Classroom Management With Tickets

Hey everyone!

So last time I chatted here, I had accepted a long term, but now I'm a third grade teacher!!!! Woo hooo!

Complicated story, but I took an already existing class, moved them into a different room and started teaching all in a span of a week! I literally had one evening to get my room ready. Yeah.

I've always thought, "I will have a clip chart or card system." I've seen in done in almost every classroom. Then I read some interesting articles and blog posts this summer that had me thinking. Well before you know it, I have my own class and they are talkers and I knew I had to do something. Another teacher was using a ticket system and their previous teacher had one too.

I decided to stick with that ticket system and it's working really well!

How does it work?  Every morning, my helper of the day (they do all my jobs and it's fabulous only having to remember one person's job!) hands out a ticket to each student. They can get tickets for being on task, getting a compliment, or homework being turned in. They can also get them taken away for bad decisions (they came up with that rule for our class constitution!).

 I was also having a problem with everyone having to use the bathroom at a certain time to avoid work and the tickets came into play with this too.   If I'm teaching and they have to go, they give me a ticket.

They can go before school starts at 7:55, during our break in the morning, after specials at 11:10 or during lunch recess at 12:30, so it's not like they don't have chances to go without giving a ticket. I understand there are special circumstances with kids too, I'm aware of that, so no worries.

You'd be surprised how much they cut down on going to the bathroom when they saw that were rewards for the tickets too. Now, their previous teacher had prizes. I personally don't want to have to shell out money, so the only thing I'd buy would be cool pencils and erasers (worth 5 tickets each). For 10 tickets, they can read aloud to the class or  use special pens and paper for the day. 15 tickets gets them a chance to sit with their friends or charge of our music during writing/brain break time. 20 tickets and they get 10 minutes computer time (I currently have no working computers except my own teacher one) or sitting at my desk.

Over time, I will change out the prizes, but they are happy for now. Some don't realize they can save up (we have an economy lesson in the spring, I hope they learn!) and get a bigger prize. I have a few that do and one is close to 20 tickets because she wants to sit at my desk.

They keep their tickets in a little pouch in their desk. They are responsible for them and are quickly learning to write their names on them too. It's been a great thing, this ticket. They're becoming more responsible and are also using their time more wisely.