The tone of your classroom is set on the first day of class through your description of your classroom management plan. My collaborating teacher, Madam Hooch, knows how vital a management plan is in an elementary classroom or in any classroom for that matter. However, she hasn’t had a consistent plan for almost the entire first half of the year, and I think its due to the fact that this is her first year teaching in an elementary school setting. The general behavioral management plan has been centered around operant conditioning and having some sort of token economy using tickets. When I first arrived in Madam Hooch’s fifth grade classroom, her plan involved handing a ticket to any student who is displaying appropriate behavior (positive reinforcement). After a certain time period she would hold an auction for various items that the students would used their earned tickets to bid on. Initially, I liked the new approach on having an auction, but after thinking about it I would have to see how the students handle the auction and ‘bidding wars’ before actually implementing it into my classroom. When returning the following week, Madam Hooch had changed her ticket system to instead of handing out tickets to only well behaved students, she gave every student three tickets in the beginning of the day. As the day would progress she would either take way tickets for inappropriate behavior (removal punishment) or give additional tickets for appropriate behavior (positive reinforcement). After she had reflected upon this change, she decided to change it yet again as I returned the next week. She discussed with me that she came to find that many times the students that were behaving appropriately would receive the same amount as those who were going above and beyond appropriate behavior. Having the time to reflect allowed Madam Hooch to see that she didn’t want her classroom to be set up where people who do extraordinarily excellent behavior don’t have much of a reward. Her new behavioral management system uses only positive reinforcement. Students are given tickets for appropriate behavior, they then write their initials on the back of the ticket with a pencil. After writing their initials they drop their ticket into a bucket that is used for a raffle. Every Friday, Madam Hooch has a raffle where she pulls five tickets that were deposited throughout the week. Each winner has their pick of goodies such as snack cakes, chips, or soda.

Deciding on a behavioral management system for you classroom varies upon each individual teacher and what works best for them in their classes. The approach that Madam Hooch takes on behavioral management is probably not one that I will have in my class only because I feel as though the students that may have received the most amount of tickets might not even win anything; whereas, a student that displays a few appropriate behaviors but mostly displays inappropriate behavior might end up winning the raffle. It’s all based on chance, and although it might work for her classroom, it’s not one that I would like to see in my own.

Reflecting:
1. What behavioral management systems will reinforce the behavior rather than teach students how to manipulate the system?
2. What classroom management plan will I use in my own classroom?