Running head: CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT PLAN 1

Classroom Management Plan

Brent Bian
EDTP 600, University of Maryland University College
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Classroom Management Plan

With the diversity in any given classroom and the limited capacity of a single teacher, classroom

management is needed to maintain order and for education to take place. I look at classroom management

as a funnel, to take all that diversity and channeling it into a teacher’s defined space to allow the teacher

to handle the different situations that occur throughout his/her time with the students. This space, or in

other words, “environment,” is what every teacher should create to set the tone of their classroom. The

ingredients for the environment for my classroom are love, discipline, and community, where students are

safe to learn, committed to learn, and encourage one another to learn. I will be exploring different aspects

of the classroom in order to create this environment and foster classroom management.

Teacher I Am’s

I am your teacher. This is a broad statement that encompasses all the following statements. You

are my students and we are in this together.

I am personable, the kind of teacher that will high five or fist bump you for achievement or

simply because we made eye contact. I take interest in you beyond just what you are learning, but also

how you are doing emotionally and socially. I will ask you about your tryouts that you were nervous for. I

will listen if you choose to share about your dysfunctional family. I will try the restaurant that you

suggest. It makes writing letters of recommendations easier.

I am on your side. Because I pull you aside doesn’t mean I think less of you, but because I think

better of you. The grade I assign you says whether or not you met the schools standards for achievement,

but I will let you know that it does not define who you are or a reflection of how amazing you are at piano

or your other hobbies. I will encourage you and if you choose to, we will work on meeting those school

standards.

I am in charge. I am on your side, but that doesn’t mean anything goes. As flexible as I like to be,

ultimately I will have the final say in how to run the room.

I am passionate. I raise my voice, but rarely out of anger or frustration, but because I am excited

to be your teacher and you should probably pay attention to this point that I am making because it might
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show up on your test. You might get hurt from my swinging arms and I might hurt myself from standing

on a chair.

I am imperfect. If I do not hold to my I Am’s or if I offend you in any way, I will make it a point

to apologize to you and will settle for nothing less than a fist bump.

Room Arrangement

I will be teaching high school physics and I assume that I will be placed in a science classroom

with sinks and gas valves lining the sides of the room. The desks will be arranged in clusters, with 4

students each to a cluster and the clusters aligned in organized rows with respect to the board in the front

of the room. From my Field Experience #1, I observed the effectiveness of having the students sitting in

groups. The students seemed overall comfortable with the people that they were grouped with and when

given the warm up, they would work together and discuss the problem at hand. It was then much easier to

transition into the lab because they were already sitting together. It was already halfway through the

quarter before I went to observe but it seemed like the students already new how to work with one

another. The teacher I was observing mentioned that come test day, he would normally separate the desks

and put them into rows, something I plan to do with my classroom as well in order to minimize cheating.

I will have assigned seating in order to diversify the tables and I will try to reassign seating so that

students will have worked with everyone in that class period (“The Pros and Cons of Assigned Seating,”

n.d.).

I listened to a student speaker during a high school graduation and she mentioned how in class

she would space out and during one of her episodes her gaze fell upon the wall of the classroom and she

noticed a quote on the wall. She mentioned how that quote inspired her and even led her to live

differently. I love inspirational quotes, and while I do not expect them to have the same impact on

students as it did for this graduation speaker, I intend to have them on the wall scattered throughout the

classroom. At the moment, I do not yet know how I would like to decorate my classroom, although there

are plenty of good ideas online that I could take inspiration from (NGSS Nerd, n.d.).
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Classroom Rules

Every classroom should have a few rules for students to abide by so they understand practical

expectations for behavior in the class. Hughes (2014, July 3) suggest you should have no more than 3

rules in the classroom that are general and broad enough to give yourself flexibility. When rules start to

become too detailed, such as “don’t sharpen your pencil 5 minutes after the bell rings,” students will

begin feeling bogged down and may become less receptive to your other requests. The rules I will set for

my classroom will be

1. Respect this house and it’s people

2. Gird your loins

3. Think beyond yourselves

Respect is a universal rule and is implied no matter where we are, however I believe to be crucial

and worth having as a defined rule. Students should be expected to treat each other the way they want to

be treated and even treat the classroom the way they want to be treated. I am on your side but I am in

charge and respect will have no room for discussion.

“Gird your loins” is an ancient saying which means to “tighten your pants” before going off to

battle or starting hard work. The saying now means to prepare and strengthen oneself for what is to come,

something I want each student to do. They are expected to finish the work they are assigned and come to

class prepared on top of being mentally present.

Thinking beyond oneself is less of a rule and more of a way of life, but something I want every

student I come in to contact with to walk away with. My philosophy of education is that learning occurs

when a student is captivated by something greater than themselves, including a future version of

themselves or a subject matter they wish to be a part of. I was told that joy is found outside of oneself and

I hold to that for myself. If I were to hike up and reach the peak of the mountain, the last thing I would do

would be to pull out a mirror and spend my time examining the details of my complexion. Rather, I would

want to take in the fullness of the view before me. The view was my motivation for the climb, and fixing

my eyes on the prize is what drove me to it.

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Classroom Procedures

As students are coming into class, I will make an effort to stand at the door and greet every

student who walks in and if not then at least acknowledge their entry. At the beginning of every class I

expect to have some form of a warm up, either a practice question related to the homework or some kind

of reading, or I might mix it up and do something completely unrelated but that I feel might be inspiring. I

will have an area dedicated to turning in papers with folders that separate each class period and students

will know to do that as they walk in before heading to their seats. Students will be allowed to hand in late

work, but with a loss in a letter grade for every day that it is late.

The content will determine the schedule for the class that day. Physics classes are known to be

predominantly either lecture based or lab based and the schedule will reflect as such.

I do not want my students packing up before the bell rings. I find that to be breaking my rule

number 1 as I believe it to be disrespectful to me as the teacher as well as the other students who are

focusing until the end. This will mostly be enforced on lecture days whereas lab days some students

might finish sooner than others and will have the liberty to pack up earlier.

For managing off task behavior, I plan on using proximity control often. I am the type of teacher

to already be moving around the classroom a lot and I expect most of the student’s attention to be on me.

If I see a student using their phone or working on something unrelated to the class, I will situate myself in

a way where the off-task student would be in the field of view of the other students and this should

naturally cause them to stop their off task behavior. I plan on getting to know my students well and so

other techniques I plan on using would be interest boosting, where I share in conversation on topics a

student is interested in, or through humor in order to diffuse tense situations (Long, Morse, & Newman,

1976).
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References
The Pros and Cons of Assigned Seating. (n.d.) Retrieved from
https://www.shmoop.com/teachers/classroom-management/healthy-learning-
environments/assigned-seating.html

[Hip Hughes] (2014, July 3). Classroom Management 101: 10 Tips for Teachers [Video File]. Retrieved
from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=km7X5kQYOg8

NGSS Nerd. (n.d.) Science classroom décor. Retrieved from https://www.pinterest.com/ngssnerd/science-

classroom-decor/

Long, Morse, & Newman. (1976). Managing surface behavior of students. Conflict in the Classroom,
p308-316.