Post #3

You've been practicing your 'entry routine' and 'do now' or warm-up.  As you model these and have your students practice them each day the way you expect them to they will conform to those expectations.  Remember to always be positive with them.  If they enter your room in a way you don't want them to, stop them, tell them that it seems they need a reminder of how they are to enter the room, have them go back out the door and walk in the way you showed them to.  As the days go by and you have them practice this (I call this a Practice Academy) they will get the message and enter properly.  The 'do now' or warm-up is non-negotiable.  You should have one prepared for every day unless you are testing.  This will make it easier for a substitute when you are out too.  Your students need consistency and structure.  This provides you with the time to focus on your lesson for the day as they work on the warm-up and it helps them prepare for what you will teach that day.  Make your warm-up meaningful to them.  

Next you will be working on 'seat signals' and 'tight transitions'.  A good number is seat signals is three to five.  Any more than that and both you and the students get lost in them.  If you have the time you can allow your students to help create them.  This helps them get buy-in and increases the chance they will use them.   When using tight transitions you must teach them what you want.  It might help to have a MAP or poster of your expectations.  If you want to see what one looks like, I have an example.  Please ask and I will be happy to share it with you.  This was the one part of Diana Day I still use, its good stuff.  In my classroom, I went so far as to model for the students the exact route I wanted them to take when we transitioned from one activity to another.  I left nothing to chance.  This allowed the class to use every minute of time on task and most completed their assignments and had no homework.  We didn't waste time.  We learned how not to.

Please take a moment and share your thoughts, ideas, successes, and failures while trying these activities.  You will learn so much from one another.  As you observe other teachers in their classrooms, see if they have these things in place and how they handle them.  Post comments here about what you experience and observe. 

I hope the ideas from this book are helping you better manage your classrooms.  Don't forget there is a DVD in the back of the book.  It has great 1 to 2 min clips you can watch to see what some of these good ideas look like in the classroom.

Have any of you ever started a class blog?  It is amazing what you can learn from your students when you blog and have them comment.