I really liked this week how we got to choose an article to read from the article bank. As I think about my case study more and more I’m feeling that it will be a constant struggle throughout the rest of the year. It is likely that my student will leave our school after fourth grade (right now he is finishing third), but I worry and wonder about what will happen next year. I think about what kind of successes and failures will occur in a different setting with different teachers. As these thoughts come to mind I also think: If I were to start again from the very beginning of the year, what would I do differently? Although this seems like a hopeless thing to think, my case study student’s behavior does not impact his academics too much. He is doing well in the third grade and does excellent in all tests and practice EOGs. Our problem is the day to day activities and behavior in the classroom that luckily does not impact his ability to succeed academically. Right now I am focusing on helping him in other areas and what I can do so that our behavior management doesn’t impact him socially, emotionally, or in any other non-positive ways.
The first article I chose to read was “Praise, ignoring, reprimands” because I liked the title. I thought maybe it would be a more specific way to deal with individuals in the classroom and thus would support my needs for this case study. After I read the article I realized it was more of a general way to use praise, ignoring and reprimands in the classroom. I really liked this article. There were some really great points about the right and wrong way to use these teacher techniques. I really like the table of effective v. not effective praises to give students. This is something I have talked about with my CT because at first I was “good job”ing everyone! It is really important that we be specific and direct with our student praise. This again got me thinking about what I would have done differently with my case study student. My case study student is new to this country and receives ELL services at the school. He will take the EOG this year, but we are not worried because he is very smart and successful in academics. I wonder if maybe we had collaborated with the ESL teacher and thought about ways to explain the specific behaviors that were not okay and then implemented a behavior contract at the beginning of the year if it may have gotten a lot better earlier. I think at this point he has developed so much frustration that our BIP is less effective than maybe it would have been at the beginning of the year.
I was curious about other articles so I also skimmed the article “teaching students with diverse needs”. As I mentioned earlier my case study student is excellent in academic areas so I was more geared to the general and behavioral suggestions. I like the ideas: Relate class to personal real life skills and experiences; Limit expectations to two or three concepts per unit; Concentrate on student strengths and bring those strengths into the lesson; Use concise written and oral directions (spoken, written, and oral); Model assignment expectations, show an example of the product; use self-monitoring strategies; provide a structure for organization; help the student set and monitor personal goals; provide alternative work area; use private signal to cue appropriate behavior for more difficult times; teach skills of independence, i.e., paying attention; provide definite purpose and expectations especially during unstructured activities; prepare the learner for changes in routine. This is a FANTASTIC article for ideas. All of these specifics I listed are things that we should have done or done more of and I think it would have helped a lot. Of course I was only here once a week in the fall so I only got a small view into what took place before January. If you are reading this post I would recommend reading this article. It is great for teachers and definitely has boosted my attitude heading into my last month of student teaching. J
I didn’t check out the article about praise and reprimand you mentioned but now I might go back and take a look. I think that’s a really great point you made about making sure to offer specific feedback to students, rather than overusing the typical “good job.” It definitely loses its value when that happens. And I absolutely agree with you that the 2nd article you read was really great! It had so many quick and easy-to-use strategies for the classroom. It reassured me because I am doing a lot of these things already, but also gave me so many good ideas that were divided into specific bullets related to individual concepts a need. Definitely a keeper!