This was a tiring week. I needed to spend a lot of time in the evenings planning lessons, preparing resources and completing some neglected paperwork for my evidence portfolio. I estimate that I've slept 27 hours this week. Still, it's done now and I'm up to date. I don't intend to do that again.
I started each first lesson with each new class by negotiating my classroom rules. In a class discussion I got them to tell me what makes a good teacher and what makes a good student and we make two lists. Then I made a deal with them that I'd try my hardest to do all the things that say say makes a good teacher if they try their hardest to do all the things that they say makes a good student. As you might expect, I stage-managed this to get the outcomes I wanted but because the students have a sense of ownership of these rules and after a few instances of me reminding them of their rules they are begining to correct each other's infringements. I then spent a few minutes telling them about my own education, employment and teaching experience.
My relationships with my students has developed much faster than in my previous school. I think this was helped both by showing that I trusted them to constuct a fair and reasonable set of rules for us and by my sharing a little of myself. They still grumble every time I get them to get out of their seats and move to the front of the room but it stops quickly when the see me smiling rather than frowning at them. I expect they will always do this. As the class begin to move forward there are always some who remain seated initially. Rather than shouting, I just look at them and beckon them. I call their names if they are not looking towards me.
The number one item on one list of what the students wanted from me as a teacher was a surprise, they do not want me to show favouritism. They felt very strongly about this.
I am finding that a lot of the students are smiling in my classes and it is contagious. I am smiling as I'm asking or answering questions. Or maybe it's happening the other way round. I think they are picking up on the fact that I like what I'm doing and I like them.
One challange I have is a class of very low ability students who are very disengaged from school. Their behaviour isn't a problem but I think I need to break my lessons into smaller and more varied tasks for this group. They are predicted to obtain low grades but I need to make sure that they do at least make them and I believe that a few can do better than predicted. This is a target I have set myself.
I've started using gestures to reinforce some instructions. For instance, if a student isn't writing when he should be I call his name, point at his exercise book and making a writing action in the air. A couple of times when I wanted the students to get out of their seats and collect equipment from a side bench I have used gesture like those used by ground crew who direct pilots when parking planes at airports, beckoning and then pointing to the left with both arms.
I started each first lesson with each new class by negotiating my classroom rules. In a class discussion I got them to tell me what makes a good teacher and what makes a good student and we make two lists. Then I made a deal with them that I'd try my hardest to do all the things that say say makes a good teacher if they try their hardest to do all the things that they say makes a good student. As you might expect, I stage-managed this to get the outcomes I wanted but because the students have a sense of ownership of these rules and after a few instances of me reminding them of their rules they are begining to correct each other's infringements. I then spent a few minutes telling them about my own education, employment and teaching experience.
My relationships with my students has developed much faster than in my previous school. I think this was helped both by showing that I trusted them to constuct a fair and reasonable set of rules for us and by my sharing a little of myself. They still grumble every time I get them to get out of their seats and move to the front of the room but it stops quickly when the see me smiling rather than frowning at them. I expect they will always do this. As the class begin to move forward there are always some who remain seated initially. Rather than shouting, I just look at them and beckon them. I call their names if they are not looking towards me.
The number one item on one list of what the students wanted from me as a teacher was a surprise, they do not want me to show favouritism. They felt very strongly about this.
I am finding that a lot of the students are smiling in my classes and it is contagious. I am smiling as I'm asking or answering questions. Or maybe it's happening the other way round. I think they are picking up on the fact that I like what I'm doing and I like them.
One challange I have is a class of very low ability students who are very disengaged from school. Their behaviour isn't a problem but I think I need to break my lessons into smaller and more varied tasks for this group. They are predicted to obtain low grades but I need to make sure that they do at least make them and I believe that a few can do better than predicted. This is a target I have set myself.
I've started using gestures to reinforce some instructions. For instance, if a student isn't writing when he should be I call his name, point at his exercise book and making a writing action in the air. A couple of times when I wanted the students to get out of their seats and collect equipment from a side bench I have used gesture like those used by ground crew who direct pilots when parking planes at airports, beckoning and then pointing to the left with both arms.
