Music Class News

Teacher Ease (also called Common Goal)

This year the teachers at Sherman Elementary are using a program called Teacher Ease. This program will house all kinds of information from assignments and grades to lunch counts and attendance to behavior incidents. All music grades and assignments can be viewed on TeacherEase. In addition to this, I will be utilizing the Behavior Log part of the program for discipline this year.

Here's how it works:

• 1. The first time a student breaks a rule in music class, I will remind them of the rule and ask them to correct their behavior.

• 2. The second time a student breaks a rule in music class, I will have a short discussion with them to determine the cause of the behavior. If something needs to be addressed we will fix it at this step before it escalates any further.

• 3. The third time a student breaks a rule in music class, I will issue a written warning (first written warning) through the Teacher Ease program. It will send out an email to the parents/guardians of the student, as well as, attach to the student's profile that is viewable by all of his or her teachers and administration.

• The fourth time a student breaks a rule in music class, I will issue a second written warning in the same way from the Teacher Ease program. In addition to the email that goes out to parents (a copy of the behavior log in Teacher Ease), I will also make a phone call home to discuss what we can do to help the student correct his/her behavior.

• The fifth time a student breaks a rule in music class, I will issue a discipline referral from Teacher Ease and the student will be sent to the principal. The administration will deal with the issue from here.

New Reward System

I am also rolling out a whole new reward system this year for good behavior that the students and I are pretty excited about! We will no longer have a competition between classes of each grade level for a big prize at the end of the year. Instead, our good behavior rewards will work two ways. First, students will be rewarded for their individual good behavior with Smith Spots. Then, students will work as a class to earn rewards through Raffle Tickets.

Smith Spots

Each day that a student doesn't break any rules in music class, they will earn a Smith Spot. They will be marker stamps on a class chart kept in my binder. The spots will accumulate throughout the year. Each student can then redeem their spots for different privileges in music class. For example, students can pay to line up first or choose an instrument first. They might also choose to pay to switch assigned seats with a friend for a day or even sit on the floor for the duration of class.

Raffle Tickets

Raffle tickets are for whole class good behavior. If no one breaks any rules for a whole music class, the class will get one raffle ticket. The raffle tickets will be posted on the wall inside my classroom door for students to track their progress. Once a class gets to ten raffle tickets, they can redeem them for a fun day in music class. The students have compiled a list of activities and games they enjoy. These ideas are written on a slip of paper and placed in a jar. Once the ten tickets are earned, I will draw an idea from the jar and that is what we will do during music class.