LISTEN to KIDS!

Whether it is parenting, or teaching, I have to remember to be a better listener.  Today a boy while doing small group work wanted to tell me a story about something that happened to him maybe 2 years ago in middle school.  The story and conversation we had was bit bloated, maybe 3-4 minutes that when other groups are working is hard to justify, especially when it didn't pertain to the assignment at hand.  But I listened and then we discussed what to do next time he is teased.

I have to admit that in times past I would have been in a hurry to get on to another group and would have dismissed this boy and his story, but this phrase (LISTEN TO KIDS) has been recently implanted in my brain and it's critical.

This morning I left for school with my ten year old son crying because of a toothache.  Neither my wife or I had a lot of time for him this morning besides telling him to chew on the other side and give him a pain reliever.  When I got to the car I thought that the correct response would have been with my son to hold him and say,  "I'm sorry", because a pain shared is a pain divided.  Or something like that.

Consider the ears on the deer pictured above.  Why so big?  Hearing a twig snap could save it's life.  Our ears are smaller but no less important.  What we hear is designed to help us.  In the case of a teacher, parent or friend, we can also help others with an appropriate response after taking time to listen.

Welcome back... to chaos!

Hi friends,

I had been warned that my classes would be enormous.  I have 42 desks and the first day back, I had anywhere from 45-53 kids in every class.  That meant all 42 desks full, plus the ten chairs, and in the last period of the day, a student sat in the last chair, my chair.  Gulp.

I know it won't last, it never does, but all these students left me a bit anxious.  Because none of the faces were familiar.  Strangers can look intimidating, especially a group of them that are also not thrilled about the temporary overcrowding.

And then something happened.  I started to notice smiles.  Smiles make me relax.   It disarms people.  It humanizes these bundles of hormones we call young adults.

One particular boy that I felt some unease with I started to strike up a conversation.  I found him very polite and we found common ground quickly.  I had gone from fearing this boy a little bit to liking him and not fearing him at all in just two minutes.

You can't judge these kids on appearance.  Some of the appearances are admittedly rough, but once you get past the facial piercings and the tattoos, these kids are still kids, with joys, hopes and dreams.

I am looking forward to another good year.

Embracing Technology

Last Christmas break, I guess with too much time on my hands, I thought about starting a Facebook page for my health classroom.  My modest goal was to see if we could get 100 Likes.  We passed that goal in about 3 weeks and hit 200 at maybe the 8 week mark.

Health is in the news CONSTANTLY!  Good for me and my class.  It's so easy to add a link to the site, and I often show the class on our screen upfront (via a wireless internet connection, and an LCD projector) something linked from our Facebook page.  It can range from the silly (bad flirting from Season 7 on Friends) or something more serious on Sexual Harassment in the Workplace which I streamed today from the PBS website.

And you know what's even better than "Likes" is when students post links of video or articles that compliment what we are currently studying!  Student engagement outside the classroom, thank you Mark Zuckerberg!

Here is a link to our baby: https://www.facebook.com/JMHS.health

Motivated By What?

I  heard once, many years ago, that people were for the most part motivated either by the promise of reward, or motivated by fear of pain or punishment.  Of course, we may be motivated to date or marry by the promise of reward-- spending time with the person we desire.  And yet, in other areas, we may be motivated by fear of punishment.

Personally, I am okay with planning ahead and figuring out lesson plans for the week or next, but when I began teaching 17 years ago it was really only about one thing:  avoiding pain. Let me define pain.  Pain would have been having 35+ ninth graders with nothing to do for 15 to 40 minutes left in the period because my lesson plan finished too early.  Therefore, like aircraft wings, I OVER-ENGINEERED my lessons to make sure I would not finish early.  Thirty-five ninth graders in the classroom with nothing to do for 30 minutes is pretty much the definition of anarchy.  I planned only to avoid pain.  Although, I will say designing full lesson plans to keep things hopping (on my terms) was and actually still is not a bad way to achieve classroom management (and without that, you leave teaching after 2-3 years)

Today, with thousands of lessons under my belt, it's fairly easy now to know how much everything will take and I can usually time multiple activities in my 57 minute period to within 3-5 minutes.  Also, I don't plan now just to avoid dead time, I plan now with questions like:  what things should my students know?  What lessons will prepare them better for living on their own someday?  I plan to help them, at least that's my goal.

Enough about me.  What then motivates my students?  There is no single answer.  Some of the more motivated ones seem to be driven by that goal of getting into their favored UC school, or the school across the country, that actually has 4 seasons like all the Ivy Leagues do.  Others, who should fear punishment, strangely don't seem to from what I can see.  I consider punishment as having to retake a class, but it would appear that many don't fear failure, perhaps as they have unfortunately become accustomed to it.

What about fear of failure, as an excuse to not even start or finish?  Not really sure what that is, since it's not in my life experience really.  But for many, I feel that could be a possibility.  Or fear of not living up to a parent's high expectations. Others may have a fear of success, because with success brings change and high expectations, and that too can be scary.

We just had parent conferences for the 4th time this year and once again in a 120 minute time frame I saw just over 30 parents.  What I really needed to do however, was to spend 10-20 minutes with about 7-8 of those parents, and not the 2-5 minutes on average that I did.  In that short amount of time you scratch the surface without much meaningful interaction occurring.

I'm still learning about these young people.  At least now I am beginning to ask the right questions, since it is all about them, and not about me anymore.  And that's the way it should be.