In my previous post on classroom management I said that the two things that I’ve concluded about this vastly ignored topic are to (1) use the StarChart™ well in all its detail to KEEP THEM ENGAGED and (2) understand narcissistic behavior the moment it comes up in all its various dark forms in our students and REACT WITH STRENGTH IN THAT MOMENT WITHOUT IGNORING IT.
I added in a note to Sean that I don’t even consider my much-vaunted Classroom Rules – which are used in some form in thousands of classrooms – in that equation. Those rules, which I now consider outdated, are not nearly as effective as those first two things.
Of those two new definers of CM, my new position on CM is that the StarChart brings 95% of the classroom management and being aware of narcissistic behavior in our kids is 5% of the deal in classroom management.
Here some voice trapped in old thinking likely would say:
Really, Ben? The StarChart is now the secret to classroom management? Really? Honestly, that statement seems kind of whack! Classroom management is separate from teaching. It is something that we DO to keep our kids in line because they need adult guidance in how to behave in our classrooms. There is CM and then there is our instruction and they are two separate things!
I respond to that voice that is trapped in stinking old thinking:
No. The CM of the future in our field is going to be 95% student engagement and the other 5% is going to be stopping all narcissistic behaviors in the moments that they happen in our classes. Listen to me: CM and our instruction are NOT SEPARATE. The reason that we have not had success with CM in the past in the TPRS/CI movement is that we have been using the old model of CM, which has them as separate.
(to be cont.)
