Working the Crowd: Behavior Management through Strategic Classroom Arrangement

Abstract

Every day in K-12 classrooms across the country, teachers are struggling to keep their students focused and on task during instructional time. There are hundreds of theories floating around about how to manage a classroom effectively, but nothing is as simple or as effective in engaging students as the physical presence of the teacher (Brophy, 1988). It does not matter if the teacher is six feet or four feet tall, male or female, a soft spoken person, or a forceful one because if done correctly, rarely will a word ever need to be spoken for this strategy to work. This is a strategy made famous by Fred Jones (2007), a nationally known classroom management guru, and is called "working the crowd." There is a popular saying about the value of an ounce of prevention. Taking the time to set up a classroom properly before students ever arrive will result in in a smoothly managed classroom from the first day.