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.

No Busy Work, Please!

Last year about this time, my school was forming a committee (on which I was lucky enough to serve, and by "lucky" I mean I couldn't think of a good excuse to get out of it) to review our grading policy and, in the process, to consider implementing a "no-zero" policy. We read some articles on the subject by a distinguished educator whose persuasive techniques were either weak or duplicitous and whose use of statistics was not much better.

As I pondered this nonsense, it dawned on me that a more essential issue was the quality and quantity of the tasks we assign and grade. In a post for this very blog, I encouraged teachers to think more carefully about the value of what they require of their students. I encouraged them to articulate clearly to the students the reason behind and the value of each assignment -- to never require them to do work "because I said so."

I argued that there is neither virtue nor pedagogical value in amassing a huge number of grades. In fact, I believed then and still believe now the concept of diminishing returns applies to graded work. I also believe that when students know there'll be 27 graded assignments in a quarter, they feel pretty okay about skipping one here and there.

As I was writing this snarky little masterpiece, I interrupted the narrative to admit that the writing was rushed "because I have a bunch of quizzes to get to."

That was last year. Now a new year is upon us and, man, have things changed!

Maybe not. A committee will once again address the grading-policy issue, and I will once again be a part of it. And as I sit at my computer, once again, to remind especially my new colleagues not to burden themselves or their students with superfluous work, I feel the need to quickly bring this thing to a close so that I may return to grading.

Click here for last year's essay in all its snarkiness.

If you have so much grading that you don't have time to read it, here's the Spark Notes version: Assign only work that will help students become more competent in your discipline; it's okay to assign more than you grade (more about this in a future post); always tell your students how an assignment will help them and where it fits in the big picture.

Giving your students lots and lots of work doesn't make you a better teacher. It makes you and your students tireder, less fit for teaching and learning. (One day we should talk about the teacher's role in cultivating workaholism, of encouraging  the culture of busyness.)

We become better teachers when we spend more time imagining learning activities and less time filling up the gradebook and in writing stuff in the margins that only a small percentage of students ever read. We also become better teachers when we leave time to convalesce, rehabilitate and rejuvenate during these precious but fleeting weekends.

Just Ignore It

So let's say you're teaching a topic close to your heart, something that means a lot to you, and has for a long time.

(Brief interruption: If you never have that feeling, getting up in the dark every morning to go stand in front of young people for very little money may not be the job for you.)

So, as I was saying, there you are expounding on, say, the beauty of the quadratic equation, and you notice either Jethro or Selmolina in the back of the room doing something that, while not harmful or dangerous, s/he knows full well s/he should not be doing. The offender may even be aware that this act of rebellion is within your line of vision.

Meanwhile, though, the rest of class is completely entranced by the quadratic equation, especially the ax² part. Students are taking notes. Their eyes have that priceless "this-is-why-we-go-to-school" look. But you're furious with that punk in the back row.

What to do?

Unless the student is disrupting the flow or continuity of the class, you just look the other way. The strategy could be the same even if it involves two kids, maybe even three.

Let them have their little world into itself. The consequences will come down on their little self-centered heads soon enough. If you single them out to call attention to the fact that they're doing something wrong when they already know that, you're the one disrupting your class, not them.

Now everyone is watching an exciting showdown between a frustrated adult and an attention-seeking adolescent. Who will win? Will Jethro or Selmolina get written up? Will the teacher become overwrought and let slip a profanity? Tension grows in the room, especially for students suffering from any degree of anxiety issues. All fascination for the quadratic equation -- despite the charms of ax² -- is long gone. What are the odds of your winning them back?

So do you then talk privately with the offender(s) after class, have a little heart-to-heart, remind the little knucklehead who's boss, threaten a call home to the parents, that sort of thing? I wouldn't even do that, not for a while, anyway. The student was seeking attention, but didn't get it. The other students continued to learn. Life went on. That wasn't any fun. Maybe tomorrow she'll try listening to you for a change. And if that happens, you can dish out some moderate praise for her decision to do what students are supposed to do.

In short, new teachers, it may take you a while to figure out which fights are worth engaging in. But whatever you do, don't jump into all of them. Adolescents hate to lose, especially in front of their kind. And when they do lose, their relationship with you is likely to be prickly for weeks to come.

Don't Forget to Listen

I just learned that if you Google "listen to your students," the search results quickly morph into "how to encourage your students to listen to you."

The former, I believe, is the finer skill and equally as important as the latter.

I think it's safe to generalize that many parents, esp. those beaten down and exhausted by the economy, find very few minutes in the day to sit quietly and listen to their kids. And when I am around groups of teenagers, I don't see many of them listening to each other, either. They're neither straining to hear nor straining to be heard; rather, they are ensuring headaches and neck pain for their later years by staring down at their cell phone, feverishly tapping out a critical message to someone perhaps sitting right next to them.

Maybe we should try listening to them. I've tried it a couple of times and I'm pretty sure I saw gratitude awaken in the eyes of my young protégé.

Do you remember what it felt like when a teacher stopped what she was doing long enough to listen to insignificant, harried, confused, teen-aged you? Weren't you flattered by this little moment of grace? Didn't it make you want to work harder for this teacher and to give her a little less grief?

(I'm not sure it ever happened to me. I remember this, instead: "Roy, could you please have a seat so we can start class? Thank you!")

This week, I resolve to listen: When a student has something to tell or ask me, I'll take a breath, establish eye contact, just listen, rather than be formulating a snappy comeback. And I'll do this during class discussions, also before and/or after class.

High school is a hectic, fast-forward world for everyone -- everything happens too fast, and it happens faster every year -- but it's okay to create an eddy in the rapids, or, if you prefer, hit pause on the DVR of life, and let a teenager be heard for a change.

The First Day Makes All the Difference

Some reputable group conducted an experiment a few years back in which students were shown no more than a minute or so -- if that -- of a teacher's class, and they were then asked to fill out a course evaluation form as if they had taken an entire class with her.

At the end of the semester, that teacher's actual students' evaluations of her were almost exactly the same as the ones written by students who had only a glimpse of her at work. Students, the experimenters concluded, know almost immediately if a class is going to be rewarding, challenging, boring, etc.

Research has also shown that many interviewers know within 20 to 30 seconds if they are interested in a job candidate.

So obviously, your first day in front of students is critical. On the one hand, I think you can win them back no matter the magnitude of the first-day fiasco. On the other hand, it sure would be nice not to have that uphill battle, not to be down two games to none in a 5-game series.

The Internet is lousy with sites offering suggestions of Kaganesque (and Kafkaesque, probably) first-day activities, ice-breaking games, throwing a ball at classmates whose names you already know, etc., so you don't need help with that from me.

My advice, in compressed form, is that you need to combine authenticity (you're a human being much like them) with authority (you know more because you've been learning longer).

Be hospitable. Whatever you say to welcome them, they should hear "I'm glad you're finally here. I'm happy to meet you." Don't make them think that their entrance has initiated your 10-month slide into the pit of hell. Listen carefully. This may rattle them a bit, because they're not used to being listened to, but once they recover they'll be deeply grateful.

Here's my advice in less compressed form:

Some of your students on Monday will be as fired up as you are, but many others will be like little kids with their thumbs in their mouths, hiding behind their mom’s legs, staring up at you to see if it’s safe to come out. They have pretty much the same questions as the toddlers: Can I trust you? Are you mean? Are you gonna like me? 

They also want to know if you know what you’re doing, if you have patience, if you have a sense of humor, if you can hear them, if you speak their language, if you’re going to ask too much of them or not enough, and what role you’re going to let them play in this game.

And they want to know how much they can get away with and, oh yeah, what kind of thinking is required in this class? They’ll also want to know what percentage of their total school energy this class will require, i.e., in light of their other six classes, how much will they need to commit to your class?

Believe it or not, you answer almost all of these questions within the first five minutes. The way you look at them, the way you carry yourself, the stuff you’ve written on the board, the way you’ve defined yourself by what you’ve displayed on the classroom’s walls – students quickly synthesize these things and predict if this class is gonna suck or rock. As we noted earlier, their predictions usually come true.

So what kind of face should you wear on that inaugural day? A genuine one, a human one. Yours. Any other one will make you a false self, and there’s hardly a teenager alive who can’t spot one of those from a mile away.

Once you've finished with the required tasks of the day, try to work in something -- a "micro-teach," so to speak -- that shows just what this class is going to be like. You're saying, in effect, "This is how we think in here. This is how we converse. This is how I teach." Their response may be, "This is gonna be great and I can't wait for tomorrow," or it could be, "I should probably see my guidance counselor." Either way, you win.

I have written at greater length about the all-important first day here: http://gladly-teach.blogspot.com/2011/08/first-day-must-dos.html.

Don't Fear the Syllabus

My classes somehow get mapped out inside my head as I go for walks, work around the house or read novels. They usually sound pretty good up there. But it’s a joyless chore formalizing these ideas in a syllabus or a lesson plan.

And yet, it’s that time of year again -- probably my more conscientious and better organized colleagues are all done with this task. I’m putting it off to the last second.

Here’s how I make myself finally get to work on these things: I keep in mind that what will actually happen in class, day to day and minute to minute, bears little resemblance to the legalistic language of the syllabus and the standards-laden textspeak of weekly lesson plans.

Both are somewhat similar to the outlines my high-school English teachers made us write before we wrote essays: They gave you a direction to follow as you began the composing process. Unfortunately, back in the 19^th-century when I was in school, we were graded on how well our essay followed our outline. Preposterous!

I now think of the outline (and, by extension, the syllabus) in a different way. When I compose, I roughly map out the piece (omitting the Roman numerals, upper case letters, Arabic numerals, etc., because they remind me of high school) chiefly to keep me from freaking out from fear of the unknown as I write each paragraph. With a map, I don’t feel like this: “I know this paragraph is going pretty well, but I have no idea what I’m gonna write about next.”

So the syllabus can be useful in reminding me and trying to convince my students that this class is proceeding according to a plan and it isn't as completely random as it seems. Ditto for the lesson plans.

You and I will not be graded on how our syllabuses match up with our classes, and most schools will give us some leeway on the lesson plans.

When I was trying to keep my high-school essays from saying something I hadn't anticipated in the outline, even my little brain became frustrated, because it hadn't died at the moment of the outline’s creation. It had more interesting things it wanted to talk about!

In the syllabus and in the lesson plans, we project our good intentions. What happens in reality is usually better than that. More about the syllabus later, but for an expansive, moderately well-written discussion of it, see http://gladly-teach.blogspot.com/2011/08/final-first-impressions.html.