There are two possible activities in today’s exercise. You can either rewrite your classroom rules or try new ways to communicate your current classroom rules to your students. Use the guidelines on pages 83-84 of 31 Days to Becoming a Better Religious Educator to rewrite or better communicate your classroom rules.
Check with some of your colleagues to see what kind of rules and consequences they have in place. In my most recent CCD class, I had the following rules:
Mr. Dees’ Classroom Rules
- Raise your hand and wait for permission to speak. (Symbol: hand raised)
- Raise your hand to get out of your seat. (Symbol: hand raised + seat)
- Keep your hands to yourself. (Symbol: hands held together)
- Work quietly at your desk. (Symbol: shh-ing fingers)
- Do not eat, drink, or chew gum in the room. (Symbol: food)
I used the symbols as a way to help students remember the rules throughout the year. I could show the symbols and the students would be able to remember the rules. This helped a lot since we only met once per week and it was often easy to forget the way the classroom was run.
Classroom Rules Resources
Check the following resources for some additional resources on setting classroom rules:
- Scripture-based Classroom Rules
- Evangelizing Discipline by Joe Paprocki
- Harry Wong’s The First Days of School: How to Be an Effective Teacher
