A good teacher knows that a solid game plan will head off many unwanted negative behaviors in the classroom. Establishing positive classroom procedures at the start of the school year is the key to a great teacher’s success. It is important to not only have procedures but to have the right procedures. Your procedures need to work for you and your students. Be thoughtful when considering what procedures you will create and communicate with your students.
Be sure you are familiar with your procedures before school starts. You will need to be able to express and define what you expect of students starting on day one. Not only will you need to define the procedures, but you will also need to be able to TEACH them. Procedures take more than one explanation before students can remember and follow them.
Here is a list of general procedures you will need to teach students.
Entering the Room
This is how you want students to enter your classroom. I like to get students thinking in ASL right from the go. Students must enter my classroom using ASL and no voice. They are to find their name card and have a seat and chat (in sign) with their tablemates. If you want specific supplies on the desk or put way out of sight, communicate this.
Exiting the Classroom
This is what you want students to do at the end of the class period. Students should clean their workstations, have all supplies put in the accurate spot, put technology away, and wait for your dismissal signal. My pet peeve is when students hover by the classroom door and wait for the bell to ring. This is a big no, no in my room and something I want to explain so students know and understand this.
Leaving the Classroom
Communicate with students your policy for leaving the classroom. Do you have a bathroom pass? A sign-out sheet? Explain to students what they need to do in any and every situation that takes them out of the classroom during the class period. This includes the bathroom, going to the nurse, an emergency situation such as an evacuation, and going to the counselor for personal reasons. Sometimes students have emergency situations and need to use their phones to communicate with family. Do you have a policy for stepping out of the classroom? Do you need one?
Participating
Students are new to learning a language. They need to know how to interact in the classroom. They may be used to sitting in classes and doing independent work. Or on the other hand, speaking to a classmate at any given time. Explain your communication policies and stick with them. I use push-button lights to indicates what type of communication is happening in the class at any given time. Then students know how they should interact…voice or no voice, partner, small group, or individually, etc.
Also, if you grade on participation, you will need to tell students how you score them. If there is a rubric, share it with them at this time.
Check out these hacks for the ASL classroom
Turning in Work
Share your turning-in work policies and explain them often. Students will need to know how and where to turn in assignments. They will need to understand your late work policy, your absent work policy, and your makeup work policy for tests and assignments. These are very important to have in print and in your syllabus.
Classroom Jobs
If you use student helpers in the classroom, make sure they know what the job is and what is expected of them. You can write this on paper and laminate it. Then pass it along to different students as they change jobs and responsibilities in the classroom. Or you can get your FREE, editable classroom jobs here.
Seating Chart
Do you keep a seating chart? Explain to students how your seating chart works, how they will know where to sit, and how often you will change the seating arrangement. I change mine daily using index cards randomly placed on the desks.
Drills
Make sure students, especially new to your campus students, will need to know how to handle emergency evacuations and drills. Make sure you have this information handy for substitutes as well.
Hand Signals
If you use hand signals, chants or other attention-getting behaviors be sure to explain them, model them and have them posted in the classroom for easy reference until students can use remember them.
Rules
Make sure you have your everyday classroom rules posted and explained in your classroom and in your syllabus.
I hope these ideas help you communicate your classroom policies and expectations. Remember to put these in writing, like in your syllabus, and to communicate them multiple times to students during the first few weeks of school. Remember students have many teachers with different policies. Make sure your policies are clear and well-defined.
What do you always put in your procedures?
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