Habits of Mind
Managing Impuslivity
Children who can control their impulses do better in school. Many people believe that basic intelligence plays the most significant factor in childrens' academic achievement. However, researchers from Pennsylvania University found that a child's abilities to self-regulate, pay attention to a task, and inhibit impulsive behavior were far more influential than intelligence for early academic success (Aamodt & Wang, 2012).
Impulse control is not an innate characteristic for many children. It is a learned skill that children must develop over time. A child’s ability to monitor his or her thinking and behavior develops rapidly during the first years of school. Learning to manage impulses is a daily challenge for my kindergarten students. They are frequently faced with the challenges of waiting patiently, keeping their hands to themselves, sitting still, and raising their hands to participate in class. My students are just starting their educational journey, so it is essential that they learn self-impulse management in my classroom. I explicitly teach and reinforce managing impulsivity in my classroom through clear expectations, positive incentives, behavior tracking and predictable consequences so students can learn how to regulate their behavior.
Explicitly Teaching Impulse Management
Young children need direct instruction in how to be responsible, kind, and in control. My students are taught exactly what I expect of them. Managing impulsivity and self-control should be explicitly taught and modeled the same as math or reading lessons.
I teach impulse management directly to students during morning meeting time over the course of the first two months of school. As a class, we discuss the importance of learning how to control our impulses. Here are a few examples of discussion questions:
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Why is it important to finish a task before playing or using a tablet?
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What should you do if you have a friend who won't stop talking during class time?
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When should you tattle on a friend?
These discussions help students think through their impulses and gain self-control.
To teach impulse management, I teach my students the three-step process of stop, think, act. When they are confronted with a choice they must go through all three steps before they continue. During group discussion time, we talk about scenarios where they may be tempted to act impulsively. Students discuss what the appropriate reaction should be so that they can control their impulses.
Since students learn a lot about impulse control by watching others, I purposefully model appropriate ways to wait patiently and tolerate delayed gratification. I Point out impulse control techniques that I'm using by saying things like, "I'd really like to be playing on the computer right now but I'm going to finish my work first so I don't run out of time."
Teaching students self-talk plays a major role in helping kids manage their impulsive behavior. Showing students healthy self-talk by saying things like, "This is a long line but we have to wait patiently for our turn." gives them references for how they should be looking at situations. I talk to myself out loud to teach my students how to develop an internal dialogue that will help manage impulses.
To the left, you will see an anchor chart I used to explicitly teach impulse management and examples of my students work from the lesson.
Reinforcing Impulse Management
Clear Daily Expectations
During our daily morning meeting, I write the day’s schedule on the whiteboard and erase items as my students complete each task. This gives my students a sense of what they will be expected to accomplish during the day. When any changes to our usual routine arise, I provide my students advance notice so they can devise a plan in their head for how they will deal with the changes.
I issue frequent alerts as the end of an activity draws near.
Giving the class a five-minute warning, and then a two-minute warning is a way to improve students impulsivity to get distracted or quit a task. It also helps ease the transition from one activity to the next.
I use a Time Timer in my classroom to help students assess how much time is left on a task, independent reading, a test, or a break. As the timer counts down and students can see the color on the stopwatch-like timer disappearing. Students know that their hands must be on their head when the bell rings. Individual must manage their need to finish an assignment with their want to talk with a friend next to them. Students are given clear deadlines for assignments that they must to value and meet. Using a time timer is the way I introduce my students to the fact timed tests and limits are part of life and teach them how to react appropriately.
To the right is an example of the daily schedule that my students receive during morning message.
Below is the time timer I use in my classroom to help students manage their impulses and to stay on task to finish assignments.
Above you will see my voice level chart. This chart helps students understand clear noise expectations.
To the right, you will see my classroom visuals that let students communicate needs without talking.
Impulse Management Classroom Visuals
Classroom visuals remind my students of our impulse management goals of having limited interruptions during class time. These visuals strengthen and promote my students' growth in managing their impulses. For example, I consistently use our voice levels chart, so that my students have a visual reminder of what voice level they should be using. Students have developed norms around when it is appropriate to use a shouting voice and when they should use a whisper voice levels. For example, during independent work time, students manage their impulsivity to speak loudly to their neighbor, and instead use a voice level of 1 to whisper. My students have shown growth in managing impulsivity by controlling their voice level, and knowing how and when to ask questions and share thoughts.
Each day, I record whether each student has goals met classroom goals and expectations onto the child's daily report card. Parents review the daily report card with their child and sign it as a part of their homework responsibilities. This tool allows a child’s parents to monitor their student's progress towards academic and behavioral goals. The daily report card also gives the child a chance to earn rewards.
Young children do not understand or tolerate ambiguity. Using a daily report card provides structure, and encourage home-school communication every day. By providing students with clear expectations and following through with consistent rewards and consequences my class is able to keep moving in the right direction.
By using the daily report card I am able to eliminate problem behaviors that interfere with a child’s academic success.
Teacher Reflection
Students who can manage their impulses can successfully stand in line, wait their turn when playing a game, and think before they act. They also tend to have more success with their peers because they're able to resist peer pressure and solve problems successfully. Impulse control contributes to academic success as well. Children who can control their impulses are better able to think about their answers before writing them down, and they have better critical thinking skills to solve problems. They can tolerate more frustration when solving problems as well. For these reasons, when it comes to academic achievement self-control is extremely important.
As my students grow in impulse management, they will not only achieve more in my class, but also build valuable life skills. Strong impulse management leads to higher work efficiency and productivity. My goal as an educator is to prepare my students for college, careers, and help create a passion for a lifetime of learning. Due to the emphasis I place on the Habit of Mind of impulse management, and there are fewer classroom disruptions. This means we are able to spend more time learning and can cover material faster. Through the explicit teaching and reinforcement of managing impulsivity, my students are on track to meet the end of the year reading goals two months early.
References:
Aamodt, S., & Wang, S. (2012). Welcome to your child's brain: How the mind grows from conception to college. New York: Bloomsbury.
Costa, A. L., & Kallick, B. (2000). Describing 16 Habits of Mind. Retrieved from http://www.habitsofmind.org/sites/default/files/16HOM2.pdf
Johnson, B., Rutledge, M., Poppe, M., & Vermont Consultants for Language and Learning. (2005). Appendix C: Pre- and post-assessments of Habits of
Mind. In Habits of Mind: A curriculum for community high school of Vermont students (pp. 101–104). Retrieved from http://www.chsvt.org/wdp/Habits_of_Mind_Curriculum_VT_WDP.pdf