This text provides practical guidelines and techniques for effectively managing acting out behavior in elementary students. It attempts to characterize acting-out behavior in the context of schooling; describe what is known about coping effectively with it; and illustrate applications of successful interventions. The 10 chapters cover the following topics: (1) an introduction to the acting-out child; (2) common school and teacher attempts to cope with acting-out children; (3) general rules governing classroom and school behavior; (4) strategies for assessing the school behavior of acting-out children and their peers; (5) behavior management techniques for the acting-out child; (6) combinations of intervention techniques; (7) classroom ecology and teacher-student interactions including defusing oppositional, aggressive behavior; (8) case study applications; (9) model interventions for use with acting-out students in the classroom setting; and (10) transenvironmental programming--procedures for reintegrating acting-out students into the regular classroom. Six appendices provide: an analysis of 100 disciplinary referrals; a guide to recording and interpreting classroom behavior; sample praise statements; an example rewards list; and a checklist of pupil behaviors. (Contains approximately 240 references.) (DB)