How to Start Behavioral Leadership Mid-Year in Your Classroom
Dear Kid Whisperer,
Another teacher at my school recently loaned me a copy of The Classroom Behavior Manual. Wow! I just read through the entire book yesterday! This book is speaking directly about my school's student population. I teach at the middle school in our city with the lowest socioeconomic demographic and the highest numbers of students with trauma experiences--not to mention homelessness, foster care, and youth homes. My question is: Can I try to implement this structure in my classes mid-year? Is it nearly impossible to try to turn the ship at this point, and should I just limp to the end of the year? Or do I try to put Behavioral Leadership into place cold turkey--starting with class names, team names, etc.?
Thank you for reading the book (all at once!) and I am so glad that you are excited about using it!
First, starting Behavioral Leadership mid-year is often more effective than starting at the beginning of the year for a reason that involves you, not your students.
While starting Behavioral Leadership at the beginning of the year has tremendous benefits, the problem with doing this is that you can’t compare the effectiveness of Traditional Discipline versus Behavioral Leadership with the same kids. You may, even subconsciously, wonder if your new students are just easier than your old ones from last year, and you may, therefore, be less enthusiastic about Behavioral Leadership, which may lead to you using it less in the future, which will lead to more negative behaviors and a less happy life as a teacher.
On the other hand, if you used Traditional Discipline today, and then rolled out your first usage of Behavioral Leadership tomorrow the way I tell you how to do it with the same kids, it will look and feel like a miracle. In one day, with the same kids, you will significantly reduce negative behaviors, you’ll have more energy, and it may feel like you improved behaviors for the first time in years. Doing this is very likely to permanently change you into a Behavioral Leadership Teacher in one day.
Now, here’s how to switch from Traditional Discipline to Behavioral Leadership tomorrow. I do not suggest that you do all the classroom setup and rearranging kids due to their behaviors, figuring out Power Positions, and so on as you suggest. The reason is that this takes some energy and time, and it’s the middle of the school year, so you have neither.
Instead, I want you to do the most profound thing you can do with the least amount of energy. You are, in one day, going to start giving more attention to kids’ positive behaviors than you do to negative behaviors. Here’s how to prep for tomorrow:
Reread the sections on Strategic Noticing and Gentle Guidance Interventions in the book.
Pick ten positive behaviors that you can notice and write them down in the “I noticed” format.
Pick your five favorite Gentle Guidance Interventions and write them down.
Here’s how I would go live with your students tomorrow:
Kid Whisperer: Folks, I need to apologize to all of you. I feel like I’ve been telling you what you’ve been doing wrong constantly, all year long. I’ve been nagging you, and that must have gotten annoying. I’m going to be different from now on. From now on, I’m just going to go around telling people what they’re doing right, which makes me happy, instead of always telling everyone what they are doing wrong, which makes everyone sad. Thanks for understanding, and we’ll never talk about this again!
Kid Whisperer starts walking quickly around the room.
Kid Whisperer: I noticed Kid #2 has already gotten three out of five problems done. I noticed Kid #19 is being pleasant. I noticed Kid #31 is sitting the right way in her chair.
Kid #31: So?!?
Kid Whisperer: I just noticed. I noticed Kid #12 is indenting his paragraph.
Kids #1-#31 are stunned and confused.
Kid #2 is so stunned that he stops working
Kid Whisperer taps Kid #2’s work gently, with two fingers, with no eye contact, while walking away. Kid #2 starts working again.
Kid #10 and Kid #29 start to have a disagreement that looks a little heated. Kid Whisperer gives them a Confused Eye: a look that says, “You guys are great, that behavior is less than great, this confuses me, and I know you will stop the behavior so that I will become unconfused.”
By using just Strategic Noticing and Gentle Guidance Interventions, you can create a life-changing environment in your classroom tomorrow and for the rest of your career!