I have realized during my time in my internship that I do not give students enough time to get to the correct answer. They sometimes need an extra push but that does not mean that I need to provide them the answers all of the time. According to Melissa Kelly's article "Wait Time and Education," teachers should wait "three to seven seconds" for students to respond to a question. I think what is difficult for me is that I want to fill the empty noise. Those seven seconds feel like a long time. I have been told multiple times that it does not feel that long to students but when it feels like I am being watched I need to fill the noise. It has gotten better throughout the semester but I know that I will need to work on it next semester when I am with students I am unfamiliar with.
One of my students invited me to attend the school play that he was a part of. He was proud of the fact he was in the play and wanted as many people to attend as possible. I was excited to get to see my student in a play for the first time. The play was "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow." I had a feeling of pride any time my student was on stage. The play was a great way for me to realize being a teacher is more than being at school every day and teaching lessons. It is more than trying to get to know students during passing period or when conferencing with them. Being a teacher is also getting to see your students participate in one of their passions and supporting them through the process. I look forward to seeing future students participating in their passions.
One question I want to explore next semester is how to put a positive spin on bad behaviors in the classroom. My MT has warned me of some of the behaviors in one of her hours I am teaching in. She said that they are not bad students but occasionally get off task and start doing things that disrupt the flow. I think I want to test out giving students jobs when they come in each day so they can put their energy into that. If any students like to talk without raising their hands I want to try the strategy of "talking chips." I hope that it will promote more quiet students to participate in discussion as well as help students who enjoy talking to limit what comments need to be made.
As the semester is winding down I look forward to seeing what challenges and triumphs occur during interning full-time.
https://www.thoughtco.com/importance-of-wait-time-8405
Madison, thanks for this post! One thing you might try to make those 3-7 seconds feel less awkward is to explicitly tell students that you’re giving them “think time.” For example, after posing a question, you might say, “I’m going to give you about 30 seconds to think and jot down your thoughts before I call on students to share.” You can even let students know that, since they’ve had time to think, you will call on them, even if they don’t volunteer. Or if you don’t want to be that formal, you can allow the wait time and just say something like, “I appreciate the way you’re thinking deeply about [xxxx], and I can’t wait to hear your ideas!” This might make the silence feel more intentional.
ReplyDeleteI also applaud your idea for jobs in class. That’s something I did in my middle school classroom, and my students and I loved it.
And Talking Chips is a great way to encourage more equal participation among students during discussion. Thanks for sharing!
Madison,
ReplyDeleteYou are definitely not alone in your need to fill the silence! Something that I have started doing is singing "twinkle twinkle little star" in my head, before posing the question in a different way or offering examples. That gives students a nice amount of time to think about the question for themselves.
That's so sweet that a student thought to invite you to their play and even more awesome that you were able to attend. For some teachers it does seem to be just a job, so I'm sure it was very heart-warming for the student to see his teacher support him outside of the classroom!
It sounds like you have some great ideas for handling disruptive behavior. Assigning jobs for students to do like passing back papers, is something my MT has done for students who get off task or finish work early and it always seems to work.
Thanks for sharing!