Paying Attention

Recently, a teacher asked an educator group these questions:

“I am in a 6th-grade classroom. I have a couple of students who are not doing their work, and a student who will not focus in class, after being given multiple sensory items, and them either being lost or broken the following day. My question is: What have you found is a good way to get students to do their work, and what next steps would you take in order to get the student to focus in class?”

I would wonder why the students are not doing their work first. Is it too hard? (You may think it isn’t hard for them, but they may feel it is too hard, and rather than fail, they would rather not try.) Is it too easy? What is their learning style? (Can you give them choices to do an assignment in a different way?) Do they understand what is expected? If you know the cause of the behavior, you can try to figure out a way to motivate them. What motivates them?

For the student who won't focus, is the assignment too long? Can it be broken down into smaller tasks? Can you sequence the steps and have him check off each step as it gets completed?

Sometimes we try to solve a puzzle like this on our own, but it is okay to talk to the student and the parents about this. I would approach this as a team effort to solve a puzzle so that they don’t get defensive and shut down. Tell them you want to consider all suggestions and it is important that you work together so the student can be successful.

This will show the student that you consider their input valuable and that their feelings matter. It also shows that you care, and you want the student to be successful. They may have failed so much before that they don’t think a little more will matter. Your insistence on helping them may give them hope and a willingness to try harder.

Many parents will feel that you are implying that their student is lazy and just non-compliant. It is important that you keep those ideas out of the meeting. This will cause the student to shut down and become stubborn about learning. Explain that you believe that the student wants to be successful, but you are trying to find the key that will help this happen.

I truly believe that if you take the time to do this kind of investigation, you will be able to find a way to motivate these students and help them be successful in your classroom. It takes time and persistence along with an “I won’t give up” attitude.

Have you dealt with this in your classroom? What did you do? Please share.

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The Squeaky Wheel

In Loud voices vs. important ones from Seth, Seth Godin shares

“Broken systems get worse when we confuse the loud voices with the important ones.”

I see a lot of this in the media. The negative stories, the most sensational stories, and the gossip stories seem to get the most attention. These stories are not necessarily the ones we should be paying attention to. It sends the wrong message to our young people. It says that they will get attention if they act bad, act crazy, or act irresponsibly.

When I watch the news stations on TV, I’m always surprised how little news they really report. If they aren’t promoting some political agenda or asking people to donate to a charity the station supports, we end up looking at commercials which pay for the news show. I wish I could watch one station where the news is reported the way it happens without any bias to slant the story. I’m not sure that is possible.

As human nature works, the squeaky wheel gets the grease. As long as we pay attention to the stories and buy the products that support these stories, they will continue.

I’m not even sure who to believe anymore. I’m not sure how true news stories are. I’m not sure who to trust either.

But I’m almost sure that when I hear the squeaky wheel, I will head the other way. I refuse to give them the attention they want. I will work hard to look for positive stories that are hidden. I want to look for the stories that are heartwarming and convince me that there is hope for mankind in today’s world. I will not support stories that extol the recklessness or carelessness of celebrities or sports figures.

I hope by doing this, I’m setting a good example for my students. If they have a role model that they could follow, maybe eventually the squeaky wheels will quietly get pushed to the background. They will never actually disappear, but we can keep them from being the front and center of attention.

How do you quiet squeaky wheels? Please share.

Photo by Edward Stark on Unsplash

Dealing with Focusing Problems

Recently a friend of mine asked me for some suggestions for her children who are having some focusing problems. Here are some ideas that I came up with. These are not in any particular order of importance but just a list of ideas as they came to me.

When we are talking about focusing and attention span, teachers sometimes confuse this with managing information. To me, that is mixing apples with oranges. These things deal more with managing your attention than managing the material. Of course, if you can manage your attention, the managing the material will be a byproduct. In education, it is important that a student learns to focus on important information for an appropriate amount of time in order to maximize learning (and pass tests, of course!)

Sometimes paying attention for long periods of time depends on the interest in the subject. Of course, the more interested I am in the subject the better I pay attention. Of course there are times that even though I am very interested in the subject, I just can’t seem to focus. I love hearing the sermons at church but I usually have trouble focusing when I am listening to others. I have found a strategy that works for me such as knitting while I am listening. This enables me to focus on the speaker. Students need to find a strategy that works for them which may be doodling, playing with a squishy object in their hands, or standing up at the back of the room.

I also believe that we build up our ability to pay attention, just like I do when I am practicing running. When I started out, I did short periods of running and then gradually increased my time. Eventually I was able to run for an hour without stopping. I think this interval training could be used to help people work up to training on focusing. First get a baseline on how long students can pay attention without being distracted but do this several times so you can get an average. Then try to increase slowly but it is important to explain this to the students so they can actively work towards this increase. Allow students to chart their progress so they can see their accomplishment (which is pretty motivating for some). Take breaks. Many small breaks are better than one long break.

Sometimes students will process too little or too much information. They are so overwhelmed with all the information that it is hard to decide what is important and what are supporting details to that important fact. Consider reducing the work if it is just copying or busy work. If there are a lot of questions, break them up into smaller segments and give the student one segment at a time so it isn’t overwhelming.

Group like problems together. Have the students look through the problems first and mark the ones that require the same skill. Then do them all first. Then go through and mark the others that have the same skill and do them next. For example, mark all of the problems that require addition and do them first. Then do the ones for subtraction. This helps the student focus on one skill at a time rather than going back and forth.

Sometimes the students are easily distracted and then it is hard to focus back on to the task at hand. I know that when I am working on a project, it is hard to stop and then come back to it. I’ve either lost my momentum or I can’t remember where I stopped at. This can be very discouraging and I can lose the motivation to continue or finish what I’m working on. Consider earphones students to block out distracting noises. I had my students listen to instrumental music that I chose for them. Sometimes they would submit music for me to approve of and if it was soft quieting music I allowed it.

Special seating may help. Sitting near the adult may help them focus. Many times my students were put in the front of the room to help curb their behavior but actually sitting in the very back row so that they could get up and stand for a few minutes if they got antsy was more beneficial for them. They didn’t distract others and they were able to move around.

Break an activity into a sequence and write this down so the student can refer to this when needed. Everything has an order to it but we are so used to doing things, we take this for granted. Not every student learns this automatically and has to be taught the steps. As the student learns the steps, the visual can be slowly taken away.

Help the student identify the important information. Have them learn to ask who, what, when, why and how questions. Have them look for the main idea. The more practice they have doing this, the easier this will be.

Once the student can identify the main idea, ask them to look for supporting details for that main idea. If the page can be written on, have them underline or mark the main idea in one color. Then have them underline or mark the supporting details in another color.

Have students use technology such as books on tape/CD or whatever reading device they have. This enables them to control how much information they get at one time. These devices allow children to control how much information is presented at one time. If they need something repeated, it allows them control of this also.

Have the student practice telling you what they have read. The student can put this down in writing, or record it. The student can also draw pictures to go along with the summary.

A student also might have trouble finding relevance in the information they are learning. If there is a disconnect to this new information to why they are learning it, it will be hard for the student to focus on the material. Help students come up with connections for the new information as it relates to their life.

Have students repeat the directions. Depending on the age of the student, don’t expect them to repeat or remember too many directions at one time (I’m an old lady and I can’t remember too many directions at one time!). Write these directions down so they can refer to these when needed.

Let students know about a change in scheduling that may be coming up so they have time to adjust from one situation to another. Don’t spring changes on them suddenly. Keep a daily schedule available for the students to refer to. Sometimes students are worried about what is going to happen next and can’t focus on what they are doing right now.

These are just some suggestions. Do you have any others? Please share.

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Too Much Attention

As this week’s tragedy was spotlighted in the news, I was truly saddened. I felt sad for the victims, for their families, for the people in Boston, Massachusetts, our nation, and the world. I was saddened that there is so much evil and hate in our world.

Yet, I wonder how much of this evil and hate is sensationalized by our media. Throughout the day, I watched endless news reports detailing the tragedy. During the week there were endless special reports about capturing the killers. There was so much attention given to these evil men. All day long, videos replayed the bombing at the Boston Marathon. I honestly did not need a blow by blow description of the investigation, killing, and capture of the killers. Now I’m watching reports about the aftermath and future prosecution of the captured killer. Enough attention to the bad guys!

I’m afraid that we are giving way too much attention to the bad guys. If someone wants attention, they look at all of this and think that they could do something bad like this to receive it. They might not care that it is bad attention because all they see is all of the media attention. I’m afraid of all the copycat unbalanced people who may look at this and want the same attention.

Our children are becoming desensitized to the evil around us. There is so much killing in video games, movies, and TV shows that children think it is all make believe. No wonder they don’t understand the impact of an actual gun shooting.

Why doesn’t all of the many good acts that go on around the world get attention? Obviously bad news sells and good news doesn’t. People seem attracted to the bad but I wonder if it is a bad habit that we have developed. Maybe we need to turn off the news and watch things that are more productive. Maybe if we stop giving all this negative attention to the bad guys, it might slow it up.

I’m not saying we shouldn’t know what is happening around the world but it seems like the regularly scheduled news reports are recapping what has been shown all day long. Why not stop the daylong show and just report it on the regular news programs?

Do you think we are giving evil to much attention? How can we change this? Please share.

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Silence is Golden

In The Teacher We Are, The Student We Were from Practical Theory, Chris Lehmann says,

“The teacher we are today is, without question, informed by the student we were. But we have to make sure that we create a vision of our classrooms — and our schools — that include all students in that vision, not just in ways to “make them fit,” but to create spaces where all students can find themselves and find success.”

When I was in school, I was the quiet shy kid. I hated to raise my hand. I hated to be called on. I used to find a desk sitting behind the tallest widest kid I could find. I would hide. I hoped if the teacher couldn’t see me, I could blend in and be forgotten.

When I became a teacher, I sympathized with kids like me. So, I called on the first person to have their hand up. I didn’t call on kids who I noticed were “hiding.” But then I realized that I was doing them a disservice. I guess that is why my teachers didn’t let me “hide” and they knew something I didn’t know. They gave me a chance, even when I didn’t want it. I couldn’t learn if they just let me slide by and hide. It was important for them to assess my understanding of the concepts. It was important that I learn to join the conversation. I believe if I was given more time rather than being put on the spot, I would have been able to answer questions more easily because I needed more time to process questions. I like to mull over questions and “chew” on it for a while before I come up with the best answer. I did well on written tests rather than oral tests for this reason.

So now when I teach, I look for the students who were just like me. Instead of calling on the first person to raise their hand or only the students who want to be noticed, I let there be silence. I inform the class that I will not call on anyone for a few minutes and I want silence so they can process the information. I learned to allow for “wait time.” By allowing silence, I allow all of the students to process the information without the stress of worrying whether I will call on them or not.

Sometimes I meet with the students who do not like to answer questions out loud and explain to them that I need to assess their understanding. We try to think of ways that I can do this without calling on them to answer questions. Here are some strategies that I use in the classroom:

1. If I ask if you understood something, put thumbs up for yes and thumbs down for no.

2. Use a small white board for each student. When I ask a question, have them write the answer down and I walk around to check the answers. If white boards aren’t available, I used scratch paper for each student.

3. Have the students review what they learned and come up with their own questions and answers. I have them use the words: How, What, When, Where, and Why. After approving the questions and answers, I collect them all. Then I use these questions to guide my questioning. It helps the quiet ones because they know what 5 of the questions will be and the answers.

4. Give “wait time” before calling on students. The students, who know the answer, put a thumb up. I wait until all students have a thumb up. If some students are struggling, I prompt them on where to find the answer.

5. I had small square foam blocks for each student. One side was red and one side was green. They turned the green side (meaning OK) up if they knew the answer and the red side (meaning I need help!) up if they didn’t. I went around and helped everyone find the answer until all blocks were green. The more I did this; soon most of the students were able to turn the blocks to green.

How do you help the students who want to stay “hidden?” Please share.

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Close to Home

On the way home the other day, my husband and I were discussing how many accidents were happening on our highways. Just recently another high school senior was killed in a car wreck due to reckless driving, no alcohol involved. I mentioned that people needed to slow down but my husband insists that it is not speed that is causing the accidents but people who are driving recklessly (texting, talking on phones, playing with the radio, weaving in and out of traffic, etc.). This led to the discussion about how many accidents occur close to home. Here are some statistics on accidents and the distance from home. In fact, our wreck in 2000 happened within a mile from our house and we were almost killed. An elderly lady had a heart attack and was unconscious as she ran a stop sign. Unfortunately she didn’t live and we were lucky to suffer only minor injuries.

I think that many people get complacent when driving close to home. We feel relaxed and comfortable thinking that nothing can happen since we are near home. When we travel, we are on unknown roads and in different types of traffic so we tend to be more alert and careful.

I began to wonder if we get like that in the classroom. When I am teaching the same subjects as the year before or I have the same students, I tend to be more relaxed and less focused. When I teach a new subject or have students I’ve never seen before, I feel more alert and excited. The information I am going to teach will be a new challenge and keeps me on my toes. The new students are also a challenge because I have to get to know them and their personalities.

Maybe I need to treat every lesson and every students as if we are having new beginnings. They deserve my full attention and energy. By being too relaxed, I could be shortchanging them in what they deserve. Too be most effective, I need to stay on my toes and be excited about what I am doing. If the lessons are too comfortable, then I need to change them up a little so they can be exciting to me as well as my students. My students will pick up my attitude and if I’m bored with the lesson before we start, they won’t be motivated to learn. In turn, if I feel excited about the lesson, they will be more engaged.

What do you think about “being too close to home” when teaching? Please share.

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