Management Philosophy
Throughout my educational career I have learned the influences that have affected my philosophy for managing a classroom. There are many important aspects to managing a classroom in order to create a successful academic learning environment for students. The aspects I believe are most important are using teacher language, creating a strong, safe community, emotional bank account, morning meeting, logical consequences, and procedures.
I have had the opportunity to learn the use of teacher language from Marla Ruark, a professor at Oklahoma State University. Teacher language comprises what we say and how we say it to students. An article from Responsive classroom states when speaking to students, it is important to always be authentic, direct, convey faith, focus on action, keep it brief, and know when to be silent. Students must feel respected and need to know expectation of them at all times. Through my teacher language, I can encourage my students by showing I have faith in my students academic and personal intentions. When talking to students, I must specifically focus on actions. For example, if a student is writing a paper I would say, “The way you used verbs and adjectives to describe your setting makes me want to read more” instead of “Your writing is interesting.” It is also important to keep comments brief and know when to be silent. Students often start thinking about other things if comments are not brief and sometimes silence can mean more to a student than anything a teacher could say. Teacher language is powerful when used effectively.
In order to create the best learning experience for students, as a teacher it is my job to create a strong and safe community in my classroom. This entails a welcoming, encouraging, and fun environment. Students should want to come into my classroom and be excited to learn. Positive teacher language is respectful and uplifting and sets an example for students to speak nicely to each other. I will create this strong and safe community through recognizing each student’s emotional bank account and through morning meeting. An emotional bank account is a term I learned from Cindy Petree, a Stillwater middle school teacher. It is a measure of a student’s emotional well being due to family life, loved ones, teachers, and friends. Teachers should always work hard to deposit encouragement and affirmation into each student’s emotional bank account. Starting each morning with morning meeting is a way to deposit into students emotional bank account each day. This is a time where students can greet each other, share with me and their peers, play games together, and a time for me to speak to students. This helps build a strong community and enables students to become close and learn to work with each other both academically and socially.
Lastly, logical consequences and procedures are an important part to classroom management. The logical consequences that I will use are loss of privilege, break it-fix it, and positive time out. This is a way for students to learn to take responsibility for their actions, both positive and negative. This also helps the classroom community to become stronger because students learn how to work together, be responsible, and problem solve. Logical consequences are implemented within the classroom procedures at the beginning of the year. Procedures are a big part of classroom management as they allow students to know what is expected at all times, when it is appropriate for certain actions, and allow for smooth transitions throughout the school day. Procedures have to be followed consistently in order to be effective.
All of these aspects listed above effect teaching and learning within a school setting. Each teacher has his or her own philosophy, but I believe the aspects I stated above will allow my students to receive the best learning and growing experience within my classroom.
I have had the opportunity to learn the use of teacher language from Marla Ruark, a professor at Oklahoma State University. Teacher language comprises what we say and how we say it to students. An article from Responsive classroom states when speaking to students, it is important to always be authentic, direct, convey faith, focus on action, keep it brief, and know when to be silent. Students must feel respected and need to know expectation of them at all times. Through my teacher language, I can encourage my students by showing I have faith in my students academic and personal intentions. When talking to students, I must specifically focus on actions. For example, if a student is writing a paper I would say, “The way you used verbs and adjectives to describe your setting makes me want to read more” instead of “Your writing is interesting.” It is also important to keep comments brief and know when to be silent. Students often start thinking about other things if comments are not brief and sometimes silence can mean more to a student than anything a teacher could say. Teacher language is powerful when used effectively.
In order to create the best learning experience for students, as a teacher it is my job to create a strong and safe community in my classroom. This entails a welcoming, encouraging, and fun environment. Students should want to come into my classroom and be excited to learn. Positive teacher language is respectful and uplifting and sets an example for students to speak nicely to each other. I will create this strong and safe community through recognizing each student’s emotional bank account and through morning meeting. An emotional bank account is a term I learned from Cindy Petree, a Stillwater middle school teacher. It is a measure of a student’s emotional well being due to family life, loved ones, teachers, and friends. Teachers should always work hard to deposit encouragement and affirmation into each student’s emotional bank account. Starting each morning with morning meeting is a way to deposit into students emotional bank account each day. This is a time where students can greet each other, share with me and their peers, play games together, and a time for me to speak to students. This helps build a strong community and enables students to become close and learn to work with each other both academically and socially.
Lastly, logical consequences and procedures are an important part to classroom management. The logical consequences that I will use are loss of privilege, break it-fix it, and positive time out. This is a way for students to learn to take responsibility for their actions, both positive and negative. This also helps the classroom community to become stronger because students learn how to work together, be responsible, and problem solve. Logical consequences are implemented within the classroom procedures at the beginning of the year. Procedures are a big part of classroom management as they allow students to know what is expected at all times, when it is appropriate for certain actions, and allow for smooth transitions throughout the school day. Procedures have to be followed consistently in order to be effective.
All of these aspects listed above effect teaching and learning within a school setting. Each teacher has his or her own philosophy, but I believe the aspects I stated above will allow my students to receive the best learning and growing experience within my classroom.