More Classroom Management!!!

Though I really want a noisy class, my students here in Aleppo are going a little bit beyond my hopes and expectations. I fear that I will have to make an example of a few students this week and assign some lunchtime detentions. It will be my own brand of detention: lunch taken in silence followed by a debrief of why the students are staying in and making a plan to ensure they do not find themselves in at lunch again. (Lofty goals for a thirty minute lunch break!) I am somewhat hesitant to assign detentions though because I have observed that these consequences do not seem to stick with this particular group of students.

I think that these students need a tailor-made approach. I agree that they need to practice their listening skills and being respectful towards others, but they should be practicing these habits through opportunities that either play on their strengths or are so meaningful to these students that the kids cannot help but get tuned in and focused.

I have encountered a lot of middle-school aged kids as a camp counsellor, and there are always kids who are not listeners. When considering boys in particular – it is the behaviour of the boys in my classes that other teachers and myself are finding the most challenging – these guys can often be self-centered doers and jokers who feed off of one another. They like to talk, which unfortunately interferes with their listening. While I agree that these students can do some great work when they finally sit down and get to it, the fact that there is a regular struggle between teacher and student to get to that productive point suggests that these students are lacking buy-in. The typical presentation of the material does not jive for these students.

Some teachers manage this group by being strict disciplinarians and maintaining a rigid class structure. Personally, I find it hard to believe that a student constantly sent into the hallway or to the vice-principal is going to eventually start learning effectively, although the rest of the class might be kept in line through this one person’s punishment. I think that it is better to channel students’ energy rather than fight and contain it because the majority of these students are going to grow out of their self-centered behaviour anyways! Students receive countless reminders about listening to and being respectful towards other, but it is a lot nicer for everybody involved if students are praised for when they do listen instead of being reprimanded when they do not.

As I go through my last week of in-class teaching, it is my hope to put some of these vague notions into practice. Wish me luck as I try making up lessons for students who really like being at school but have trouble listening once they have an opportunity to start talking!

Happy Easter!

Culture Shock, Socializing, and Frames of Mind

I think that my culture shock, such as I have experienced it, has been mitigated over the past couple weeks by the fact that I teach in an English-speaking environment, I have a number of people from the school looking after me, and that I am here for such a short time. I have also tried to stay open-minded about the circumstances in which I have found myself, and I am continuously grounded and focused by thinking about the students that I have the opportunity to teach.

This past weekend was split between traveling with others and living on my own. While I definitely learned more with others - Bartering 101 with John and Wain, Passion processions in Azazieh with Berdj and Laura, and Armenian social life with Maria and Alig – it has been important to discover that I actually can function independently in a city where I essentially do not know the language. I can go grocery shopping, get from my apartment to the city center both on foot and by taxi, and deal with small bouts of minor homesickness. (Sam Roberts and Joel Plaskett were no small help this weekend)

I have heard from foreign hires who have taught elsewhere in the Middle East that Syria has been their most difficult placement because so few people speak English. It seems to me that there are a number of teachers looking forward to the end of their contract because the challenge of learning the Arabic language makes a deep integration into the culture much more difficult. While most teachers know enough Arabic to function, one individual told me that she felt it would take a much better understanding of Arabic to strengthen any of the relationships she shared with the Syrians she had met. The majority of foreign teachers therefore feel confined to a social circle of other teachers at the school in Aleppo and the scientists at the associated research facility.

In order to overcome the challenges of living in a small community and thrive on the international education scene, I think that a teacher needs to exhibit one of three characteristics: a solid knowledge of the local language that allows the teacher to participate fully in the host community; a true love for exploring cities, the Great Outdoors, and/or tourist sites; or a enjoyment of hobbies unrelated to teaching that can be done at home regardless of where “home” is. I want to teach abroad to engage with an entirely different community of students, but I know that I will need to bring other pastimes and interests when I take on a contract to teach outside of Canada.

Right now, I am really missing having a guitar to play. Music plays a big role in shaping my frame of mind and helping me to re-focus myself. Since I hugged my parents at the airport and said goodbye, I have constantly been evaluating how I am feeling and why I am feeling that way. I am happy to report that I have felt really good since I stepped out of the airport in Aleppo. It has been difficult to get to a phone or computer for a longer period of time, which sometimes weighs me down when I first wake up or when I am heading to bed, but as one of my associate teachers often said, the promise of “just another day in paradise” helps to both start my day and send me off to sleep.

Managing Age, Language, and Education

What is causing so much nervous energy in my students? As I began teaching the Grade 6 and Grade 7 Humanities classes this week, I was fascinated, intrigued, and a little horrified at the constant motion these students demonstrate throughout a period. The students at this school are all very polite to teachers, and it is pretty wonderful when students go out of their way between periods to pop their head inside the staff room and say hello. On the other hand – wow! The effort it takes to get them to listen to me or each other once they are worked up is a little overwhelming!

As I have been putting together my lessons to teach these students about the Crusader castles we are visiting in just two weeks, I have repeatedly been considering where their motion, their energy, and their sociability flows from in the hopes of tapping into that energy rather than suppressing it! After working with kids of the same age at summer camp, part of me feels that these students are simply acting their age. Eleven- and twelve-year olds can be bad listeners and are very active. I also wonder if the fact that English – the language of instruction – is a second language to the majority of these kids plays into their behaviour. I can tell that a good deal of their discussion is the result of explaining something to a neighbour. Finally, I am also aware that I am working with kids who have been brought up in a very social culture. Students do not see each other outside of school and so class time seems to be regarded as another opportunity to catch up, play, and hang out!

We will see how the week goes, but one thing is certain – I do not need to get the students excited to learn at the beginning of each period. These kids are already firing on all cylinders. Maybe if I build up the excitement throughout the class, I will have a little more success harnessing that energy! On the other hand, the kids here are just as wonderful here as they anywhere else I have been, so I know that I am going to laugh with them in spite of whatever challenges they throw my way!

Motivation in Leadership

I hope to someday serialize and post an essay I wrote for my Public History course regarding motivation and Grade 10 History students in Ontario, but time flies and I have still more ideas to write about. I am continuing to examine the motivations of students during my practicum, and in particular I am looking at the level of commitment that some students show towards leadership camps, which I have referred to in other posts. At these camps, students learn about the essentials of communication, group dynamics, problem solving, goal-setting, leadership styles, stress relief among other topics. Whether these participants in these camps actually develop into effective leaders is an entirely different question, but the organizers of the weekend have a high intrinsic motivation to make their camp a success. There is a high emotional attachment to the camp, many students feel that they change as a result of this camp and want to make a difference in the lives of others, and there is also some pride or status attached to being a part of this camp, which is of course an extrinsic motivation. I am not sure that educators are ready or really want students so interested in a particular course that they put off other school work, become almost obsessively focused on the work, and ignore even bodily needs of sleep when preparing for large activities, but it is interesting to look at how such motivation might be directed and harnessed for the purposes of education. While I suspect that one of the reasons that students devote so much effort to leadership camps might be because it is not a school activity, I think that this potential should nevertheless be investigated.

Lesson Planning 2.0

When I am pulling together resources for a lesson plan, I usually read through the text assigned to students, read the pertinent sections from whatever books are a part of my secret syllabus for that course, and then start searching the internet for images, primary sources, black line masters, and activity ideas that can enhance my students’ learning experience. I always rely on my own resources first because I am familiar with my own books and notes, but I usually look to internet sources to avoid having to re-invent too many wheels.

At the beginning of the year, I decided that carrying a binder of photocopies and lesson plans through my career was not for me. I wanted to get with the times and keep my resources digital; consequently, I am always hopeful that the internet will provide me with helpful teaching tools. Sadly, I am frequently disappointed with the quality or availability of teaching resources, and I am sure that many of my colleagues often feel the same way. I imagine that they do what I do – lift the general concept and transform it into something that is actually engaging for students and will last more than fifteen minutes. (Because let’s be serious some of the online lessons promising to last for a whole period would not play for even half that time in the real world!) Unless the resource or lesson idea is superb, we really do not want to directly copy the resource; however, it is incredibly helpful to have digital activity plans and worksheets that can be adapted, changed, chopped into little bits, and made our own. In short, we need Lesson Planning 2.0 where lessons, skill practice, and content are collected together but in discreet packages that can be universally accessed and infinitely hacked. Lesson Planning 2.0 would challenge some educators to move beyond simply printing a worksheet off the internet and instead plan for their specific group of students, and our learners would benefit by receiving lessons that had been thoughtfully tailored to their own interests and learning needs.

The internet can provide teachers with ready access to the tools necessary for enhancing students’ learning experiences. Until we start advocating for dynamic databases that encourage users to continually add value to these applications, educators will limit the professional collaborative opportunities presented by the internet and Web 2.0.

Leading the Way in Inconsistent Behaviour

The students who participate in planning leadership camps at my practicum school are incredibly passionate about and dedicated to creating a leadership camp experience that builds on the fantastic time that they themselves had as delegates only a few years before. At the camp that I helped to supervise in the late fall, I was stunned to learn that these students were willing and able to provide a quality camp to delegates when running on only a few hours of sleep. Their motivation in that moment was such that, whether or not this was a reasonable and healthy choice, they were willing to push their own physical limits in order to pull off the camp that they had been dreaming of and planning for the previous three months.

It was therefore so frustrating for me to attend a leadership planning meeting this past Monday to observe this dedicated group carrying on a multitude of side discussions throughout the course of their time together. Brainstorming was definitely less efficient with only part of the group tuned into the discussion, and the disregard that some students showed towards their peers was shocking. Were these the same individuals that had shown a united front dedicated to seeing through a quality leadership camp?

While many of the students involved in planning leadership camp have strong intrinsic motivations for directing considerable time and energy to this extracurricular activity, I wonder if the extrinsic rewards of being recognized as a member of the planning committee or validating the club to skeptical teachers are actually what focus the entire group to complete tasks. Perhaps these students acquire and demonstrate greater motivation as they are able to see the fruits of the labour. Because the group is so large, it may be that a consensus model is unwieldy for organizing such a large event. I believe that the energy these students invest into leadership camp can be directed towards other activities, but it is essential to identify and harness consistent sources of motivation rather than tapping unsustainable levels of commitment.

The Smooth Lesson

When I led Music & Drama sessions and Leader-In-Training sessions at Camp Kintail, it was always important for me to have quick, smooth transitions between activities in order to hold campers’ interest and attention. I also remember being told as an undergraduate student to work on smooth transitions between paragraphs in the essays that I wrote.

While observing my associate teachers and reflecting on my own practice, it occurred to me that leading a seamless lesson is every bit as important as creating smooth camp activities or essays. Students are given opportunities to lose focus when there are unexpected breaks between a mini-lecture and an activity or when certain lab materials still need to be pulled out. If I am mentally prepared for my lesson and have all my handouts and materials organized before the class, I think that I will be more successful in sustaining student focus on both teacher-centered and student-centered activities. Some students might be more motivated to engage in class work and activities if they feel that I am organized and not wasting their time trying to get my own act together. Other students who have trouble staying on task throughout an entire period might simply benefit from having a constant and consistent focus for the full seventy minutes.

The ability to lead a smooth, seamless lesson is thus not only a classroom management technique but also a pathway to success for students who experience difficulties learning in a classroom setting.