It
is the final semester of my English Education degree! May 16th I
will graduate and have the qualifications to be an actual, real life Language
Arts teacher! The past two and a half years have flown by! But before I get too
excited, I have to finish this semester: student teaching. Yikes.
I
began my student teaching on January 5th – the first day of the semester
at my placement school. I am teaching three classes of College Prep English,
and assisting with two other classes. I designed the current College Prep unit alongside
my cooperating teacher, and have been teaching or co-teaching almost every day.
So far, it has been an absolute blast. My CT and I built a great relationship
last semester, so now I feel completely at home, productive, and happy.
The
unit that we are currently conducting is a “book group” unit, where each group
is reading a different book. I have organized their work load into weekly work,
including one graphic organizer per week and reading notes in their notebooks,
long-term assignments chosen from a menu of options, and one collaborative
project which will serve as the final assessment for the unit. Fridays are
group discussion days, with every other day building up to the discussion. So
far, the unit has the potential to be very successful.
But
of course, it isn’t perfect. My CT and I hit our first snag last Friday—the
first group discussion day. Our plan seemed great: students will come to class
with completed notes including questions, thoughts, personal connections, and
observations regarding their books; students will have finalized their first
graphic organizer with all sorts of insightful ideas to share with their
groups; students will engage in discussion for the entire 50 minutes, which
will seem like way too little time because of all the class time and home time
they have spent preparing for this exact discussion. Oh my…I sure learned my
lesson. Turns out, giving students 50 minutes to discuss literature from their
own notes on a Friday is not realistic. As I walked around to listen to, and
participate in, group discussions, I noticed that students were often talking
about something unrelated to their book, or they were not talking at all. This
was the first problem. Second problem: many of the graphic organizers were not finished.
Students were hustling to complete their work to turn in at the end of class
instead of participating in discussion. A few groups even spent discussion time
copying the work of those students who were finished. Not a good start to the
unit.
My
CT and I had a long discussion on Friday. We came up with a game plan to
address the problems. For example, we are planning to provide a “focus piece”
to each group on Fridays to help guide their discussion, such as an article or
poem that connects to the novels. We have also informed the students that they
will be given a participation grade, and that points from this grade will be
taken off any time they have their cell phones out or are not prepared for
discussion.
One
of Wrobleski’s suggestions is to “gather reinforcements”
for the students who are consistently late. This could mean guidance counselors
and other school staff, but it could also mean parents. Wrobleski reminds us
that we cannot assume that parents know that their children are behind.
I think this is especially true for the grade level I am teaching—seniors in
high school. I wonder, though, what I should do if a parent doesn’t seem to
care…or if the student is 18 and on their own. I have several students that
have been living on their own since the beginning of this school year. In some
of these cases, parents are out of the picture.
Another
suggestion from the article is to “establish a plan” with
the students on an individual basis. Put together a schedule of when they will
turn in their assignments, and create individualized rewards and
consequences. This seems great in theory, however, I have one student who
has only come to class a handful of times this semester. I have planned make-up
times with her about 5 times now, and she has never followed through. When is it
time to pull the plug? How many chances are they given?
Wrobleski’s
final suggestion is simply to “be realistic,” which
is probably the most helpful suggestion of all. She reminds us that not
every student will pass, even if we do our absolute best as teachers. I don’t
like to think about this, because I believe that every student has the ability
to succeed in my classroom, but she has a point. I think that, with this in
mind, my late policy might still be my best option—10% per day. This way,
students have the ability to make up work, but if they wait too long to do the
work, it is out of my control. Now, I just have to stick with my plan and stay
on top of my grading, and everything should work out for the best! (Here’s
hoping…)
Yes, it is more important that students are completing the work and learning…BUT this is a college prep class and if you don’t hold them to some accountability now, they may be in for a very rude awakening when they get to college and are given a zero for late work instead. I think 10% is fair, but honestly, we don’t accept late work this semester for my sophomore honors class at all unless the tardiness is due to an excused absence related to either a faculty event or being sick. Maybe something else that you could do is advise them that no class time will be given for working on late assignments and that they will be docked 10% for every day that it is late. Then, you can also say that if you are not prepared for discussion, you will not be allowed to participate and will lose partition points. That seems kind of stinky, but they did sign up for an AP class, so they should have known ahead of time that there would be higher accountability. ???
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with involving parents if possible, and there is nothing wrong with discussing your concerns for a student with their administrator or guidance counselor. We are all part of a team right. Also, although I agree with you that simply accepting that some of my students will fail does not seem comfortable to me at all. However, being fair to everyone by giving each person the same opportunity to succeed is the best way to not only support all students equally, but to teach them accountability and what it feels like to succeed when they work hard at something.
I like that you chose to use a “focus piece” for discussions. I think that even college students sometimes struggle to maintain a lively discussion when given too much free reign. Maybe assign roles for each student to follow when “focusing” their research through the notes they have complied before discussion day will help provide a spring board...if you have a longer time frame scheduled for discussion, maybe you could split the class groups into sections of what you want discussed and have the students trade groups (like the jigsaw).
Last thing – you mentioned that you “hope” that you can help students succeed in the future…Reminded me of something I learned about last December at a workshop I went to. Her is a link to the video I watched in the workshop. There is a lot more to it than this, but the basic concept here is related to students who choose to be challenged vs. students who want instant gratification through easy success…why they make the choices they do and what we can do (starting at an early age) to help create in them a mindset of growth and the desire to be challenged. Even though the video presents younger children, this is still applicable to students of any age. Just food for thought I guess.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTXrV0_3UjY
Great post Sarah! Thank you for sharing!
Megan
Sarah,
ReplyDeleteFirst let me commend you for such a wonderfully positive attitude. You always offer a constructive and determined take on your problems. I want you also to know that my classes are struggling with late work too, though mainly it is due to absences and missing out on the day’s in-class work (we do not have much homework at the freshman level). I think where I really relate to your problem is the issue of discussion time and proper participation in discussion groups. We also tried discussion groups on Friday. The questions were not specifically about a text, but about the very relevant themes of parental expectations and the conflicts they can cause between parents and children. We set ground rules: three minutes to discuss each question, use examples from their own lives (or other people they know), and no phones or other materials should be out. Seriously, we gave them time to rant to each other, to talk about themselves, no holds barred, no note-taking, just talking to each other. Though not a complete failure, many of the groups struggled. Some stated a simple brief answer to the question then clammed up; others talked about everything but the question at hand, while others pulled out phones and pretended it was free-time.
We tried just observing the conversations, but inevitably we had to step in to keep students on track. I realize expectations are different for freshman versus seniors when it comes to level of responsibility and motivation, but my freshman struggled to remain on task answering easy personal questions and it was frustrating. I cannot imagine how frustrating it would be with a lesson where success hinges on preparation and participation by everyone. What I can say is that I agree with your ideas on how to approach the problems you are facing. I think you are spot on with the 10% on late work. Though it may not seem ideal to us, it is a clear consequence which affects their grade. And it is preparing them for college, where failure to meet requirements and responsibilities may cost more than 10% of an assignment.
I also feel that “focus questions” could be a good place to start. Perhaps you could offer these questions now, and as the unit progresses take the training wheels off. See if they can manage once they understand the expectations and have been through the process a few times. Our Honors class even struggled with discussion at first because they kept looking to me and my CT to guide them, but once they knew that we expected minimal input from us and it was their job to keep talking, they did a little better. If they faltered, we stepped in with a prompt or question to refocus them. After the second question, they needed no prompting (though we still had “off task” issues).
I have little to offer other than this in the way of personal experience, but I do think you are on the right track, especially when it comes to late work policy and a little extra guidance. I also agree with Megan’s comment that an understanding of what participation entails and what will lose you points may a be a good way to make clear your expectations (I hate to say it but they are all about the grade and the points, at least my freshman already are). I hope this has been somewhat helpful, even if only to know you are not alone in this struggle and that your ideas sound promising. Keep being awesome and keep up that fabulous optimism!
Best luck and thanks for a great post,
Krystal
I agree with Megan and Krystal -- thanks for a great post! And thanks to Megan and Krystal for their thoughtful, detailed replies. What a tremendous dialogue!
ReplyDeleteI just have one quick suggestion to add ... what if you made the deadline for students' completed graphic organizers Thursday, and you collected them at the beginning of that class (so they aren't working on them during class while you're trying to accomplish other tasks with them??) or at the end of class (if they are supposed to be working on them during class) and then you just did a quick completion check of them Thursday night and returned them for the students' discussions on Friday?
Just a thought to consider.
Thanks for sharing this dilemma--and your research! Looking forward to hearing updates!!
Your unit sounds interesting. I'm encouraged that you and your CT worked together to solve some of the initial problems with it.
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