Disrespectful behaviors directed toward the teacher or other students, including repeated tardiness, challenging the teacher and refusal to participate, are a common difficulty in the classroom. This behavior undermines the teacher's authority and makes it impossible for her to manage any students, let alone the disrespectful one. Teachers are taught to quash disrespectful behavior through private discussions with the student and never to discipline the student in front of his peers.
Traditionally, discipline comes in four stages: a reminder of the classroom rules; a warning that the student is disobeying the rules; an infraction slip, which is a formal declaration of the student's infraction; and sending the student to the office.
Dishonest behaviors, such as plagiarism and other forms of cheating, are often more difficult to handle than disrespectful behaviors. Dishonest behaviors undermine the teacher's authority, but they also undermine the honor code that is understood to be in place in the world of academics. Teachers are taught that one of the best ways to manage dishonest behaviors is to make the consequences for such behaviors clear at the outset of the school year.
College instructors have a zero-tolerance policy for cheating, and any student caught cheating is issued an automatic "F" for the first offense and an automatic expulsion from the class for the second offense. Teachers at the secondary and primary levels are taught to have a similar stance on cheating, though expulsion for such an offense is seldom an option.
In their book "The First Days of School," Harry Wong and Rosemary Wong state, "The No. 1 problem in the classroom is not discipline; it is the lack of procedures and routines -- the lack of a plan that organizes a classroom for success." When seeking to manage their classroom effectively, teachers are taught to give their classroom structure. They are taught to break the time spent in class down into a routine that can be fallen back on should the class's focus stray.
An example for such a routine would be: students enter the class and are allowed two minutes to take their seats; attendance is taken; the previous night's homework is collected and discussed; the day's lecture is given and a discussion is held; the day's assignments are passed out, completed and collected; the students' homework is passed out; the students leave the classroom. In a study by Carolyn Evertson of Vanderbilt University, classrooms that followed such procedures and routines were found to have a "consistency in managing student behavior" that was absent in classrooms that lacked this type of structure.
Teachers are also taught a number of management models to help them manage their classroom. The teacher-centered "assertive discipline" model says that the teacher is the sole authority in the classroom and that all classroom expectations are based on his decisions. At the other extreme, the student-focused "discipline with dignity" model asks students to be accountable for their actions and to decide the terms of their punishment. Many instructors are taught to find a medium between these two styles, employing some aspects of both management models.