Positive Behavior Reinforcement

This year I have had the opportunity to work with a teacher at Lowell Elementary to learn about classroom management. I have learned how to manage both positive and negative behaviors while teaching a lesson. My teacher has taught me the importance of positive behavior reinforcement and teaching strategies on how to positively manage a classroom.
My teacher manages and controls behaviors through positive reinforcement with punch cards. Every student has a card taped to their desk with ten stars around the edges. If the students are ready between transitions, using work time wisely, and follow directions they will receive a punch on their card. Once a student receives ten punches they are able to turn their card in for rewards such as extra …show more content…
She makes it very clear that she expects them to make mistakes and she will be there to guide them along the way. Her overall expectations align with the school’s expectations for all students, which is to be safe, kind, respectful and honest. All around the school are reminders of the school’s expectations and within her classroom she has each expectation with examples of ways to be safe, kind, respectful and honest in the classroom. Around the classroom, there are also posters of the classroom rules and rewards for students to clearly see and for her to reference to throughout the year to remind students of the rules and expectation. Along with explaining the expectations of the classroom, on the first day she has students fill out a survey. The survey asks students to explain what the rules are at home and the consequences for not following the rules. This gives her a better idea on what each student’s home life is like when managing behaviors. Lastly, she has the students make five classroom goals for the school year. She starts by breaking the class into small groups and each group picks five goals. Then she combines the groups bigger and bigger until there is one set of five goals and everyone has contributed to the five classroom goals for the …show more content…
The team is a PBIS team that is specially trained through the state on behavioral management techniques and trains other staff within the school on positive behavioral interventions. Along with support for the PBIS team, teachers at Lowell Elementary are also given online resources and guides to behavioral management. Throughout the year, there are also teacher inservices for professional development to train teachers on strategies for behavior management. The teachers are solution orientated when managing behaviors to both help students manage their own behavior and create ways for the students to be the most successful. Along with the teachers being trained on behavioral management, the teachers also interact with parents about behavior management. Teachers send out newsletters about the events during the week or emails. If there are behaviors with a student, the teacher will reach out to the parent by email, phone call, or through office discipline referrals (ODR forms). At times, the teacher will send out an email to all parents if the entire class is struggling with a specific behavior to establish communication between parents and their child’s learning to create an efficient and effective learning