I posted this to Facebook. It was entitled "Hey Teachers: please stop using behavior charts. Here's why." I was in the midst of writing something on this same topic and thought to myself, "This is already written for me, so why do I need to reinvent the wheel?" However, the feedback I got both on and off screen gave me reason to keep writing. As great as this article is about WHY we need to stop, it doesn't give alternatives about HOW we can change.
This author gives us compelling arguments to rethink behavior charts:
- They're demeaning
- They're shaming
- Makes the teacher a figure of judgement, not empathy
- They encourage extrinsic motivation and corrode self-esteem
- They're hypocritical
- They're a waste of class time
I can't disagree with these statement, generally speaking. And if you're waffling about the idea of behavior charts, here is a quote from Peggy O'Mara that resonates with me on this subject, "The way we talk to our children becomes their inner voice." This quote hangs on the walls of my son's childcare and even though it may be directed toward parenting, this too can be said about the way we handle behavior in our classrooms. Behavior charts can have the ability to become the inner voice of our students.
I was at a positive behavior intervention systems (PBIS) training at the beginning of the school year and a slide with this information popped up on the screen:
"If a child doesn't know how to read, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to swim, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to multiply, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to drive, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to behave,
we..... ......teach? ...... punish?"
(Tom Herner (NASDE) Counterpoint 1998 p. 2)
As this slide glared at us on the screen, a woman raised her hand and said, "This really reminds me of when teachers just simply respond, 'No thank you' to a child and then walk away as if the problem was solved." I was immediately caught off guard...... I am that teacher. I do that. I am 100% guilty of saying "No thank you" to children when they exhibit a less desirable behavior. I wanted to defend myself and argue my point but deep down, I knew she was right. I wasn't teaching anything to the child who exhibited the undesirable behavior - I was putting a "No thank you" Band-Aid on it. So revisit that slide. What do we do when a child is having a hard time in the classroom? Do we punish them by telling them to 'clip-up,' 'change your color,' or 'no thank you?' Or do we figure out how to teach into the behavior (or the behavior we'd rather see)?
I think (and hope) that everyone who has read this far in this entry agrees we need to teach students about how to be respectful, kind, positive citizens inside and outside of our classroom walls. Without getting into the individualized 'behavior plans' for some of our more tangled students, I want to present alternatives that reflect a shift in the day to day classroom environment for the whole group.
1) Permission to take time to build classroom culture
This doesn't have to happen only during morning meeting or at the beginning of the year. I challenge all of us to thread community building throughout the day all year. Fostering a classroom community that is positive, nurturing, kind, and respectful takes time and effort. We can get so bogged down with curriculum demands early on and throughout the school year, but what if we chose keep revisiting and reminding students of our high expectations of them while teaching reading, writing, math, science, etc.? When we think about what really matters in our classroom, a healthy, kind culture can elevate the learning and progress we wish to see for all our students.
2) Trust/relationships
This mostly likely is thought of as a "no-brainer" to build trusting relationships with both students and their families. However, many students who present us with behavior challenges often times have a harder time trusting and feeling safe in our classrooms. They want control in a world and life that most likely they have no control over. Many decisions are made for them each day, all day; therefore, the extra time and effort we must make to ensure students trust the teacher, the classroom, their friendships, the classroom community and the school system is one step to building trusting relationships. It is easier to form trusting relationships with students who come from stable home environments; however, for students who may be living in trauma or living in a place where they don't always feel safe, I have found that it is our most challenging students who need more of our attention and time. It's not about equal time, it's about equitable time. It is important to give individualized and differentiated effort to ensure all students get what they need to feel like they can trust their teacher, friends and school.
What does this look like? It could be something as simple as Daniel needing to sit in a chair during circle time, or Charlotte reading under the table on her belly, or students knowing that the daily schedule is predictable and posted every single day. These types of 'teacher moves' lessen students' anxiety and build the trusting relationships students need to thrive.
3) An Environment that is culturally responsive to students NOT the teacher
I spent many of my first years as a teacher ordering borders off Amazon and die-cutting birds and owls to adorn my classroom walls. I wanted to make it an inviting fun, colorful space to learn. Is there anything exactly wrong with this practice? Not necessarily. However, if we look at how we create culturally responsive classrooms - I was spending all summer preparing a room that was culturally responsive to ME. Did my students' voices fill my classroom? No. My voice was loud and clear. It wasn't until it dawned on me that students don't need me to decorate and prepare the classroom for them that I realized how powerful it would be for the students' to own the classroom walls. Margaret Mooney once said, "If you have 24 students, you [the teacher] only own 1/25th of the wall space." I interpret this as there is no need for teacher store posters but rather co-created anchor charts to reinforce learning, honor the differences of students by displaying art that doesn't all look exactly the same and posting pictures of the students' faces and bodies in the action of learning. Kindergarten is controlled chaos, messy with learning. What if we nudged ourselves in this direction?
4) Believing that social and emotional skills are taught as a content/academic area
This idea was a new one for me as I became a kindergarten teacher. Coming out of teaching school, we learned how to teach reading, writing, math, and science - academic content areas. However, when I started to hone and refine my practice, I realized that until my students were able to learn critical executive functioning skills, self-regulation, how to use their words to solve problems and identify their feelings, academics weren't going to come easily to them regardless of how good my teaching was. Through simple academic activities, the focus wasn't on the academics but on the social and emotional aspects of taking turns, using materials and working with peers. In my school district, we have an over-arching philosophy of "go slow to go fast" -- when we put effort into building a foundation based on social and emotional learning, then the academics will soar.
5) Student Choice & Teacher's 'bottom lines'
Choice, ownership and management is embedded throughout the structure of the day. The routines and procedures are put in place and kids are free to make the learning choices they need to make. The early childhood notion of bottom lines comes into play here. If the teacher's bottom line is that the student needs to be making a reading choice, then the student chooses what to read and where to read and with that, the student just met my expectation. My expectations are not lowered, they remain high and I give the locus of control to the student to make his/her own decisions. The choices are guided and intentional. I set the parameters and students make the choices. They take ownership over their learning in this way and become self-managers and independent learners.
6) Positive marble jar
So, a teacher has best practice in place, students have choice embedded throughout the day, a positive, trusting climate and culture is built and continues to build, the environment is culturally responsive to students, and social and emotional learning is at the forefront of all student-teacher interactions and instruction... and it still feels like a behavior reinforcement is needed? I'll give you an alternative to students clipping up and down. A positive marble jar is one way we can always stay positive with children and have a focus on working toward a classroom goal as a community. The marble jar only works when marbles go in the jar, never out. When the teacher sees a positive behavior they want to reinforce, a few marbles go into the jar. This only works if the teacher uses the marble jar often, filling it up several times throughout the day. When the marble jar is filled up, the "prize" isn't a trinket from a prize box or food but something related to learning (i.e.: extra art project, an interactive read aloud, like Tumblebooks or Bookflix, an extra recess, a whole class game, etc.)
Let's revisit the quote from above:
"If a child doesn't know how to read, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to swim, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to multiply, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to drive, we teach.
If a child doesn't know how to behave,
we..... ......teach? ...... punish?"
(Tom Herner (NASDE) Counterpoint 1998 p. 2)
So, if a child doesn't know how to behave... my hope for every teacher is that the response will be:
we reflect on our current practices, ensure best practices are in place and we TEACH.
Until next time,
Nina
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