Practice Cards

Practice CardsA Powerful Addition to Whole Brain Teaching’s

Classroom Management System

Jay Vanderfin

Yucaipa, CA

WholeBrainTeaching.com

Practice Cards, copyright 2009, Jay Vanderfin 2

>> Contents

Introduction 4

What are Practice Cards? 5

More Ways To Use Practice Cards 12

Practice Cards and WBT’s

Classroom Management System 18

Advance Rules Sheet 23

Practice Cards Summary 27

Practice Cards Samples 29

Notes Home Samples 32

For more information about Whole Brain Teaching or our products contact

Jay Vanderfin

[email protected]

or visit our website at

WholeBrainTeaching.com


>> Introduction

WHOLE BRAIN TEACHING (WBT) is a grassroots education

reform organization founded by three Southern California

instructors (Chris Biffle, Jay Vanderfin, Chris Rekstad) in 1999.

Since then, we have presented free teaching seminars to over

7,000 educators representing over 300,000 students. Our

websites are visited over 2,000 times per day; WBT videos on

YouTube and TeacherTube have received over 700,000 views.

Whole Brain Teaching is one of the fastest growing education

reform movements in the United States.

For more information about our movement and to access

hundreds of pages of free downloads, visit our website:

WWW.WholeBrainTeaching.com


1/ What are Practice Cards?

There are many excellent classroom management systems

but one of the most popular uses color cards to underscore a

students’ positive or negative actions. Here is a sample of how

the cards are coordinated with student behavior:

Green card: student had a great day

Gray Card: student receives a warning

Purple card: student receives a time out

Red card: student is given a note to take home

Black card: student is sent to the principal’s office

Not all color card systems are the same but they generally

follow a similar pattern. Colors are used to identify an ascending

set of consequences for inappropriate activity. There are two

problems with this system. First, students aren’t told specifically

what they need to work on. Second, all the cards but one indicate

negative actions.


To solve these problems, I came up with Practice Cards. I

created one card for each of Whole Brain Teaching’s five

classroom rules. These rules are:

Rule 1: Follow directions quickly.

Rule 2: Raise your hand for permission to speak.

Rule 3: Raise your hand for permission to leave your seat.

Rule 4: Make smart choices.

Rule 5: Keep your dear teacher happy!

Each Practice Card (see page 29 for samples) is printed with

one of the classroom rules. Thus, there is a set of Practice Cards

labeled, Rule 1: Follow directions quickly. Another set of Practice

Cards is labeled Rule 2: Raise your hand for permission to speak

... and so forth. When students break a classroom rule, the

teacher places a Practice Card for that rule in their pocket on a

pocket chart at the front of the room.


Let’s see how Practice Cards work for our imaginary, but

wonderful, Whole Brain Teacher, Mrs. Maestra, and one of her

challenging students, Juana.

Juana has a common problem; she often speaks without

raising her hand. Frequently during the day, Juana breaks Rule 2:

Raise your hand for permission to speak.

Whenever Mrs. Maestra believes Juana needs to practice

following Rule 2, she places a Rule 2 Card in Juana’s slot on the

pocket chart. The advantage to Mrs. Maestra is obvious. She

doesn’t have to stop teaching to address Juana’s problem. Mrs.

Maestra simply continues with her lesson, while she picks up a Rule

2 card and places it in Juana’s envelope on the chart. If Mrs.

Maestra has several disruptive students who are breaking a

variety of rules, she never has to wonder at recess who needs to

practice following which rule ... she simply looks at the cards she

has placed in the pocket chart.

The Practice Card is also an advantage to Juana. She is not

“bad,” she simply needs additional practice in following a rule.

Juana is not scolded by Mrs. Maestra, neither of them like a


scolding session, she merely receives additional time to focus on a

problem she is having with a specific behavior.

And so, what does Juana do at each recess and lunch? She

sits at a desk with a kitchen timer in front of her; for two minutes

she raises her hand over and over, while she whispers, “Rule 2:

Raise your hand for permission to speak.” Try this yourself for

two minutes to see what a powerful effect it has! Two minutes of

hand raising and whispering feels like forever. If one arm gets

tired, raise the other!

While Juana is practicing Rule 2, Mrs. Maestra is free to

engage in whatever work she wishes. If Mrs. Maestra has yard

duty, then Juana sits on a bench outdoors and practices following

the rule she broke. Later in the year, Mrs. Maestra has the option

of increasing the amount of time spent practicing a rule to three

minutes, four minutes, and so forth.

If Juana refuses to practice the rule, then Mrs. Maestra does

not quarrel with her. Mrs. Maestra simply doubles the amount of

recess minutes that Juana misses.


Mrs. Maestra believes, along with contemporary brain

researchers, that it is not the size of the penalty, but its

frequency that changes behavior. It is more effective for

students to have five short practice sessions, than one long one.

Thus, it is Mrs. Maestra’s principle that even on Juana’s worst day,

she never receives more than two Practice Cards. If four minutes

of hand raising and whispering doesn’t motivate Juana, then eight

or 10 minutes will be no better. Mrs. Maestra knows it is a long

year; in September she gives her students two minutes of

practice, understanding that late in the spring, she made need to

double, or even triple the rehearsal period.

When Juana receives a Practice Card, this also means she will

receive a note that goes home to her parents (see page 32).

This note informs parents about the rule that the student needs

to work on, and encourages them to have the child practice at

home(!) In most cases, the Practice Card stays in the student’s

pocket chart, until the note comes back from home signed. Thus,

Juana is highly motivated to bring Mrs. Maestra evidence that her

parents have read the note.


Luckily for Juana and other challenging kids, Mrs. Maestra is a

realist. She knows some parents will follow through and some

parents won’t. Juana’s parents are very involved in their child’s

education; they can be depended to do anything the school asks

of them, including promptly signing notes. And so with Juana, Mrs.

Maestra is quite strict about keeping the Practice Card in Juana’s

card pocket, until she receives the signed note from the girl’s

parents. However, Jack is a different story. Jack’s parents are

space cases. Mrs. Maestra knows, realistically, there is no chance

in the world that Jack can get his folks to do anything to support

his education. Mrs. Maestra cuts Jack a special deal. She takes

her troubled student aside after he fails to bring a note back from

his parents two days in a row and says, “Jack, I know you want to

do your best. If you’ll guarantee me that you’ll work hard today

on following the rule you’re having problems with, I’ll pull your

Practice Card out of your slot on the pocket chart.”

To sum up, students receive Practice Cards, never more than

two, whenever the teacher decides they should spend time at

recess and lunch practicing a rule they have broken. The practice


involves two minutes, initially, of repeatedly whispering the rule

and making a gesture that reinforces the rule. The cards are not

viewed as punishment, only as an opportunity for additional

rehearsal. If students refuse to practice, they are not scolded

but the time lost at recess is doubled. The Practice Card stays in

the student’s card pocket until a signed note is brought home

from the parent. Students whose parents are unreliable are given

a special deal by the instructor; their Practice Card can be

removed even if a note is not returned from home.


2/ More Ways To Use Practice Cards

After I had been using Practice Cards for several months, I

realized that they could be used in two additional ways, as

rewards for good behavior and as prompts for in-class practice of

individual rules.

I made three sets of Practice Cards; each card, remember,

has one of the five classroom rules. White cards I used as

described above, to signal that a student needed time to

rehearse a rule. Purple cards (I call them Wisdom cards) became

rewards for good behavior. Green cards were placed on a

student’s desk and guided in-class rule practice.

Here’s how the whole system worked for Mrs. Maestra.

When Juana was having problems with a rule, she received

one, or at most, two white cards. She stayed in two to four

minutes at recess to practice the rule she had broken. After this

had been going on for several weeks (or even longer) Mrs.

Maestra reinvigorated her system by introducing purple cards.


When Mrs. Maestra noted that Juana was doing a good job of

following a rule, she put a purple card in Juana’s pocket chart. A

purple card canceled the effect of a white card; Juana was always

highly motivated to get back on track and earn a purple card when

she knew she had practice time ahead. If Juana managed to end

the day with one or more purple cards (and no white cards) then

Mrs. Maestra sent a congratulatory note home to Juana’s parents

(see page 32 for samples).

As the year unfolded, Mrs. Maestra saw that Juana’s number

of white cards decreased and her purple cards increased ... but

the troubled girl needed additional guidance. It was not enough

that Juana knew the rule, had practiced it over and over, and was

taking positive and negative notes home. Juana needed help in

class ... she needed practice actually following the rule when

surrounded by the normal lively atmosphere of a classroom full of

students. To address this issue, Mrs. Maestra put a green

Practice Card on Juana’s desk. The card was labeled with the rule

Juana needed to focus on; in her case it was almost always Rule 2,

raise your hand for permission to speak.


Mrs. Maestra explained the green cards to Juana as follows,

“You’re doing a great job with the Rule 2 and I really appreciate

the effort you have put into practicing. I love to give you purple

cards because I want you and your parents to know when you are

excelling in classroom behavior. So, here is a green Rule 2 card.

Each time during class you actually raise your hand for permission

to speak, I want you to make a star on the green card. At the

end of the day, I’ll look at how many stars you have accumulated

on the green card, showing that you have been following the rule.

If I think you have been doing a good job ... and I really want

consistency ... raising your hand for permission to speak and not

breaking this very important rule, then you’ll have a good chance

of earning a purple card.”

Thus, green cards guide student practice in class. Juana

now has a chance to apply what she has learned about controlling

her impulse to speak. Her goal is identical to Mrs. Maestra’s, to

see how many times during the day she can follow Rule 2. The

green cards are a simple way of guiding and nourishing her

positive behavior.


It turns out that Juana eventually went overboard with raising

her hand for permission to speak. She so enjoyed making stars

on the green card that could earn her a purple card, that she shot

her hand up at every opportunity. Mrs. Maestra, ever the wise

Whole Brain Teacher, was prepared for this. She took Juana aside

and said, “You are doing fantastic following Rule 2. You are always

raising your hand for permission to speak. But I need you to let

other students follow this rule as well. If you always have your

hand up and focus too much attention on yourself, then that isn’t

fair to others. In fact, I may think you are breaking Rule 4: Make

smart choices. Or even worse, I might feel you were breaking Rule

5: Keep your dear teacher happy. We certainly don’t want to

start getting Practice Cards for those rules! You’ve lost enough

recess time already with Rule 2.”

Several additional points should be noted. When using the

green card, Mrs. Maestra did not say how many stars Juana

needed to make. Nor did she guarantee that a heavily starred

green card would earn Juana a purple card. Mrs. Maestra deeply


believed in one of Whole Brain Teaching’s favorite sayings, “We

use the system. The system doesn’t use us.” Mrs. Maestra

valued the freedom of making decisions based upon her best

intuition as a teacher. She did not want to be confined by an

arbitrary rule like, “If you turn make 10 stars on the green card,

then I’ll give you a purple card.” Mrs. Maestra did not want to be

involved in this kind of bookkeeping for 35 kids. In addition, she

wanted the flexibility of being able to give, or withhold, purple

cards whenever she judged it was the best for her students.

Occasionally, Mrs. Maestra had a student who couldn’t be

relied upon to make stars on the Green Card. Paulie nibbled on his

card; Janey could resist tearing the corners off. In cases like

these, Mrs. Maestra gave the Green Card to a dependable

student, someone who could do excellent work and make a star

whenever the troubled student followed the rule on the card.

Finally, Mrs. Maestra knew that one of the most difficult

aspects of classroom management was to keep the system from

becoming stale. Techniques that worked in September, often had

little effect in January. Thus, she saw the Practice Card system as


having three phases, White Cards, White Cards plus Purple Cards,

White Cards plus Purple Cards plus Green Cards. By stretching

out each phase as long as possible, Mrs. Maestra kept her

students engaged for many months.

In the next chapter, you’ll learn how Practice Cards fit into

the year long WBT classroom management system.


3/ Practice Cards And WBT’s Classroom

Management System

Whole Brain Teaching’s classroom management system is set

up in a series of ever more challenging levels, like a video game.

The levels (completely described at WholeBrainTeaching.com) are:

Level One: The Scoreboard Game

Level Two: Practice Cards

Level Three: The Guff Counter

Level Four: The Independents

Level Five: The Bullseye Game

Level Six: The Agreement Bridge

As you can learn at our website, Level One rewards and

penalizes the class as a whole. When the majority of students are

working hard, then the class earns a point on the Scoreboard;

when too many students are off task, the class loses a point.


Points earn time to play learning games at the end of the day or

week. If the class loses more points than they earn, then extra

homework or lost recess minutes can be a consequence.

Practice Cards, which we introduce at Level Two, address

the behavior of individual students. If Juana is off task or breaking

a classroom rule, she might receive a White Card which gives her

time at recess and lunch to practice following the rule she broke.

Later in the year, if Juana is on task, she might earn a Purple

Practice Card that she can take home to her parents letting them

know about her excellent behavior. Finally, still later in the year,

when Juana needs additional in-class practice, then Mrs. Maestra

might give her a Green Practice Card. Thus, Practice Cards are a

powerful complement to the Scoreboard Game. The latter is used

by the teacher to guide a class as a whole; the former helps

individual kids.

I remember exactly where I was when the Practice Card

System came to me; it was somewhere between clouds 9 and 10.

I believed I had found teacher heaven, until a student saw

something that I missed. I can’t tell you how foolish I felt when a


nine year old discovered a glaring problem.

My dear little Brielle, asked me, “If the class loses the

Scoreboard Game, why should we ALL suffer for a couple of kids

breaking the rules?”

Her point was wonderfully obvious. The Scoreboard

assessed penalties to the class as a whole, but generally it was

only a few kids who were breaking the rule. These kids were

getting Practice Cards ... but their behavior was also pulling down

all their classmates. How could Practice Cards and the Scoreboard

be integrated ... in a way that was equitable for everyone?

After some head scratching, I found a simple solution. If the

class loses the Scoreboard Game, only the students with Practice

Cards receive the penalty (even those who forgot to have their

note signed by their parents). Thus, if the penalty was five extra

homework problems, and the class lost more points than they won

by the end of the day, only students with Practice Cards in their

card pocket chart did the extra homework. Even more motivation

for following classroom rules!


A final note. Look again at the six levels of Whole Brain

Teaching’s classroom management system.

Level One: The Scoreboard Game

Level Two: Practice Cards

Level Three: The Guff Counter

Level Four: The Independents

Level Five: The Bullseye Game

Level Six: The Agreement Bridge

Depending on the teacher’s needs, a class can stay at a

level for a week to several months before moving up. At Level

Two we introduce Practice Cards and assess a two minute

rehearsal time. But what happens to Practice Cards at Level

Three through Six? We keep using them, but increase the

rehearsal time to match the level. At Level Three, students

practice for three minutes; at Level Four, they practice for four

minutes, and so on. This underscores the importance of using a

short practice time when the Practice Cards are first introduced.

As you move up levels, the the system becomes increasingly


challenging, and the Practice Cards become more and more

powerful motivators.


4/ Advanced Rules Sheet

In Whole Brain Teaching, we like to have “a big back pocket.”

We always want to have a large number of fall back options when

a technique needs supplementing. One year, Mrs. Maestra had a

particularly challenging class. In the spring of that memorable

term, she introduced two of her strongest willed students, Paul

and Benny, to the Advanced Rules Sheet.

Here is what she said, “I have a new challenge for the two of

you and I’m very interested in seeing how you respond. It’s called

the Advanced Rule Sheet. From here forward, instead of

practicing a rule at recess, you’ll be going through a more complex

routine. This will give you additional, very specific practice, in

following rules and also in making smart choices.”

She handed the two boys the two sided Advanced Rules

Sheet.


Advanced Rules Sheet

At each recess and lunch, your job is to do each of the following practice procedures FIVE times.

Place a check mark beside each one as it is completed. Thus, when finished, each number below will have five checks.

1. Get out your math book.2. Open to page 147.3. Sit with your hands folded for ten seconds.4. Put your math book away.5. Raise your hand for ten seconds.6. Put your hand down.7. Stand up for ten seconds.8. Sit down.(Begin over at #1 above)

Turn this paper over and answer the questions on the back about making smart choices.

When finished practicing the procedures FIVE times, sign and date this paper and turn it in to your teacher. Use the rest of your recess for a bathroom break and getting a drink of water. If you have time, head over to the playground.

Student____________________________________


Date___________________Smart Choices Practice

Answer each of the following questions in a complete sentence. Be sure to think about what the BEST possible answer would be.

1. What is one smart choice you have made recently?

2. Why do you think it was a smart choice?

3. What is one foolish choice you have made recently?

4. Why do you think it was a foolish choice?


Mrs. Maestra believed the Advanced Rules Sheet was a good

supplement to the Practice Cards. Paul and Benny needed even

more structure than was provided by practicing a single rule at

recess. She wanted the boys completely inside a structure that,

for at least five minutes, canceled their impulsive, unthinking

behavior. Having a detailed set of instructions to follow was a

much stiffer requirement than sitting at a desk and raising their

hand over and over. Also, Mrs. Maestra thought that the boys

needed to spend time each day thinking about the difference

between smart and foolish choices. Often she used their answers

as a prompt for additional discussion with her beloved, but strong

willed boys.


5/ Practice Cards Summary

1. Kids receive a maximum of two White Practice Cards to

practice the rule(s) broken in class. Initially, the practice is for

two minutes per card at each recess and lunch.

2. A note is sent home to parents describing the rule

broken. If the note isn’t signed and returned, kids continue to

practice (unless the teacher decides that the parents can’t be

relied on to sign the note.)

3. Later in the year, Purple Practice Cards are awarded for

positive actions. A note is sent home informing parents about

their child’s excellent behavior.

4. A Purple Practice Card cancels a White Practice Card.

5. Still later in the year, at the teacher’s option, Green

Practice Cards are placed on a student’s desk during class.

Students make a star on the card each time they follow the card’s

rule. At the end of the day, the teacher may decide that the

student’s work with the Green Practice Cards merits a Purple

Practice Card.


6. If the student cannot be relied upon to put stars on the

Green Card, another student may be given this task.

7. If the class loses at the Scoreboard Game, only kids with

Practice Cards receive the negative consequence.

8. Practice Cards are introduced at Level Two of Whole Brain

Teaching’s classroom management system. For each level the

class moves up, an additional minute of practice time is assigned

to the Practice Cards.

9. The Advanced Rules Sheet is used for students who need

highly structure practice time.


6/ Practice Card Samples

Samples of the Rules Cards, using Whole Brain Teaching’s symbols for the five classroom rules are on the following pages. To make a set of white, green and purple Practice Cards, print each symbol (as you might expect) on white, purple or green card stock.




7/ Note Home Samples

Samples of the Practice Note and the Reward Note that

should be sent home to parents are on the following pages. Print

the former on white paper and the latter on purple paper.


Note To Parents: Your Child Needs More Practice

Help!!!!!!!! I need practice. Today at school I broke the circled rule(s). I agreed that all of these rules are fair and I am fully capable of following them. I would never do anything to spite my wonderful teacher or break one of the rules on purpose; therefore, I need you to help me practice.

Family, Please have your child practice the rule at home for as long as you feel necessary. We have practiced at school already, but PRACTICE MAKES PERMANENT! Sign and return this paper tomorrow. If you have any questions, please give me a call or e-mail.

My son/daughter practiced for _____________ minutes at home.

Student_______________ Parent_________________

Date_______


Note To Parents: Your Child Deserves A Special Reward!

I ROCK!!!! Today at school I was a model student following the circled rule(s). My teacher acknowledged me in front of the class for doing such an amazing job and for sharing my wisdom with my classmates!

Family, Please give your child some extra one on one time or a special reward. Your student’s actions today in class were better than expected and displayed strong, virtuous character. Your child was a model of what we look for in our students! If you have any questions, please give me a call or e-mail.

Teacher____________________________

Date____________


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