Teaching with little voice available
(and much coughing when I try to speak up) this week has been a tough gig. It
being my first week at the helm has made it even more challenging. It did make
me think of our reading from last week by Robyn R. Jackson “Never Work Harder
Than Your Students.” I thought of logical consequences and what work should be
on the students and not me. I also remembered Harry and Rosemary Wong’s book The First Days of School: How to be an
effective teacher and their focus on set up and procedures. Where do I go
from here?
In my 6th hour class I
was constantly working to speak over them when I needed their attention. I
tried the “Raise your hand if you can hear me” approach my CT occasionally uses
to mixed results. The irony is that we started the day, and indeed my unit,
with expectations. The students drafted, ratified, and signed off on their own
personalized, class expectations, which included respect and at least a mention
of not talking while teachers or peers were. I reminded them and we moved on,
but the normally boisterously chatty class still escaped me on occasion. We
even fell short of finishing, or even getting to, our vocab awareness
pre-assessment activity. My 1st and 5th hours at least
completed all activities but there were break downs in my ability to be heard.
My CT is pretty laid back and I
know I can’t reverse my students’ world at this point, but I have to find a
balance. Wong said “The effective teacher establishes good control of the class
in the very first week of school.” They also talk about how “the teacher must
create a well-ordered environment” and that seems impossible at the moment. So,
how to get order, now?
These first days were an
introduction to me and my class culture blended with theirs. It is also an introduction
to the structure I do want them to have, like regular journaling, expectations,
rewards systems, and my style of taking student input and giving my feedback as
often as I can. Strangely they didn’t all sit in rapt adoration as I spoke or
suddenly stop checking cell phones while their peers talked. Their sticky note
journal entries were awesome, their chosen class mascots interesting (mostly),
and their drafted expectations sufficiently reasonable, and yet I am not
satisfied.
My voice cannot yell tomorrow
either. What to do? Like Jackson said: wait time. That is one thing I am going
to try. Just stand and wait either with arm raised or will a sound effect
coming from my phone or computer. Just until I catch their attention and then
swoop in with the next thing. I am also going to try some things I got from
this cool site edutopia.org that I found tonight. (http://www.edutopia.org/blog/classroom-management-tips-novice-teachers-rebecca-alber
) This blog post about classroom management says:
- · Use a normal, natural voice
- · Speak only when students are quiet and ready
- · Use hand signals or other non-verbal communication
- · Address behavior issues quickly and wisely
- · Always have a well-designed, engaging lesson
So tomorrow, I
am going to use my normal, natural voice. If they can’t hear, maybe they will
quiet down a bit. I am going to try the “It looks like you have a question,
Emilio” rather than “Emilio, didn’t we just create this expectation?!” I am
going to find a sound effect to trigger things like “3 minute warning,” or “attention
please.” If that fails, I am going to raise my arm until it wears out, or until
they are ready to let me get a word in edgewise. Then hopefully I will have a
voice left to yell at my dogs and talk to my husband.
