Florence Elementary uses Positive Behavior Interventions and Supports (PBIS) as our primary approach to managing behavior. PBIS prioritizes prevention of undesirable behaviors by developing routines, procedures and expectations and by giving students opportunities to practice desired behaviors.
To help students remember our schoolwide expectations, we developed the acronym ROCK. ROCK stands for:
R- Respect self and others!
O- Own your actions; be responsible
C- Character Counts
K- Keep expectations high; be ready!
Each of these expectations may look slightly different in different parts of the building. Therefore, we created posters (left) to help students remember how to ROCK in different parts of the building.
ClassDojo is a communication platform used by many schools across the country. One of the things it communicates is daily behavior. Teachers can reward students by adding or taking away behavior points. Ideally, students should receive 4 positive to 1 negative dojo.
Students who receive an overall ratio of 95% positive to negative points each month earn a spot on our "PBIS Honor Wall" in the cafeteria hallway. Students on this wall receive a monthly incentive for the hard work that led to them being on the wall.
Our entire approach to behavior is to emphasize learning opportunities whenever a student exhibits a negative behavior. This includes reteaching expected behaviors with the goal of reducing instances of the same problem behavior repeating itself. To this end, teachers may assign classroom level consequences for repeated instances of inappropriate behaviors. These consequences should always include a restorative and instructional component. Teachers should always communicate with parents about these behaviors and their consequences. Classroom level consequences may include:
- conference with teacher, student success coach or counselor
- writing an apology letter
- completing a reflective assignment
- alternate seating arrangement in classroom
- eating lunch in office or with student success coach
- walking laps during recess, sitting on playground bench during recess or meeting with student success coach during recess
If classroom level consequences are not effective and the student is referred to the office, an administrator will contact parents and determine consequences. Administrative consequences will also always involve a restorative and/or instructional component. Administrator-assigned consequences could include any listed above, as well as:
in-school suspension (student spends day in student success coach's room completing classwork and restorative/instructional assignments)
after-school or before school detention
out-of-school suspension
For more information about the behavior management process at Florence Elementary, please contact principal Ryan Burch (ryan.burch@boone.kyschools.us).