The slide thread got me thinking about how to convert rules into routines.

I recently read an article http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/01/31/opinion/sunday/how-to-raise-a-creative-child-step-one-back-off.html?referer=&_r=0) which said that parents of creative children typically had one rule in the home, while parents of more conventional children have an average of five. We have a lot of rules in our home so this article sort of made me anxious. Ever since then I've been trying to distill my rules into as few as possible.

This reminded me of a classroom management course I took that talked about rules vs routines, and how converting rules to routines can have tremendous impact on classroom management. Right now we are having trouble with picking up our toys so I'm working to make it a routine and not a rule. Tonight was an epic battle. But at school it was a non issue...I think because they treat it like a routine and not a rule.

Teacher bees, how do you distinguish between a rule and a routine? What is the difference in how you enforce a routine vs. a rule? Or is this distinction just mumbo jumbo.