Instead of focusing on my entire week as a whole, I wanted to bring up how incredibly different individual classes are and how I need to teach them. This week I officially took over two of my four classes. One is an Option II (college bound) 1st period class of 16 students and the other is an Option II (college bound) 6th period class of 22 students.
Though the class hasn’t gotten into the “meat” of Huck Finn yet, (that will all start Monday… pray for me) we’ve spent the last week doing background research and poster projects about the 1840’s (aka, the time period in which Huck Finn was written). More or less, Monday & Wednesday of this week were centered solely on students as they worked with their partners in researching and constructing their compare/contrast poster. As the teacher, I addressed individual questions, checked that students were on task, and gave directions when needed. In essence, I had a relatively passive role in term of direct instruction. ( Which actually I felt was beneficial before I start teaching an in depth lesson centered on the text.)
Fast forwarding to Thursday, this was the day that 1st and 6th period would share their presentations, review for their vocab quiz with an engaging, competitive game and start some vocab extra credit for homework.
Coming into Thursday I felt great, and 1st period went so smoothly! The informal partner presentations were (for the most part) well done and very interesting. The students took well done notes (which were handed in as class work credit) and were very respectful while others were presenting. As for the vocab game, we got through the game with plenty of time to spare and the students seemed to love the competition. In all honestly, there were moments when they would try to argue the words or the answers- but there wasn’t anything blatantly disrespectful or out of control.
After 1st period, my co op gave me some constructive criticism and suggested that I make sure I assert myself and not allow the teams to argue over words/rounds of the game. Taking this advice, I figured I would reflect and adapt my instruction for 6th period. WELL…. That’s what I “figured” I would do.
Little did I realize that 6th period is significantly different than 1st period. I hadn’t really realized it before because during the days of research I had the same questions, comments, and even issues in both classes. I assumed (which I will never do again as long as I live) that 6th period would go as smoothly as 1st period. Well needless to say it didn’t.
Coming out of lunch, 6th period was incredibly talkative. Tiny outbursts, smart-ass comments and “whispered” side conversations were going on constantly during presentations. I must have asked.. no, wrong word… told my students to be respectful and courteous about ten different ways and in ten different tones. By the time we had finished presentations and moved on to the vocab game, they would be silent for 10 seconds and then it would take another 10 seconds to quiet them again so people could hear the question.
According to my co op, they were definitely testing me to see what they could get away with. I realized that makes sense because my co op tends to let them get away with a lot and unfortunately she was always repeating herself in that class.
Luckily, Friday’s 6th period (today) went so much better! After Thursday’s disaster I realized I had to change something. My first instinct was to be tougher, firmer, and even a bit of a hard ass with this class… some students respond to that, and others don’t. But I changed my mind.
I realized that my students in 6th period respond a lot better to me when I’m calm but firm. I unfortunately had to give a student a 0 on his vocab quiz because I caught him talking… so at least now they know they can’t walk all over me.
I know that 6th period will be one of my more challenging classes, but in the end I know the good days will outweigh the bad ones.
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Krysten,
ReplyDeleteI think that is a valuable lesson to learn. My students(all periods) are very well behaved. I have a few students who tend towards the smart aleck comments but for the most part they are pretty good. I think it's good that you realized that they don't respond well to being yelled at. I think that shows good classroom managment. I completely argree. I think when the teacher is calm but lets the students know they can't take advantage of him/her it creates a better atmosphere for the classroom. Otherwise students might antagonize you just to see if they could get Miss Goetter fired up.
I'd also be interested to hear what kind of game you played with the vocabulary. Some of my classes struggle with it and I'd like to come up with some fun ways to improve their skills. Let me know!! Good luck next week.
I too had an experience with classroom management this week. It is really tough to come into a classroom and try to be liked by the students but also in control of them. It seems that you handled it well, and I don't think they will try to get away with so much anymore. I am interested in hearing how the discussion goes next week.
ReplyDeleteDo you think that your students had too much time to work on things in class? Did they have to work on them out of class too? I am always curious about the appropriate amount of time spent on free work days because my co-op gave his kids one this week too, but I feel like we've been taught that we aren't supposed to do that. Any thoughts on that one?
Krysten,
ReplyDeleteI connected with this post, because I too realized how individual classes that learn the same thing can act so different and learn differently for that matter. I had four classes this week and two of them are Eng 9 and two are college prep. For each class, I have to modify it after the first section in case anything goes wrong. I would love to see how things work out once you get into the meat of Huck Finn. I think you will find that things will smooth out. Keep me posted!
Hey Guys,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your words of encouragement; they were greatly appreciated.
Ellen: The vocab we played was called "Bluff". In this game, the class is divided into two teams, and a sheet of numbers (1-20) is put on the smartboard. "Team One" gets to pick a number, and then I read aloud the coressponding vocab question to "Team Two" (usually the questions are ants, syns, or definitions) Anyway, since Team Two has the question, they can either opt to stand up if they know the answer, or stand up if they want to "Bluff" that they know the answer. The trick is that your team can gain as many points as people you have standing for your team. If you have 5 teamate sstanding up who claim to know the answer, then you have the potential of getting 5 points. Anyway, Team One gets to pick one person who is standing from Team Two to answer the question. If he/she gets it right, the team wins as many points as the people standing up. If he/she gets it wrong (because they were trying to bluff) then that team loses all those points. Then you just keep going back in forth. It's a lot of fun and then kids seem to benfit from it. Let me know if you have any questions.
Meg: I'm right there with you girl... I DO want to be liked by my students, of course. But we are not there to be their friends. To answer your question, the kids were given all the time to work on their research during class. During this time, I felt like I had strong class management because all the kids were busy doing their own project. It wasn't until they had to listen to presentations that they turned disrespectful. I also feel like we were taught differently but when I said that to my co op she said "if you have them do it outseid of class it will never get done".... I would much rather force them to take responsibility for their work, but that is just me.
Edward: I will keep you posted on how everything goes. Monday will be very telling!!!
Yep, I totally know we aren't there to be their friends, but it's still hard to go into a new environment thinking "it's OK if they all hate me." I am trying to find a balance of creating a fun classroom environment, and creating a controlled classroom environment.
ReplyDeleteEver heard the expression, "Don't smile until Christmas?" There is a shred of truth there...
ReplyDeleteI'm happy to hear about the choices you made Krysten. It's always difficult to resolve to be "tough" on kids, but ultimately, I've found, they respond well to structure, accountability, and stability in the classroom. They need to know what you stand for. Be firm!
Hi Krysten. I've actually had A LOT of classroom management problems but not all because of me (I swear!). My "team" is 98% IEP, learning support and/or behavioral support kids, so somedays they are just going to be "bad" no matter what you do. My co-op keeps telling me that they will push me just to see how far I will bend (like you mentioned). Well, I don't bend too far. And I think they respect that about me already.
ReplyDeleteGood luck - it sounds like you've already got it under control!