Wouldn't it be nice if your classroom could run like clockwork, with students knowing exactly what to do without constant reminders? In this episode, we’re showing you how to connect your procedures into seamless routines that stick, so everything from morning arrival to end-of-day chaos feels easier. You’ll learn our three-step process (anchor, expand, and reinforce), fun strategies for keeping routines consistent, and the “Core Four” every classroom needs: calm morning starts, orderly hallway movement, smooth transitions, and efficient end-of-day procedures. With these tools, your classroom will practically run itself, freeing you up to focus on teaching and building connections with your students!

Prefer to read? Grab the episode transcript and resources in the show notes here: https://www.secondstorywindow.net/podcast/classroom-routines/

Resources:

• Ladystacks Book Tracker
• Join the Teacher Approved Club!
• Connect with us on Instagram @2ndstorywindow.
• Shop our teacher-approved resources.
• Join our Facebook group, Teacher Approved
• Leave your review on Apple Podcasts!

Related Episodes to Enjoy:

• Episode 48, How to Make Classroom Transitions Simple with Clear Beginning and Endings
• Episode 49, Rapid Classroom Transitions: How to Save 45 Hours a Year
• Episode 50, 3 Guidelines to Make Classroom Transitions Work Smarter Not Harder
• Episode 89, Hallway Behavior Management: 4 Essential Plans for Improving Hallway Classroom Management
• Episode 93, Teacher Morning Routine: 10 Tips for Creating Your Perfect Plan
• Episode 94, A Great Day Before School Even Starts: Your Perfect Teacher Morning Routine at School
• Episode 95, 4 Must-Have Characteristics of Your Classroom Morning Routine
• Episode 120, Supporting New Teachers with Ashleigh From Rainbow Skies for New Teachers
• Episode 160, 4 Dismissal Routine Tips for Teachers to Calm the End-of-Day Chaos
• Episode 173, Getting into the Nitty Gritty of Classroom Procedures and Routines
• Episode 219, How to Build a Classroom Community That Lasts All Year

Mentioned in this episode:

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This is episode 223 of Teacher Approved.

You're listening to Teacher Approved, the podcast helping

educators elevate what matters and simplify the rest. I'm

Heidi.

We're so glad you're tuning in today. Let's get to

And I'm Emily. We're the creators behind Second Story

Window, where we give research based and teacher approved

strategies that make teaching less stressful and more

effective. You can check out the show notes and resources from

each episode at secondstorywindow.net.

the show.

Hey there. Thanks for joining us today. In today's

episode, we are talking about how to turn your individual

procedures into routines that actually stick, and sharing a

teacher approved tip for handling your own routines.

Let's start with a try it tomorrow, where we share a quick

win to help you boost your classroom community. Emily, what

is our suggestion for this week?

Well, if you haven't already, take a couple minutes

during your prep time today to set up a table to track positive

communication for each student. A simple way to do this is to

list students' names down the side and then have a column for

each month. Then it's easy to keep track of which families

you've reached out to recently. Making communication with

families a positive experience and not just something that

happens when there's trouble, can go a long way to

strengthening the school home partnership. And I can vouch for

this from the parent side, that I hate feeling like every time I

see an email from a teacher that something must be wrong. So it

would be great if sometimes it's positive communication as well.

Well, if you like this idea or anything else that we

share on the podcast, would you take a second and give us a five

star rating? Ratings and reviews are one way that new listeners

find us. So really, truly, every rating and review is a huge help

to us.

So if you've been listening for a while, you know

that we are big believers, that almost seems like an

understatement, huge fans of strong classroom procedures. We

have talked a lot about how to design them, how to teach them,

using our tell try tally talk method, and how to course

correct when they slide.

But, this might be hard to believe, there is actually

one part of procedures that we have never tackled. How do you

take all of those individual procedures that you have been

working so hard to teach and link them into routines that

your students can actually follow? And today we're going to

tell you how to make those routines stick without having to

turn into the nagging police.

So think of a single procedure as one Lego brick. It

does what it needs to do, but if you want something that really

works for you, like a smooth morning start, you need to snap

those bricks together.

I love that analogy, and that's perfect for your Lego

family.

Yes.

A routine is a string of procedures in a set order that

is done so often that it runs on autopilot. The goal is that the

brain doesn't have to think. It just does.

Think back to how you taught your individual

procedures. If you used our tell try tally talk method—are we

going to start calling that the 4T method? Are we going to, I

don't know, but we'll stick with tell try tally talk. If you used

our method, you clearly explained the procedure and

modeled each step. You had your students try it out with your

guidance, you tallied how everything went and celebrated

progress, and then you talked over what worked, what was

tricky, what practice was needed.

That method works beautifully for individual

procedures, but let's dive into how to connect those procedures

into a seamless routine. This time we will use a three step

process of anchoring, expanding and reinforcing.

Wait, but there's no alliteration in that one.

I feel like we're really letting the side down. It all

has an "ing," does that count?

Okay. That is something, I guess. But you know we love a

process, so let's look at the first step in this new process,

which is anchoring. This is where you pick one solid

procedure that's already working well and use it as the

foundation for the whole routine. Think of this as the

core of your routine. It's the one thing that, when it's in

place makes everything else easier.

For a morning routine, this might be students unpacking

their backpacks correctly. For transitions, it could be having

students respond quickly to your attention signal.

So the key here is to choose something that's already

pretty solid. Don't try to anchor a routine to a procedure

that is still wobbly. You want your strongest procedure as your

foundation.

And here's where a lot of teachers get tripped up. They

try to teach the entire morning routine as one giant procedure.

And I have done this myself, but let me tell you friends, that's

like trying to swallow a watermelon whole.

Oh, that sounds miserable. That's gonna end

badly. If your morning routine includes coming into the

building, entering the classroom, unpacking backpacks,

making lunch choices, getting materials, starting morning

work, and knowing what to do while waiting for others, that

is not one procedure. That's like seven procedures that have

to happen in sequence.

And when you look at it that way, it's no wonder that

your kids are having a hard time following through. They just

can't master that many steps in one go. A good rule of thumb is

that if a procedure has more than about five steps or so,

give or take, it's time to break it down. The smaller you can

make each task, the more deeply students can internalize it.

And when they're shorter, they're faster to teach too. So

that's just a little win. Okay, so identify the Keystone

procedure in each routine and go all in on making it run like

clockwork. That is the first step. Then you can start

expanding. This means adding the next logical step in the

sequence.

If unpacking backpacks is your anchor to your morning

routine, the next step might be making your lunch choice without

having to be reminded. That used to kill me every day. How many

days are we in school? Anyway, you want that to be automatic,

and then you would teach that procedure separately, right?

Tell try tally talk, until it's solid.

Then you'd start connecting them in your

student's mind. The students already know how to do each

piece, but you're helping them see how it all flows together.

So first unpack your backpack using our five steps, then make

your lunch choice using our three steps.

Keep expanding one procedure at a time until you

have built the full routine. You know, plan on this taking at

least two weeks. That is totally normal, and it's to be expected.

If things start to fall apart as you're connecting

procedures, pull back for a minute and try to pinpoint the

issue, instead of plowing ahead, because you want this all done

and out of your hair.

Oh, yes, figuring out a problem now will save you from

having to deal with it for nine more months.

And that brings us to the final step, which is reinforcing. This

is where the magic happens, because this is when your

routine moves from something we do because the teacher told us

to, to something we just do.

This is the point where your routine will either take

off or fizzle out. The goal is to train your students brains to

run this sequence without you prompting them every step of the

way, and that only happens with intentional, repeated

reinforcement.

Think of it like teaching kids to tie their shoes. If

you've ever lived through that, you don't just show them once

and then expect them to do it perfectly every time. You have

to practice a lot.

Yep, and it's going to take a lot of practice with your

routines too. But that doesn't mean it has to be drudgery. Have

some fun with it. You could set up a bingo board or a tic tac

toe board with all of the different procedures that make

up your dismissal routine. Every time they complete one part of

the routine without needing instructions from you, they get

to cross off a square. If they get a bingo or a tic tac toe,

they get a small reward, and when the whole board is full,

they get a larger reward.

Yeah, we want to make sure that practice doesn't start

feeling like a punishment. Another thing that I like to do

with my students was to time them. I would say something

like, okay, yesterday, it took two minutes and 28 seconds for

everyone to get their notebooks put away and come to the rug. I

think we can do it faster. Can we do it in two minutes? Kids

love racing. And the nice thing about this is that it can

motivate them to kind of push each other to move more quickly,

so you're not the one having to, you know, nudge them along.

Let's let that positive peer pressure work in your favor.

If you are doing whole class rewards for practicing

routines or anything else, don't let a few kids ruin it for

everyone. If you've got one or two little ones with some

special behavior challenges, like maybe they'll go slow on

purpose, just because everyone else wants them to hurry, then

you can just kind of take them out of the equation.

Right. If all but your two most challenging darlings

are at the carpet, count that as a win. Way to hustle, everyone,

you made it to the carpet in one minute and 58 seconds. And then

when someone raises their hand to point out that Dimitri still

isn't at the carpet, just make it a non issue. You know what,

you worry about you and I will worry about Dimitri.

Yeah, especially because getting attention for it is

probably exactly what Dimitri wants. And it's just a good

reminder that most of our management plans will work for

most of our kids most of the time. So put your focus there.

You can set up a personalized plan for Dimitri at a different

time, but it will only make things worse if we turn him into

the class scapegoat. That's not good for anyone.

And besides making routine practice fun, you can

also reinforce your expectations by turning it over to the

students. Try assigning helpers for routine checks. Have a

materials monitor who reminds classmates about getting their

pencils, or a line leader who models proper hallway behavior.

That's nice, because then you're not having to oversee

everything that happens. And when routines start to slide,

because they will, especially after a long weekend or a

holiday, go back to practicing them just like a sports team

runs drills.

Don't feel like you have failed if you need to reteach a

routine. This is something honestly that I struggled with.

I used to see this as a failure as a teacher, but it is just a

predictable part of dealing with kids. They need repetition, and

sometimes you need to refresh those neural pathways to get

everyone back on track.

Now you likely have dozens of routines needed to

make your classroom run, but it's important that you're

putting a lot of time and energy into streamlining what we call

the core four, and these are the routines that truly make or

break your school day.

And if you have taught before, you can probably guess

what these are, but they are a calm morning start, orderly

hallway movement, controlled transitions, and efficient end

of day routines. If you can master these four, everything

else in your day becomes so much easier.

So let's walk through what it looks like to anchor,

expand and reinforce our core four routines. And we'll kick

things off with a calm morning start.

For your morning routine, your anchor might be getting the

backpack procedure down. Once that's solid, you expand it with

lunch choice, then getting materials, then starting morning

work. Each step gets taught and practiced separately before you

try to link them.

When it comes to reinforcing your morning

routine, visual supports are your best friend. Post the steps

of each routine where students can reference them, or where you

can send students to check if they've forgotten something.

Yeah, you definitely want to outsource the work of keeping

kids on track as much as possible. So let a display help

you out. You could make a chart or project slides each morning

with the steps that you want students to follow. I was very

analog. I used sentence strips and magnets to put them on my

board because I didn't want to have to write it out every day.

Yep, I did the same thing, and it definitely does

not need to be fancy. So just make sure you're posting them

where kids can see them every single day, even in the middle

of May, and that they're going to know exactly where to look

each time. It's always going to be in the same place.

And if they ask you what they're supposed to be doing,

point them to the display, so they get in the habit of

checking that instead of turning to you for the answers.

Exactly.

Morning routines have to run without much teacher input

because you're busy handling your own routine of getting the

day started. Those posted steps give kids a way to stay on track

without needing you to prompt every single thing.

If you want a deeper dive, maybe the deepest of

dives, on morning routines, check out our three part Morning

Routine series, which is in episodes 93, 94 and 95 where we

talk about how to set up your own morning routines, as well as

your students.

For the next in our core four routines is hallway

movement, and you might anchor this one with the signal to line

up. Then you can expand to walking without talking, then

how to walk while you're carrying supplies, and then what

to do when you arrive at your destination.

Reinforcing your hallway routine can be a lot of fun. So

try announcing that you've chosen a mystery walker. If this

student remembers your procedures as you travel to your

destination, they'll get a prize, and it's easier to watch

this if you like our strategy for walking at the back of your

class instead of at the front.

That does make it simpler, or you can get real

good at walking backwards.

Yes, you know, both are good skills to have.

The prize for the mystery walker can be as simple as a

high five or a sticker. It's the mystery of it all, not the prize

that is going to be most influential on getting your

students to meet your expectations. And another fun

idea is called line freeze. Ashley from Rainbow Skies for

Teachers, shared this with us back in episode 120.

Oh, and you should definitely go back and listen to

that so you can hear it in her delightful Australian accent.

But basically it's a bit like red light, green light. You lead

your line down the hall normally at the front of the line, but

every once in a while, you flip around and look at the kids.

Their goal is to freeze in place as soon as you turn.

That is a really fun game, and it's perfect for the

hallway because it can be done silently. Ashley says that she

has done it with kids from kindergarten to sixth grade, and

that they all enjoy it. So give that one a try if you want to

add a little whimsy to your hallway routine.

And go back to check out episode 89 if you want even more

hallway tips.

But for now, let's look at how to handle your transition

routines. A good place to start here is by anchoring your

attention signal. When that's solid, expand into listening for

all the directions before they start moving, cleaning up

workspaces, then getting materials for the next activity,

and then transitioning to the new location quickly.

And we did another three part deep, deep dive in episodes

48, 49 and 50. This one happened to be on transitions this time

because, as you may have noticed, they are tricky, and

they can eat up a lot of your learning time. So revisit those

episodes, and also check out episode 160 if you want tips for

our final core routine, dismissal.

This one is hard because you are so tired by this point

in the day. So do what you can to automate this routine as much

as possible. You could anchor it with your procedure for tidying

up desks, then expand to getting take home materials, then

packing backpacks and then getting ready for dismissal.

The end of the day is a great time to add in some

student ownership as reinforcement. Besides regular

class jobs like sharpening pencils, you can assign students

to hand out papers, pass out lunch boxes, check that everyone

cleaned under their desk, and really, anything else that the

kids are capable of doing, make them do it.

For sure, don't take it on yourself to do all of the

work. And the beauty of this approach is that once these

routines are solid, your classroom really does start to

run like clockwork.

Now this does take a lot of time and energy and

intention. I want to be clear about that, because we know how

much work this is, but we promise solid routines are worth

it, even if they're not your favorite thing to teach.

I know, no one goes into teaching because they love

procedures. Although maybe we do. Do we? We talk about them a

lot, maybe we do.

I didn't start out loving procedures, like, I got there

once I saw what they could do for me.

That's I was gonna say. I think we love procedures because

we love what they give you as a teacher. And obviously, no

student says their favorite part of school is your efficient

dismissal routine.

But it would be nice if they pointed that out. But it's

procedures and the routines that they create that are going to

make the good parts of teaching, the stuff you like, possible.

They enable you to be the kind of teacher you want to be.

They're what create consistency so students feel safe and know

what to expect. They prevent problems by minimizing

opportunities for kids to test your limits, and they free you

up to focus on your students instead of logistics.

So let's wrap up with a quick recap of how to turn

procedures into routines that stick. First, anchor your

routine to one solid procedure that's already working well,

then expand by adding one procedure at a time until you've

built the full sequence. Finally, reinforce the routine

as a whole, not just the individual steps.

Focus on your core four routines—morning start, hallway

movement, classroom transitions, and end of day. These make or

break your classroom flow. So look for opportunities to

reinforce your expectations, so students will want to meet them.

And remember that this will take time. Plan on at least

two weeks for the basic structures to stick, but there

will still be a period of watching and reinforcing before

it becomes truly automatic.

And we would love to hear how you're building routines

this year. Come join the conversation in our Teacher

Approved Facebook group.

Now for our Teacher Approved Tip of the Week, where

we share an actionable tip to help you elevate what matters

and simplify the rest. This week's teacher approved tip is

to create your own routines. So tell us about this, Heidi.

Well, have you ever noticed how satisfying it is

when your own personal routines just click? Like when you

develop that evening routine where you prep everything for

the next day, and then morning you feels like you have gained a

superpower. Well, let's lean into that. This week, pick one

routine in your personal life that's feeling a little chaotic

and apply the same anchoring, expanding and reinforcing

approach we talked about today.

So maybe that'll be your after school routine, or your

Sunday meal prep, or even just how you unwind in the evening.

Start with one solid step that's already working and then build

from there.

And we did talk about teacher morning routines as part

of our morning routine deep dive. So the ones that focus on

teachers specifically are episodes 93, which is your

getting out the door morning routine, and episode 94 that's

like, once you get to school morning routine. So definitely

check those out. And just like with your students, give

yourself time to practice and adjust. Those neuronal pathways

need repetition at home, too.

The best part is that when your personal routines are

running smoothly, you'll have more mental energy for all of

the amazing teaching you want to do.

All right, to wrap up the show, we're sharing what we're

giving extra credit to this week. Emily, what gets your

extra credit?

I'm giving us credit to the Good Hang podcast with Amy

Poehler. Have you listened to this, Heidi?

I haven't. It keeps showing up in my feed, so I've

been meaning to, I just haven't had a chance yet.

Same, and I just barely started listening a couple days

ago, and it has exceeded my expectations. I think Amy might

have been born to be a podcaster, not an actress. I

like her as an actress, too, to be clear.

I keep getting ads for her master class on improv, and

she's so delightful. I keep thinking, do I need to take a

master class on improv? I don't want to do improv, but she's so

fun.

Be worth it to hang out with Amy. And usually I don't

care to watch video podcasts. I just want to listen to a

podcast. But I got fed one of these on YouTube, and I was

like, Oh, this is so fun. And so now I just kind of have it on in

the corner while I'm working the last few days, and it's been so

fun. And seriously, every episode is genuinely a good

hang. And one thing I love that she does is at the beginning of

each episode, she does a video chat with someone she knows who

also knows her guest for the episode, and then they say good

things about the guests behind their backs.

That is so fun!

It's so cute. So like, before she talked to Andy

Samberg, she called Seth Meyers, and they talked about him, and

like, how they got to know him and what they love about him.

And then Seth, like, gave her an idea for a joke to play on Andy.

And it was just fun. It was so cute.

That's such a fun way to introduce a guest.

I know, it just felt so, it's just wholesome and fun, and

it just makes me smile. So if you need a mood booster, check

out the Good Hang podcast.

Well, I'll definitely have to try that out, because

I'm going to be working for quite a while today.

Yeah, pull it up. Start with the Adam Scott episode,

because you're a Parks and Rec-er. So start with that one,

even though you haven't watched Severance, so you won't get all

the Severance talk, it's still worth it to hear them talk about

Ben and Leslie is just so cute.

They're so good. I do love that. Okay, I'll definitely

have to check that out.

Okay, let me know what you think. What's getting your

extra credit?

Well, I'm giving extra credit to the Lady Stacks

Ultimate Book Tracker.

Ooh, it sounds fancy.

Now, I haven't been someone who keeps track of my

reading, because when I tried, I would get too caught up on how

much or how little I was reading, and then it would start

to feel like a chore, or that I was being graded and I was

failing somehow. So I had to stop doing that. But I kept

seeing ads. I'm so susceptible for ads, apparently.

Apparently.

But I kept getting ads for this digital reading

tracker. And 100% I have to say, I only bought it because I was

trying to figure out how this person, Lady Stacks, how she

managed to get the images to work well in Google Sheets,

because it's a whole, you get a whole little like library image,

but it's all in Google Sheets. And I have to say, I could not

figure it out, because those tabs are locked.

Oh, dang it.

But it turns out that it has been fun to play around with

just putting in my own reading. So what you do is you type your

book titles on one tab and then a little book is added to your

cute library picture on the next tab.

Oh, cute.

It's very satisfying. I love seeing my little library

grow, and there's lots of info, like page totals and graphs. I

haven't been on story graph because I know a lot of people

use that instead of good reads, so I think it might be similar

to that. But I don't know that you get to make a cute library

in story graphs.

I bet not. And I the reason I haven't switched to

story graph is I don't think it's free, and I don't want to

pay.

Oh, that's annoying.

Well, not, I'll pay for something. I just don't want to

pay continuously for a tool. I could be wrong, though. The

people listening may be like, No, it's, you don't have to pay

for it. I have no idea. I should have probably checked that

before I made that statement, but it sticks in my head that

that's why I didn't switch over, was like, Oh, I don't want to

pay for it.

That's good to know. Well, I did have to pay for the

book tracker, but it has been fun. I thought, Oh, I could make

a new sheet for each year and have my little library just

built up, so.

That's so cute. I'm definitely gonna check it out. I

do use Goodreads, but there isn't an easy, satisfying way

to, like, see everything you've read. It's kind of utilitarian.

And I also get stressed out in Goodreads about the reviews,

because I feel I overthink the stars, because sometimes, well,

I really enjoyed this. So it's like a four star, but really

it's the writing's not that great, the story's not that

great. It's probably more like a three star, but I liked it. So,

you know, I just spend too much effort on that. Plus, I feel so

guilty ever giving anybody.

I know it's hard.

Like, less than, yeah, I feel bad every time I give even

a three star. I'm like, Oh, I'm such a jerk. So.

Well, now you can rate lowly in private. No one will

ever see it.

There we go. Okay, I'll check it out.

And there's a link in the show notes if anyone else wants

to check it out.

That's it for today's episode. Remember our three steps for

connecting your individual procedures into smooth running

classroom routines, and then you can try out those same steps to

your own routines.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of Teacher Approved. I'm Heidi.

And I'm Emily. Thank you for listening. Be sure to follow

or subscribe in your podcast app so that you never miss an

episode.

You can connect with us and other teachers in the

Teacher Approved Facebook group. We'll see you here next week.

Bye for now.

Bye.