Classroom Norms

I had an interesting experience setting classroom norms and rules in one of my classrooms at the beginning of the year. I'm reminded of this episode as we get closer to student teaching, because I will have to reset norms with my students. At the beginning of the year, I used a process that one of the other classroom teachers used, and that my cooperating teacher wanted to try out. It involved asking students in groups to come up with classroom norms that would allow them to do their best learning. From the group lists, one class list was generated. And then from this list each group picked one that was most important, to create a class list of norms. There was a discussion (pretty quick) to determine if anything important was missing or should be taken off. Then the prescribed process was to okay each norm by having all students raise their hand to signal their agreement to the norm. If they didn’t raise their hand, then there was a discussion about why and what should be done to modify the norm to make it acceptable. I received pushback during the hand-raising portion from several students. Several students refused to raise their hands and didn’t have a response when asked why they didn’t want to agree with the norms. One particular student said it felt like “middle school,” because so many of the norms were obvious (like respect, communicate). On the fly we modified the procedure so that everyone could raise their hand for the entire group of norms. Looking back at the process I would agree with my students’ complaints. The process did feel very artificial. First, the students didn’t really come up with any norms that I wouldn’t have come up with myself, and they weren’t all that well detailed, explained, or justified. It felt like students were just repeating words that they had been trained to say. Also, they didn’t have any real sense of having power over the situation. Did they know (or did I know) how much they could actually influence the norms? Finally, the hand-raising process was slow and tedious and students didn’t really have any choice but to accept; it felt like coercion. When I think back to classes and seminars I’ve taken, the norms are either implicit or the teacher lists some possible norms and then asks for input, which accelerates the whole process. I think using a similar process could have worked with this group of students.

ELL

I have one student in my first period class who is an ELL (English Language Learner) student receiving support from ELL staff. (I have many other ELL students, but they are significantly advanced in their English that they no longer need or are granted ELL support.) She does not attend class that regularly, but each morning that she does, a staff member comes to class to check on her. The staff member usually spends time translating what is going on in class, but I have noticed that he also tells her how to do each step (like “measure this, then multiply by that”). I have observed this in other classrooms where I have witnessed support staff doing similar things. It seems unlikely that this kind of support is in the best interest of the student—yes it is efficient on the part of the support staff and perhaps makes the student feel more comfortable. I’m not sure how she would know how to do any of the problems on her own without being given the opportunity to work through them on her own. On another note, I’ve noticed that because I know that my ELL student has support, I actually interact with her less than other students, and I feel terrible about this. I’ve heard that this is a common unintended consequence of this kind of ELL support structure. I’ve been trying to make an attempt to reverse this pattern, but she hasn’t been coming to class on the days that I’ve been there.

Getting to Know Students

I have been a big believer in getting to know one’s students. I have found this helps with classroom management and motivation, but more importantly it is what makes the job of teaching fun and meaningful and worthwhile. At the same time, I am finding this very difficult to do within the context of these observations. I felt like I was making great progress when I was in the classroom 5 days a week, when I went down to 2, I felt like I moved backwards in this area. Some weeks I only saw my students once. One of my observation days the students were taking a standardized exam, another was parent-teacher conferences, recently I chaperoned a field trip, and there have been other interruptions. I used to know everyone’s name, but now I hesitate on a number of names. This is due in part to the fact that several students were also shuffled around to different classes and teachers about a month into school when CS was granted a few more FTEs (for higher student enrollment than expected). I’ve also found that when I was in the classroom less often, I felt less comfortable because I did not know the kids as well. As a result, I fell into a bad and self-defeating habit of talking more to the kids that I already knew. I could see how this could come across as favoritism on my part. I’ve started to intentionally break this habit, but I can see that it will take a long time to get to know 150 students, especially when class periods are fast paced and kids rush in and out as the bells rings and I don’t really have much of a chance to interact with students at other times.

Administration

I am really starting to appreciate how much school policies can affect learning in the classroom. I am used to working in classrooms of students who do not test my classroom management skills and who are generally motivated and well behaved. In the event that I have trouble with a particular student, I can usually call in administrative support (though this has been very rare). From observing at Chief Sealth and talking to Robin and others in my cohort, I can see how important it is for the administration to adopt policies that support teachers in the classroom. I know that Chief Sealth has dramatically reduced tardiness with a policy that requires late students to get a tardy slip from the front office. There doesn’t seem to be much recourse, however, if students choose to not work or generally be defiant and disobedient. Of course there are ways for teachers to work around these things in the classroom, but for the students there is no threat of going to the front office or detention that a teacher can wield. I have one student who is regularly disruptive in class. I talked to him about having to make a choice between changing his behavior or facing possible detention. He said that if he got detention he wouldn’t come. At which I said, well then it escalates to more detention and eventually to being referred to the front office. He said that happened to him last year and nothing happened. This is pretty frustrating from my perspective that I have basically no recourse with teeth should a student choose to be disruptive. And not only does it hurt him, but it hurts all the other students he distracts or takes attention away from.

Group Work

I am used to doing group work with my students at SGS, but as I think about implementing a group work system with my students (specifically my Algebra 1, and especially my first period Algebra 1 students) I am starting to doubt whether or not this is a good idea. First of all, there are a number of students absent each period. My CT currently has a seating chart that has students arranged in groups, and it is not uncommon to have just one student out of four show up in a group or two. Trying to shuffle these kids around to accomplish an activity can eat up a lot of class time. It becomes more complicated when students start to trickle in partway into the period. That places a lot of responsibility on the students’ group members (if they haven’t already been shuffled around into other groups) and the teacher to get them caught up part way through the class. Secondly, these students don’t have very much training in working in groups. If I were to have these students for the entire year, investing the time to develop group work skills may be worth it, but I’m not sure how I can teach this as well as keep the class moving at the pace my CT expects me to. I am still considering using group work, but I think I am going to have to rethink how to organize it. I can’t count on having stable groups, and I may have to focus on just a few group work skills to teach in the few weeks that I’ll be with the students.

Field Trip

Today I went on a field trip with the language arts teachers to the Seattle Art Museum. They needed an extra chaperone and I was curious to see how large public school field trips are pulled off. I was assigned a group of about 6 students. It was a little confusing because I was given a list of students but then one chaperone wasn’t able to make it and I was assigned a few extra students. The whole day I wasn’t sure if I actually had everyone. I wasn’t used to that level of confusion and chaos on a field trip. I am used to compulsively counting my 30 something students on SGS field trips, but there seemed to be fewer controls on this field trip. In fact, I think some students may have wandered around outside at one point. At the end of the trip, role was taken and everyone miraculously showed up. Once we actually split up into small groups I was a little less stressed out because I had an easier time keeping track of my group. The docent led us to a series of exhibits and through a series of activities. They were decent activities—they were inspired by the art and came from the students’ interests and prior knowledge. For example, we saw a coffin that was shaped like a BMW and we talked about how in this place in Africa (can’t remember where; also the students were studying Africa in their LA/Social Studies block) people were buried in coffins that represented their life and/or their aspirations. We had a discussion about this and then the kids sketched what they would want their coffin to look like. Some questions that plagued me the entire time were: What was the purpose of these assignments? Where was the accountability? And how can students who have never had an opportunity to visit an art museum be given free time to explore on their own? Throughout the trip I also struggled somewhat with discipline and motivation with the students. Students were very reluctant to do some of the activities, and since I didn’t know them or what their class was about I was uncertain about how to keep them motivated. I often resorted to asking students about their experience with/feelings about art and trying to bring them in someway based on their responses. In terms of discipline, the students were basically fine, but I had one to two students who would sit or stand very far from the group while our docent would speak to us. This one particular student said he could hear and was paying attention. I responded that his actions could come across as lack of motivation or disrespect and that it’s good to check whether our behavior is coming off the wrong way, but he wasn’t motivated by that. Overall, it was a good experience to see how one can pull of a field trip with a large number of students.

Accountability/Assessment

So far it seems like the only form of assessment are tests & quizes. My CT gives points each day for class work and homework, but I wouldn't really count these grades as a form of assessment. Points for both are awarded on whether or not you completed the assignment. Doing an assignment doesn't necessarily mean understanding it. An efficient approach can be to copy the assignment from someone who understands it best. It seems though that waiting until a test or quiz to find out info about students' progress is too late. I will sometimes go around and ask students what they learned from a particular activity or exercise. Students rarely seem to understand what the meaning is behind what they are doing and/or they don't have the words to explain what they do understand. I'm wondering how one teaches students to explain their reasoning other than modeling it for them and requiring them to do it over and over.

Students don't seem particularly accountable for their work either. A class typically goes like this: The CT checks for homework completion as students check their answers/finish up their work. Then the CT lectures or leads an activity. Then there are book problems. It is usually unclear to me whether these problems are considered class work or homework. Many students opt not to do the work in class and instead say that they're just going to do it for homework. It is unclear however if the CT checks that the classwork got completed. Also, I'm not sure what the mechanism is for assessing understanding through class work. Whether or not there's assessment or accountability, it seems like an extraordinary amount of class time is wasted by students choosing not to work. I can understand that students might need some time to disengage, but class time does seem like the best time to do the work so that they can get ideas/feedback from the teacher and classmates. It also seems to breed a culture of slacking in the classroom. This is the part that troubles me most.

As I think about taking over these classrooms in January, I have to say that I am quite nervous to see how students respond to my accountability measures. How do I keep kids working for the entire 50 minute period if they are used to checking out for the last half?