Image via CrunchBase

I’ve had to think about student YouTube-use management strategies in my class ever since the Board unblocked YouTube. From the moment my students discovered YouTube was unblocked, they kept sneaking onto it instead of focusing on the online assignment I’d given them. (I’ve written about my frustrating experiences here , here and  here.) Notice, I said my students “kept sneaking” onto YouTube. I can use the past tense because now my students don’t do that anymore- well almost not anymore.

What made the difference? I now give my students independent time on the computer for the first 15 minutes of the class to explore any topic that interests them. Students are free to access any site they wish during that time. My thinking here is that my students can meet their emotional needs (the need for undue attention, the need to feel important, the need for fun and the need for freedom) at the beginning of the class using their free time on the computer and then settled down and do the work I assigned to meet the needs of the curriculum for the last 60 minutes of class.

I can imagine that some of you at this point might be thinking that taking 15 minutes of class time to let my students explore what they will online is wasting time. Well, it actually isn’t. Let me explain. I teach struggling, reluctant students. Many of them are “at-risk” academically and find school offers them little. Usually my students will trickle into class for the first 15 minutes. I have to be pleased they come to class at all. I make my classroom as inviting as possible so students will come to class on their own accord. Mostly, it works. I don’t have many skips at all. Honestly, I’d rather they come to class a bit late than not at all. Since I’ve started letting my students explore their interests online at the beginning of class, they are coming to class earlier and earlier. They don’t want to miss out on the fun. Yes, the fun for most of them is YouTube. However, some students do choose other sites such as Wikipedia or coolmath games. We usually do have class discussions around what they choose to see. Mostly the discussion starts with me asking why they find the particular video they’ve chosen so interesting. I don’t ask this question to criticize their choices of videos, but to help me better understand my students. Believe me, I’m learning a lot about the culture of 14 and 15 year olds, and to think I have YouTube to thank for that. Who knew.

The other classroom management strategy I use to help my students focus on the assignment I give them is to block YouTube after the 15 minutes of free time. A large padlock appears on the screen indicating time is up. Students aren’t resentful that I do this. They get it. They know our tacit or perhaps not so tacit agreement. First I give them freedom and fun, then they settle down and do their work and give me completed assignments. We’re both happy. Our needs are met.

I’d like to thank Liz, teachermom, Sam and Melanie for leaving comments about their classroom experiences with students using computers as learning tools.   I appreciate their suggestions and  insights on the topic.  I do appreciate all the help I can get.

Independent time on the computer at beginning of class is helping my students stay focused for the rest of class originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on June 7, 2011.

Ages ago, I learned about Glasser’s Behaviour Choice theory.  The idea is that students act certain ways to try to meet certain basic needs.  Sometimes these students try to meet their needs by inappropriate behaviour. These needs are are

• Survival- the need for for, shelter, clothing
• Power- the need to feel important
• Love/Belonging- the need to feel accepted and loved by others
• Freedom- the need to choose what we want to do with our lives
• Fun- the need to find enjoyment in life by learning and playing

For example, a child might try to meet his need to feel important by getting undue attention.  When my students are off task and go to other sites online and turn up the volume so that everyone crowds around them, they’re getting undue attention from other students and from me.  They might be thinking they’re only important when they  keeping me busy and keep getting the attention of other students.   That scenario seems to fit a couple of kids in my class.

Students could try to meet their need for power by going off task repeatedly and promising me when I try to redirect them that they will stop going off task and stay focussed but don’t, and I have to continually refocus them.  They may think that they only belongs if  they can be boss and prove I can’t make them do anything. I see that explaining some of the behaviour I see in my class.

Some of my students have profound learning disabilities that makes school difficult for them, and they don’t do as well as some of the other students.  They often feel stupid even though they have average or above intelligence. Since they have difficulty learning or demonstrating their learning,  learning isn’t much fun and they meet their need for fun by amusing  themselves by going to other sites like YouTube which they find entertaining.  When I ask my students why they go to other sites, they  tell me the other sites are fun. I can see why they think that  that because these fun alternative sites don’t expect anything from them like the sites I assign that support the curriculum. For at least one student,  learning how to take tests or write a strong paragraph can’t compete with  the fun of listening to various body sounds (farting sounds)  on www.soundboard.com. No, I’m not kidding.  A student, a grade 9 student, went  to that site and played back farting sounds to amuse himself while while other kids worked quietly on task- quietly, that is, until they heard the farting sounds.

Students could meet their need to chose what they want to do with their lives by refusing to do the assignments in class because they don’t want to be in a special education class. They want the freedom to choose what to do, and they don’t have it. They don’t want to be in my class so they choose not to do the work.  I’ve  heard students tell their friends my class is another English class even though it isn’t.  Students will even ask to keep the door shut because they don’t want their friends to see them in the learning strategies class because it’s a special education class.

When I think about some of the behaviour  goíng on in my class ín light of  Glasser’s theory, the behaviour makes sense to me. I now understand why some of my students act the way they do when they are completing assignments online.

Since I use computers  in my class, students are not sitting in the usual classroom configurations of rows or  tables.  They’re  sitting at computers facing the outside walls of the classroom. They don’t have the opportunity to  interact with me or their classmates in the same way as before I had computers in the classroom, so they have to figure out how to meet their emotional needs in the new context of a classroom with computers.  Students are trying to meet their needs in this new context  in inappropriate ways and this leads to a less than a positive learning environment.  The challenge for me is to help students  meet their needs in positive ways using appropriate behaviour in this new context. .

Any ideas?

photo thanks to sanjoselibrary

New classroom management issues arise when students who use computers in the classroom try to meet basic emotional needs through inappropriate behaviour. originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on June 5, 2011.

Bitstrips which is a user- friendly, online comic strip maker is an excellent teaching tool and learning tool. I’m presently using it to have my students demonstrate their learning.

I’ve asked my grade nine students to use Bitstrips to create a graphic-non-fiction booklet about the teenage brain based on the PBS video Inside the Teenage Brain. The the  booklet  would be for grade seven students to read so they could understand  how changes in the teenage brain might affect them as they enter their teen years.

I teach my grade nine students  about the teenage brain, and how it  is responsible for the characteristics we associate with teenagers- sullenness, difficulty going to sleep, difficulty getting up, engaging in risky behaviour, just to mention a few behaviours.  Students enjoy learning how their brain affects their behaviour because they finally can understand why they behave the way they do, and why adults react to them the way they do.

I planned the unit on the teenage brain  mindful of two things.  First,  my students enjoy spending  lots and lots of their free time online watching videos of one sort or another and little time reading, and second my students enjoy novelty. When I introduced the teenage brain assignment, my students  were quite keen on learning why they  behave as they do, and when I asked them to demonstrate their learning by creating a graphic-non-fiction booklet, they seemed to relish the idea.  If someone had complained about creating the booklet using Bitstrips, I would have entertained other options.  But, no one did, so we were good to go. I suspect  my students would  rather create a graphic-non-fiction booklet than write an essay to demonstrate their learning.

I introduced the teenage brain unit by asking them to do a placemat activity to generate the characteristics of  teenage behaviour.  After we talked about teenage behaviour, I asked them why teens acted the way they do.  Hormones is the answer I got.  I told them it was more than hormones that caused teenage behaviour.  It  was the teenage brain itself that caused teenage behaviour.  The teenage brain is different from the child’s brain and different from the adult’s  brain.  The teenage brain is unique, and they were going to find out why and how. I had their interest!

After our introductory discussion, I outlined what they would be doing during the unit. They would be learning about the teenage brain and how and why it affects teenage behaviour. They would be

• watching the  PBS video  Inside the Teenage Brain;
• taking notes from the video and a transcript of the video using the note-taking  graphic organizer;
• using the note-taking rubric to be mindful of  note-taking expectations;
• using the story board to plan the graphic-non-fiction-booklet;
• using the rubric for the story board to be mindful of the storyboard expectations;
• using the Bitstrips application to create the graphic-non-fiction booklet;
• using the rubric for creating the booklet to be mindful of booklet expectations.

I asked my students  to take notes during the video using the  Inside the Teenage Brain note organizer I created just for this assignment. I’ve  noticed  my grade nine students take notes better if they aren’t faced with an empty 8.5 x 11 in.  lined page. I think they’re intimidated by an entire empty 8.5 x 11 in.  lined page, so I  create graphic organizers to help them.  I’m hoping that given more practice note taking and more confidence, my students won’t need these graphic organizers or if they do, they can learn to create their own using Word.

I’m using this kid friendly  note taking rubric I created for the note-taking assignment.

Since many of my students have difficulty taking good notes while watching a video, I provided a link to the  the transcript of the video so they could read what was said during the video  and add to their notes.  Then I met with my students and we evaluated their notes using  the note-taking rubric to discuss strengths and next steps.

My students have almost  completed their note-taking activity and are ready to go on to planning their graphic-non-fiction booklet using the Inside the Teenage Brain Story Board legal size .

I haven’t had my students complete a graphic-non-fiction booklet before, so I’m not quite sure yet how many frames or pages would be reasonable to expect from my students. I’ll discuss this with my class,  and once we’ve decided on a range of possibilities, we’ll create a rubric to use as a guide for the booklet.  I’ll share all this in my next post.

If anyone has any hints about creating graphic-non-fiction booklets, I’d sure appreciate hearing them.  Creating a graphic-non-fiction booklet is all new to me.

Students demonstrate learning by creating a graphic-non-fiction book using Bitstrips originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on April 28, 2011.

Most of my students tell me that they like using the timer during activities because

• they  know exactly how much longer they have before the activity ends;
• they won’t spend more time on the activity than they are supposed to because I forget about the time;
• they like the different sounds the timer can make at the end of the activity.

I’ve had one student tell me she didn’t particularly  like the timer because she felt pressured to do more during the activity.

I like using the timer because it signals the beginning and the end of the activity.  For example, I have some students who would gladly not read at all and have difficulty starting the daily reading activity and others who would love to read for the entire 75 minutes of class and have difficulty stopping the reading activity.  When I use the timer, I don’t have to keep nagging and telling my students it’s time to start or time to stop reading.  The timer does that for me.  I love it!

I used to use a mechanical timer I bought at the dollar store, but it was small and difficult for student to see.  It did the job, though. Sometimes it would “disappear”  for a day or two. I guess some students just can’t resist.  Now, I use a timer I found online and display it on a large screen for all to easily see. Students assume the responsibility for setting the timer, and the class develops a consensus as to what sound the timer will make at the end of the time period.  Amazingly, this just takes a few minutes at the beginning of class and provides an opportunity for students to practice coming to a consensus respectfully.

There are a number of timers available online, I use this one because it counts the time down and give students choice of timer formats and sounds the timer makes when time it up. My students have great fun auditioning different timer formats and sounds.  I’m O.K. with that because the fun my students have  choosing the timer and the sound it will make at the end of the activity rubs off on the activity itself so that it becomes more fun.  My more reluctant, struggling students are more likely to complete an activity if there’s a bit of fun attached to the activity. Come to think of it, so will I.

Years ago, I started using a timer to time the silent reading activity at the beginning of the class and the journal writing activity that followed the reading activity. When I saw how well students focused on the task when I used a timer, I extended using the timer to other activities.  I think I’m going to start to use it in my grade 9 math class as well.  There are some reluctant, struggling students who have difficulty getting organized at the beginning of the class. I’m always waiting and nagging them to get their books and other materials out so we can start the class. I think I’ll have the timer displayed on the white screen as a reminder that class is going to start in 3 minutes, and they need to be ready.  I’m hoping the timer will refocus everyone, and we can start the class on a more positive note.  I hate nagging. It takes too much energy.

I’d love to hear about your  ideas for time management and motivational during activities in your classroom.  I definitely could use more strategies in my tool-kit.  Using the same strategies all the time loses its effectiveness.

Helping to motivate and focus students using a timer originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on April 25, 2011.

I decided to have a class meeting to establish a class YouTube policy. We had the meeting next class where I raised my concerns about the inappropriate use of YouTube, and the class reached a consensus that they wouldn’t access YouTube unless it was part of an assignment or until they  had completed all their work. One student suggested that we skip the daily reading and go to YouTube instead. He has such a sense of humour, that one!

I wish I could say that our student generated policy for using YouTube in class was working well, but I can’t. The lure of YouTube and what it has to offer is too much for most, if not all, of my students. So, it was back to the drawing board today to come up with another solution. I decided this time to ask my colleagues for help. I didn’t want to ban kids from using the computer because they need to use the online information computer technology to complete assignments. Getting banned from the computer could be another excuse for not completing assignments.

At lunch, I shared my dilemma about managing the use of YouTube in my classroom and got some wonderful suggestions.  I am so grateful.  Thanks.   I’m going to start by using some of S’s  suggestions and next class and for subsequent classes I intend to do the  following:

• have students know there are certain expectations around computer use in a classroom just like there are in a place of business that are different from the ones at home;
• help students understand  the YouTube videos they choose to watch should add value to what they are doing in class;
• encourage  students to think critically when watching YouTube videos to determine if the videos have the potential to add value to the task at hand;
• have students practice thinking critically about the videos they are watching and evaluating them.

I’m going to create a chart type graphic organizer for students to use while they practice evaluating the YouTube videos they watch. The headings across the top of the chart , at least the first draft, will include :

• Name of Video
• Short Description of video
• Score  for Adding  Value   ( 1,2,3,4)
• Why it doesn’t add value or how it can add value.

We’ll talk about this of course.  They’ll have 15-20  minutes for this activity. I’m not sure how long the activity should be, but since the activity is helping kids develop critical thinking skills  I think 15-20 minutes is worthwhile. I have my students  read for that long each day and do a metacognitive reflection on what they’ve read, so they’re  familiar with thinking critically about what they read. I don’t think its much of a stretch for them to think critically about what they have seen.  They’ll be expected to complete an entry for each video they choose to watch during this activity.  I’m not sure how many classes I’ll have them do this activity either. I guess I’ll just have to play it by ear.

Any suggestions or comments about what I’m doing or trying to do here?  I’d appreciate the feedback.

Continuing to develop a viable YouTube policy for my classroom. originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on April 4, 2011.

Image by grantlairdjr via Flickr

Last week,  I decided to ask my students what they expected from teachers. I told them that teachers are always telling students what they expect from them.  Now, I wanted to hear what students expect from their teachers. I ask them to tell me in a paragraph what they expect and why.   This is some of what they told me.  I expect teachers to

• not abuse their power and order me around like they control my life;
• respect my personal life and not to bug me on things that are none of their business;
• not to yell at me because that  just makes me made and I won’t listen;
• not to talk about themselves all the time and show off they’re smarter than us because I find it discouraging;
• not to treat us like we don’t know anything;
• have respect for all students no matter what they have done;
• to be able to hear both sides of the story and respect them;
• to be equally fair to all students;
• try to help every student to make him or her have the best results in class;
• give me less homework because it is hard to do it by myself if I cannot ask the teacher;
• more free time in class to do homework;
• give less homework because it is boring and takes away from time with family and friends;
• let us eat in class because sometimes kids are hungry in class and can’t stay awake in class;
• not give us homework before the holidays;
• let us listen to music while working in class;
• let us watch videos in class and not have to write about them;
• to want me to pass my classes;
• to be  helpful, respectful, and fun to be around.

One student was philosophical about student expectations .  He wrote “what can you do it’s life”.

After reading their paragraphs it stuck me how students and teachers have similar expectations. Teachers want students to respect them; students want teachers to respect them. I expected more of them to tell me they didn’t want homework.  Some did tell me that, but it was because they didn’t have anyone at home that could help them with homework.  Some students told me they want less writing.  Maybe teachers could have their students demonstrate their learning orally more often.  I’ll be honest, I want to do this more often, and I’m not sure why I don’t.  I’ll have to think about that one.  Any ideas about an easy way to evaluate learning orally?

I was delighted that my students felt safe enough in my classroom to actually tell me these things.  I work hard to develop an inviting classroom, but I always think there’s room for improvement. My students are great teachers, and they tell me what my next steps need to be.

I encourage you to ask your students what they expect from teachers.  I teach high school kids who are academically at-risk.  It would be interesting to hear what students who are not academically at-risk expect from their teachers.  Is it the same, or is it different?

What my at-risk high school students told me they expect from teachers originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on March 6, 2011.

I teach my students a process when I get them to write a paragraph, an essay, create a poster, a PowerPoint presentation, etc. The process starts with brainstorming. The students generate and record all kinds of ideas about a topic during this part of the process. They then select the most appropriate ideas to use for completing their assignment. That’s where graphic organizers come in.

Graphic organizers can be used to do more than organize ideas in a visual way.  They can be used to store ideas for later reorganization. Students regardless of their preferred learning style can park the ideas they select after brainstorming into a graphic organizer and need not worry about forgetting the ideas. who have short term memory challenges. This is especially useful for students who have short term memory challenges.  Once the ideas are parked in graphic organizer, students can organize or reorder the ideas as they see fit. Students won’t get overwhelmed trying to remember everything and trying to organize it all in their heads if they use an organizer.

I show my students how to break down assignments into manageable chunks. Sometimes that involves using several graphic organizers. For example, if I assign a five paragraph essay, students can brainstorm ideas and park them into a mind map they’ve created by hand or by using software like Smart Ideas or Inspiration. Once they’ve created the mind map, they can take those words and create phrases and put those phrases into five paragraph essay organizer. Once they’ve parked their phrases into the five paragraph organizer, they can create sentences out of the phrases and paragraphs out of the sentences.  I encourage them to insert appropriate linking words to help their essay flow.

My students regardless of their learning style appreciate graphic organizers  more and  more when they see how powerful a tool they can be.

Visual learners love to use graphic organizers but auditory and kinesthetic learners would benefit from using them too originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on February 10, 2011.

OK., I don’t get it. Why did Kim choose to do the three paragraph essay to demonstrate her HOTS?

Kim, not her real name, has a learning disability that makes it difficult for her to get her thoughts down on paper.  Her oral contributions in class are always very insightful and demonstrate superior critical thinking skills, yet  her written output demonstrates non of this.  When I talked to her about the discrepancy between her oral and written work she simply said “That’s how I am.  I don’t do details”.

I’ve been encouraging Kim to use graphic organizers that will let her tease out her thoughts on paper, well actually onto the computer monitor,  and build them from single words into phrases, then into sentences and paragraphs and finally into an essay.  Let’ s just say that were still working on that.

Keeping Kim’s strengths in mind and the strengths of the other students in the class, I decided to differentiate the next summative evaluation by inviting my students  to choose  to demonstrate their HOTS on the topic  by

• writing a three paragraph essay

or

• creating a comic strip

or

• writing a poem

or

• writing a song

or

• giving a 3 minute oral report

or

• creating a 5 minute radio script about the topic  with a partner

I had the rubrics for each of the activities available for the students to see to help them decide which one of the activities they wanted to do.

When I asked Kim what she had chosen to do for the summative , she  told me she was going to do  the three paragraph essay. I was surprised, to say the least.  When I asked her why she chose to write the essay  instead of  using her oral skills, she just shrugged her shoulders and told me she thought it was easier to do the essay than anything else.  I don’t get it.  She knows I won’t accept an essay that doesn’t meet the standards set out in the rubric  for the essay.  It will be interesting.

Oh bye the way, other students are busy writing poems and songs, creating  comic strips and  a radio scripts and enjoying themselves immensely.  The classroom was filled with that wonderful laughter that tells you learning is fun.

photo from here

Differentiating students’ summative evaluations brings unexpected results originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on December 1, 2010.

Really.  These are the kinds of teachers some of my reluctant/struggling students love.  I tried to talk to them about why I thought that the teachers like these might not be helping them do their best in school.  The kids didn’t care.  They just kept talking about how great these teachers were . Come to think of it just now as I’m writing this, I could get into a lot of trouble for  the conversation I had with my students about teachers W, X,Y and Z.  In the heat of the moment, I might have said something about them not doing their job properly- but please don’t quote me! Usually, I tell my students I don’t want to talk about other teachers. It’s disrespectful.  But….

While some students may love teachers like this now,  they may not feel the same way in the future.  Recently, I had a conversation with an adult I’ll call Chris who is really angry that he had teachers like that when he was in high school. Chris  now as an adult feels cheated out of learning opportunities because  some of his teachers didn’t insist he do his best.  Chris’ argument goes something like this: What does a kid in grade 9 know.  He’s  too immature to understand that these teachers are cheating him  out of learning opportunities. Teachers who choose to not care if a student finishes his work, choose to  let kids take attendance to the office and not notice that they don’t come back, choose to  lets kids out early all the time, and choose to show  movie every Friday instead of finding some way to engage a kid, are abdicating their  responsibilities as teachers and it’s not fair to the kids.

Now, I suppose you could say that Chris only has himself to blame for his missed learning opportunities while he was in school.  He needed to take school more seriously.  Well, maybe.  But Chris was a 14 year old kid and the teachers were adults who had certain responsibilities.  My question always is: If teachers don’t take school seriously, and they are adult role models in the schools, how can we expect kids to take school seriously?  Some students need teachers to care about the their education  because these students  are too immature to care about it themselves.

Some students really appreciate teachers who don’t take their responsibilities as teachers seriously. originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on November 21, 2010.

I tell my students that although they may have a preferred learning style, they need to do all they can to develop their less preferred learning styles as well so that learning becomes easier. I have found from personal experience with students and as a learner myself  as all three learning modalities, visual, auditory and hands-on  strengthened because of practice using them learning  became easier.

I recently came across this great site that has  free graphic organizers galore I can download and  use.  The site is a real time saver because I don’t have to create my own graphic organizers like I used to do.  I’m sure  you find graphic organizers you can download and use.

One of my friends at work found this site useful. The graphic organizers are also free. Thanks for sharing, Jenn. There are also suggestions for when to use the specific graphic organizers.

Graphic organizers are one of the most useful tools to use in the classroom originally appeared on Teachers At Risk on October 24, 2010.