What has worked: This is my second year teaching. Having a year's experience under my belt coupled with all the information learned at NTI this summer has made the first month go pretty smoothly. I feel more confident and relaxed and I believe that is impacting the "psychological learning environment". It is nice to see familiar faces among my students and it was easier to learn my level I student's names quicker. Last year I had to learn 130 new students because everyone was new to me and this year I only had to learn 53 new students. That made a big difference for me right there. The transfer in and take 5 activities have been the most helpful. Especially the "3-2-1" we learned a few weeks ago. My students really picked up on it and enjoyed answering the questions.
What hasn't worked: I really liked the concept we learned this summer of having the students repeat back instructions before moving into an activity. This hasn't worked out for me though. I know the reason why. It is because I forget to ask the students to repeat back to me. I give instructions and then set them about the activity. I guess I don't feel like time is really wasted during transitions so I haven't had a big need to change my routine to include it. I do believe if I could get into the routine of asking it would benefit the flow of things but truthfully I just keep forgetting to do it.
Connie,
ReplyDeleteYou are right I have forgotten the last step also. But I found out that if the students do not repeat the instructions for the task assigned, they are confused and continues to ask questions for clarification during the group activity. I found that to be very tiring for me. Now I am more conscious of my oversights and is trying to work smarter instead of harder as they say.