Our new book on CM is starting up its engines:
The General Plan
This book consists of three parts. In the first part we take an in-depth look at key points and strategies made in previous books I’ve written. The first part of the book, then, recapitulates, defines and illustrates the external strategies found in previous books on the topic, things like the Classroom Rules, etc.
In the second and third parts of this book we look at two ways of “scanning” our own internal thoughts while in the moments of teaching, those moments when we are stretched – sometimes beyond our limits – to deal with an oppositional kid or group of kids while at the same time trying to keep interesting CI happening in our classroom.
In the past, we just bored our students into submission with worksheets, etc. Now we must start to take honest looks at what is going on inside our psyches in class during those times of pushback (the nice word) from students, or during times of outright oppositional defiance (the real word) from them.
It is good that we are finally developing a concept of what classroom management even is in terms of our own internal awareness of what is really going on in each and every moment that we are standing in front of our students.