I've decided to do this thing where I just sit silently and wait. For now, it's working really well. Today in 7th grade I actually felt like we got something accomplished. Not as much as we needed to, but I will take anything for now!
The hardest thing with this teaching technique, for me, is that I forget sometimes what I am saying and have to repeat what I said to remind myself. Today I did a really great job just stopping in the middle of a statement and picking up from where I left off. It's also helping me keep the pace of my teaching up.
The other thing I've started doing is assigning vocabulary words for students to define. Those students who continuously choose not to listen are given a sheet of paper and a book. The grade is 100 percent dependant upon their choice to do the assignment.
Sitting here thinking about it, it actually works well with my principal's request to the teachers. Students who choose not to participate (in p.e., music, etc.) should be given an alternate assignment. I have students who don't want to do what I'm asking, to them it's a punishment to sit and define words, to my principal it's an alternate assignment. Either way, they're learning something about music.
Today I had a 7th grader choose to constantly be off task. I gave him the sheet of paper and book and requested he define 10 words. At the end of class I asked I'd he had the assignment. He simply told me he did not do it so I responded with, "I'm sorry you chose to take a zero for class today. Maybe we can try for a better day tomorrow." After class I added the grade into the system. Zero for him, exempt for everyone else. When there's an issue later because the student is unhappy with the grade, of will be very easy for me to go back and say "well, you have a zero here because you chose not to participate. I gave you the option to do an alternate assignment."
Several 6th graders are starting to catch onto me just sitting back on my stool and folding my hands into my lap; including several students who I wouldn't have expected to catch on this quickly. Today in class we played 7 songs from the book! We also had a super productive day last Friday. I think they're actually starting to see the benefit of listening and following instructions!
The hardest thing with this teaching technique, for me, is that I forget sometimes what I am saying and have to repeat what I said to remind myself. Today I did a really great job just stopping in the middle of a statement and picking up from where I left off. It's also helping me keep the pace of my teaching up.
The other thing I've started doing is assigning vocabulary words for students to define. Those students who continuously choose not to listen are given a sheet of paper and a book. The grade is 100 percent dependant upon their choice to do the assignment.
Sitting here thinking about it, it actually works well with my principal's request to the teachers. Students who choose not to participate (in p.e., music, etc.) should be given an alternate assignment. I have students who don't want to do what I'm asking, to them it's a punishment to sit and define words, to my principal it's an alternate assignment. Either way, they're learning something about music.
Today I had a 7th grader choose to constantly be off task. I gave him the sheet of paper and book and requested he define 10 words. At the end of class I asked I'd he had the assignment. He simply told me he did not do it so I responded with, "I'm sorry you chose to take a zero for class today. Maybe we can try for a better day tomorrow." After class I added the grade into the system. Zero for him, exempt for everyone else. When there's an issue later because the student is unhappy with the grade, of will be very easy for me to go back and say "well, you have a zero here because you chose not to participate. I gave you the option to do an alternate assignment."
Several 6th graders are starting to catch onto me just sitting back on my stool and folding my hands into my lap; including several students who I wouldn't have expected to catch on this quickly. Today in class we played 7 songs from the book! We also had a super productive day last Friday. I think they're actually starting to see the benefit of listening and following instructions!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Post a Comment