Progress with My Behavior Plan

My behavior plan with my student is going very well so far. Last Tuesday I sat down with this student and asked him to collaborate with me to complete this behavior plan. We have decided that some of the behaviors we are going to target with this plan are tapping pencils, working on other assignments during inappropriate times, drawing in class, and talking out of turn. The student identified these behaviors himself, though I guided him by asking questions such as "What behaviors typically cause you to receive minuses (our school's disciplinary program)?" and "What do you think you do during class that keeps you from being the best student you can be?" I also guided him through what he could do to change these behaviors; he will only work on other assignments during free time, and he will raise his hand to speak in class or ask questions.
I also felt it was important that we have my student be completely responsible for his rewards for good behavior. His rewards will be responsibilities such as passing out and collecting papers in class, getting the opportunity to draw during free time, and working on personal assignments during free time. We also set up a scale of consequences for poor behavior: 1st Offense = Warning, 2nd Offense = Minus, 3rd Offense = Referral to office

On my last week in the school, I plan to review our plan with my student and give feedback to his performance so far.

Developing a Behavior Plan

It is nearly the end of the semester, and I still have many things left to do so I can complete all assignments and expectations for Benedum interns. In order to fulfill all the requirements for the Intern rubric this semester, I must meet the needs of at least one student with a behavior plan. With this plan, I am definitely going into an aspect of teaching that I didn't have experience with until now. Rarely have I had to deal with behavior issues beyond what is stated in a child's 504 plan, so I didn't even know what a behavior plan should include. After looking over my text from different education classes, I found some information to help me complete this requirement. I have chosen one student in my 8th period class to focus on with this behavior plan. This student has several issues with talking out of turn, without his hand raised, and with working on other assignments in class when he feels disengaged or bored. I have decided to make this behavior plan a cooperative activity with my student; I will take a moment out of class time to go over different aspects of the behavior plan with him and fill out the form together. The first thing covered on the plan is the behaviors that are not acceptable that we need to change. Like I have stated previously, this student has issues with talking out of turn and working on other assignments when it is not appropriate. We will then decide what he needs to do in order to change this behavior. Next, I will talk to my student about the things he enjoys doing in class that can be used as rewards; this particular student likes drawing and having special responsibilities such as handing out papers or writing utensils. I need to explain to my student that these will be rewards given to him when he successfully gets through class without talking out of turn or being off task.
I am very excited to see how this behavior plan works out and if it will have any effect on this student's behavior. It will definitely be extra work to keep track of this plan, but I think it will ultimately pay off.

Dealing with Classroom Interruptions

Classroom interruptions are an unavoidable element of any class or school; many times teachers will experience interruptions by intercom, a teacher or student entering the room, or even dealing with behavior issues within the classroom that take up class time. The ability to manage these pauses in instruction is not something that can be taught in school; in my opinion, learning how to deal with class interruptions can only come from experience. In education, we often talk about the idea of "withitness": the ability for a teacher to be present in the classroom and deal with issues as they are noticeable. A teacher must have "withitness" to be able to effectively handle interruptions and move on with instruction.

In my classroom, our most common interruptions are from outside the class; we often encounter announcements from the office for the school or for my students. Thankfully, my seventh grade students are able to handle announcements well. They know that when someone is on the intercom, it is their time to be quiet. I believe that much of the ability to recover from interruptions comes from classroom management strategies that have been implemented with the students from the beginning of the year; because the students have respect for me and know my expectations, I am able to reconvene and continue my lesson immediately after any interruptions.

Utilizing Extra Instruction Time

One common occurrence for even the most well prepared teachers is to finish a lesson with more class time left. Though this may seem to be a time to allow students to talk quietly or work on other classwork, this is not exactly the wisest decision; class time is precious and we as teachers must forgo the urge to take this time for relaxing or working on other things. It is especially unlikely for my class of 7th graders to have the ability to talk quietly or be productive on their own. To help with this unexpected additional class time, I like to keep a set of extra activities in my figurative back pocket that can be presented quickly and executed for any amount of time necessary. I personally believe that this extra class time is great for review of the previous day's lesson. For example, if the students recently defined new vocabulary words, this is a great time to quiz the class on those definitions. However, this does not work in all conditions; if the students recently came back from a break or a long weekend, there is usually not much to review or time for the teacher to prepare review materials. In times like these, being in a geography class with a map is very useful to me. My students began the year with lessons on latitude and longitude, learning intermediate directions, and reviewing the continents. During extra class time, I can call on random students to find a coordinate of my choice on the class map. I can then include another student by calling on someone to tell me what continent or ocean that coordinate is in. This activity is also useful for differentiation techniques because I can challenge higher ability students by having them tell me what country the coordinate is in. This activity was introduced to me by my current mentor teacher, and I feel that I will definitely keep this as a back-up plan of sorts for my future teaching.

Reflecting on my inquiry project

At this point in my inquiry process for this semester, I believe I can say that I have gotten through the most difficult issues posed by my research subject. First and most importantly, I have recently filmed my first set of videos in which my students ask questions about life in China for children their age. I will say, however, that doing so was not easy for all three classes involved in my research. My third period class had numerous behavior problems (which I expected) and were nearly unable to respectfully and efficiently complete their video; I think that though this issue was a bit of a headache for me, this realization that behavior problems in the classroom will also show up in this activity will be helpful to my research and analysis.

I also successfully sent my first video to my colleague in China who has already shown my video to his class and filmed their responses to our questions. As I have stated in previous writings, I could not have picked a more difficult country to try this video communication inquiry with because the Chinese government blocks all sites that allow video sharing. My only alternative is using email to attach my videos, yet this also creates an issue because Google mail has a 25 MB limit. Thankfully, my first video was not very long so this limit was not much of an issue.

My favorite part of my inquiry so far is that I am already seeing the benefits of adding video communication and teaching global awareness into the classroom. I recently talked with the other 7th grade social studies teacher who told me that her students in homeroom have been talking about their excitement for my video activity and showing a great deal of enthusiasm for my class. I have noticed that when students asked about when we were going to watch the video from the students from China, more than anything else they were excited about having communication with people from a different part of the world. I also have been able to use our little project to help the students make connections to abstract ideas and new vocabulary. For example, we recently talked about Thomas Jefferson and his work as an ambassador to France; to explain this, I told the students to think of Mr. Blevins (my colleague in China who is a WVU graduate and US citizen) as our ambassador to China. To this thought, I heard a collective "Ohhh okay" of realization from my class. The sound of understanding is music to my ears.

Taping My Lessons

My first experience taping my lessons at Taylor County Middle School this semester occurred recently when I taught a lesson on maps that allowed students to create a map of our classroom. After taping my lessons several times last semester, I have gotten used to the habit of setting up my camera in the back of the room and carrying on my lesson as usual. It definitely isn't convenient to have to prop up a point and shoot digital camera for an extending period of time, but as teachers I suppose we are expected to work with what we have. I decided to tape this particular lesson because this has been one of the first lessons I have liked so much I decided to keep the lesson plan for future use. In our World Geography class, we have been studying different map features, map types, and projections. To give students an idea of how a map can be used in many different, non-traditional ways, we planned a lesson in which students created a map of our classroom. Students received a printout of the class seating chart and were instructed to add a title (Favorite Pizza Topics in ___ Period) and a legend/key with different types of pizza toppings associated with different colors. We then went around the room and had each student announce what type of pizza they most enjoyed, then as a class we all filled in that person's desk on the seating chart with the color associated with that topping. The students really enjoyed both the coloring and discussion aspects of this activity; I find that this is a great way to teach map skills that I am glad to have ready for my portfolio.

Relationships with Other Staff

In my past years of working with the staff in my Professional Development Schools (Taylor County Middle School and University High School), my relationship with other faculty didn't really go beyond my mentor teacher and coordinator/coordinators. The only individuals I talked to during my time at school were the people I was required to speak to.

This semester has definitely been different for me in this manner. Every moment I have to spend with another member of the staff is so valuable; I truly regret never creating these relationships in the past. Even during "down time" like lunch in the faculty lounge is useful to me. During this time I can talk to the other teachers about their tutors or participants to see how they are doing, ask for advice about how to manage different students, and to stay aware of things going on at the school.

My most useful interaction with the faculty is during our weekly seventh grade team meeting. We usually hold these meeting with all seventh grade teachers and our principal. Sometimes other individuals come into our gatherings to talk to the group about technology integration, new policies, etc. These are wonderful moments of calm to talk about our concerns and see what's going on with students in other classes. Though these meetings are held during our only planning period, I think this time for staff development is extremely valuable to me as an intern. I already know most of the 7th grade staff's names and subjects, so if I have any questions about how to integrate another subject into my curriculum I will know who I can go to for this.