Henrietta and I took a trip to the teacher store today which is still a super fun part of teaching for me. Of course, rumor has it that due to budget constraints we will not be getting the $150 Teacher's Choice reimbursement for our expenses that we've gotten in years past. But I think what I bought will be a worthwhile investment anyhow: I bought supplies to create a LERNO tree!
LERNO is a behavior management system that Sunny started using at her old school. She taught me how to do it and I tried it out at the end of last year when the kids were getting antsy, and it works better and is easier to do than anything else I've tried.
How it works (and the reason why it's called LERNO) is that each section of the tree corresponds with a letter of LERNO-- at the top, the sky is L, for leadership. The branches are E for effort. The trunk is R for ready. Below that in the roots is N for needs improvement, and the very bottom layer of dirt is O for off-track.
Each student gets a leaf that corresponds with their class number-- (Sunny's version is stars in the sky.) At the beginning of the week the kids start in the middle on "ready" because everyone is expected to come to class ready to learn. If they behave well, they get to move their leaf up, if they misbehave, they move it down. If they have a bad day, they get to reset back to "ready" the following day. The kids keep track of their scores for the week on a paper that goes home at the end of the week and must be signed by their parents.
Also, if they are in the dirt for more than a day or two, I contact the parents. If they are in the branches or sky for an entire week, then they earn a prize.
It's cool because it's a visual reminder of where they stand, and the cluster teachers or subs can use it too, so the kids are accountable for their behavior even if I'm not there. Sending the LERNO charts home is a good way to communicate regularly with the parents about behavior so there are no surprises come report cards. Plus it's a regular way of giving positive feedback to the kids who are always doing what they're supposed to.
Cool, huh?
No comments:
Post a Comment