4. Behavior and Discipline in the Classroom

Hey there, this is Ellie, and I'm here with Brittany.

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Brittany: Hello!

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Ellie: Welcome to this week's episode

of our podcast, where we're going

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to be diving deep into the topic of

behavior management in middle school.

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As any teacher will tell you,

managing the behavior of middle

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school students can be a challenge.

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But with the right strategies, you can

create a positive and productive learning

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environment for everyone involved.

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In this episode, we'll be discussing

some of the most effective behavior

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management techniques that teachers can

use in their classrooms and sharing our

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own experiences and insights from years

of working with middle school students.

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Whether you're a seasoned educator or just

starting out, this episode will provide

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valuable tips and techniques that you

can use to help your students succeed.

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So sit back, grab a cup of coffee, and

join us as we explore the exciting world

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of behavior management in middle school.

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Brittany: So what are some of

the behavior issues that you've

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dealt with in the classroom?

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Ellie: Some of the most common ones

are things like not doing their work,

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just kind of sitting there, maybe

looking around, trying to pull out other

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things from the desk, talking in class,

calling out, distracting other people.

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Like, you know, trying to

talk to those other people, or

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maybe throwing things at them.

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Sometimes getting up and trying to walk

around, you know, during class when

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they're supposed to be actually doing

something at their seat, or sometimes

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every once in a while even trying to

just walk out of the room without asking

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permission or saying where they're going

or making sure it's okay to go somewhere.

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What about you?

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What kind of things do you think

of when you think of behavior

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management and discipline things?

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Brittany: A lot of talking out

of turn some yelling across the

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classroom to get somebody else's

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Ellie: Hmm.

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Brittany: Yeah, a lot of throwing things

to get someone's attention or passing

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Ellie: Ooh, passing notes.

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Yeah.

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Brittany: Not working,

not being attentive.

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Not having their supplies,

not being prepared for class.

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That was a common one for me.

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Getting up and just walking out of class,

going to the bathroom without permission,

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or just getting up and leaving the room

without permission was a common thing.

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Yeah, just, those were

the most common ones.

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I've had a few oddball

ones as well, but...

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Ellie: Do tell.

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Brittany: I've had, during my

student teaching, I actually had

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a student pull a knife on me.

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Ellie: Oh my gosh.

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Brittany: And then when we had

their parent come in to talk to

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us the parent threw a desk at me.

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Ellie: Oh my goodness.

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Brittany: So was not happy with me,

and yeah, that was quite an incident.

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And then, and then close to the end of

my teaching I had a student who had a

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lot of emotional issues and just threw

basically everything he could at me.

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He threw a desk at me, he threw shoes,

he threw markers, he threw binders.

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Ellie: hmm.

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Mm

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Brittany: Yeah, he just, he just didn't

know how to regulate his emotions.

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Ellie: hmm.

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So, in a more extreme situation

like that, did you have support

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from outside of the classroom?

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Administration or guidance counselor or?

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Brittany: When I did the student teaching

one, I did not really have support.

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That was a very rough school.

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It was considered a college prep

school, but it was in the middle

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of Milwaukee urban area and did not

have a lot of support there, even

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though it was my student teaching.

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But with the, the emotional one,

I had a great administrative staff

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and they were very supportive.

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They ended up getting him testing

and moving him to a more, a classroom

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that was more conducive for him.

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Yeah.

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Ellie: Yeah.

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So, we have those extreme

kind of situations where...

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We do need some of that outside support.

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you know, I have had a couple of

students over the years where I

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had to call the guidance counselor.

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I had to call somebody else

in to help just because of the

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general demeanor of the student.

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Not doing work just as other kids

don't do work, but just with a little

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bit of a scarier attitude, I'll say.

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So fortunately we had, you know, good

support and guidance counselors would

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come in and help and try to, try to see

what was going on and try to connect with,

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with the students and that kind of thing.

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But if we think about some of those less

extreme, more common behaviors, like we

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kind of talked about to begin with what

are some things that we can do in general

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for the whole class to try to minimize

some of those behaviors or keep students

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on the right track and paying attention?

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Any thoughts that come to

mind for you right away?

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Brittany: For the whole class, I

tend to like doing a situation where

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you write a word up on the board.

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Maybe like recess or reward or something

like that and you, you either write

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each letter up as they earn a point or

you erase a letter one way or the other

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Ellie: Yeah, we did that, too.

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Yeah.

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Brittany: and then they, you know, try

to get recess or get a reward based on

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behavior and it can go back and forth.

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all throughout the day or

all throughout the week,

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Ellie: Mm

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Brittany: Over and over

until they hopefully earn the

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recess or earn the reward.

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So that was one of our favorites.

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We also did like marble jars or bean

jars where we would have marbles added

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to a jar based on behavior each day.

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I would add like three marbles

each day that they had a great day.

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If I had a sub and I got a great

report, I'd add five marbles.

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If they had a bad day, I might add

just one or none, it would depend.

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And then when it, when it would end up

at a certain line, they'd earn a reward.

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And so, and then the jar

had like four lines on it.

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for the four quarters of the year.

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Ellie: Oh, okay.

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Brittany: So, how about you?

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Ellie: Well, thinking about the beginning

of the year, since we are kind of near

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that, sometimes I found over the years

that it was really helpful to let kids

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not just create the rules and be any

rules that they wanted, but have some

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input into rules so that they kind of

buy into those rules so that most of

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the time kids do believe in something

being right or wrong or good or bad.

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And they have, you know, kind of a

moral, ethical, whatever, a moral belief

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about how they should be behaving or how

they expect their peers to behave and

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what kind of classroom they want to be

in and environment they want to be in.

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So we've had times when we let them

create some of the rules or construct

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the rules and really they end up with

the rules that you want most of the time,

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you know, they will say you shouldn't be

talking when somebody else is talking, you

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should be paying attention when there's

instruction going on, things like that.

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So getting them to buy into

those rules is helpful just for

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the whole class environment.

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And we did have that podcast

episode where we talked about

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the positive classroom culture.

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So, if we wanted to talk about things

like routines and stuff like that,

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you guys could check out that podcast.

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Cause we did a little bit more in depth

about that, but thinking about the

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rules, thinking about routines, like we

know how we're supposed to get in line.

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We know what the routine

is for the end of class.

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We know what we're supposed to do

if we get done with something early.

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So there's not question about...well,

I don't know what to do right now,

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so I think I'll talk to my friend or

I'll like flick this paper over at

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that person over there to get their

attention because I don't know what

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I'm supposed to be doing right now.

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So if we give them those parameters, those

expectations, it helps a little bit at

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least to minimize some of those behaviors.

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But then I like to do things

like group or team points.

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So most of the time I had my

students sitting in groups and

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they would pick their group name.

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So they had the opportunity to do that

instead of just saying group, A, B, C,

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D, whatever, they chose their names and

their names would be up on the board.

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And then we would tally points for

those groups, depending on maybe

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behavior, participation, homework

completion, that type of thing.

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And once they reached a certain number

of points, I think it was probably 10 ish

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then they got to have a specific prize.

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Maybe they got to come and have lunch

in the classroom or some homework

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passes or some extra free time.

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Something that they were motivated by.

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So I really like that.

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That was really helpful...for

a lot of grade levels.

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I did that I think at fifth

grade, fourth grade, sixth grade.

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So that was helpful there.

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Brittany: Lunch with the

teacher is always a popular one.

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Ellie: It really is.

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Yeah, you think once they get to middle

school they're maybe not so interested

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in that but they really do like that and

a lot of kids would like to just come

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eat lunch in the classroom because it

was so much quieter than the cafeteria

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Brittany: Yeah, it doesn't have the chaos.

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Ellie: Right.

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They'd like to come and sit and read.

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Brittany: Yeah.

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Ellie: Read in the classroom

because they wanted the quiet.

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But that was really helpful for,

for groups and, and the whole class.

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Brittany: We would often do like mission

statements at the beginning of the year.

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So kids kind of bought in that way,

and they would establish a mission

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statement with like three main points

that they wanted to work on behavior wise.

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And academically, and

then socially as well.

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And so those were like their three

main points that they would work on.

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And then I had a system where I did a,

a green, yellow, red kind of question.

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And one of the questions was

what do you want to see in

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the classroom behavior wise?

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And they would work in different groups

and come up with scenarios that they

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would write on construction paper.

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And then they'd.

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Tape them up underneath the question

and so they would say like I want to see

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positive talk I want to see helpful You

know helpful Strategies I want to see

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Friendly voices I want you know and they

would come up with different things that

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they wanted to see in the classroom and

That would help with the behavior because

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I would leave that up most of the year And

then I could point, you know, if somebody

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was like, "That's a stupid answer!"

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I could point out, you know, Is that

really working towards our behavior

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that we want to see in the classroom?

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Is that positive talk?

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Is that friendly voices?

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You know.

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And then they would have to reflect

on themselves and talk about,

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you know, No it's not, I'm sorry.

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And then they'd have to

apologize and that kind of thing.

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So.

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What are some techniques

you used with individuals?

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Ellie: Well, we had a system on our team

where we did a thing called demerits.

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And so, if students got a certain number

of demerits throughout a time period,

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they might end up with a note home or

like a lunchtime detention type of thing.

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We really didn't have a lot of detention

stuff at our school for the school.

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So it was kind of on the team level

and, and typically lunchtime was

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the only time you could do that so

that they did have about 15 minutes

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or so of a recess type of time.

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So they would have to

miss things like that.

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So we did have the demerits.

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At one point in time we

had reflection sheets.

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So if it was a homework miss or some other

type of situation in the classroom, they

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would have to fill out a reflection sheet.

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What happened?

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What would, what did they do?

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What should they have done differently?

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What will they do next time?

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That type of thing.

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And that would have to

be signed by parents.

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And brought back to school.

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Brittany: We had a, a similar sheet.

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We, for some years we called

it like a character sheet or

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citizenship, citizenship sheet.

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That's a tough one to say correctly.

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Ellie: Say that three times.

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Brittany: Or a behavior

contract, something like that.

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But it basically went

through those same motions.

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You know, what did you,

what did you do wrong?

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What should you have done instead?

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What character was

missing during this event?

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That sort of thing.

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We often had a corner of the classroom

where they would sit and reflect

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on their behavior, and we had like

character posters up in that corner.

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We had like a, it was like a calm

down corner, so they had like,

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there was a bucket in the corner,

and they had like different fidget

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items in there

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Ellie: Oh, okay.

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Cool.

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Mm

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Brittany: stress balls and stuff so

that they could go to that corner if

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they needed to and just kind of unwind

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Ellie: Right.

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Yeah, thinking about going somewhere.

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Sometimes we would send them, I mean,

they would go across to the classroom,

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across the hall, and maybe hang out

in there, sit there for a little

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bit, do some work over there or, you

know, run an errand to someone else.

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It's just something to get them

out of the situation that they

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were in, if it was, you know,

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Brittany: Yeah, sometimes

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Ellie: to walk away from.

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Brittany: Sometimes you see a kid

who's definitely having trouble

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sitting still or focusing or whatever.

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And so just giving them a note

that says like You know, Mr.

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So and so I'm sending you Tom to

just You know, burn off some energy,

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Ellie: Mm hmm.

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Mm hmm.

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Brittany: You know, and then you

just say, can you take this to Mr.

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So and so?

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And then,

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Ellie: Right.

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Right.

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Brittany: yeah,

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Ellie: And it's also helpful, like, to

give kids just an opportunity, like, to

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choose different things in the classroom.

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If that's something that you're able

to do, you know, do you want to do a

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group project or work independently?

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Or even if they're in a behavior

situation, do you want to do

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this or do you want to do that?

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And try to give them some

choice as far as work, behavior.

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So that maybe if they're in a situation

where they know they're not doing the

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right thing, but they don't know how to

get out of it and you give them a choice,

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A or B, would you like to walk across

the hall and, and sit in that classroom?

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Would you like to stay here and

behave as you're supposed to, or, you

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know, start taking part in whatever

activity we're working on or start

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taking your notes, that kind of thing.

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Giving them that opportunity for a little

bit of choice gives them kind of an out

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Brittany: yeah.

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And it helps them, it helps

them save face in a way

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Ellie: Yeah.

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Brittany: yeah.

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And I think along those same lines,

just giving choice in any activity

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can help a kid not behave poorly.

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You know, it helps them feel like they

have more ownership in the day, so, yeah.

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Ellie: I know this is off topic in a

way, but going back to the first whole

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class idea, it might seem silly and it

might not work all the time, but there

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are times that I just sat and waited.

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You know, if the whole class was

talking or the whole class was

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whatever, and I just stood there

and I wouldn't say anything.

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And one person would be

like, Oh, she's waiting.

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And then it kind of gets around and then

they, they just be quiet by themselves

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and it doesn't seem like it's something

that should work, but when they realize

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that you're not going to do anything

until they're done and they're ready

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to move on, sometimes something little

like that helps and they just stop

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and, and they're ready and then you

can tell them one thing at a time.

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First do this.

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And wait till they're all doing it.

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Then do this, wait till

they're all doing it.

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Take out your pencil.

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Show me your pencil.

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You know, and then slowing down sometimes.

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It's hard to slow down because you want

things to do, you need to keep going,

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but sometimes they need you to do that.

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Brittany: There's those memes

where it shows like a skeleton

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standing in front of a classroom

saying like, you know, I'll wait,

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Ellie: I didn't have to wait that long.

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Brittany: but, but it is

effective sometimes, and another,

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another thing I found effective

sometimes was just whispering,

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Ellie: Mm hmm.

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Mm hmm.

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Yes.

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I did that too.

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Yeah.

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Brittany: you know, okay, I'm gonna wait,

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Ellie: Mm hmm.

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Brittany: real quiet.

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Ellie: Right.

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Brittany: And whoever's listening

to me right now is going to get

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three extra minutes of recess.

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Ellie: hmm.

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Mm

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Brittany: And you, you know, you would

see some kids who are like, Okay, I'm

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sitting upright, I'm listening, you know?

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Ellie: Right.

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Yeah.

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Brittany: Yeah, so.

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So I

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Ellie: think, I was gonna say, I

think that leads us into the idea

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that we need to stay calmer, right?

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Brittany: yeah.

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Staying calm is kind of one of those

keys when dealing with behavior issues.

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Don't let the kid wind you up.

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Ellie: Mm

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Brittany: Don't, let the

situation wind you up.

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Don't eat into the situation.

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You're just gonna, that's just

gonna make the situation worse.

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So.

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And you want to have as many tools as you

can in your teaching toolbox because what

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works with student A isn't necessarily

going to work with student B or C.

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And what works with student A

today is not necessarily going

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to work with student A tomorrow.

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Ellie: Mm hmm.

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Brittany: So feel free to check

out the show notes for everything

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mentioned in this episode.

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You can find them at

teachingtoolboxpodcast.

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com.

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Ellie: Okay, so we'll see you next time.

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Brittany: Thank you for listening.