Management plan

Rationale
My approach to classroom management is to be firm and structured while maintaining a
positive loving and nurturing relationship with my students. I have worked hard to maintain a
soft spoken calm and patient demeanor in hopes to facilitate a calm and welcoming space. I will
model the tone and volume I expect from my students and be very mindful of my reactions to
their behaviour, focusing on de escalating high stress behaviour. I have been working to build
relationships with each student and try to spend extra time with the students who have been
struggling with appropriate behaviour. I think that the students who are make classroom
management the most difficult need that human connection the most.
I believe in fostering a space for students to be independent and solve their own problems. I
approach student conflicts with the intention to listen first and encourage them to work
through the problem on their own.

Classroom Setup
All materials students need are accessible to them in order to foster independence. As
well, fidgets are always accessible to them, with the joint understanding that they are
tools not toys.

The classroom has two meeting mats, one main mat and a back up mat if we need a
change of scenery. Students sit at tables with 4 to 6 students at each one. Their seats
are assigned but change often, as well they are open to work anywhere during work
times. In addition to changes in assigned seating, the tables themselves move often as
well as other furniture in the room to best fit students needs at different times.

There are many areas of the room that have visual references (ex. calendar wall, word
work wall, classmates pictures, and posters for shapes, colours, numbers, sounds etc.).
Throughout my units I will be adding to these visual references.

Classroom routines
The class lines up in the morning at the back of the school down stairs, both my
sponsor and I walk down to meet them. We take a few minutes to check in with parents
and then walk with the students upstairs into the school. I go first and stand outside of
the classroom, greeting every child by name as they take of their outside shoes and go
into the classroom. Once they have their shoes off and come into the cubby area they
hang up their coat and backpack. Next students take out their back-and-forth bag, pick
up their inside shoes and hand their bag in to the box on their way to put on their inside
shoes on the mat. The expectation is that students clear out of the cubby area quickly
and put their inside shoes on at the mat, not in the cubby area. While they are at the
mat they will sign themselves in by flipping over the card with their name and picture
from black and white to colour and putting it back into the “who’s here today?” pocket
chart. Once they have signed in and gotten themselves ready for the day, they submit
their guess for the daily guessing jar (everyday the objects in the jar change, often
related to themes, the amount of object ranges from 1-20). After submitting their guess,
they go to their tables and start working on the daily math challenge (every month they
have a different math challenge workbook that is laid out on their desk before they come
in). Once they have completed their math challenge they put the work book away and
choose a math bucket (math buckets have games and activities that focus on multiple
skills, most buckets allow for 4 students to work collaboratively). 3 bells signals the end
of this time, students clean up and go to the main meeting mat.

Once the students are at the main mat in the morning we begin the morning tasks. We
sing our morning welcome song, and then move directly into the check in. The student
on the left of the teacher gets the talking rock first, and starts by saying “good morning
class”, the class responds with “good morning (student name)”, and the students says “I
feel ____”. The teacher will review the daily math challenge on the document camera
and quickly introduce tomorrow's challenge. The order of these tasks slightly change
day to day.

Calendar time changes day to day and sometimes gets skipped. There are many tasks
and songs within calendar and many opportunities for the daily helpers to lead the
class.

A fairly new morning routine is the word work wall. At this time we manipulate pictures
on posters, working on beginning sounds, ending sounds, rhyming words, counting
words and syllables etc.

During snack time students are reminded to choose a small snack, when they are done
eating they clean up and get ready on their own time and return to their desks. Once the
bell rings they are expected to thoughtfully get up and walk outside.

Prior to the longer recess time, students will get ready for outside, put their lunch kits on
their desks and line up. When the bell rings students are expected to walk out of the
school thoughtfully. When students come in from big recess, they take off their coats,
change their shoes, wash their hands, and begin eating. Eating time is a quiet time that
is meant to be relaxing. The lights are off and room is only lit by white christmas lights
on the ceiling, quiet music is playing and students are expected to talk quietly to the
people at their tables. A visual timer is set and students are not to start cleaning up until
the last five minutes (coloured blue on the timer), when the timer goes off all students
are expected to start cleaning up. When students are cleaned up they wait for a teacher
to hand them a “quiet as a mouse bucket” (a small container with a random assortment
of small toys) and find a yoga mat (laid out ahead of time by the teacher) to quietly and
independently play. Students are reminded that this is a quiet time and they should be
playing with their own bucket on their own mat. This time ends with 3 bells, students
clean up and go to the main meeting mat.

Prior to centres time students sit on the mat facing the centres choice pocket chart. The
teacher has a card with each students name on them and chooses the students that are
showing they are ready to choose. When a student’s name is called they are to respond
with a full sentence, “I would like to go to___”, the teacher then puts their card in the
pocket chart next to their choice. When the centre fills up, the card gets turned over and
no longer is available. If only one student chose a centre once everyone has chosen,
that student will get the choice to stay or switch to a centre that has other students. The
time ends with three bells and the daily clean up song, students are encouraged to be
cleaned up and on the meeting mat by the end of the song.

Students are to line up in a specific area whenever traveling to the gym, library music,
etc. Often one helper will be at the front of line, one at the end, and one may be
assigned the role of “hallway monitor” where they will stand at the halfway point and
watch for proper hallway behaviour, and report to the teacher how the class did.

When students need to use the bathroom, they silently communicate to the teacher with
the sign language for toilet, if appropriate the teacher will nod and the student will go
quietly. If it’s not an appropriate time I will often ask the student if it is an emergency or if
they can wait. If they can wait I will check in with them at an appropriate time, and allow
them to go then. Our classroom unlike many other kindergarten classes does not have
a bathroom. If there is an issue with the bathroom closes to us, students may have the
option to go to the upstairs bathroom with a responsible buddy. Other than that situation
we often only have one student at the bathroom at a time.

All materials students need are accessible to them at all times. Each table as a caddy
with pencils, erasers, glue, and scissors. In addition to these supplies, all students have
a container of crayons and a container of markers in their cubby. If we are doing an
activity that requires additional materials, they will be laid out ahead of time for easy
student access. Worksheets and workbooks are often laid out on students desks ahead
of time and the students are responsible for putting them away.

Expectations
During work time students should be focused, quietly talking to people at their own
table. Students are expected to raise hand for help/ to check on work and should not
come to me.

On the meeting mat students are expected to keep their hands to self, listen and look at
who is speaking and not talking out of turn.

Students are expected to “do best work” and use this language often. Students are
reminded to be thoughtful about what they are doing. The classroom runs on the idea
that everyone helps each other learn, first by doing their own best, and contributing to a
space that allows for learning.

Management Strategies
In the classroom we use the following sound signals:
1 bell take a deep breath, refocus
2 bells stop look listen
3 bells clean up

In the gym I will be using the following sound signals:

1 whistle go, etc.
2 whistles stop look listen
3 whistles go to the middle circle

While students are coming to the map I will start a 1 minute sand timer with the
expectation that all students will be on the mat before the timer runs out. Students enjoy
watching the timer while they are waiting for their peers to join them. When I am waiting
for students to be ready on the mat I will countdown, while giving reminders of what I
expect from them throughout.

If a behaviour problem arises (with an individual or the whole group) we will have a
conversation about the concern and work together to find an appropriate solution. If an
individual student is continuously struggling on the mat after multiple reminders they will
be asked to take a break at their table and rejoin the group when they feel they are
ready for a second chance. This is not something I like to do very often so it is often a
last resort. To keep the language consistent, struggling students are often asked “are
you doing best work right now?”.

I believe in giving energy to what I want to increase, and will choose to call upon and give
attention to positive behaviour rather than giving attention to negative behaviour. I
acknowledge that at times it can be extremely challenging to ignore undesirable behaviour, and
it may not be possible to fully ignore. I will be very mindful about choosing when to
acknowledge undesirable behaviour. I want to keep the classroom dialogue positive and
uplifting and will be highlighting desirable behaviour.