Classroom Management

Last week my house hosted a day/night festivity that we coined "JungleFest." It was a huge success, and one of the reasons was because my roommate Kyle and I sent out daily emails during the week leading up to the event that contained some humorous classroom management tips. Enjoy!

TIP ONE

Greetings from the Jungle,

Seeing how we are a mere five and a half days from the MOST GLORIOUS EVENT OF 2009, we thought it fitting to email you with an important classroom management tip and a
JungleFact each day of the week leading up to aforementioned event. Please note that the
purpose of this email is purely to educate on classroom management; JungleFacts are only
offered up as a pleasing dessert to the main entree.

CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT TIP ONE: When things seem to going eerily well in your classroom, be aware of your surroundings and take quick action. Choose a random student, call him/her to your desk, and say, very simply, "I know you did something wrong today. What did you do? You don't have to tell me, but I know, and you know I know. And if I hear it from
_______ (insert student's best friend's name here), your consequences will automatically
be raised to a level three."

It doesn't really matter what level three is or if this even makes sense in your current
management scheme, because CNN has trained our youth to associate fear and danger with
continually changing threat levels. The student will honestly tell you everything that
they did in vivid detail--you must simply choose anything they say and deliver harsh
chastisement on a single, specific action. Often this can lead to a stronger bond with
the student, and this tactic has been demonstrated to lead to an increase of student
achievement of 63 points average on the NHTCB Scale of Student Achievement (2nd edition).

JUNGLEFACT: Only 6% of the earth's land mass is classified as "jungle." 1% of this can be
found at 68-268 Olohio St, Waialua, HI, 96791. About 4% is located in Zach DiIonno's
hair, with the remainder spread through Brazil, Costa Rica, and several other countries.

TIP TWO

Greetings from the Jungle,

As we are now only FOUR days from the most Incredible, Glorious, and
Junglyest event of The Millennium, it's time to provide you with
another daily classroom management tip and JungleFact. Please note
that the purpose of this email is purely to educate on classroom
management; JungleFacts are only offered up as a pleasing dessert to
the main entree.

CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT TIP TWO:

Nicknames are an effective way to create a positive culture of
achievement and confidence in the classroom. When students are working
hard and showing mastery as measured by the Smithson-Caulishaw
Remedial Operations Test of Education 4th Edition (SCROTE 4), call
them by a positive nickname that embraces the word "Prime." Successful
examples include Prime Time, Prime Rib, and Optimus Prime. This highly
boosts confidence and also allows you to bypass the process of
learning names, giving you more time to track student mastery.

If data from the SCROTE 4 indicates that certain students are not
demonstrating mastery, simply drop the nickname and call them by the
name of a pet. When they correct you, simply respond, "Sorry for
calling you Dr. Whiskers, but I guess I got you mixed up with my cat,
who scored the exact same score as you on yesterday?s vocabulary
assessment."

JUNGLEFACT: About 57% of all species live in the jungle environments.
This includes creatures such as Greg Teich, Kyle Bond, D. Talevich,
Jess P, and also Amanda Frahm and any military personnel she decides
to associate with.

TIP THREE

Dearest TFA friends--


GREETINGS (YET AGAIN) FROM THE JUNGLE! As we approach the destined day of our most Jungly of Fests, it is time again for another daily classroom management tip. Remember, the point of these emails is purely to educate on classroom management; JungleFacts are only
offered up as a pleasing dessert to the main entree. Without further ado, here is your
Classroom Management Tip Number Three.

Students love personal challenges, and it is an established fact that personal challenges
lead to a spike in student achievement according to the Greschberger-Rottschild
Underachievement Non-Deviated Longitudinal Evaluation (GRUNDLE). Before class gets
underway, gather the class' attention and announce that you have a very special challenge
for a particular student. Then, with the eyes on you, announce the following: "If
__________(insert student name there) can stop themselves from doing that thing they
always do, then the whole class does not have to stay ten minutes after. However, if
___________ does that thing, or makes that face, then everyone has to stay ten minutes
after."

Being vague here works to your advantage; it gives the student time to self-reflect, and,
in some cases, rapidly change an entire range of behaviors based on best guesses as to
which behaviors must be curtailed. To signal that the challenge is real, peek over at the
student intermittently and shake your head gently, as if to suggest their certain failure
and remind them that the fate of the class rests in their critical thinking skills. At
the end of class, hold them for five minutes. It keeps them wondering.

JungleFact: The Amazon anaconda can reach 33 feet in length. This jungly Anaconda,
however, is dwarfed by the Jim anaconda, which can reach 42 feet in length and has been
known to frequent the JungleHouse.

TIP FOUR

Future JungleFest attendees,

THE JUNGLE IS ALIVE WITH THE PROMISE OF SWEET VICTORY. We are a mere day from the sweet JungleTime we've been craving all week. To make sure the Jungle is at it's prime, several members of the JungleFest Planning Team (JFPT) are taking sabbaticals from work tomorrow. The Jungle will be ready--will you?

Without further words, let us move on to another important Classroom Management Tip.
Remember, the point of these emails is to educate about proper classroom management
technique--the JungleFact is simply added as a bonus.

Classroom Management Tip Four:

Nothing is more important than student motivation as aligned with benchmark mastery
tracking. One of the most effective ways to ensure that students are invested in their
content is to make absolutely clear that their self-worth as a person is directly related
to their ability to master the content. It is also important that this information is
related visually to all students (especially our English Language Learners, who may have
difficulty understanding the relationship between the two variables); to that end, you
can create a public chart demonstrating individual student mastery with the accompanying
level of self-worth for that day. If a student masters the benchmark for the class
period, his/her self-worth is visually moved up the chart; if they fail to master the
benchmark, their self-worth is moved down. During self-worth adjustment, it is important
to make clear comments, such as "Congratulations__________(student name), you're worth
more now that you were just 50 minutes ago" and "I'm sorry__________(student name), but
maybe if you had've worked harder you wouldn't be worth this little today." This is an
important investment process for two reasons: one, it demonstrates to the student that
being born does not automatically make you a person of general worth, and two, it shows
the student that she/he is only as important as the benchmarks she/he has mastered. This
technique has led to benchmark mastery increases of up to 40% in several classrooms in
countries with little to no recognition for basic human rights, and is just now finding a
following in American society.

JungleFact Four: The Amazon Jungle has been described as the "lungs of our planet"
because it provides the essential environmental world service of continuously recycling
carbon dioxide into oxygen. On Saturday, allowing yourself to be the breath of life in
the Jungle will lead to a 23% decrease in carbon dioxide, and, ultimately, global
warming. Also, Greg killed a chicken and it's under the house.

TIP FIVE

Aloha Junglites-
You can hear it in the wind, The Kai, and the sounds of The 'Aina.
Junglefest is TOMORROW. Rest up tonight because tomorrow will be epic.
Here is one more classroom management tip followed by a JungleFact.
Remember, the point of these emails is to educate about proper
classroom management--the JungleFact is simply an additional bonus.

CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT TIP 5
A strategy called "Natural Education" (NE) or "Nature Therapy" (NT)
has become a new trend among many teachers. Supporters argue that
incorporating nature into curriculum gives students a soothing and
enriching new medium for learning. However, this stance lacks
conclusive data, and reliable assessments such as the Greenburg
Optimal Assessment To Diagnose Individual Character and Knowledge
indicate that filling a classroom with plants and gerbils and taking
students outside every once in a while actually leads to a 44.4%
decrease in efficiency and a 58.37% drop in content mastery.

While flawed, the concept of NE and NT is at least on the right track.
A new and more effective technique has taken the use of nature in the
classroom to a new, highly successful extreme. Into The Wild Education
(ITWE) is a strategy that sends students out into rugged, uninhabited
parts of the world to fend for themselves and survive (while obtaining
80% mastery of all benchmarks and objectives). As one of the pioneers
of ITWE, Professor Grizzly Adams (St. Louis '95) sent his students out
into the harsh wilderness of the Yukon in the spring of 1998. Equipped
with a pocket knife, 3 quarts of rice, a jar of Gold Bond, and 30
packets containing daily assessments (he laminated them so students
could not use them to make a fire), the students were air-dropped into
the untamed barrens to survive and achieve. The results were gleaming-
the students scored in the 98th percentile on the Colfax-Hammond
Ontological Diagnosis of Effectuation 8th Edition (CHODE 8) and
reached 120% mastery on all benchmarks and objectives (they
successfully taught a pack of transient wolves prime factorization and
fraction multiplication). The most outstanding part of ITWE is that it
complies with the goals and policies of No Child Left Behind, though
Dr. Adams is currently petitioning Congress to change the name of NCLB
to NCLBEOTWWCBTBMIWMLICTBIWRSF (No Child Left Behind Except for One or
Two Who Were Caught By That Bear or Maybe It Was a Mountain Lion, I
Couldn't Tell Because I Was Running So Fast).

JUNGLEFACT
Natural habitats in a jungle are classified among four different
layers: the emergent layer, the canopy, the under-story, and the
forest floor. The JungleHouse also has various layers of habitats that
support a variety of life, with the exception of Greg's bathroom,
which is uninhabitable for even the most durable species, like rats.