Positive Attention & Recognition 8.3

Simultaneous Management 8.5

Giving Directions 8.6

Cooperative Management Signals 8.8

• Give positive attention to shape the behaviour of our students (IT'S THE MOST POWERFUL TOOL)

• Whatever we pay attention to will get more of. So, focus on what students do right than what they do wrong. It creates a more positive classroom environment too.

  E.g. “I like the way Team Panthers are working so well together!”

• Students crave attention from their classmates and from the teacher. Even negative attention is rewarding for some students. (So, don't give them negative attention. Channel it with positive attention. FIND THE LIGHT in even the littlest thing.)

• Give attention and special recognition to students with model behaviour (And explicitly say WHY) to positively influence others (Give immediate and public recognition.) (Same goes to group/whole class)

• If things go haywire (channel the positive attention back to the group/individual with model behaviour, but need to make sure others are paying attention too)

• Let students understand which behaviour is valued. Let students feel secure with the class norms which are valued.

• Same as when we would usually address negative behaviours, now, we should address positive behaviours (immediately when it happens).

• Students will like the teacher more and the students will have a happier learning experience in class.

• Verbal rewards and positive feedback positively impact on intrinsic motivation.

  ----------Recognition-----------------

• Recognition = publicly celebrating an individual, team or whole class' success in a number of forms except teacher praise.

• Example:

  • Class Newsletter - can let students take home to share their success with their parents

  • Class money/points - Can redeem something with the points/money

  • Awards - Give different awards for projects/presentations (so each team gets something)

  • Positive letter home - Give a small, positive note for students to take home and share with parents.

  • Team/Class reward - e.g. (team reward) free time/ first to be dismissed for lunch; (class reward: Activity, party, game, trip)

  • Public Applause/Bow - e.g. theatrical bow

  • Celebration Board - Posted with a student/ a team's accomplishment written on the board, teacher reads the celebration to the class at the beginning of the weak, and it stays up for the rest of the week.

  • Team or Class Cheers - e.g. a chant, cheer, handshake, or movement to celebrate their success.

to avoid management problem, we:

1. circulate (in class)

2. observe (the monk students)

3. verify (if they understand or not)

If one group don't geddit, confirm the rest also don't geddit.

When this happens,

1. get everyone's attention

2. clarify instructions

We can ask questions to focus teams on

their task:

“What’s your next step?”

“How do you plan to…?”

“Who will…?”

Check students' work - if they really blind to their mistake, teacher can intervene.

But can only make student aware that there is problem or provide additional resource.

Provide an answer only if the students cannot obtain one on their own. (students are supposed to do it on their own)

Ideally, we do not interrupt or interfere with the work of the students, but at the same time, we are seen as friendly and approachable rather than distant.

Why are we doing this?

So that the students know they, on their own, are responsible for the direction and quality of their work.

briefly in order to maximize time for student to student interactions

So give instructions in multiple ways (announce + write on white board/ project)

Short instruction = less to clarify, quick to understand

long instruction = more to clarify, slow to understand

BETTER instruction = : “Students, when I say ‘Go,’ and not before, you are going to stand up, put a hand up, find a partner you have not worked with today, give them a high five, put your hands down, and then remain standing until I give the quiet signal. [Dramatic Pause] ‘GO!’”

the Trigger is the word "“When I say GO"

1. confusion

2. bias

3. complaints from students

Choose a method that create interest and is fair. For pair/group - establish who goes first clearly.

Suggestions to divide students into pair/teams:

1. Who's up (students with darkest hair, students wearing glasses, students born in May etc)

2. Craft sticks/ spinner with students names (pull)

3. online random selector

   
   

How to model:

1. You can model the behavior yourself;

2. you can pretend to be a member of a group and role-play the behavior with the group;

3. you can work with a pair or group and then have them model for the class;

4. you can wait for the desired behavior to occur spontaneously and then ask the students to repeat what they just did, so the whole class can see.

Examples:

1. Choral Practice. Students finish the teacher’s sentence or respond in unison to a teacher question. Teacher: “The first thing we’re going to do is….”

2. Simultaneous Sharing. Use AnswerBoards for written responses or thumbs up or down for yes/no questions.

3. Showdown or Numbered Heads Together. Students write their own answers, then compare them with teammates.

4. RoundTable or RoundRobin. If directions involve a sequence of steps, each student in turn writes or says a step in order.

The teacher gives each team a piece of mahjong paper and lets students work as they please to do the assigned task.

Probable results: In many teams, each student takes out

his/her colours and works alone on some corner of the paper.

There is little if any cognitive or linguistic development (no thinking or talking), little interaction (no cooperation), and no development of conflict resolution skills (don't know how to fix problems)

With Structuring

1. Give students time to discuss how they plan to answer the task in teams.

2. Announce how to do the task, the limitations of the task and how they will

be evaluated.

3. Give teams time to plan their task and who will do what.

They must all agree on a team plan before they start.

Probable results: Equal participation, linguistic and cognitive

development (speaking and thinking improved), and development of skills in the areas of planning, conflict resolution, and consensus seeking will occur (more fair to all members)

8.11 Cooperative expectation

8.13 Setting up the room

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• Immediate Attention

  • The Five Count

    • Students are expected to become quiet in 5 seconds. (Teacher to count down using fingers so students can see.)

    • If it takes over 5 seconds to get all hands quiet and all eyes on me, we will stop everything and practise the quiet signal.

    • If they manage to quiet down in 5 seconds, genuinely appreciate them by saying, "Thank you for that quick, full attention."

    • Remember to reestablish the signal if it loses effectiveness.

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• Quiet Signal Variations

  • Give Me Five - To remind students of 5 rules:

    1. Eyes on the speaker

    2. Quiet

    3. Be still

    4. Hands free (put things down)

    5. Listen

  • It can also be: 2 eyes on the teacher, two ears on the teacher, one mouth closed.

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• Instrument Signals:

  • Pleasant bell, whistle, chime, piano key, guitar strum etc.

  • Students are to stop talking and give the teacher full attention.

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• Switch lights on and off

• Music/sound effect/ sound bite.

  • E.g. Songs with first few lines 'Respect', or cartoon character saying 'quiet'

• Clap/ snap a rhythm

  • Teacher claps or snaps a rhythm, and students respond by clapping a response rhythm in unison

• If You Hear Me, Clap Once!

  • Say "if you hear me, clap once", and clap once, then students clap. Do the same with clap twice, and clap 3 times.

• Choral Response: Teacher prompt something like "One, two, three - eyes on me!" and students reply, "One, two - eyes on you!" (Can work with singing a line too)

  Make sure to model and reinforce the Quiet Signal.

• Free Talk Time: A time where students can actually talk to their friends during a period. Teacher can time how long it takes for them to quiet down and give full attention. The number of seconds took each time was posted and summed each week. The time students took to keep quiet would be the time lost from their 'Free Talk Time'.

• The Quiet Signal is effective for quickly getting students to focus on the teacher, but not effective as a noise management method.

Sound Level Training:

Noise escalation can be prevented if students know and use their appropriate voice levels during interaction time.

• Voice Level

1. "No Talking" - independent work.

2. "Partner Voices" - pairs must be quiet enough not to be heard by the other pairs

3. "Team Voices" - teams must be quiet enough not to be heard by other teams.

   • Can use hand signals/colour cues to signal voice level.

   • Can even have whisper voice, six-inch voice, little voice, or tiny talk.

• Choral Response: Using verbal cue to tell students they need to quiet down. e.g. chant a response in unison.

  
  

• Noise Reduction Signal: Horizontal palm slowly lowering to remind students to keep it down.

  
  

• Stoplight Cards:

  • Green card on desk of the teams if their voice level is fine.

  • Yellow card if they need to tone down a bit

  • Red card if they need to become completely silent and count to ten before resuming interaction.

• Background Music:

  • Play soothing background music or sounds during team interaction times. E.g. slow tempo music of 50-60bpm, calm classical music, and nature sounds like ocean sounds.

    
    

• Mechanical Noise Monitor: Yacker Tracker (Noise Monitor lights up based on sound level. HOHO) Has buzzing sound if students are too loud.

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Student Self-Monitoring

• Quiet Captain

  • Can use stoplight cards or a quiet meter to let the group know they need to quiet down.

• Class Noise Monitor

  • Can ring a bell or clapping a pattern when the classroom is too loud.

  • Rotated role so all students get to be more conscious of classroom noise.

• Team Noise Cue

  • To cue the class to quiet down and watch each other's noise level by carrying out a cue such as 2 snaps and a 'ssssshhhh!' to politely let others know they are being too loud.

Sponge activity is for students or teams to turn to when they're done or time the task so teams finish at about the same time.

8.18 Sponge Activities:

• Can be a student/team self-directed activity that students do when they've finished their work.

• Often used as a follow-up to a lesson to reinforce or extend student learning

• Can also be a fun reward for finishing quickly

• Can be a good answer for "Teacher, we're done. What do we do next?"

Type of Sponges

• Team sponges: Team challenge question or problem, a topic to discuss, or a content-related team task

• Individual sponges: Journal writing, drawing, or starting homework.

Assigning Sponges: To inform the class what to do if they finish early.

• Announcement

  • Announce the activity when we announce the team activity

• Posted

  • Write the sponge on the board.

• Sponge Center or Area

  • Students or teams know to go to a sponge center or area.

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• On the Assignment