ABSTRACT
This chapter examines how rules, routines and rituals influence the quality of social and learning behaviour in classroom. The main function of classroom rules is to provide structure and consistency, enabling teachers to focus on teaching and setting limits to pupils' behaviour to make them aware of the conditions required for success. Classroom rules can promote appropriate behaviour in four different ways by: helping individuals to cope; framing interpersonal relationships; supporting whole-school behaviour policies; and helping create the conditions for engagement with learning. In addition to physical safety, effective classroom rules can contribute to psychological safety and support emotional well-being. Routines are procedural supports that are pivotal in managing everyday social and academic behaviour around school and classrooms. They are often organised around a particular time, a place or context. A ritual, such as assembly, requires participants to behave in a formalised way and includes particular actions, words and movements, and a series of routines occurring in a particular sequence.
