Our Most Creative Student Behavior Management Interventions Ever

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Some of our best ideas aren't really our ideas. The first couple of student behavior management interventions in this issue were inspired by Dr. Matthew Meyers from LAUSD.

Most Creative Student Behavior Management Methods
 

Shaquille on Line 1

This is such a great idea. This strategy is one of the terrific ideas suggested by Matthew from LAUSD.

Staff at his site are working to create celebrity wake-up calls for students. It fits L.A. perfectly and you can easily make it fit your part of the world. Get local or national celebrities to record wake-up calls for your students and start their day with a bang.

No one sleeps through a call from a big name star. Their eyes will be wide open.

Put Your Doors to Work

For years we have been recommending that you put your walls to work by hanging our popular motivational posters.

At LAUSD, they don't just work their walls, they even work their doors too.

They have created door hangers that they leave on the homes of absent students. We liked that idea so much that we created door hangers for the classroom (pictured above).

As you can see, the door hangers focus on instruction and testing, and are very motivational. You can make your own by downloading a blank outline of a door hanger image. That's how we made our versions.

Succeedies: Breakfast of Graduates

This behavior management method is like nothing you've ever seen before.

They put really successful athletes on the cover of a box of Wheaties, the Breakfast of Champions. Have your students put themselves on the cover of "Succeedies: Breakfast of Graduates."

To do this, purchase boxes of Wheaties and have your students alter them, or provide them the art supplies to create mock-ups.

Use a digital camera, have students take head shots then transfer them to your computer. Next, print the pictures and have students add them to the cereal boxes.

This activity is a lot of fun and potentially inspirational. Plus, it's hard to stay sour and negative about school when you are involved in a fun project like this.

Put Your Shirt to Work

In this issue, we've already discussed putting your walls and doors to work. If you're a teacher, now it's time to put your clothing to work too.

You're going to love this unusual behavior management strategy.

Create buttons or stickers that say "Call Me Banker" or "Don't Call Me Teacher" and attach to your shirt.

Inevitably, students will ask why your button or sticker makes such a bogus claim. Reply by noting that since graduates earn $329,000 more than dropouts, you prefer to be called "Banker."

iPod Planet

This is one of my favorite student behavior management interventions ever.

Like many people who work with children and adolescents, you probably don't know which you hate more: iPods in class or cell phones in class.

Instead of waging a constant battle against distracting technology, prevent problems before they start.

First, have students make a list of The Worst Places to Use Your iPod or The Worst Places to Use Your Cell Phone. Include suggestions like "during surgery" and "at church." Be sure to include your site on the list.

Post the lists on the wall, then warn students that they will face unimaginable consequences if they use their iPod or phone in class. Be sure to convey this message using humor because students will face humorous sanctions.

Students will be required to switch to an obsolete version of the offending device for the rest of the class or day. So the iPod will be traded for a cassette player or clunky 8 track tape player. The cell phone will be traded for a dial phone.

The trades should be done using lots of humor to ensure that you avoid the usual power struggles that iPods and cell phones can normally cause.

If you don't have ancient cassette players and phones at home, you can pick them up inexpensively in thrift shops. Students are often intrigued to use low tech technology like dial phones that they may not have seen or heard of before; that intrigue can even distract them from arguing.

Ultimately, students who use prohibited devices will come to expect that they will have to trade their cute little iPod for a dusty, over-sized record player.