When I was struggling to find hope early in my career as a teacher, I came across a few pieces of advice given by King Solomon from the Proverbs:

He who spares his rod hates his son,
But he who loves him disciplines him promptly. — Proverbs 13:24

This one jumped out at me as I realized I overlooked way too much misbehavior. I came to understand that by continually letting the students misbehave because I wanted them to like me was actually counter-productive and instead it made them respect me less. More than that, it showed me that whereas I thought I was being loving, I was actually being hateful.

That helped me a whole lot as it…

The results to my most recent Twitter poll (what is your classroom management secret weapon?) can be seen over at Miss Cal.Q.L8’s blog.

Be sure to go check out 27 Classroom Management Secret Weapons. While you’re at it, subscribe to her blog and leave some comments.

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

As we’re going through the transformation, one of the key things to remember is that you must remain respectful to your students. As I’ve written before, classroom control is essential. Some of us have a naturally abrasive personality, and so when we begin to re-assume control, politeness tends to go out the window.

Don’t take things personally
The thing to remember is that even our worst behaved students actually have a genuine reason for doing the things that they are doing. Most misbehaviors are not personal attacks. They are simply misbehaviors for the sake of themselves.

One of my mentors once told me a…

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

When I was a new teacher, I had some really good classroom rules and expectations and consequences all lined up. It was good on paper. Unfortunately, I didn’t follow through consistently at all. If one of the “bad kids” did something out of line, WHAM, I was all over his misbehavior in an instant. If on the other hand, one of the “good kids” did the exact same thing, the one consequence was a smile and warning not to do it again.

Human nature seems to lead us to pick favorites in our classes. These are the kids whose misbehavior we call “cute”. We…

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

I took the day off from blogging yesterday because it was Mother’s Day and I play in a mariachi. If you don’t know what that means, I started playing serenatas (Mother’s Day Serenades) at 6pm Saturday afternoon, wrapped up a little after 8am Sunday morning, then played for another 4 hours Sunday afternoon. We played three songs 40 different times, and also had a one-hour gig in somewhere along the way. With a church service thrown in on Sunday morning for good measure, it probably goes without saying that I was exhausted yesterday when we finished up. But now I’m back and ready to go!

Be…

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

What a wild week this has been! I’m surprised by how much even going over these classroom management basics on here has impacted my teaching. When I preach this stuff, I sort of have to force myself to follow through. I’ve been discussing this stuff with a couple of friends this week, and just in case one of them walks into my classroom, I want to make sure they see the same stuff!

So if you’ve been following along, you are coming to a realization of just how important classroom management is to your overall effectiveness as a teacher.

I know that the week…

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

Face it, misbehavior has been around only slightly longer than behavior has been. As teachers, we are often expected to fill every possible role in the lives of the students. Unfortunately, that can’t always happen. Sometimes our control and influence over the actions of the students is limited.

Every teacher has students who misbehave from time to time.

One of the things that revolutionized my teaching was to realize that most of the parents really wanted to help me help their child be successful. Most parents also have no real idea of how their children really act.

To really get through to the students,…

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

Today’s lesson is simple, and yet profound.

One of the most difficult concepts for me to grasp was one of the most important in my early days of teaching. It is also the most transformational and pivotal of everything that we’re going to be doing through this process.

Every problem that happens in my classroom is my fault.

Or stated more positively

I am responsible to ensure good things happen in my class.

If we can get over that hurdle, if we can get through that first barrier, we are on…

This is an article in the Total Teacher Transformation series. Click here for a complete table of contents.

Congratulations
First of all, I want to congratulate you on taking the first step of this journey toward becoming a great teacher! I can’t even begin to describe for you the exciting possibilities that await you as you move through these lessons and begin to come over to the other side. If your experiences are anything like mine as I went through this process five years ago, you will not believe that you used to have classes the way you currently do. If you follow the advice here, I can virtually guarantee you a completely different classroom environment before this month is out.

To…

This is an ongoing series. Bookmark this page as a way of navigating your way around the series. By the way, this was my 400th post on the blog.

1. Day 1: Find A Moment
2. Day 2: Find A Mirror
3. Day 3: Find A Mentor
4. Day 4: Find A Mother
5. Day 5: Find A Motivation
6. Day 6: Find A Mentor (Again)
7. Day 7: Week 1 Summary
8. Day 8: Be Prepared
9. Day 9: Be Consistent
10. Day 10: Be Fair
11. Day 11: Be Respectful
12. Day 12: Be Respectable

Okay okay. So I’m a band director. Why would anyone listen to me anyway. I’m just an elective teacher.

My friend JD2718 emailed me and told me about some stuff that he does in his math class. So even if you ignore my advice about classroom management, maybe some of his advice about keeping students engaged will apply to you. Hop on over and check out Teaching off topic 3.

By the way, I have ADD so my kids know that if they ask me a question about my dogs or what I did over the weekend or pretty much anything else, I’ll get off topic. But even when I do stay focused, I find ways to bring some off-topic…

Reader Appreciation Month didn’t quite turn out the way I had envisioned it would. That is primarily my fault. As I sit here, I realize there are some things that I used to do with blogging that I don’t do any longer. I have decided it’s time for me to change some things. You may or may not notice the changes as I begin implementing them. If you do, great. If not, then perhaps it is simply a change to the way I approach blogging. Whatever the case, it’ll be good.

How can I apply this to my classroom?
How many times do we get into the habit of being so familiar with the subject matter that it no…

When I began turning my band around during my second year, I received some of the best advice ever from one of my former band directors. He noted that he had observed three Rehearsal Skills that were lacking in most bad bands. These same three Rehearsal Skills are present in most great bands. The three skills are:

1. Do not turn and talk to your neighbor when you are not playing.
   This eliminates the “but we were talking about the music” part of the “DO NOT TALK” equation.
2. Sit still and quiet when the band director is working with another section.
   I don’t have any idea how many times kids got up without asking to during my first

…

I am a huge fan of simplicity. For that matter, I love the idea of having no classroom rules. However, I know some people don’t operate that way.

Great teachers can be found in both camps. But whether or not we feel it necessary to tie our students down with rules, the greatest commonality between all great teachers is that they have clear, concise, and comprehensive expectations for their students and they communicate them in such a way that every student is aware of what is right and wrong.

My school has a list of something like 12 school-wide classroom rules. That is way overboard for me, but I dutifully posted them on the wall in the classroom as I’ve…

One of the greatest challenges that I had as a first year teacher was with classroom management. I’ve mentioned that a number of times before and I think most first year teachers go through that.

As with most, I noticed that I had some days where the kids were good, and others where they were bad. It was just so unpredictible. But why?

What made those days so unpredictible?
I honestly think it was a combination of things. But the most important factor in the behavior of the kids had to do with how much dead time they had. How much time they were unoccupied and had to find something to do to keep themselves occupied.

How…

When I first started out teaching, I desperately wanted the kids to like me. To this end, I ended up letting my classes get out of control. A handful of things contributed to this:

• Concerning myself with every matter that was brought to my attention
• Allowing kids to mesbehave
• Trying to get the kids to like me
• Yelling at kids
• Arguing with them

…

If you have ever been in a typical band or orchestra room at the beginning or end of class, you know how utterly chaotic it can get. Kids throwing music into their folders, quickly rushing to take off reeds, shoving horns into cases, and running out the door to get to the next class. Then one inevitably comes running back in because he forgot to take off his neckstrap or loosen his bow or whatever.

Then the next class comes in. Excited to see each other, talking, rushing to take their instruments out, soak their reeds, prepare music, get set up, and the list goes on. Every day, someone feels it is necessary to tell me they forgot their instrument…

This is a guest post by Dr. Pezz.

Thanks to Joel for allowing me this opportunity to post an article on his excellent site!

In my short time as a blogger I have written a few posts which have elicited quite a few e-mails, These include posts about the fish bowl lesson, how teachers may create student failures, and ideas about teaching denotation and connotation. However, my post regarding the need for classroom rules has brought in more e-mails than any other. I actually ran a small in-service at my school for some of the new teachers about why I don’t have classroom rules, and I think a couple were shocked that rules may not be necessary.

This may sound…

Teaching children is arguably the most taxing job in the world – it demands a great deal of patience and tolerance all through the day, every day of school. A good teacher takes the extra effort needed to ensure that the children understand what’s taught, not just in the way of lessons but in the way of life too. Sometimes a teacher’s patience is put to the test in the form of difficult students, those who will just not fall in line with the rest of the class. And at others, the whole class acts up and there’s chaos all round. At times like this, it’s no use shouting and tearing out your hair in an attempt to regain control…

Hello, Readers. I decided to take Joel up on his offer of EduBloggers Gone Wild. My name is Miss A and you can find me at Confessions From the Couch. I am beginning my 4th year of teaching in an urban school district and no longer under new teacher status. I feel like I’m at a place where I must CONTRIBUTE to the edublogging community. As I enter into the this new phase of my career, I am using blogging as a reflective and personal growth tool-with limited complaining and griping-because I love my job and the impact it has on my life. My goal is to share my ideas as well as solicit the ideas of other teachers out…