The Case against Behavior Charts

As the school year begins, many teachers, particularly new teachers, spend a lot of time setting up their classrooms. Besides reading areas, classroom libraries, small group material and supply buckets, rocking chairs and classroom rugs, many teachers set up behavior charts. They can be quite cute and colorful! They may resemble race tracks, stop lights, clip up/clip down charts, and use clothespins, stickers, markers, magnets and more. But consider this:

• Any chart assumes that students are going to misbehave. What message might that send?

• Behavior charts can track behavior, but they do not actually change it. How might they worsen undesirable behaviors when students are publicly identified as "bad" or underperforming?

Charts can be quite demoralizing and embarrassing, especially for kids who have difficulty understanding or conforming to cultural expectations of school, such as kids with Asperger's, Autism, ADHD, and other behavior disorders. How can they be successful when their success can only be tracked by a chart?

Furthermore, when students see exceptions being made or ways for these students to earn their way back to a "good" position, it can be confusing and discouraging to the students who have made choices in line with the teachers expectations all along. They may see the chart as a farce, as an means to mock their classmates, or an opportunity to push the boundaries themselves. What might happen if students begin to notice that the teacher can't actually mark all of the negative behaviors on the chart (because ultimately no one can catch all undesirable behaviors or have the time to mark them).

Instead of a behavior chart, what are ways that a teacher can encourage productive behaviors, minimize off-target behaviors and, ultimately, encourage students to focus on the exciting activities and learning to be had? Instead of behavior charts, consider:

• getting to know the source of the behaviors you wish to to stop. Is your student struggling with the assignment, a classmate, lack of sleep, hunger, emotional or physical challenges or something else? How can you address the cause of the behavior first?

• examining your lesson more closely. Does the lesson require prerequisite knowledge that students don't have including content, skills, or even social skills? Does the lesson have a lot of materials that tempt experimentation and play without appropriate introductory exposure? Does the lesson capture their interests, bring meaning to their lives, or provide opportunities to serve or perform?

• creating a personalized behavior plan for individual students who are struggling more acutely than their peers?

• building relationships with the students that allow them to ask you questions, fail without fear or make them want to make you proud?

Ultimately, behavior charts do not address the importance of developing intrinsic motivation, and emphasize extrinsic motivation, which only creates students who will make choices based on whether they get something out of it or whether they fear punishment.

Read more on this topic from some of these great resources:

• https://www.pbs.org/newshour/education/column-hey-teachers-please-stop-using-behavior-charts-heres

• http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/sept18/vol76/num01/Tear-Down-Your-Behavior-Chart!.aspx

• https://www.edutopia.org/discussion/when-behavior-charts-dont-work-throw-them-out

jlh 8/12/19