It’s often tempting for new teachers to dive right into lessons at the start of the new school year. But float this strategy past many experienced teachers, and the typical response is, “Been there, done that—and lived to regret it.”

First things first, advises veteran Minneapolis kindergarten teacher Janet Kujat, who also is a National Board for Professional Teaching Standards-certified educator. “Don’t worry about the curriculum for the first few weeks. Spend time building the classroom community, getting to know the kids’ names, teaching them the rules and procedures.” Try to arrange home visits to meet the families of students, she adds.

And, when it comes to classroom management, “don’t assume anything, even in the upper grades,” Kujat stresses. Actually write out the classroom rules and spend lots of time discussing them with students. “Do this piece right, and everything else will fall in place.”

It’s a view of teaching shared by Billings, Mont., middle school teacher Carol Haverlandt, who was a state teacher-of-the-year runner-up last year. Like her colleague from Minnesota, Haverlandt is a trainer in the AFT’s professional development grass-roots network, Educational Research and Dissemination (ER&D), which focuses heavily on training that helps teachers establish learning-conducive climates right from the start of the school year. “It’s called the ‘3 equals 33 rule,’” explains Haverlandt: The work teachers do with rules and procedures in the first three weeks of school will typically save them time wasted on classroom disruptions and other class management headaches for the next 33 weeks.

“Teachers go through their rules, but I don’t think they go through their procedures,” Haverlandt adds. That means time wasted on everything from turning in homework assignments to student paper exchanges. “You really have to stop, think and ask yourself, ‘How do I want them to behave?’”