Classroom Management: More Than a Bag of Tricks
Cindy, a well-educated and highly qualified recent graduate pursuing a 4th grade teaching position, has a ready response for the principal's interview question, "How do you plan to manage your classroom?" She confidently replies, "I plan to develop a system where students will earn points for good behavior during the week and receive tickets to enter a raffle for prizes at the end of the week."
Across the country this spring, thousands of graduates from hundreds of teacher-education programs will enthusiastically prepare for the job search in hopes of landing a teaching position for September in a difficult market. And like Cindy, they'll be asked a question or two about classroom management during their interviews. Many prospective teachers will respond with answers similar to hers, expressing a plan that uses an extrinsic-reward based system.
This plan, while not uncommon, unfortunately conveys a narrow view of classroom management. With her answer, Cindy implies that she equates effective classroom management with bribing students to behave appropriately. However, students deserve to be held to a higher behavioral expectation than bribery confers. After all, don't we want students to develop into independent, critical thinkers who are capable of self-regulating their own behavior? How will that be possible if they are continuously bribed to behave or...
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