Harry Wong and My Flawed Classroom Management Plan…Oh My!!!

I was very lucky last summer to get to meet with and learn from Harry and Rosemary Wong and company at a one day seminar.  The focus was his latest book The Classroom Management Plan.  It was a once in a lifetime experience and I was grateful to get to go.  I was ready to hit the ground running when I left, I felt like I had a clue of what I was doing and there was going to be no misbehavior in my classroom this year, no sir! 

So day one of school comes and I have my classroom management plan in my hands and the kids are at the door.  Keep in mind, this is my first year in second grade in many, many moons…I have to say this year was not an epic failure in the classroom management plan arena, but I learned very quickly that I had lots of room for improvement.  This was a new school, mixed with new kids who were also at a new school and we all had no idea what was true expectations.  We were all flying by the seat of our pants it felt like.  I knew what procedures I had when I taught 4th grade so I put those into play because in my mind those were general enough to apply to any classroom….WRONG-O!!!  I didn’t have enough procedures lined out.  At. All.  I knew I was in for it when there came question after question about what to do with this item and what to do with that…I was beat and this was just the first day.  So, I persevered.  I won’t say I abandoned the plan…I just didn’t do it with fidelity.  I was in survival mode most every single day! But, one day close to the end of the year we sat down and had a class meeting.  We worked out what needed written procedures and I will just say, out of the mouths of babes.  These kids said everything needed to written and practiced.  So that is just what we did.  We came up with a list of the procedures we currently had in place in the classroom and hallways.  Then we broke out into groups and the kids wrote what should be in this years plan.  I have to apologize here because this would be a fabulous place to insert pictures of this chart and the kids working on the different procedures of the plan…BUT survival mode remember. 

This was the finished product.

I took all their notes and cleaned up everything and this is what will run my classroom this year.  I even included some for departmentalized classrooms since I was not sure who would be using this just me or some of you fine people!  I had no idea that I needed to write and practice a procedure for tissues and hand sanitizer but yes folks…we ran out because there was nothing in place to show kids how I wanted these items to be handled.  I have kids of my own and this never crossed my mind.  Go figure!

This is housed in a notebook with my notes for each page.  It is on a powerpoint which I will use in the first days of school to go over each procedure.  I will hang posters with the procedures on this in different areas of the room so kids get a constant reminder of the procedures when they are in different areas. 

If you would like an editable copy of this plan, you can find it in my store by clicking on the picture above.  It’s a forever freebie!  Because a smoothly running classroom is a teacher treasure! 

I am going to leave you with a question to ponder…even with the best laid plans and procedures set…what about those little stinkers who KNOW what they are supposed to do but they just don’t do it.  That to me involves consequences not just a reteach…Any thoughts?