Classroom Management Plan 

EDU 5310 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
CJ Gebhardt  
Rolling Meadows Elementary  

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 Table of Contents 

Preamble ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3

Preparation for the First Day ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- 4

Positive Relationships with Students ------------------------------------------------------------------ 6

Positive Classroom Climate ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 8

PBIS ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ 10

Teaching Procedures and Establishing Routines --------------------------------------------------- 11

Managing Instruction - Support Techniques --------------------------------------------------------- 13

Intervention Techniques ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 16

Communication with Parents ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- 17

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 Preamble 

I know that teaching is an underpaid, under

recognized, and under appreciated field, but I still want to
teach. I want to inspire kids to not only be lifelong
learners, but to be kind humans, good citizens, and to
always be inspired. Students are being shoved through a
cookie cutter, being made to fit into society in a certain
way. That’s not how I teach. Students deserve to have
freedom when it comes to their education. Not all
students learn the same, talk the same, or even walk the
same.
In my classroom, students have more freedom to
create projects and assignments that fit what they like.
For now, when I let students be free, they are incredibly
confused and keeping asking for help. Hopefully, with
time, my students are able to take an assignment/project
and do something with it that interests them.

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 Preparation for the First Day of School
There are so many things to get done before the first day of school, and if we don’t think
about them now then we only think about them when we need them. Preparing for the first day
of school is important because the first day sets off the tone for the rest of the school year. If a
teacher is prepared for anything and everything the very first day, then their year should go by
smoothly. If a teacher is not prepared then they are going to struggle and find the school year to
not be much fun, just like their kids will think.

Expectations (only a few of many):

● Room arrangement​ - The room shouldn’t be a distraction from the student’s learning, it
should only enhance. The two that I would like to try are the following pictures. The one
is a horseshoe which I like because it creates a natural stage for the kids to roam around
in and perform it. The other is a horseshoe with a few tables inside. I like the horseshoe
with tables arrangement because I could the tables inside as a reward or as a
consequence.

● Entering the classroom​ - When students enter my classroom, I expect them to hang up
their jackets and backpacks and walk over to the breakfast line to grab breakfast. After

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 they take breakfast, they should go straight to their desks and start working on their daily
starter.
● First day layout​ - I know my first day is going to be rough. A new teacher who has a
hard time coming out of her shell is always a hard person to work with. I will probably
forget a few things here and there, so I want to plan out my day, even somethings that I
am going to say, that way I can be sure that I don’t forget anything and that everything
that needs to be said gets said.
● Have routines and procedures set in place​- I don’t want to worry the night before about
what my kids are going to do when they need to sharpen a pencil or when they have to
use the restroom. I want to have my classroom routines and procedures already set in
place, that way I can teach them all on the first day, review on the second, and be off and
running on the third day.
● Plan for the first two weeks -​ I don’t want to be the teacher who has to be out sick during
the first two weeks of school. My mentor teacher was out for the first 6 weeks due to a
surprise surgery. I want to make sure that my first two weeks are planned and ready to
go, just in the event that my guardian angel hates me and has me miss a day or two during
the first two weeks.
● Classroom hashtags​ - Before the first day, I will create 2-3 hashtags for the classroom
and hang them up on the border of the bulletin board. On the first day, I will have the
kids each create one more hashtag for the classroom and hang that up on the border of the
bulletin board. When a student sees something that relates back to a hashtag that is up,
we can take a picture of it and then hang it up. It’s just a fun way to have the kids take
ownership of the classroom.
● Put together a classroom management plan ​- This I’m already doing! A classroom
management plan is a must when it comes to setting up a classroom. If everything is just
set up all haphazardly then there is no real order and sense to anything and students are
going to struggle with owning the classroom and being responsible for whatever happens
to themselves and the classroom.

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 Positive Relationships with Students
I don’t normally know how my students nights were. I don’t know if they had a good
night's sleep, if they had dinner, or if they had a loving environment to go home to. This is why
classrooms need to have a welcoming atmosphere that nurtures the basic needs of students.
Teachers are often caught up in the game of teaching, that they forget that the things in front of
them are little humans that need to be shown an appropriate amount of love.

Expectations:
● Greeting students ​- Every day when my students arrive for school, I want them to know
that I am here for them and that I care. Right before my students enter the classroom, I
will let them choose if they want to fist-bump, hug, or high five. It’s a small gesture that
I can use to show students that I am always here. I will also do this before they leave. If
I ever have the opportunity, I can do a handshake for each student, but that requires a lot
of memory that I don’t think I have. However, if I can see that my students need to have
a smile put on their face, then I will do it for them.
● Informal conferences​ - Every day, before and after school, I’ll leave a small chunk of
time blank so that students can have time to talk to me. I want to be available for them
and by giving them that time to have a one-on-one conversation with me I feel like I am
successfully achieving that standard. Students can sign up for a 5 minute time slot either
during breakfast or right after school ends. I might not be able to talk to them during the
day while everything is racing in my mind, but I do want my kids to talk to me when they
need to talk.
● Special responsibilities​ - Every month, students will get a classroom job. They can sign
up to be line leader, banker, paper passer, teacher assistant, etc. The objective is that
students are responsible for something in the classroom, so it makes it feel more like
home. Every student would have a job and they would get paid for their jobs. It’s a fun
way for all students to earn money and feel like a team.

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● Photo bulletin board​ - Home can sometimes be a scary place and I don’t really want to
bring that atmosphere into my classroom. Therefor, I would want each of my students to
bring in a picture of themselves with something that makes them happy. It can be
anything as long as it is appropriate. When students are frustrated or feel down, they can
go over to the picture board and remind themselves of what makes them happy and then
think about why they learning and why they are there.

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 Positive Classroom Climate 
When students enter my classroom they should always feel welcome and have a sense of
adventure. Students also need to know that they will be noticed and recognized during the day,
they aren’t just matter filling a seat.

Expectations:
● Voice & choice​ - Student can feel like they have a loss of control or they feel
powerlessness. I want to empower my students everyday to be the best version of
themselves that they can be. This is why every morning, my students will reflect on
themselves and answer a question that deals with the world around them. Examples of
starters are stated below:
○ Motivation Monday - Tell me about why your excited to be here this week.
○ Totally Awesome Tuesday - Take a sticky note and write one totally awesome
thing about a classmate on it and stick it back on the wall. Be sure to pick
someone that you don’t normally talk to.
○ Wondering Wednesday - Tell me about something you’re (wondering) curious
about .
○ Think about it Thursday - If you won a million dollars, what would you do with
it?
○ Factual Friday - What current events happened this week?
● Relevant lessons​ - A language arts lesson from 40 years ago would never grab the
attention of students these days. Students are ‘too cool for school’, especially when the
learning part doesn’t impact them right then. Lessons have to be relevant if it is going to
get the attention of 20-30 kids. Students need to talk about pollution, recycling,
homelessness, anything that can have a direct impact on their lives right when they are
learning about it.
● Predictable routine rhythm​ - Students have to see a typical school day pattern throughout
the entire year. If the pattern gets messed up once during the day, then the students can

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be thrown off and then the whole day is thrown off. I will have a predictable routine set
in place for everyday of the week. Mondays might be set up differently from
Wednesdays, but it will still have the same basic framework.

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 PBIS 

​WORKING ON NEXT SEMESTER

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 Teaching Procedures and Establishing 
Routines - Preventive 
My classroom should function effectively and purposefully. This will only happen when
students are taught what to do with certain routines. All teachers are different, so it is important
to help students learn your expectations for the year and practice showing/doing those
expectations.

Expectations:
● Caring for supplies​ - ​ Supplies are the property of the school and they should stay in the
classroom. The only school supplies that you will need to take home are a pencil, your
homework folder, and all the papers inside your homework folder. If a student can’t treat
supplies with care, then that student can’t earn more supplies later on.
● When speaking​ - When students want to speak they should raise their hand and wait to
be called on. If I don’t call on them, students need to put their hands down and show
respect to the person who is talking at the time. I also expect my kids to use good
manners when they are talking to anybody in the school. Good manners are hard to come
by and I want my students to constantly use them that way they are prepared to be good
citizens.
● Dismissal -​ Before the dismissal bell rings, I expect my kids to line up in some sort of
order slightly in front of the door. They should have their jackets and backpacks on and
stand quietly in line. When all students are in line and quiet, then we start the end of the
day game. When the bell actually rings, I expect students to calmly walk out of the
classroom and head towards the exit that they need to take.
● Lining up​ - When lining up, I expect my students to quietly follow directions. We
normally line up in one of two ways. The first is that I call on tables who are showing me
that they are ready to line up (quiet mouths, still hands, and eyes that are focused on me).
Then they line up in line order and wait until I tell them that they can leave the classroom
for their destination. The other way is that I ask certain groups of people to line up. If I

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 only have a few students who are listening then I will call certain people to line up until
everybody is in line order and waiting to go to our destination quietly.
● Walking in the hallway​ - At Rolling Meadows the standard for walking down the
hallway has been that students walk single file, second tile with a hair stare. I really like
this expectation and I hope to keep it going wherever I may end up.

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 Managing Instruction - Supportive 
Techniques
I want to achieve the most that I can every day that I am teaching. In order to do so, I
have to remember the Big 8 strategies learned not only at school, but through Granite School
District. Implementing them isn’t hard once you get practice using all 8 strategies every day.

● Expectations:
○ These are the students immediate results that happen after a teacher gives a
direction, signal, or cue. Expectations should be clear, precise, and sometimes
short. To cover the expectations part of my classroom I plan to have in view at all
times an information chart, something that let’s the kids know what happens when
they make good and poor decisions both in my classroom and for the school. I
also would like to have clear instructions and more positive cues to remind my
students of what is constantly going on.

● Time Management:
○ This is probably the hardest concept to have in a teacher toolbox. Teachers only
have so much time to do anything, so making sure that they are always on time is
a struggle. Also knowing how much of a time limit is needed for transitions can
be difficult. For me to become better at time management, I would like to have a
timer that is easily accessible at all times. This would ensure that I can always
time my students as well as myself when I need to be a somewhat stricter
schedule.

● Cueing:
○ This is a strategy teachers use to clarify expectations, maintain high levels of
students performance, and support a positive learning environment. I use cueing

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 when I call out a student who is doing something that I asked of them, and then
normally I also give them classroom money. I will also use the 5:1 strategy of
giving 5 positive verbal comments before giving 1 corrective comment.

● Attention:
○ Getting the attention of 25-30 different kids in a classroom is a difficult task,
beginning and experienced teachers struggle with it sometimes. Attention is a
learned behavior that is taught on the first day. It can be verbal or nonverbal
signal that clues students into the fact that the teacher needs their attention. In my
classroom, I would want to use the grabber “Snap, Crackle, Pop” “everybody
stop” since that’s what I used for 2 years at my last job and it’s just ingrained in
my memory. I also like the idea about using “Hands on top” “everybody stop”
where all the kids put their hands on their head. It’s their hands off of whatever
they are doing, and I can visibly see that everybody is stopped and wait till I hear
almost nothing.

● Proximity:
○ This relates to where I stand in the classroom and how my students view that
position. When I am standing on stage left of my classroom, my students should
know that it’s a power position. That’s where I go to have serious conversations
with my students about behavior, participation, and expectations for the lesson.
When I’m wandering around the classroom, my students know that I’m watching
all of them, and even though I’m on the opposite side of the classroom, I can still
hear and semi see them.

● Signals:
○ In my classroom I like to use hand signals for when my students are actively
learning. When they understand what I’m saying, they give a thumbs up, when
they don’t understand, they give a thumbs sideways (because they don’t

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 understand it yet), and when they agree with what a student is saying, then they
give the ‘me too’ sign.

● Voice:
○ This relates back to the transition between teacher voice and normal voice. When
I’m in front of the class, or behind the class, teaching a lesson, I have a different
voice that I use then when I’m working with a student one-on-one. I also have a
different voice when I’m encouraging my students to continue with their thought
process and to not give up.

● Tasking:
○ Students are given multiple things to do throughout the day. Most of time,
instructions are given as a multi step process. I will give explicit instructions as to
what students are to be doing at a certain time. When students are able to
complete their tasks accurately, they can silently read a book and in some cases
can play a coding/math/language arts game.

● Curriculum:
○ With curriculum, it should be engaging and interesting. Students should be
willing to actively participate with the material being discussed. I want my
students to feel like the lesson relates to them, which is why I want them to
choose the topics we learn about and then I can take those topics and relate them
back to a lesson.

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 Intervention Techniques
Students don’t usually come to school knowing how to calm down automatically, they
need to have some help to learn how to calm down. These techniques that students use can be
student contracts, a stop and think break, and being self aware of what’s happening around
them. I don’t want to immediately go to the student contracts and stop & think right away, I
would want my students to be self aware and know when they should take a break.

Expectations:
● Cool down card - Frustration is natural for everyone, especially when students are
learning things that they don’t understand. With my students, I want them to know that
it’s okay to be frustrated and it’s also okay to know when to cool down and take a break.
I would give a student a cool down card when they are getting a little too rambunctious,
and then they can take 2-3 minutes to do some breathing exercises that they would learn
with the growth mindset piece of interventions.
● Growth Mindset - I know how influential a growth mindset can be with students and I
want my students to be given the chance to adopt a growth mindset. Students will hear
about a new person every other week who had a huge or tiny failure and how they turned
the failure into something remarkable. Students will also have a growth mindset training
session every other week that way they can start using new strategies to help them grow
as learners.
● Behavior Bingo - This is a neat idea that I would do with my kids before getting them on
a contract. I would give a bingo sheet to all my kids, that way nobody feels left out, but
my behaviorally challenged students will have a secret deal. Every time they get a bingo,
they get to choose something off of a chart. The whole class would earn a bingo number
by being task, quietly raising their hands, or by following instructions the first time.

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 Communication with Parents  
Importance: ​Having good communication with parents is key to a healthy school environment.
When parents receive positive and constructive information about their child, they are typically
more willing to work with the school, staff, and teachers. Positive communication can also lead
to a positive environment at home. It is important to not only communicate the constructive
comments about a child, but also the positive. Many parents don’t receive a phone call home for
positive comments and it can really make a world of a difference.

Expectations:
● ​For my class, I plan on having a classroom website. It would change every year since I
wouldn’t want to get rid of a website for a parents information. I’ve made a classroom
website for my technology class at SLCC, and I still have it, so I can reference that when
I’m creating my website.
● I also plan on having a monthly newsletter sent out. I would be the editor of the
newsletter, but I would ultimately have my students create the main portion of it. It
would be sent electronically or in hand with the student, which ever the parent[s] would
like more. There would be a section about what standards we are planning on learning
about in the following months, what the students did projectwise, and a section for me to
make announcements and have a classroom calendar.
● I would also love to do phone calls home. I always see the behavior plans in classrooms
emphasize the negative aspect of phone calls and I would like to change that point of
view. Positive phone calls will be ‘given out’ to those students that I know need the
support or have done something exceptional. My goal is to do one positive phone call
home a week. Every student will get a positive phone call home, and I’ll keep a list, but I
want every student to feel special both at home and at school.

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