scientists, chefs, and mathematicians

In class the other day the students were doing guided discovery with base ten blocks (math manipulatives)....and the teacher asked "as a mathematician what could you do with these blocks?" After several responses, one boy said that, "you can put them in your mouth" and the teacher responded so fabulously..."Well, if we were scientists, we might put things in our mouths. If we were chefs, we would definitely put things in our mouths, but as mathematicians, we're not going to put things in our mouths. We're going to play with them on our desks!" It was a delight to hear her respond so calmly and in such a clever way!

Do you know what your students from last year say?

In a meeting, I was talking with an 8th grade teacher who has many of my students from my 7th grade class last year! He turned to me and asked, "do you know what your students from last year are all saying?" To which I replied..."what?" He told me, "they all use support."

I beamed and cheered out loud! I was so excited to hear the news that the words that we used last year had stuck in their head. The teacher told me that he started noticing it recently and all the students use support instead of help!

Fantastic - Success! I'm still smiling thinking about it...

You can sit up here because you are smart!

Recently I had the fabulous opportunity to teach another teacher's class. The students came in, perhaps assumed I was a substitute, and were walking around the room, talking, and quite concerned about their hair (hence the bottle of mousse being shared).
As the students continued to come in the classroom, I started assigning seats since most of the students gravitated towards the back of the room. I told two students, "you may sit here and here" to which they asked, "why?" My initial response was "I don't know" and then I followed that up with "you can sit up here because you are smart!" When the next person walked in the room and asked why they were sitting up in the front, one student responded "because she said we're smart." As the class continued, I explained why I was in the class with them and told the students that I only work with smart students. "That's the bottom line - I only work with fabulous, smart students, and your teacher has told me fabulous things about how smart you are - I know you've got great brains!" The class was silent and focused on my every word!
As the lesson continued, I realized this was not going as smoothly as I wanted - I focused on the students who were grasping parts of the lesson but told the students, "I would like to share with you what I am thinking - I want a chance to revise this activity so that next time I am with you, we can all have more success!"

"You may get to class on time"

This week, I've been modeling "you may get to class on time". Some of our students spend extended time at their lockers or chatting in the halls - which prevents them from getting to class on time. Instead of saying "your late", or "your going to be late", I've started saying "you may get to class on time." Those simple words have made a huge difference. I'm now getting a smile back and an "ok", following the students immediately going right to class.

Five days later, I'm now hearing fellow teachers say those same words. Kids are responding positively, and our hallways are running smoother.

One good thinker and more!

After reading the post about one good thinker, I was reminded of that skill. As I was teaching yesterday, I decided to try it (I had done it sporadically in the past). "One good thinker, two good thinkers...." and I was just amazed at how well this skill worked! All of a sudden, hands were going up in the air and the majority of students were more engaged! Later after I left the class, my co-teacher commented on how much she liked "one good thinker." Success with students while influencing others!

Another success I want to share is when a new student joined our class. The student was complaining that he did not have a pencil or paper. So I said, "so what's a question you could ask to work toward a solution?" and he thought for a few seconds and looked at a classmate who supported him with, "you ask a question like...can I have a pencil?" So the new student asked a for a pencil. The student who had supported him told the new student, "you'll get used to that - she does it all the time." I was so excited that my students were recognizing that they were the ones who needed to do the thinking and how we can learn from one another! My focus is using a light tone with students with my eyebrows up - in my experience it takes a while for the students to learn how to ask questions and support one another! I strive to be patient with students and with myself!

I'm glad you told me the truth

In class on Friday, students were taking a quiz. One student was told by the teacher to move his seat so he would stop talking. He was punished through isolation. I was in the back of the room and the student came to sit down a few desks and a row away from me to finish his quiz. I asked him, "would you like to sit next to me?" "No," was his immediate reply as he took the seat he aimed for. "I'm glad you told me the truth," I responded. "What?" He asked. I repeated it, he looked down for a second, and then moved back a row to the desk next to me.

It was clear that day and in previous classes that this student was not ready for this quiz. Many of his responses we incorrect and he will probably receive a failing grade from his teacher. This student and I thought through the quiz together - he struggled with adding and multiplying one and two digit numbers and was lost with the Order of Operations and Exponents Quiz. Through great struggle, we has able to answer one or two questions correctly. Even though his teacher will likely grade his quiz as failing, he left class for the weekend feeling successful: he focused for at least 25 minutes on math and actually did answer two problems on his own.