Training in classroom management and the managerial behaviors of teachers

The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which the managerial behaviors of teachers who had received training in the analytic-pluralistic approach to classroom management differed from those of teachers who had not received such training. The analytic-pluralistic approach is one in which classroom management is viewed as a four-stage process. The training program consisted of a formal three credit-hour, fifteen week, graduate course designed for inservice teachers. Seven directional hypotheses were posited and tested. Given the purpose and the hypotheses which were tested, a quasi-experimental design was employed. Specifically, a posttest only, control group with matching design was used. The treatment variable was training in the analytic- pluralistic approach to classroom management. Dependent variables were teacher managerial behaviors of seven types: authoritarian, behavior modification, common sense, group process, instructional, permissive, and socioemotional climate managerial behaviors. The sample consisted of fourteen matched pairs of elementary school teachers in nine public schools. One teacher in each pair had completed the training six to eighteen months prior to this study; the other teacher in each pair had never undertaken such training. Each pair was matched with regard to sex, grade level taught, school district, socioeconomic status of students, and type of classroom organization; to the extent possible, each pair was also matched with regard to class size, level of formal education, years of experience, and chronological age. Two instruments were used for data collection: the Classroom Management Training Inventory (CMTI) and the Managerial Approach Behavior Observation System (MABOS). The CMTI is a two-page questionnaire designed by the author to gather demographic information and data regarding the teachers' participation in classroom management training. The MABOS was used to collect observational data of managerial episodes and behaviors (Coman, Goldstein, Peacock, and Weber, 1978) . The MABOS enables trained observers to categorize each teacher managerial behavior into one of seven managerial approaches. Subjects were observed for a minimum of three hours during each of two morning reading and mathematics instructional periods by different observers for a total of not less than six hours. Observations were made during the seventh and eighth months of the school year. When all fifty-six observations were completed, the subjects responded to the CMTI. Each teacher managerial behavior was categorized according to the managerial approach it represented. The total in each of the seven categories for a particular teacher was expressed as a percentage of the total number of managerial behaviors recorded for that teacher. The data were analyzed through the use of the Wilcoxon matched-pairs signed-ranks test, a nonparametric procedure. The five percent level of significance was set as the criterion for the acceptance of an hypothesis. [...]Education, College o