CONNECT STUDENTS THROUGH SHARED EXPERIENCES AND SHARED TASKS

Few things can establish a sense of community in a classroom as quickly as shared experiences and shared tasks. Students who learn to see themselves as a united group working and playing together learn to be supportive of each other’s efforts and tolerant of each other’s idiosyncrasies. This is especially important for difficult students who can easily be isolated because of their disruptive behavior and attitudes. In the list below you will find several ways that you can encourage your students to be part of a supportive classroom.

Taking frequent photos will encourage students to see how they have progressed and grown throughout the school year. Display photographs of students doing various classroom tasks such as maintaining the classroom library or managing a classroom recycling center as well as participating in field trips and other class events.

Keep a scrapbook of major events and experiences throughout the year. The scrapbook does not have to be elaborate to be effective. Even photos clipped into a three-ring binder will show your students that they are important to you and to each other.

Use bulletin board space to show collages of the interests students have in common, their contributions to the class, and personal quotations or mottoes that are important to them.

Set goals as a class and work together to reach them:
The entire class earns a certain grade on an assessment
The class goes a certain number of days without tardies
The class earns a specified class average on a test
The class settles to work within a specified time limit
The class strives for perfect homework completion

Adopt a class mascot, secret sign, or catchphrase.

Celebrate class “in jokes,” traditions, or rituals such as group cheers when something good happens or pinning stars on the bulletin board to commemorate success.

You can also observe milestones such as the twentieth homework assignment or the tenth day with no tardies or the Hundredth Day. An excellent resource for Hundredth Day celebrations can be found at Enchanted Learning (http://www.enchantedlearning.com). Use “Hundredth Day” as a search term to access resources and lesson ideas to celebrate this occasion.

Become a Charismatic Teacher

 

 

Who wouldn't relish the idea of becoming a charismatic teacher? Being the person who makes students feel so important that they would never miss your class or forget to do your homework or talk back? When you were first deciding on a career in education, the chances are good that you did not daydream about unruly students making your life miserable. Instead, you thought of all of the students who would thrive in your classroom.

    

Fortunately for the millions of teachers working in today's schools, classroom charisma is not a mysterious quality. The basics are quite simple. The tricky part is that you can't forget to work on your charisma. You will begin working on it on the first day of class and you will still be working on it on the last day of class.

 

Here are a few of the basic tenets of classroom charisma that you can adapt to meet your needs. Sart with the ones that you can manage with ease and then move on to work on the ones that are harder for you to manage.

• Your class should be about your students and their work. Make them the focus of your attention. Some inexperienced teachers make the mistake of talking about their own lives too often while ignoring students, who are quietly tuning out.

• Recall those teachers in your past who seemed to have that something special that made their classrooms an enjoyable place to be. What can you take away from those teachers that you could use know with your own students?

• Smile at your students. No one likes a grouch. A teacher with a pleasant demeanor has half of the charisma battle won. What if you don’t feel like smiling? Do it anyway. You owe it to your students. Remember that your difficult students are the very ones who most need your smiling support.

• Stand at the door to greet your students as they come into the classroom. You should greet your students to convey the message that you are glad to see them.

• Overlook what you can. Although it is certainly OK to be strict with your students, there is a fine distinction between a strict teacher and a too-strict teacher. If you spend your day quibbling over minor problems with your students, you will not have enough time to attend to larger issues.

• Early in the term, establish the procedures and routines your students should follow, and then stick to them as much as reasonably possible. Students who know what they are supposed to do and how they are supposed to do it are much more comfortable than those who are uncertain about what you expect.

• Laugh at yourself. While you should not be the focus of the class—your students and their work should be—you should let your students know that you have enough confidence to not take yourself too seriously.

• Make sure to eliminate distracting personal habits that might annoy students. Some of the most obvious behaviors that interfere with classroom charisma are a monotone voice, poor eye contact, sloppy speech patterns, and distracting gestures.

• Charismatic teachers talk less than their students do. Ask questions that will encourage students to share their ideas with you.

HOW TO CREATE A POSITIVE GROUP IDENTITY

One of the most important things that all teachers should do at the start of the school year is to direct their students' thinking about themselves. A class that perceives itself as filled with toublemakers will, without a doubt or any hesitation cause trouble. If, instead of allowing students to create negative images of themselves as a group, think what would happen if you teach them to think highly of themselves. Here is a brief excerpt from THE FIRST-YEAR TEACHER'S SURVIVAL GUIDE to help you get your students headed in the right direction.

Unless you create a positive identity for your class, students may take your smallest misbehavior

correction to mean that you think of them as troublesome. This will happen even more quickly if

students in your class have struggled with school in the past. Once a group starts to think of itself in

a negative way, it is almost impossible to change the group’s self-perception into a positive one.

            Sometimes students have been dragging this negativity around for years. If you can eliminate the negative image and give your class a positive self-image, you will all receive the rewards. But this is no easy task. What you must do is make a conscious effort to praise and reinforce your class’s positive group attributes. Thus, you will promote the group’s desirable behaviors and extinguish their negative ones.

            Even difficult classes can have positive attributes. If a group is very talkative, for example, you can put a positive twist on it and praise the students for their sociability. Further, focus on students’ strengths, rather on what they do poorly. To create a positive group image, you must find and reinforce their positive attributes. Here’s how:

Step One: If you learn that your class has a negative self-image, let students know that you disagree with it.

Step Two: Observe two things about your class: how your students interact with each other and with you and how they do their work. Find at least one positive attribute that you can reinforce.

Step Three: Begin praising that positive attribute as often as you can. In a few days, you will notice that your students will accept it as truth and will start to  bring it up themselves.

            Think of a positive label or two for each class and use these labels frequently. Each of your classes should believe they have a special place in your heart. Here are a few positive labels your students should hear you use at the start of the year:

·       Caring

·       Motivated

·       Intelligent

·       Prepared

·       Successful

·       Friendly

·       Polite

·       Accurate

·       Efficient

·       Reasonable

·       Adaptable

·       Reflective

·       Adventurous

·       Energetic

·       Creative

·       Studious

·       Realistic

·       Cooperative

·       Industrious

·       Likable

·       Helpful

·       Dependable

·       Ingenious

·       Determined

·       Thoughtful

·       Deep thinkers

·       Punctual

·       Curious

·       Inventive