• Welcome to Teachers At Risk

  

• Elona Hartjes, MEd (Candidate), Ontario Certified Teacher

• Recent Comments

  • sham on Setting SMART goals help students succeed
  • jordan on Students Who Drop Out of School Can Lose Driver’s Licence
  • Matt B on How Teachers Can Manage Stress through Five Fitness Tips
  • Liz on How Teachers Can Manage Stress through Five Fitness Tips
  • Peter Martella on Setting SMART goals help students succeed
  • Jeffery on Students Who Drop Out of School Can Lose Driver’s Licence

• An honour

  • Edublog Awards
• 
• A Public Service by Dentist Advisor

• Meta

  • Log in
  • Entries RSS
  • Comments RSS
  • WordPress.org

I was listening to Joshua Kadison’s song Wild Angel tonight on Joyrise. It’s a sad song that reminds me of all the Wild Angel’s I’ve had in my classrooms. You know, those kids who are so needy and looking for love in all the wrong places. Kadisons lyrics are so powerful. Go listen ,and you can’t help but be moved. It made me sad. I wonder where all those Wild Angels are now, the ones I taught in jail, in the open custody facility and in the regular classrooms these last twenty two years.

1. Interact frequently with these students. They do soooooo better with the personal touch. Seat them close to you, stand near them, ask them questions, ask them their opinions. This will help reduce the chance of them drifting off into lah lah land. Some kids work better if they know you are interested in them.

*************************************************************************
2. Assign buddies when doing class assignments-math buddies, English buddies, science buddies etc. Train the students to ask their buddy first if they have a question. If their buddy doesn’t know the answer, then it becomes a group question that the teacher will answer. This will prevent kids from just sitting there because they don’t know what’s going on, or don’t know how to do the work.

*************************************************************************
3. Check for understanding by having the student explain “whatever” in their own words. Kids get to know they are accountable and pay more attention.

*************************************************************************

4. Catch them being good. I can’t stress this enough!!! Reward them with praise whenever you see students doing what they are supposed to. “Oh good, you’ve got your books open and ready to go.” “Oh good, you’re asking your buddy a question.” “Oh good, you’ve finished three questions-you get the drift. It works like magic! I catch them being good, not being bad, and I feel so much better! Really. Try it.

*************************************************************************
5. Have the work listed on the board with page numbers. When kids seem to be in neutral, ask them what are they supposed to be doing. Don’t ask them why they aren’t doing it.-waste of time. When they say they don’t know, point to the board. Soon they’ll be trained to look there.

My high school students absolutely love it when I use a timer in my classroom. It never ceases to amaze me. (Although, I must say that when I first heard of the idea I had my misgivings.) In an earlier post, Mental Energy, I talked about using a timer to help one of my student become aware of how much of the time he is off task. I’ve been using a timer for quite a while now in class to help kids focus on the task at hand. Usually I’d set the timer for 20 minutes of silent reading, 5 minutes of furious writing, 10 minutes to complete a handout etc. The kids love it when the timer rings because it means the “torture” is over: they can stop reading, writing etc. and have a micro break until the next task. It’s amazing how much work the kids get done when I use the timer. It helps set the pace for the class, and I always feel we accomplish more when I use the timer.

This time, I’m using the timer a bit differently. I talked to the kids about mental energy and how everyone has a different amount. Some people have more;some people have less. I told them that I wanted them to become aware of how much mental energy they have. If they have low mental energy then they need to know a strategy to help them deal with that because low mental energy affects performance in school and on the job. Some of the kids told me that their bosses at work have talked to them about speeding things up, and the need to take the initiative. So, they were interested.
I set the timer for 10 minutes, and after the timer rang, they wrote down what they were doing when the timer rang. I thought this might be too disruptive, but it wasn’t. They had so much fun doing this. It was nice to see all that positive energy. In fact, when I forgot to set the timer at the beginning of one of the classes, the students asked ” Aren’t you going to use the timer?”.

Now that they are aware of how frequently they are off track, we’ll talk about strategies to help them refocus.
Just an aside- Yesterday, I was talking to my son Chris about this timer business. He told me he read somewhere that to increase productivity at work you can set a timer so that every hour you work non stop for 48 minutes ( no interruptions whatever) then you take a 12 minute break to do what ever. Apparently this strategy boosts productivity unbelievably.

How do I try to deal with stress? One way is to accept two facts of life. First, I’ve come to accept that, for the most part, I can’t control what other people say, do or think. (Believe me, I’ve tried.) I can only hope to control what I say, do or think. I can choose how to react to other people or situations. I can choose to get all bent out of shape, or I can choose to let it go. Second, I’ve come to accept the fact that change is constant. The good times don’t last; the bad times don’t last. I’ve had lots of both. Life is a roller coaster ride. These two realizations have helped me deal with the stress of everyday life.

When someone does something that has the potential to drive me crazy, I tell myself I have a choice: I can go crazy and be all stressed out, or I can let it go and limit my stress. I remind myself that I cannot control what that person says, does or thinks. I can only control what I say, do or think. Then, I ask myself if I want to get stressed out and sick over something I have no control over. The answer is a resounding no! So then I decide that I am not going to get bent out of shape over whatever. Does that mean I let everything slide? Of course, not. It means I pick my fights, and that’s the point. Some things, when you really think about it, aren’t worth the fight, aren’t worth getting bent out of shape over. Others are.

The other realization that has helped me deal with stress is that change is constant. Why is this helpful? Because, it means that any given difficult situation will end. Goodbye! Good riddance! I try to live in the moment and deal with just that difficult moment and tell myself that I can handle it because it’s just this moment. I try not to live in the past and dwell on how good it used to be and bemoan the fact that it isn’t like that now. I try not to live in the future and dwell on how terrible it will be in the future, and I know I will probably hate it. Notice, I say I try to do these things because I’m not always successful, but whenever I live in the past or in the future, I just get angry and resentful and stressed out. That’s why I want to live in the moment.

← Previous Page — Next Page →

• 
• Tweet
• Search for:
• 
  This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 Unported License.

• Archives

  Select Month May 2012 April 2012 March 2012 February 2012 January 2012 December 2011 November 2011 October 2011 September 2011 August 2011 July 2011 June 2011 May 2011 April 2011 March 2011 February 2011 January 2011 December 2010 November 2010 October 2010 September 2010 August 2010 July 2010 June 2010 May 2010 April 2010 March 2010 February 2010 January 2010 December 2009 November 2009 October 2009 September 2009 August 2009 July 2009 June 2009 May 2009 April 2009 March 2009 February 2009 January 2009 December 2008 November 2008 October 2008 September 2008 August 2008 July 2008 June 2008 May 2008 April 2008 March 2008 February 2008 January 2008 December 2007 November 2007 October 2007 September 2007 August 2007 July 2007 June 2007 May 2007 April 2007 March 2007 February 2007 January 2007 December 2006 November 2006 October 2006 September 2006 August 2006

• Dislcaimer

  These are my personal views and not those of my employer.