What has worked well for me; My favorite things that I have learned at NTI this summer were the classroom management skills. I absolutely love and have had remarkable success with my students repeating back to me what they are going to do before they begin the new task. I also have had wonderful success with my newfound student interaction strategies. Just today I had a situation with a student that could have escalated to the point where I would have needed help. Instead of letting this happen, I took her aside and used the "to you to me" speach and she really went to work on the task I had assigned. It was amazing!
What I have had trouble with; A big issue I have had this year is absenteeism. On an average day I have about 6 students in ISS. These seem to be the same students and they are missing out on so much in the class. This is very frustrating to me. I decided today that I would take them aside as they came back to class and discuss whatever behavior they are choosing that keeps getting them into ISS. Then I thougth that we would try to work on some strategies to help them stop the behavior. We will see if it works!
Isn't it amazing what a few changes in wording and a little patience can achieve? I’m lucky enough to have Jayna as a colleague and a classmate. I have seen Jayna in action. I visited her one day, as I was having an issue with a stubborn press-on fingernail, and hit her up for some acetone. I watched her as she was handing out tests and a girl was not in her assigned seat. She simply asked where her assigned seat was and very calmly asked the girl to find her proper seat. The girl got up and moved without a single word. I was expecting resistance, but like we learned, “Behavior Breeds Behavior.” I have adopted that as a mantra. Sometimes I feel myself swallowing my sarcasm – a very bitter taste indeed – and offering a sweet retort instead. It’s like magic! Unfortunately, I have a tremendous liking for Sour Sticks and only moderately enjoy the sweet gooey goodness of milk chocolate. But I try to limit my sour sarcasm to humorous quick quips, and let the river of sweetness flow… Ick.
ReplyDeleteI, too, have a problem with absences due to ISS. Not as many, but it’s difficult, no, impossible to get these kids to make up stuff that they must perform. I once e-mailed the teacher in ISS asking him if my student could go interview a teacher that had some information on a video yearbook. Of course, he said no. That was a few days that that project was put on hold. I don’t like the idea of replacing performance work with book work. It’s not the same.
I have to agree with all that you said concerning your first weeks of class. I was thrown into the fire so to spealk last year when I started. I had to endure the mistakes and failures of the the past teachers. In other words the classes that I inherited came with all the bad behaviors and habits. I followed the classroom management plan to the letter and it has worked. I get lots of support from my boss in the use of the NTI materials. The use of the different behavior strategies has worked very well. I feel your pain with all the students that are absent every day. Some days it is close to 10 percent of the whole school, not counting all the atheletic, testing absences. i have some behavior issues that have gone beyond my class/lab level to the school administrators. They were very impressed with my behavior log. It is a lot of work keeping it up to date. it really is an eye opener to a parent during a conference. I also staple all hall passes to this log to show when and where they have been, ( everywhere but class sometimes)
ReplyDeleteI have had students like that and one day I ask one of them if they would help me. So every day when he came in, he was to take attendence. From then on I never had any more trouble with him.
ReplyDeleteAnother young girl I had put her in ISS several times. I knew her from middle school. I talked with the principal about her and he said that I might as well give up on her that they had tried everything to no avail. One day she got in trouble again in my room and as I was taking her to the office to be expelled, I stopped and and related how at her age that I was expelled form school. I told her of the time that the teacher was going to have me expell again, but stopped and said to me, "you are on a fence, one side is good, the other is bad and instead of expelling you, I am going to pray for you that you will come down on the good side". That event still sticks in my mine today. I related this story to Helena and told her I was going to do the same for her that this teacher had done for me. I told her that I cared about her, and that I didn't want her to ruin her life at fourteen years old. Helena is a junior now and is passing all her courses, has not been in trouble since. She e-mails me almost every week to let me know how she is doing. Oh by the way, she calls me her grandfather. Also, she told me that I was the only person who had every care about her. We never know what we might say to do sometimes that might have a lasting influence on a student.