to make suggestions fit any particular theory.  They write in an informal manner and use many aphorisms that stick in the mind. Rosemary Harry

The Fundamental Hypothesis of the Wongs’ Approach:  Discipline problems largely disappear when students are carefully taught to follow procedures for all classroom activities.

Wongs’ on School:  School is where the students go to learn how to be productive citizens and reach their potential as human beings.  School should be challenging, exciting, and thought provoking, but it must have structure to ensure student success.  You cannot give students self-esteem, but you can make sure they find success in school.

Wongs’ on Teaching:  Teaching is a craft – a highly skilled craft that can be learned.  By far the most important factor in school learning is the ability of the teacher. The more capable the teacher, the more successful the student.  Good teachers enhance the life and spirit of the students they teach.  Stop asking, “What am I supposed to do?” Start asking, “What must I know that will help me accomplish what I need to do?” What you do on the first day of school determines your success for the rest of the year.  Start class immediately. Do not take roll until later.  Learning is the most effective when it takes place in a supportive community of learners.

On Teaching (Cont’d):  The more that the students work together responsibly, the more they learn.  Shorter assignments produce higher student achievement.  Intersperse questions throughout a lesson.  Students usually learn more from an activity-question approach to teaching than from a textbook-lecture approach.  Teachers go through 4 stages of professional development-fantasy, survival, mastery, and impact.  You can have your achievements or you can have your excuses.  Those who teach well never cease to learn.

About Classrooms and Procedures:  The most important factor governing learning is not discipline; it is how a teacher manages a classroom.  A well-managed classroom is task oriented and predictable.  Effective teachers spend most of the first two weeks of the school year teaching students to follow classroom procedures.  The very first day, the very first minute, the very first second of school, teachers should begin to establish a structure of procedures and routines for the class.

About Roles and Responsibilities:  Responsibilities as Your Teacher:  To treat you with respect and care.  To provide you an orderly classroom.  To provide the necessary discipline.  To provide the appropriate motivation.  To teach the required content.  Responsibilities as My Students:  To treat me with respect and care as an individual.  To attend classes regularly.  To be cooperative and not disruptive.  To study and do your work well.  To learn and master the required content.

About Discipline:  Classroom rules indicate the behavior you expect from students.  Rules of behavior set limits, just as do rules in games. They create a work-oriented atmosphere.  Behavior associated with rules must be taught through discussion, demonstration, and practice.  Consequences should be attached to rules – positive consequences for compliance and negative for non compliance.  Explain your discipline plan to students the first day of school.

About Testing and Evaluation:  If a student cannot demonstrate learning or achievement, it is the teacher’s fault, not the student’s.  Use criterion-referenced tests to evaluate student performance.  The more frequent the tests, the higher the achievement.  Grade on what is learned, not on the curve – a procedure that has done great harm to education.

First Day of Class:  Have you classroom ready for instruction, and make it inviting.  Organize your classroom in accordance with a script that you follow.  Stand at the door and greet students as they enter.  Give each student a seating assignment and a seating chart.  Position yourself in the room near students: Problems are proportional to distance between you and them.  In a consistent location, post an assignment for students to begin when they enter the room.  Display your diploma and credentials with pride. Dress in a professional manner that models success.

About the First Week of Training:  3 most important things: discipline, procedures, and routines.  Explain your discipline plan to students.  State your procedures and rehearse them until they become routines.

A Discipline Plan is Necessary, However  They believe most teachers are too eager to begin teaching lessons, and when misbehavior occurs, those teachers apply punitive measures to stop it.  The Wongs are not particular about the kind of discipline you use, they prefer if you adopt a style that suits your requirements and needs.  The Wongs suggest that you carefully think though the kind of behavior you expect from students.  Wongs suggest that you limit your number of rules to a maximum of five.  The rules of the classroom are to help students learn in a safe and effective way.  Also, organization is knowing where things are, and making your time and space work for you.

How to Decide on Procedures for Your Classroom  To establish good procedures do two things: (1) Decide what routines are needed for the activities you will provide, and (2) make lists of the procedural steps students must follow to participate in and benefit from the activities.  Every time you want students to do something, they need to follow a procedure.  Examples of some of the matters the Wongs give specific attention to are:  How to enter and exit the classroom.  How to begin and finish work.  How the class is to get quiet when necessary.  How to move about the classroom.  How to walk in corridors.

Classroom Procedures Must Be Taught  Good procedures allow a great variety of activities to occur, often several at the same time, with little confusion.  The Wongs suggest a 3-step method for teaching procedures:  1. Explain. Teacher states, explains, and demonstrates the procedure.  2. Rehearse. Students rehearse and practice the procedure under the teacher supervision.  3. Reinforce. Teacher reteaches, rehearses, practices, and reinforces the classroom procedure until it becomes a habit.

How to Begin a Classroom Successfully:  Wongs say new teachers have bags brimming with ideas, lesson plans, and new ideas for the classroom. But new teachers have little idea about what to do during the first days and weeks of school.  The Wongs present a First Day of School Action Plan, which they credit to Sarah Jondahl. It consists of step-by-step processes of how to prepare your classroom, academic expectations, time frames, lesson plans, and activities for the first days of school.  Wongs’ emphasize that teachers need to set high expectations from day 1.  Before class begins, tell yourself:  1. I will establish classroom management procedures from the beginning.  2. I will convey that this class will be business-like, with a firm, competent, warm teacher.  First I will establish work habits in my students and I will worry about content later.

The First Five Minutes are Critical:  The Wongs repeat that you should have an assignment for the students to begin working as soon as they walk into the classroom.  Set the tone in the first few minutes for your classroom.  Students needs to know their expectations.  Make sure that their materials are all ready. Procedures for Cooperative Work Groups:  Students do better when they are allowed to work in cooperative learning groups.  Wongs suggest that you call your groups support groups with each member of the group known as a support buddy.  Effective teachers teach the students procedures and social skills needed for functioning in a group.  Before you begin your first group activity, teach students how to do the following:  1. Be responsible for you own work and behavior.  2. Ask a support buddy for help if you have a question.  3. Help any support buddy who asks for help.  4. Ask for help from the teacher only when support buddies cannot supply it.