Top Ten Things I Learned about Teaching This Year

The school year’s almost over, or maybe it is over for some of you lucky people. You’re checking in books, correcting exams, and closing up the grade book. You know that some of your lessons really met the objectives and the kids learned a lot. They caught the spark and you could see how the new understanding captured their interest.

But what did you learn? Did you catch that spark? Did you have an ah-ha moment? I’m out of the classroom and able to talk education experts. Here are my ah-ha moments:

Reducing Classroom Noise to Increase Classroom Learning

People don’t believe me when I tell them about my first classroom in the South almost 20 years ago. To be fair, my school district was in a poor part of the state and we hardly had money for textbooks and postage, let alone sound tiles and noise-reducing carpet.

My central noise problem didn’t come from my students, loud hallways, or sound bouncing off the classroom’s hard, bare walls and floors. My noise problem came from the enormous air conditioning unit that hung from my classroom’s ceiling. I don’t think I’m exaggerating when I write that this unit had the dimensions of an office cubicle, but just half as tall.

A Culture of School Discipline

The committee of teachers who interviewed me for the high school principal’s job had the usual questions, but it was clear that they all shared one overriding concern. “How do you feel about discipline?” is the way one teacher put it.

Feel about it? How do I feel about it? “Well,” I answered truthfully, “I’m not sure what you mean, but I will say that without good discipline in a school very little learning takes place.”

How to Address Classroom Cheating

The other day, my daughter’s middle school teacher caught my kid cheating. My daughter was finishing up a test, had moved to the classroom’s back tables, and was working when the next class entered the room. The bell rang and teacher began to teach. My kid quietly returned to her stack of books, removed the top layer, and took out a piece of paper that had writing on it.

Classroom Discipline: Don’t Ask Why

Teens are impulsive. That spontaneity is part of their charm. And it’s part of the problem, too.

Picture this: Nick sees a cute girl downstairs by the lockers. He thinks that he can impress her if he jumps over the stair rail from the upstairs landing to the commons below.

Not impressive, Nick, when the paramedics have to haul you to the clinic for a cast.

Easy Student Engagement: Name Dropping

This teaching tip is courtesy of the junk mail that piles up on my kitchen table. When the pile gets too large to ignore, I sort through it and toss uninteresting junk mail in the trash.

My husband asks me why I don’t just throw it all away.

Well, some catalogs I might be able to cut up to use as conversation starters or metaphors in class. Some flyers I might be able to use in my mass media class to teach a persuasive print advertising technique.

And let’s face it: I like the pieces that call me by name.

Don’t Let Insults Slide

Life in summer English 11 was pretty peaceful until I allowed the class to divide themselves into teams for a review game. My students were completely engaged in the game. They enjoyed any opportunity to compete and began to trash talk. You can imagine how the trash talk escalated from good-natured ribbing to real insults. The original lesson plan had called for a friendly game with vocabulary words and a go-to-the-bathroom-free pass at stake, but it escalated to an event that was about honor, justice, pride, and revenge. They began to shout, stand up, and scatter desks.

Praising Students Improves Behavior, Academics

Studies like the one from graduate students at the Peabody College of Vanderbilt University affirm what you already know: praise works.

Students like to feel good about themselves, they gravitate towards teachers and classes where they feel good, and they like subjects that reinforce the notion that they’re good at something.

It’s nice, though, to see what we all accept as good classroom management and good teaching backed by research. It’s also good to be reminded of some simple truths that surround the simple concept of praising students for good behavior and good work. However, we all know that implementing these simple truths isn’t always so simple.

Classroom Management: Always Have a Plan B

Yes, the unpredictable happens, but we can at least predict which types of events might occur. Fire drills, lock downs, drug dogs, power failures, tornado drills, bomb threats, hallway incidents, and an out-of-control student all unpredictable disruptions to your class. Even predictable disruptions like Homecoming events, assemblies, and club photo days can cause classroom chaos. How are you expected to teach when the power is out or half the class is in the yearbook room mugging for the camera?