What's working, what's not

I thought I would throw out what's working for me and what's not. Perhaps someone can take from the good and help with the bad.

What's working

• PBS with tickets and a raffle on Fridays. (Thanks Annette and Jen!)
• Handing each student a card with the coordiantes for a point and having them plot their point on the board one at a time. (Even my kids who ususally do nothing did this)
• Positivity
• Concrete, explicit directions
• Taking an interest in each student (The whole "I noticed ________" thing from the Teaching with Love and Logic book)
• Collaborating

What's not working

• 5th hour. It is still a challenge for me. I have many students failing the class and they seem to be starting to give up hope for the term. There's this "I don't care" attitude for many of the students in this class.
• Keeping the students' on task for the whole hour. This is primarily 5th period again, but also in other classes. I have tried to have a variety of activities for each day so it won't seem so monotonous, but once they lose focus it is very difficult to rope them back in for the next activity.

I would love any feedback and would like to know what's working for everyone else.

Teaching student expectations

I keep getting reminded that my expectations and the students' ideas of my expectations are quite different. It is hard to imagine that a direction such as "read this page" conjures up different ideas to me than the students. I have realized that "reading" to them is abstract so I continually have to be very explicit on what I want to see and hear. I can't make the student read and they know that which I think is why it becomes abstract to them. Instead, I remind them that I want to see the books open, their eyes in the book, the book right side up (just in case) and their mouths closed. This is much more concrete and I have much better results.

The next project I want to tackle is more obvious reminders/cues/concrete examples of what I expect if students get stuck. Too often, they are stuck and just don't have coping strategies in their toolboxes, such as how to use their notes or the textbook to help them. Then then talk to their friends and get frustrated when I come down on them for not working, saying they tried and were stuck and I hadn't read their mind to come help them. They feel like they have done every thing they could so why am I so upset. Plus, it is much easier to be defensive and blame someone else.

I have observed that students have a hard time transferring information from notes to other problems. Instead of blaming the students for being lazy, let's figure out a way to help teach and reteach these strategies and remind students of our expectations. I am working on a log type system for my students to record what steps they take when they get stuck with very visible choices posted in the room. More to follow, but let me know what you think!