Why So Difficult?

I asked my students today why the quiz was difficult for many of them. They responded by saying that when the questions are on the screen they find it difficult to look and transfer the correct answer to their page, especially when there is a multiple choice format on the screen. Many need to have the choices in front of them on a printed sheet so they can cross off, eliminate, see what's right in front of them. I agreed with them but explained that the reason the screen was used was to save on photocopying costs. So economics militates against success?

Into My Head

Why does evaluation often seem like a crap shoot? The other day a student came in during lunch to write a quiz she had missed. I was getting her quiz questions out when she said "Wait! I have to get this back into my head!" as she quickly flipped through her notes. The information needed for the quiz had been reviewed in class. She had all of this. But now it seemed she knew almost nothing, as if it was a matter of cramming some information at the last minute so she could remember bits of information enough to pass the quiz. Is most of what we do in quizzes and tests "getting it into my head" long enough to pass and then it's gone again?

Unexpected Response

Maggie stayed at lunch in my room to finish a reading assignment. I noticed she was looking perplexed. Her face was slightly contorted. I said in a light-hearted way "Maggie, you look like you're in pain! ( meaning because of the reading ). She quickly replied " Yeah, it sucks always being alone". My heart sank. I was not expecting that response. She took my words in the deeper emotional sense. I immediately understood. Maggie's the girl with the purple hair who sits by herself and neve joins a group. My words were a trigger for her, bringing to the surface her feelings about being socially isolated. Other students worked in reading groups. She worked by herself. I stayed close to her desk just long enough to say "I understand" and to make sure she had my support in understanding the reading. My next step will be to look for an opportunity to pair her up with a willing student, and to connect with her daily to help her with her work so she doesn't fall behind....other thoughts?

It Pays to Overcommunicate

I have two classes at the same level following the same course curriculum. During the morning class, I assigned a task and later realized that students had a lot of questions about the expectations I had not anticipated. I spent a lot of time repeating the same answers to many inquiring about details of the task. For the afternoon class, I decided to approach things differently. I spent a few moments explaing each page and number of the assignment, thus quelling the barrage of questions I was faced with in the morning class. The moral of the story for me this day was that you can't assume students understand a handout or written instructions such that they will produce optimally as a result. It pays to overcommunicate and assume that what I've prepared and is eminently clear to me may not be clear at all to the students. It pays both from the standpoint of use of my time and of student success to go over each parameter and answer any outstanding questions. I wonder how often students don't understand and don't bother asking and just do what they interpret, rightly or wrongly, to be what is expected. This is more guesswork than it is learning.  

Student Presentation Boredom

When is it more educational to have students listen to each other's presentations without any requirement other than to listen and clap? This may lead to boredom in the audience. I have a group of 24, each of whom present for between 5 and 10 minutes. 3 or 4 class periods go by without anything else going on except presentations. Is this a valid use of the listener's time? An alternative I have used is to have students ask topical questions and get credit for it. Or students are asked to keep a log of the main ideas for a quiz later. Or student listeners also take turns asking standard questions that each presenter must answer. This becomes the interactive structure of the presentation where different students take turns asking the lead questions. Or another silent seatwork task is given that students must complete before the last set of presentations finishes. Other ideas?

Missing Student

I have a student who is new to the school. She has been late already a few times to my class. Yesterday she asked to get a drink of water twenty minutes before the end of class and never returned. I will have to deal with this situation today.
My plan is to speak with her privately before class begins ( assuming she arrives on time ). I will ask her what happened and listen to her story. If her story does not justify the behaviour, I will say to her that she needs to
A. earn some trust back because she lied about going for water
B. buy back class time by coming in at lunch to complete the work not done.  The consequence for not doing this will be to sit in the hall and do independent work during class time in order to regain the privilege of resuming normal classroom participation.
C. If this does not remedy the issue, I will call home and try to get parental support to help this student follow normal procedures.

Your thoughts?

To Record Marks or not?

A teacher may have too many grades or too few. I try to have just enough by assessing first, which means certain marks don't count, and then recording only the grades that are true reflections of the students' abilities.
The other day I had my class do a drawing to illustrate their understanding of key vocabulary in an article they had read. Most did a wonderful job with the drawing, but few included vocabulary from the article. They simply put in their own vocabulary! Since my goal was to reinforce new vocabulary from the article, I had to make a decision. Should I deduct marks and record the results or simply use this as another assessment tool? Then it occurred to me that if most students did not follow the instructions, then perhaps I did not make them clear. (Part of the challenge is giving instructions in French in and FSL class with varied comprehension levels).
I have decided not to record these grades. I will explain that they did not follow the instructions and that my instructions may not have been clear.
When do you assess only ( not for grades ) and when do you evaluate and record grades for reporting?

To Memorize or not to Memorize

Today I asked my grade nines to memorize a dialogue. Each pair of students was required to ask 6 questions and answer 6 questions in French. I gave them class time to rehearse and help each other remember their lines. 

My instructions were that they have a conversation without props: no paper, nothing read.

Some began to write their lines on their hands and arms!  Some said they couldn't memorize things. I was in a quandary: should I have allowed scripts to read from, or cards to prompt them? Since some students have difficulty with auditory memory and visual memory, was it fair to have this requirement?

When it was time to present I chose the group that had the lines perfectly memorized to lead off. Perhaps this would influence others to believe they could do it too. Then students asked if marks would be deducted if they had prompts on their hands and arms. I replied that looking down would get in the way of communication, so they would lose a mark if they looked at any written prompt, including body parts.

In the end, only 2 groups out of 11 used written prompts. I was impressed that so many who thought they needed the written support were quite able to get the message across without it.

In the end memorizing reinforces practice, repetition and mastery. Is there a down side?

Three Types of Principals

 Since I have started teaching I've had eight principals in three schools. They seem to fall into three leadership styles. First, there are the humane, maintenance mode types. Then there are the bureaucratic, by the book types. Finally, there are, more rarely, the humane game-changers ( I've only had one ).

The first style allows for accessibility in the office, a caring approach to staff's personal situations, but not a lot of leadership pedagogically. The block budget gets distributed more or less as staff requests it but the process is not always clear as to how the money is allocated across the school departments.

The second, more bureaucratic style follows the board mandates and expects staff to do the same, the fund allocation process is methodical and clear. But issues get dealt with in a political way. For example, when I put in a request to the union to have my room tested for mold after a pipe burst in the ceiling and nothing had been done by the administration,  the principal and two vice-principals showed up at my door as a safeguard against the possibility that I might misquote anything they said (overkill, in my view).

The third style is the principal who gets things done but who also supports learning and professional growth. If the number of board expectations for the shcool are just too unreasonable to implement, this principal will find a way to justify not doing everything by the book. Staff meetings are for inspiration, not drudgery. Book draws for professional learning are the norm. If students are impeding other students' learning, there is intervention. If teachers are impeding students' learning, there is intervention. The school leader is consistently on the side of student success. The school building is cared for. Department funding is based on need and negotiated collegially.

In my experience, there are a few of the first styles out there, more of the second style, and very few of the third.

Unfair Marking Practices

I'm noticing that when I'm grading some writing pieces from my students, I tend to mark them progressively harder. When I see an error on the first one, I'm usually more lenient than when I see the same error repeatedly -it starts to aggravate me and I mark the latter papers harder! With this realization I am taking the time to group all my level ones, twos, threes and fours at the end of the marking session and comparing the results within each level. This gives me the opportunity to reevaluate my assessments more objectively before I return them to the students.

 

The key is not to have so much marking or so little time that my level of tolerance of repeated errors skews the results!

Back to School Adrenalyn

First week of September. It's like I never had the summer...I wake up before the alarm goes off. I'm out jogging five minutes later, shaking out the anticipatory tension of the day. I get going with my lesson plans like starting a cold engine in minus 25 celsius weather. It takes a lot of energy. On the one hand I'm rested and ready, on the other I'm out of routine and rusty. I want to maintain an interactive language learning environment. Will I be able to keep it up so the seatwork doesn't become the norm?

How many chances do we give?

My grade nine student Andy did minimal work in the first half of the semester. He earned a mark of 35% . His attendance was intermittant. In the second half of the semester I encouraged him to attend more regularly and finish the work. He attended, started most of the work, but did not complete much. He was pleasant, often asked to be excused to "go to the washroom", and sat at the back quietly. He was socially connected with a couple of boys in the class and had struck up a romantic relationship with one of the girls who sat on the other side of the room. This relationship did not interfere with the learning environmnent. He was friendly and we got along fine on a personal level. As the semester was coming to a close, I tried the following:
a. I called home, spoke to the dad about my concern and asked for his support in getting his son to come in once a week for extra help at lunchtime.
b. I offered Andy extra help and said clearly this would be his key to success.
c. I registered Andy for the school-wide catch up days.
d. I asked him daily for outstanding work.
e. I gave him mark printouts and highlighted the work still not submitted and made sure he understood what each piece was and what it was worth.
f. I arranged to work with him after classes had ended for as long as it would take to pass the course.
Unfortunately, Andy always had a reason for not coming in for extra help and in the end handed in a fraction of the work a day after report card marks had been entered. He failed the course.
What else would you have done to help Andy?

Everybody pays

A colleague of mine was running a test in her grade 10 French Immersion classroom and one of the highest performing boys repeatedly spoke out during the test. When the teacher warned him of the consequences for disrupting the test environment, he challenged her, claiming she was singling him out unfairly. This was not an isolated event. The teacher felt she was not able to resolve the issue. She called the vice-principal in. He came in during the next test and said that if any student spoke out during the test everyone in the class would receive zero.
Is this an effective intervention? Will this create an appropriate form of peer pressure, or will this unfairly penalize the innocent students?