The Days of Reflection
Day 8 – Attention to detail
I have recently taken on some new classes. The honeymoon period is over and the students are settling into a routine. There are However, some students who will persist in pushing boundaries. Today I went for a small win.
The group has done a fair amount of practical work recently and today we focussed on writing up the experience, describing observations and drawing conclusions. Most students in this particular group dislike written work and employ all manner of tactics to avoid it.
So what did I Do?
As mentioned earlier I went for a small win. As students were working I walked around and engaged with them one by one. I had a pencil and rule in my hand and for each student I underlined a title or sub-heading and made their page look neat. This small task is something I usually ask them to do but today they saw it happen in their book without discussion. I told them “let me know if you need to borrow a rule in the future” (many of these students rarely even bring a pen to lesson). Afterwards I asked them if they were confident about being able to complete the activity which was a series of questions about the practical investigations. In most cases the students wete honest and said yhey knew what to do or thwy asked how to get started. All students worked well during this lesson and produced more written work than I was expecting. In general they tried hard to complete the task rathe than emplying their efforts to avoid it.
I’ve been thinking about why thr lesson was so successful and mybreflection has kead me tj this idea. As my initial encounter was a kind gesture to them and resulted in their own work looking neat in their book, they were motivated to do more. In addition, because my first spoken words were non confrontational I had created a safe conversation for the student to ask for help. This meant that they got the help they needed at the start of the lesson so could start the task. All subsequent conversations could then be built on the positive independent work that they had already completed and motivate the student further.
This tactic is not always possible but it can be used to target the most challenging students first when trying to engage a group of students.
If you try this technique, let me know how you got on in the comments.
Thanks for reading.