Promote positive behavior by stocking your classroom with rewards. Toys and candy give children incentive to perform well. Since many students respond to positive reinforcement better than they do criticism and punishment, prizes meet students' needs to be rewarded for good behavior, resulting in maximized productivity in the classroom. Rewards can include an extra five minutes at recess for an elementary school class that works together well. Offer high school students extra credit for putting additional effort into assignments.
Request a teacher's assistant from your school. An aid will allow you to meet the needs of children who require extra help in mastering new skills and completing tasks. An assistant can be especially helpful in large classes where a single teacher may struggle to give every student fair and adequate attention. If your school does not have the budget to hire someone, ask high school students to serve as aids in classrooms of younger children. This will give elementary-age students positive role models and can help teens fulfill community service hours many schools require for graduation.
Establish consistent systems regarding homework, discipline and work schedules. Assign a similar amount of homework every night and clearly establish the consequences for failing to complete assignments. Strictly enforce these guidelines without exceptions. This will let you meet their needs for regularity and predictability. Many students thrive with consistent discipline and expectations as this order gives them a sense of importance and accountability. It will also help you keep a well-ordered classroom, since children are less likely to feel compelled to test the boundaries of rules that are clearly stated and always maintained.
Equip their learning space with plenty of school supplies. Meet their most basic needs for academic success by ensuring that they never want for pencils, paper, folders, art supplies and tools such as calculators. Enrich lessons by encouraging students to use multiple mediums to communicate what they have learned. For example, drawing a frog's life cycle in crayon can be more fulfilling and creative than writing it out in sentence form. Establish a policy where students can ask you for supplies privately or use communal items in case their families cannot afford to equip them.
Provide your class with a reprieve from drills and lessons by allowing them to play learning games. Games meet students' needs for variety in learning activities. Adventures such as a scientific scavenger hunt improve their cooperation by adding fun to their day and make them more likely to enjoy learning. Enact math games such as relay races, in which students must correctly complete problems before their team can move on to the next activity. Combine games with rewards as well.
Stock your classroom with a variety of academic and imaginative resources such as books, maps, movies, music recordings and photographs. A stimulating environment that permits access to multiple mediums addresses the needs of children who learn in different ways. Diverse classroom resources will also appeal to students with varied interests. For example, a biology poster will enrich the experience of a child who is a visual learner with an interest in science.