PBIS Newsletter: Winter Boost!
Volume Four: Winter 2018
Silver Awards All Around!
This past fall, our students again participated in the School Climate Survey and those results are shared at the end of this Newsletter.
Other features in this edition of the newsletter are videos and articles for a mid-year boost to re-calibrate our commitment to a healthy, positive, and caring school environment.
Is a student's challenging personality wearing you out?
Watch this fun TED Talk by former foster child and motivational speaker Josh Shipp: YOUR CHILD’S MOST ANNOYING TRAIT MAY JUST REVEAL THEIR GREATEST STRENGTHS
In another great video , Josh Shipp describes how ONE CARING ADULT can be the difference in a child's successful outcome: "This is How 936 Marbles can Change Someone's Life" (5:37 min)
Classroom management mid-year tune-up tips from favorite teacher blogs...
Goodbye, Teacher Tired: 5 Days to Doing Fewer Things, Better: A free 5 day challenge with Angela Watson
1) Get real about how much you can accomplish each day, and eliminate the unnecessary.
Do fewer things.. better. At least a third of the things for which you’re trying to find time don’t actually need to be done. Or, maybe they don’t need to be done by YOU. Or, they don’t need to be done by you RIGHT NOW. Say “no” to the things that are less important so you have more time and energy for things that are your biggest priorities.
2) Schedule your day to get the most important things done, instead of doing as much as possible.
The idea here is to stop measuring success by whether you finished what you wanted to, and instead have a focused list of priorities which you re-evaluate throughout the day. When you do fewer things, that which remains will be done better.
3) Minimize decision-making by automating tasks and creating routines that simplify your life.
One of the reasons that teachers feel so worn out is because of decision fatigue. Research has found that teachers make more minute-by-minute decisions than brain surgeons, and that’s extremely tiring. Every choice you have to make throughout the day taxes your mind and reduces your ability to make good decisions later.
Also, self-control and willpower are limited resources that get depleted as the day goes on.
So, how do you prevent decision fatigue? By automating as many decisions and routines as possible. When you do the same things the same way each time, it requires less brainpower, less willpower, and less energy.
4) Maximize your energy and focus by batching tasks and building in buffer time.
Batching your tasks is one of the easiest strategies to implement here - you want to group similar tasks together and do them in one larger batch.For example, instead of answering emails one by one as they pop up on your phone, turn off those notifications and read/answer everything all at once, at a predetermined time of day.
5) Prioritize rest as the catalyst for productivity, and schedule time for things you love.
The final step of the “Goodbye, Teacher Tired” Challenge is to create time in your schedule for rest, self-care, and your biggest priorities in life.
The critical piece to remember is this: You can’t wait to make time for rest until you’ve figured out a perfect system for simplifying every aspect of your life. Prioritizing rest isn’t the payoff for your other efforts in prioritizing; it’s actually part of the prioritization work itself.
Read the full podcast transcript here
Follow her blog: Angela Watson's The CornerStone for Teachers
When to Enforce a Consequence and When to Redo a Routine, by Michael Linsin
Or do you send the entire class back outside to perform the routine again? If it’s just a few students, then it doesn’t seem fair to make them all redo it.
Michael Linsin presents a way to determine the best strategy to use and when in his Smart Classroom Management blog :
Simply asking them to redo it is easier, of course, and takes far less time, but this should only be done if the off-track behaviors were minor—light talking, rushing, sloppiness.
If, on the other hand, the class was disruptive and chaotic, then it’s best to stop everything and reteach the routine as if it’s the first time.
So the solution is to teach, model, and practice the routine in explicit detail. Raise the bar even higher than it was before, and teach with a passion that refuses to accept anything less than excellence.
Not only will you clean up the routine and prove to your class that you really do mean what you say, but you’ll sharpen every other area of classroom management as well.
In other words, it’s an opportunity to get better.
So, to sum up, while observing a routine, if a few students misbehave, then enforce individual consequences.
If it’s more than a few, and the behaviors are minor, immediately send your class back to the beginning of the routine to do it again. If the behaviors are more substantial, however, then reteach the routine in greater detail.
In this way, you’ll always know how to respond.
You’ll always know how to fix the problem, improve behavior, and keep your classroom running smoothly and efficiently.
Read the full post here: Smart Classroom Management: When to enforce a consequence and when to redo a routine, by Michael Linsin
Other great posts from the Smart Classroom Management blog:
3 Big Mistakes Teachers Make When Enforcing Consequences, by Michael Linsin
Consistency is fundamental to a successful classroom management plan, yet even it can be undermined by 3 common adult responses to rule-breaking behavior (from a post on Michael Linsin's Smart Classroom Management blog ):
1. Showing displeasure.
It’s normal to occasionally feel disappointment or frustration when a student misbehaves, but sighing, glaring, frowning, and the like create friction and animosity, which takes the focus off the student and their misbehavior and makes it a personal feud between you.
Instead, the student should reflect on their misbehavior and how to not repeat it.
2. Waiting for a response.
Another common mistake is to enforce a consequence and then wait for a response. Waiting for an explanation —or coming right out and asking the student why they misbehaved—is an opening for the student to justify their misbehavior, point the finger elsewhere, or try to convince you that you didn’t see what you just saw.
3. Adding your two cents.
The final big mistake usually crops up when the teacher decides to escort the student to time-out. Instead of allowing the consequence to work, the teacher will express their disappointment and tell them how they should feel, what they should think, and how they should behave the next time. But this interferes with the student coming to these conclusions on their own, which can be a powerful experience and the very point of time-out.
How To Enforce
Enforcing consequences effectively is a quick and painless process. As soon as you witness misbehavior, calmly approach the offending student, look them in the eye, and deliver your line:
“You have a warning because you broke rule number two and left your seat without raising your hand.”
Then turn and walk away.
When a student misbehaves, your only job is to inform. It’s to hold accountable in the least disruptive way so your classroom management plan can do its good work.
This way, you safeguard your relationship with the student. You allow them to ponder their mistake and take responsibility for it.
You empower them to learn and mature and leave their misbehavior behind them.
Read the full post here: Smart Classroom Management: 3 Big Mistakes Teachers Make When Enforcing Consequences, Michael Linsin
WCSD School Climate Survey Results Fall 2017
Once again, our students report feeling safe and respected, in an environment with clear rules for behavior and adults who are there when they need help.
This is the strongest validation we can get for the importance of positive and supportive approaches to nurture social and academic behavior. Staff and families working together as a team... works!
WCSD PBIS: Positive School Climate for Student Success
Email: pbis@whittiercity.net
Phone: .