Voice Management - Online Reflection #2

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 6^th 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 1^st and 5^th 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.