Effective Classroom Management Strategies

Classroom management is important in order to have an effective, organized, and peaceful classroom. Disruptive students are not only disrespectful to the teacher, but it also makes learning for the other students much more difficult. There are ways for teachers to prevent classroom disruption so that every student can learn in a well behaved and safe environment.

As many new teachers learn quickly, colleges and university programs do not prepare you fully to manage a classroom. It's not that higher education does not understand the need. Colleges offer many courses that provide you with classroom management strategies and techniques. Classroom management is a skill that you learn on the job.

If you have poor classroom management skills you and your students will have a disconnect that will definitely affect the learning environment. If you don't have control students will no longer focus on learning and problems will pop up that shouldn't. The ideal situation is for every student in your classroom to fully understand the consequence of every action that they make before they take any action. Consistency is the key to help students understand outcomes.

Student behavior problems continue to be on the rise in our schools. Teachers in America today have a more difficult time than any other time in our history when it comes to managing their classrooms effectively. Without proper classroom management, even the best lesson plans, rubrics, and worksheets will not result in student learning. This article discusses some of the most effective classroom management strategies along with how to implement them properly.

While we will discuss several specific classroom management practices, there are two strategies that will help ensure the success of any practice. First, be up front with students about the classroom rules. Talk about them at the beginning of the semester, and make sure they are posted in the room. Refer to them periodically to remind the students of the rules. This will help avoid any confusion and let the students know that you are serious about classroom management.

Second, be consistent in classroom management. Enforce the rules the same way with every student and on every day. Do not allow any student to "slide by" with a clever excuse, and do not be lax with the rules on the days that you do not feel the desire to enforce them. You can be certain that students will pick up on this and try to find ways to bend the rules if you are inconsistent. However, being consistent will send a clear message to your students - "Don't try it." These two practices are useful no matter what type of strategies you employ.

Several classroom management strategies can help make a classroom less disruptive while improving the educational quality for the students. Here are a few that come to mind:

For students who often attempt to get the focus on themselves, give them some type of job in the class. This can be reading class announcements, reading questions out loud, reading test review questions, etc. This can help turn that desire for attention into something positive.

For students who are either writing notes, whispering, or doing something else that may be subtle but distracting, a great classroom management strategy is to go stand by them during the lecture. These students are often trying to avoid the attention of the teacher, so standing by them quickly shuts down the disruptive behavior without stopping the lecture.

For students who are publicly defiant or argumentative, take them out of the class to deal with them. Removing them from the situation takes away any reward they might get out of having an audience, and will allow the teacher to gauge the student's situation. There may be some type of situation outside of the classroom that is causing the student's attitude, and they will be more likely to open up about it.

For all students, make sure to keep the class active and build different modes of learning into the lesson plan. For example, after spending several minutes lecturing, give the students a worksheet or have them do a class activity as a group. This will break the monotony of the lecture and help fend off student boredom.

Consistently employing these classroom management strategies will help ensure that a teacher can have an effective classroom, free from purposeful distractions. When a classroom is managed well, teachers may just find that their students are more engaged in the learning process.