07.26.08
discipline = love
“She opens her mouth with wisdom, and the teaching of kindness is on her tongue.” Proverbs 31:26
These verses have really shaped my discipline structure for my classroom.
“He who loves him is diligent to discipline him.” Proverbs 13:24b
If I really love my students, I will take the time and the trouble to discipline them.
“He disciplines us for our good, that we may share his holiness. For the moment all discipline seems painful rather than pleasant, but later it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness to those who have been trained by it.” Hebrews 12:10b-11
Not only will it save me grief in the future, it will later produce fruits of righteousness in them!
“And these words that I command you today shall be on your heart. You shall teach them to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise. You shall bind them as a sign on your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. You shall write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates.” Deuteronomy 6:6-9
I am called to teach God’s Word to my students. In everything we do, we are supposed to come back to His Word. It is to be our guide in everything we do, even in a public school! I love that biblical truths are applicable in all situations, without being overtly “religious”. Because I have based my classroom rules on God’s Word, I am shepherding my students’ hearts toward godliness! I love this idea!!
I will spend the entire first week of school teaching my students what our class rules mean. We will discuss examples and non-examples, draw pictures of appropriate behaviors, act out different scenarios, and post them on our wall so that we always have a present reminder of these rules. My students will have no excuse for misbehaving. If they misbehave, it will NOT be out of ignorance, but out of choice. Which will give me the freedom to discipline them consistently when one of these rules is broken.
So….how will this look on a daily basis?
I was hoping you would ask that! I have spent a long time in prayer over this, and am confident the Lord has guided me in my decisions. I know that it is not perfect, and will need to be tweaked once I am living this every day in my classroom, but here is the “rough draft”.
As I said, these rules will be posted on the wall BIG, surrounded by pictures, with a list of examples underneath each behavior. Each rule will be a different color:
- RED – Be a hard worker.
- YELLOW – Treat others with kindness.
- GREEN – Respect authority.
- BLUE – Use pleasant words.
Every week each student will receive this chart (called a “Choices Chart”):
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M |
T |
W |
R |
F |
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Be a hard worker.
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Treat others with kindness. |
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Respect authority.
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Use pleasant words.
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I will have those colored dot stickers that people use for garage sales in Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue. If at the end of the day, the student has followed the Red Rule (Be a hard worker.) then they will receive a red sticker for that spot on their Choices Chart. Same for Yellow, Blue, etc. If at the end of they day they have received all 4 colored stickers (a rainbow!) they will get a 5-minute reward (reading nook, graffiti art wall, computer center, music center, feed the fish, etc.). If at the end of the week they have received 4 out of the 5 rainbows, they get a SNO-CONE!!
If during the day, the student breaks a rule, they will immediately receive a white sticker with the number 1 on it. (Meaning they have broken the rule 1 time.) If it happens again, they will receive a sticker with the number 2, etc. Each number indicates a different kind of punishment:
- 1 = lose half of recess
- 2 = phone call home
- 3 = office referral
- 4 = corporal punishment (my views on this possibly another time…I generally think corporal punishment can be a positive thing, and plan to use it to discipline my students most extreme behaviors.)
Students who do not receive a rainbow will continue working while others get their 5-minute reward time.
So maybe that was a little confusing. But I am excited to implement this system! I really believe that by using these rules as the basis for every classroom behavior, I will be teaching my students to write these WORDS on their hearts, and to learn these ACTIONS as well. For students with more extreme behavioral problems, there will be LOTS of disciplining at first, but eventually, I believe that they will learn how to act, and they too will bear peaceful fruits of righteousness. And those are the most valuable lessons I will teach.
07.25.08
good choices!
Starting August 11th I will be working at an intermediate school teaching special ed. Special ed is confusing and foreign for most people, so I will explain. Special ed comes in many different forms. Most common – LIFE Skills (for students who learn functional life skills like hygeine, job skills, cooking, etc.), Resource (for students with specific learning disabilities like dyslexia to learn academics), and Adaptive Behavior (for students who have emotional/behavioral disabilities and need to learn social skills & behavior).
I will be teaching a combo Resource/Adaptive Behavior class. I will have 5th graders in the morning and 4th graders in the afternoons. I will be teaching Math, Reading, and Language Arts, as well as having an intensive behavioral componant to my classroom. I am so thrilled! I believe that behavior and academics are linked. So tackling both in one classroom is, in my opinion, the best. I don’t know how to effectively teach one without the other.
So this summer I have spent a lot of time in prayer and thought over my behavior plan for this group of kids, and wanted to share what I have come up with. First I want to share some of my beliefs on behavioral management:
- I believe that students choose their behavior. There is no one to blame their behavior on except themselves. They may have learned it from someone else, but they chose to engage in it. And they can also choose to behave well. God holds us all accountable for our sins, even if it is a generational sin learned from our parents. I want to hold my students accountable for their actions.
- I believe that having rules for the sake of having rules is stupid. If you can’t come up with a good reason for the rule, why does it exist? All of the rules that God gave us are for our benefit. I want all of my classroom rules to be to the benefit of my students.
- I want my students to know both what they should and shouldn’t do. In the bible God never tells us what to “put off” without telling us what to “put on”. I want my students to know examples and non-examples of each expected behavior.
I decided that I want each of my rules to be based on a biblical principle. I want my students to see me in submission to these rules as well. So on the wall we will have a list of their rules, and examples of what these rules look like, and on my desk I will have a list of the same rules, with the Bible verse written below to remind me of my responsibility of shepherding these students’ hearts toward godliness, even in a public school. This is my mission field. Children are an inheritance from the Lord, and I have inherited them for 8 hours a day. I do not want to squander this inheritance, but to train these kids in the way they should go so that when they are grown they will not depart from it.
So…without further ado, here is Ms. Moore’s List of Good Choices:
1. Be a hard worker. Students who are hard workers:
- arrive on-time
- listen to directions
- are ready to learn
- give their best effort
- complete their homework
- ask for help
“Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the inheritance as your reward. You are serving Jesus Christ.” Colossians 3:23
2. Treat others with kindness. Students who are kind to others:
- keep their bodies to themselves
- ask before borrowing
- help others in need
- share with others
- keep their eyes on their own work
- use good manners
“Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.” Ephesians 4:32
3. Respect authority. Students who respect authority:
- obey school rules
- dress in-code
- respect all adults
- follow directions the first time
- accept discipline
- say “Yes/No Ma’am/Sir”
“Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God.” Romans 13:1
4. Use pleasant words. Students who use pleasant words:
- encourage others
- tell the truth
- don’t complain
- disagree without arguing
- listen before speaking
- use indoor voices
“Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in Your sight, O Lord, my rock and my redeemer.” Psalm 19:14
God has been good to teach me about discipline this summer as I have been preparing for the fall. I love that Jesus was a teacher to his disciples. Soon I will have my own little disciples, and I do not want to take this responsibility lightly. I want them to see me learning and practicing these behaviors daily, because their little eyes will be watching my every action.
Later I might post about the system I have been developing for discipline based on these rules…
