This is my third year at The Foote School and sixth at NHCLS. What a nice feeling knowing you are returning to a familiar and friendly workplace! You no longer need to impress your peers or walk on eggshells that may or may not cut your feet. I have a different classroom this year, but the unpacking really does not faze me
There are now more detailed preparations I busy myself with:
- How about some fun first day activity? I decided to do the Name Game in my sixth grade class this year. Thanks to Creative Language class!
- What will I post on the walls that will be more conducive to student learning? Instead of glossy posters and excessive artifacts, I am going to be more critical about everything I put up. I want students to be able to look up and find answers and clues everywhere. Every time they search for these words, they are learning.
- What classroom commands are useful in helping my students stay in target language? I listed stock phrases or "language chunks" that can make things "happen". What better way do we show our students that language is real than teaching them things that make things happen! (i.e. 我可不可以___？ ___怎麼說？ 老師, 我有一個問題。etc.)
- Do I do a review unit or go straight into the new content, and review along the way? After planning a number of review activities, I joined last week's #langchat forum. I wonder if it would be more productive to learn new materials right away, and "integrate previously studied concepts throughout the year". Some thought-provoking ideas, games and thoughts were shared generously on langchat. See langchat summaries for details.
All
in all, I love first days. September is when we are the freshest,
most prepared and positive, because we have all summer to freshen up,
and we have yet to encounter new obstacles that bog us down in this
9-month marathon. Even though some of us have had the same students, every
September, they get bigger, more mature, and more eager to see us again. I embrace September when it finally hits, and I can't wait to tell my students that!
Have a great year, my friends!
Over the years, David and I have shared much about our own classrooms with each other. I often comment on how lucky he is that his ivy league students soak up whatever he throws at them. He can just 'talk', or read from a script if he wants. There would be absolute respect for his status and indiscriminate acceptance for what he had to say.
Maybe it's a reaction, or maybe it's his natural tendency to better himself. The professor started reading my recommended books on teaching, on brain studies. Last year, he even attended an "education summit" for teaching undergrads. I was touched that student-centered instruction has been introduced to university classrooms, and he is amongst the "reformers".
In readying ourselves for our first classes in the fall, I reworked my first-week documents and tweaked some warm-up activities. My husband spent hours "watching videos". He was determined to find a video to accompany each of the 24 topics that he is going to introduce this semester. I thought it was a huge undertaking, but he found them all. Of all the video clips, there is a "Geology Kitchen"; there is a new-age mineral healing clip; the list goes on. The rest were also unconventional for a geology class, but there is too much goodness to fit in my little blog. How he uses these clips should go into another post. All in all, I think he beat me in bettering one's own teaching this time!
But I guess I am the most impressed with the fact that a college professor can decide to take such drastic measure in improving his instruction and student engagement when he has been at the same job for the past 13 year! He cares. It's easy to get comfortable, lazy and complacent, or simply stop caring!!! (You cannot lose your job when you are tenured.) It takes a lot of reflection and courage. I don't often give him kudos, but this time I have to say, "Way to go, professor!"
A friend just reminded me that I have a blog! It's been another working summer followed by complete relaxation, sneaking in thinking about some classroom management ideas and first-week activities while I sat bathing in the afternoon sun on the cabin deck. Upon returning home, I got out my many versions of classroom procedures and policies (also known as RULES). It's like reading a classroom diary, not about what happened in my classroom, but about how I perceived my classroom. There seems to be a trend - The more of these I wrote, the more succinct they became. I notice there are things I thought were important at the time, but the words and the "rules" carry no real significance in managing the classroom. Moreover, I found that I sometimes stopped being consistent with reinforcing the rules. Sad.
My New and Improved rules are all highly observable. They are short commands I can consistently hold the students accountable by them. The rules cannot be too taxing on ME, otherwise I'd stop reinforcing them. They have real consequences (like grades or rewards). They can all be justified by being conducive to student learning. Sounds like the guidelines you were given at teacher school? I started looking at some archive resources from other amazing bloggers and came upon some syllabus ideas I promised myself to return to one day. Many teachers combine their syllabus and rules. Some examples I looked at are Senora Hitz's Syllabus post, Martina Bex's Syllabus, and all the exciting syllabi at Creative Language Class. I like how friendly they look, but don't know if I will have it in me to churn out more documents.
On my list so far:
- Parent letter (email it when school starts)
- Syllabus (ready for open house)
- Classroom policies (first week)
- Classroom policies PowerPoint with more pics than words (first week)
- Classroom policies homework (first week)
- First week of lesson plans (now)
On first day of classes, I sometimes don't go straight to the rules. In fact, the first day is often a "getting to know you" sort of day in my class. It's also a good chance to impress upon the new students - It's fun to use only the target language! For my friends who are entering their first "real" classrooms-- It is so important to get that first day down pat. I remember my first day in a real classroom. I rehearsed it for hours. I was theatrical and playful. I performed. Out comes the TPR and exaggerated "Je ne sais pas" when the students were speaking English to me. It was fun. It brought us closer. The rules may come later if you think your students and your management style can handle it.
For classes that I teach 'rules', I have had activities to check their understanding of the 'rules'. Sometimes I give a homework assignment or quiz on it. Sometimes I ask parents and students to sign off on a portion of the document (I don't do this anymore). I have also drawn up rules that students suggest in my second year of teaching (something else I no longer do).
There are certain classes for which I don't explicitly teach the rules. They are usually my youngest students, heritage students and students whom I have taught before. My youngest students tend to learn the 'rules' as we encounter them. My heritage students and I have some mutual understanding (and I know all of their parents very well!). And students whom I have taught for many years know better. Instead, I teach them what I call "procedures"- to smooth out the kinks in the working of our classroom.
