This week was a short one for me. We were off on Monday and had an in-service on Tuesday which gave the students a three day week. Tuesday's in-service was a work day for the teachers and I never realized how valuable they can be. There was no teacher training scheduled which left us time to get a lot of extra tasks accomplished. I was thankful to get the chance to sit down with my co-op and be able to talk more than usual about my upcoming lesson plans. Along with the in-service day, I also had a good experience with my money and banking class this week. The students completed a project of redesigning the $100 dollar bill. I gave them the job to create new features and improve the bill. On Wednesday, the students presented their projects to the class. I was really impressed with their designs; many of them went well above what I expected them to do. On Thursday and Friday we talked about United States currency and coin. As a homework assignment, I gave the students an article about the U. S. dollar and a worksheet with questions about the article. I thought the article would be beneficial for the students to learn more about the features of the bill and it turned out to be a hit with them. They were very interested in the content and asked me a lot of questions about working as a bank teller. Usually this class doesn't have the best behavior, but this week went well because they were so engaged with what they were learning.
With this week being so short, I feel like I don't have as much to choose from for what I would completely change about my week. I can say though, that I need to improve on rewarding the students who follow directions and demonstrate good behavior. I sometimes feel I concentrate so much on those who need behavior reminders that I overlook the other students. It's something I've noticed and will be working on in the coming week!
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Wow do I fall into that same trap you do. In my Accounting class I have a group of seniors that are difficult to keep on task and often interrupt. I also have other students that are well behaved and I never reward them for their efforts, I am constantly giving attention to the problem students. I also will be working on this the upcoming week!
ReplyDeleteI also give more attention to certain students and didn’t realize it till this week. I just noticed myself going towards the more outgoing kids. Like Jon said you could start to reward the good students maybe this will influence the others to behave.
ReplyDeleteI think that we all tend to give more attention to the students that are giving us problems in teh classroom and do not reward those that are well behaved. I also agree that the in-service days that are working days become very beneficial to use for planning.
ReplyDeleteWelcome to the world of education! Wow - your statement, "I sometimes feel I concentrate so much on those who need behavior reminders that I overlook the other students" hits directly on what almost every teacher toils with every day in every class.
ReplyDeleteLook at your student population. We legally need to accommodate the students who need learning support on both ends of the spectrum: the students with learning challenges and the students who are gifted. What about the majority students who make up the middle?
Add to that fact that the students in the middle demand less of our attention and unfortunately get....lost in the shuffle.
The teacher who makes every student feel like he or she is valued individually as a student and whose presence in the classroom is recognized and appreciated is the type of teacher we should all should aspire to be in our careers!
How many of the student teachers were lost in the middle in their education past? Can anyone relate to this?