Let "Down Time" Work for You

And now a question from Chedra Philpott, an English teacher from Lake Chester, Nebraska: "I tried to gain some control over my rowdy class by giving assigned seating and moving some of the non-participants to the front. One social butterfly who loves to sit sideways in her desk chatting, and rolls her eyes at everything I say, was moved up front. Robbed of her audience, she glared at me coldly for all of first period. It was almost unsettling. I know this is the daily life of a teacher, but sometimes it simultaneously ticks me off and sucks the enthusiasm right out of me."

Thanks, Chedra. I have just four words for you: "Better you than me." But seriously.

I very recently had a similar situation, esp. re: the sideways-sitting-now-I-hate-you girl. Here's what I did: When they began to say how much they disliked this new seating arrangement, I fired back with "Now you know I've been feeling the whole dang semester!" Then, at the bottom of a quiz, I wrote a note to the sideways sitter encouraging her to find a way to seem more involved and enthusiastic before she began her studies at the next level.

Then she really hated me, but it didn't last, and she soon became a more frequent contributor to the class's general misunderstanding of what I was failing to teach them.

But here's something that works better. As an English teacher,you may find your class time is frequently devoured by the school's other little necessities: assemblies, yearbook photos, guidance-counselor visits, registration, schedule pickups, administering flu shots, things like that (I call these "Disrupt-O-Days," and I've come to accept them)

So occasionally, you find yourself with a pocket of time not quite long enough to start a discussion or to make a valid point or to give a test. One way to respond is by having the kids begin to prepare for whatever's going to happen next or to review whatever just happened, ensuring that not a precious second of learning time is wasted.

On days like this it's good to wear those reading half-glasses so you can peer threateningly over them should a student start checking for split ends or gazing wistfully out the window at a sunny day whose pleasure she's been deprived of. The half-glasses, when peered over correctly, really help create either the corporate-bully or evil stepmother look, whichever one you find most effective.

Or . . . you could allow your students to quietly do anything that's not illegal on the state or local level while you unobtrusively mingle with them, small talking and getting to know them a little better. You'll gain points just from this small gift. And they weren't going to learn anything in those few minutes anyway.

Ask some of the hard cases what they plan on doing with their lives and if they plan to go to college and if they're involved in any of the school's extracurricular activities (even though you should already know this from a first-day writing or something). You're just asking. You don't have to say, "Well, you're doing a real crappy job of preparing" or "Sure hope you don't need a letter of recommendation from me, Mr. Knucklehead." You are free, however, to offer genuine helpful advice.

By acting interested in them and genuinely listening to them, while they're held captive in your class, you may not need to say such things. Suddenly you're more human. If you find out one of your texting sideways-sitters plays volleyball, go watch her. Now you're even more human. Now you're almost likable. 

It's not fun, even for a teenager, to make a somewhat likable human miserable.

Hope you can try this, Chedra, and thanks again for your question. I'm having my staff try to round up that bag of multicolored paper clips you requested, and it should be in your mailbox by early October.

A Reader's Question

Lately, I've received a few questions from new teachers, and I'm very grateful for them because they keep me from saying things no one wants to hear.

Many of your questions will no doubt be beyond my field of expertise. If you're saddled, for example,with a class full of the criminally insane who may benefit most from a Hannibal lecture, about all I can suggest is body armor and a good stash of high-quality, but safe, antidepressants. But having taught since before your parents were born, there are many things I can tell you that will make your first months easier. So fire away!

Today's question comes to us from Sheila Burkson, a first-year teacher from Little Falls, Iowa, a sleepy bedroom community just a few miles east of Dubuque:

"I read your post about trying not to give busy work, but sometimes I mistime a lecture, or a discussion runs dry too soon, and I feel I have no choice but to give them busy work in the form of worksheets or reading or some such time eater. Then I'm swamped with grading. Trying to figure out how to fix this, because it stresses them out and gives me too much to grade!"

Thanks, Sheila. Try to convince the little rapscallions that in order for them to improve, they need to write more than you can grade. Take up this apparent busy work and if they ask if this one'll be graded, you say, "It sure as heck will be if you didn't do it." Keep these papers in a folder marked "later" or "just in case" or "mini-informal portfolio." And, of course, be sure to justify the assignment: "This will give you a better idea of what a(n) _______ is like and how to analyze a(n) _______ in order to ________."

Later, depending on the nature and quantity of future assignments, you may decide to grade these. That's not a problem because you notified the students of that possibility. Or a student may later have an extraordinary and legitimate excuse for missing an assignment that is next to impossible for her to make up, so you can plug in one from your folder.

Just be open about this. It's not trickery. You don't need to pretend you've lost a set of papers.

Give them the old piano-lesson analogy: At your weekly visit to your piano teacher, you play some pieces which she more or less grades; she then teaches you a new piece, then you go home and, if you're serious, play it 40 times, none of which is graded -- but those 40 ungraded efforts were necessary for you to improve.

And just keep repeating the mantra: "To improve as a writer (or substitute "reader," "thinker," etc.), you must write more than I can grade."

As for filling up leftover time with reading, there's nothing busy or wasteful about that. Reading helps on many levels, and your classroom may well be the only place some of these teens read (a) an actual book and (b) without the distractions of a room full of social-media temptations. Reading in class, on a practical level, can also eliminate homework, the bane of existence.

If reading-time makes you feel guilty, you can always have them sum up, free write, synthesize, comment on or ask questions about what they read, then take that up and do with it whatever helps. (But you don't have to do this; I seldom do.)

So thanks for your question, Sheila. And as a token of my appreciation, that free bag of Jolly Ranchers should be in the mail to you within the next day or so.

As for the rest of you, if you have a question you think I can help with, but you don't want the whole world to know you asked it, feel free to send it to me by way of Facebook message and, in my response, I will shroud your name in secrecy.