Guidelines for Classroom Management for elementary students

Give kids the opportunity to set and reaffirm expectations.
Encourage all of your students to help you build classroom expectations. This will generate more buy-in than simply telling them what they’re not allowed to do. This may be accomplished by prompting conversation with the following questions:
What kind of learning environment do you want to learn in?
What are some expected behaviors that you want to see from your classmates in our classroom?
What are some unexpected behaviors that you do not want to see from your classmates in our classroom?
This may seem like you’re setting yourself up for failure, but you may be shocked at the strictness of some proposed expectations students will bring up at any grade level. For example, in my second-grade class, students have come up with some of the following expectations:
Treat others the way they want to be treated (the platinum rule).
Listen when others are speaking.
Always be responsible in class by doing your work.
Be respectful when someone thinks differently than you.
Show kindness to others.
Regardless, having a discussion should lead to a cohesive set of four to five expectations for your classroom culture. By hanging it up on the wall, it will serve as a reminder of the agreement made between educator and students.
Model ideal behavior
Make a habit of demonstrating behavior you want to see, as modeling effectively teaches students how to act in different situations. For example, during curricular teaching moments, model what to do with a question you have and how to navigate the classroom with that inquiry. Setting up a classroom reward system for positive behavioral demonstrations will also help to bring light to examples of expected behaviors.
All classroom management system is based on the book My Mouth Is a Volcano! by Julia Cook, which I think each teacher should read to their students on the first day of school. Each student starts with three volcanoes. Students take off a volcano after receiving a warning for unexpected behaviors. At the end of the day, they get a point for each volcano that remains. They can also earn points for showing accountability, responsibility, compassion, and engagement throughout the day. They can also re-earn their volcanoes by correcting behaviors before the end of the day. The three volcanoes reset each morning. In the end, students can exchange their points for prizes or rewards.
Whether you are modeling or redirecting student behaviors, be sure to:
Use polite language
Maintain eye contact
Explain clearly what your expectations are
State when unexpected behaviors occur and what you hope to see from students moving forward
Ultimately, when it comes to classroom management for new teachers, your modeling and rapport with the students will be the deciding factors in making you a more effective educator.
Developing an effective classroom management plan at the high school level requires an entirely different mindset than one might apply for younger students.
As seasoned educators of high school students know, teenagers are experiencing rapid changes at both the physical and mental level. Their hormones are out of whack. They may be overly concerned with their social status, anxious about peer pressure, and feel awkward and uncomfortable in their own bodies. According to the National Institute of Mental Health the teenage brain has a great deal of “plasticity,” or the ability to grow and adapt—yet teens are more likely to experience stress and to need more sleep than children and adults.
The lingering effects of the pandemic may have also left high school students feeling depressed or isolated, further compounding the challenges that any typical teenager faces. It’s no wonder that such students may be distracted—and may sometimes present behavioral issues that can throw teachers for a loop.
How can we best guide these students through their high school years, helping them to maintain focus and grow socially, emotionally, and academically? Having a high school classroom management plan in place prior to the first day of school is key. And focusing on positive reinforcement, building relationships, and creating a safe and supportive culture—rather than enforcing punitive consequences and rigid rules—is what many teachers say works best.