marble jar

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Home : 2003 : September : 20

marble jar
By Katy

I have a very well behaved class in most ways except they are very loud. My problem is that they have learned to response to the lights going off or clapping (repeat my pattern) and when they simply hear a teacher's voice,
they ignore it. (and they often don't hear it because it's too loud!)
A colleague of mine suggested a marble jar and it has already started to work. I figured out how many "blocks" there were in the day: morning work, reading workshop, math, lunch, etc. Each block where the whole class uses indoor voices and responds to my directions very quickly, they earn a SCOOP of marbles. I

added up the total # of blocks over the week. Let's say there are 50. I expect children to earn scoops 40 out of those 50 blocks. If they do, they will have filled the jar and therefore receive a class reward on Friday. This is what helped me decide what size jar to buy. If they don't earn enough scoops to fill the jar, it will carry over to the next week and they might earn a prize on Monday or Tuesday. It's important not to give them a scoop unless they really earn it or the behavior won't change. And I never take away marbles. The poor choices children make don't take away the good ones they have made in the past. The rewards I give are: an extra recess, a movie (a short one) or they can wait for the next time they fill the marble jar and get a movie with popcorn, buying a new game or puzzle for the classroom, not giving one of the homework assignments, etc.