Five Documentation Strategies that Work, Part Three: Making Documentation Work for You

September 12th, 2008 By: Diane Trim in Articles, Teachers' Corner

This last installment contains two tips for improving classroom management and discipline through documentation.

Friday phone calls. This isn’t really a documentation technique, but I did document it in my computer grading program (see part two of this series) and it was very useful.

Let’s say on Tuesday I write an office referral for noisy Phillip. Phillip came back to class on Wednesday and has been trying to live the good life in my class: appropriate talking, on task, and complete assignments.
It’s now Friday and Phillip is facing a weekend at home because he’s grounded. I pull Phillip aside when he walks in the classroom and tell him that I’m going to be looking for good behavior today. If he behaves like a model citizen, we’ll make a phone call to Mom after class and tell her about his shiny new behavior. He can watch me make a note on his computer record about his behavior and another note about the phone call. He might even salvage his weekend.

It works like a charm. Phillip is so good, he’s almost smarmy. He’s not disruptive, though, so we make the phone call and the note. I see Phillip at the football game and he gives me a small wave.

I can’t take credit for this one, either. I think one of my seniors, Patrick, suggested this scheme to me one Friday. It worked so well, I made it my Friday routine.

Missing work slips. Handling missing work can be troublesome. Students who are out for multiple days or habitually miss a class a week make record keeping a nightmare.

I created a two-part carbonless half-sheet While you were out form that I kept at the front of the room. When I took roll, I placed a form, a paperclip, and a fun-sized chocolate bar on some lucky person’s desk. In exchange for the treat, the student filled out the checklist according to the assignments I had on the board. The student paper clipped any handouts to the sheet, initialed the bottom, and gave it to me at the end of class.

When the absent student returned, I put the date that all items were due on the form, she initialed the bottom as a receipt, and I gave her the top copy. I speared the bottom copy on a spindle I kept on my desk.
If I ever had to refer to that student’s make up work, the due date, or anything else related to the make-up work, I could just look at the yellow copy on my desk. I never filed these because questions didn’t come up that often. The ones in question were usually at the top of the spindle, so I could leaf through them pretty easily.

Contribute! Feel free to share your own documentation tips with me and others at InsideTheSchool.com. Leave your solutions in the comments section.

Tags: absent, documentation, phone calls