Behavior Management Charts

Managing the behavior of many students in one class or multiple classes, as many music teachers do, can be exhausting. You lose valuable teaching time dealing with behavior issues. 

A behavior chart is one option for managing the behavior of individual students or an entire class.

Displaying a behavior chart on the wall shows students or the class how they’re doing on any given day. A chart is perfect for visual learners.

Behavior management charts can help limit the number of issues you experience in your class by providing extrinsic motivations for students to follow the classroom rules.
 

FOUR Fantastic Ideas for Positive Behavior Management Charts in the Music Classroom 

1. The Keyboard Chart. The image above shows the design used by Liz Beth for her classes: piano keyboards with clips designating different classes. I also love that she has a set of MTR set of class rules displayed above the charts!  

2. Notes on a Staff. Rob created these behavior management charts for each of the students in his class.

At the end of each class, he goes over his classroom MUSIC rules (did we/you: make good choices, use kind words, show respect, involve ourselves, and care for our room materials and instruments). If the class or students answer “yes” to them all, they earn a music note!       

When they’ve earned FIVE notes, they choose a particular activity. The activity can be: music centers, favorite songs and/or games, a talent show, a musical movie for a lesson, etc.

Rob uses individual behavior charts for his 5th and 6th-grade students. He also increases the goal to ten notes. Rob adds the following to the list of award choices: where they sit or a pick from his prize box.

The ClassDojo website is what Rob uses to add to individual awards. 

3. Katie took the bars of a xylophone as her inspiration.

A speech bubble usually sits next to her xylophone behaviour chart. It says, “Are we hitting the right note yet?” 

The name of each class Katie teachers is written on the mallets that mover up the chart.  

4. The Noteworthy Behavior Chart

Lauren gives all her music classes their own music note.

The note is moved up the staff based on their behavior during class time. When it reaches the top, the class earns a lesson activity reward or one of the school’s reward tickets. The class note is then returned to the bottom of the staff to start again.

I’ve seen many more wonderful ideas for behavior charts over the years. The most important thing to remember if using one is that students/children must feel like they can succeed; they can turn their behaviour around when they have a ‘not so great day’ in class. 

The following behaviour clip chart is available in the MTR TpT store.

Other related MTR posts to read are:

♫ SIX Tips to Gain Students’ Attention in  Your Music Class

♫ 35 Ways to Keep Students’ Attention in the Music Classroom

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