Lessons Learned: "Bad" Words

I've been reflecting lately on some of the lessons I've learned since becoming a teacher that they DON'T teach you in classroom management. Here's one of them: When a student tells you that another student said a "bad" word, do a little investigating. The word is not always what you think!
Yesterday I had reports in back to back classes of students saying bad words. The first report was that a student used "the 'b' word", and after talking to both students in the hallway, the word you're thinking was confirmed.
In the next class period, a student told me another used "the 't' word". I was so confused trying to come up with a bad word that started with the letter "T". I tried asking her to spell the word, to tell me something that rhymed with it, to whisper it in my ear so I could figure out what really happened. She refused, only telling me "it's inappropriate" and "it's a bad word".
The accused denied having said a bad word. He told me that he told another student, who laughed about it, that he looked like a turtle. My theory? I think he either said "turd" or she thought she heard it. Either way, not a nice word, but certainly not a "bad" word in my book.

On a slightly related note, you should also investigate when it appears as though a bad word is written on artwork. A student was checking in with me when he thought he was finished with a painting. It appeared that the "f" word was written on his artwork, and I was shocked! I asked who wrote it, and he immediately looked confused. That's when I remembered that I was speaking to a 1st grader, who had drawn what appeared to be a truck on his paper. He had tried to label his drawing, left out the "r", and accidentally made his "t" curve at the top.

Summary: Take a minute to think and investigate. The "bad" word may not be what you think! :)

Art Room Jobs

I was inspired by a post by Jen at "draw the line at" to try assigning Art room jobs at my intermediate school. I had never tried before, because this method had never occurred to me! Jen came up with 6 jobs, one for each table, and created a system with magnetic tape to easily rotate the assigned tables for each job each week. After I read her post and saw the pictures, I started brainstorming which 6 jobs would work well in my classroom with my style. I wanted to make sure I could come up with 6 jobs that really mattered if I was going to do it. I already had each table assigned a color so that part was easy! Coming up with names for the jobs was kind of fun, too. I wanted to get some new vocabulary in there, too.

Here are my 6 jobs

1. Distribution- Pass out table folders, and other supplies if asked
2. Directions experts- Pay extra special attention to the directions so they can answer questions for classmates. I think they will also be able to help if a student comes in late and I'm busy helping another student.
3. Tree Huggers- Monitor recycling bin, check the floors for papers and trash at end of class.
4. Collection- Picks up table folders at end of class.
5. Polishers- Makes sure tables are clean and ready for the next class.
6. Mufflers- Reminds class about "table talk", removes an ART letter if volume is too loud.

I'm really excited about trying this out, and so far the students have seemed pretty excited about it! I've only seen half my 4th-6th grade classes and we spend the first day taking care of business, so we haven't used the job assignments yet. When discussing the jobs, I did make sure to emphasize that each student still needs to be responsible for their own messes. You don't get to leave a mess because you think it's someone else's job to clean it up. I also think this will help with the volume. I try to use "ART" letters- 3 magnetic letters on the board that can be removed as a reminder/warning which means if all the letters come down, we clean up early and think about what to do better next time- but I'm usually too busy helping other students that I don't make it to the board to remove a letter. I think giving students responsibility for monitoring the noise level will help them be more aware even when it's not their job. Maybe it won't work, but I'm optimistic. I promise I'll let you know how it's going in a month or two after there's been enough time for a judgment.

Also, I'm going to have a student teacher for the first half of this semester! I'm excited to meet Miss Bennett tomorrow. :)

Listening

Listening is pretty darn important. One of my classroom expectations is to be a good listener. Every once in a while I get a class that is soooo chatty (some might say disrespectful) that we have to take a time out from the project and do a different kind of lesson based on listening.

This is what I do when "drastic" measures are required.
I'm sure you've all participated in or at least heard of this activity before, but just in case you haven't, here is a description:
Put the students in pairs and give each a number 1 or 2. (Or any other labels you want to use.) I try to sneakily put the students who need the lesson most in the same group*. Tell one group to think of a story they will tell their partner and while they are thinking, tell the other group what their job is going to be. Their job is to be the worst listeners they can be. Tell them to do things that are problems in your classroom when people should be listening. I told them to play with supplies, avoid eye contact, get out of their seats, interrupt, and anything else I could think of. Send the group back to their partners and allow about 2 minutes for the storytelling to take place. You may need even less than 2 minutes. The first time I did this with a class, I had to stop early because students were getting so upset that they weren't being listened to that they started yelling at their partner. Not quite what I had in mind.

After students are sufficiently frustrated, stop them and ask how the storytelling went. Talk about the things that were happening and how it made them feel. I make sure to tell the students that the activity is not a punishment, I just realized that maybe they didn't know what it is like to try to convey information and not have a good listener. Call it forced empathy. Then I have a short, but candid conversation, where I tell them how it makes me feel when I work really hard to plan lessons that I think are important and will be fun for them and have students being disrespectful and not listening. I may play up the hurt feelings just a bit with my younger classes.

If I really need to drive the point home, I have the students write and make an illustration. I recently had to do this with a class of 2nd graders so after our discussion, I gave them paper and asked them to write about why you should be a good listener or how it feels when someone won't listen to you. I added pictures of the most legible papers.

 What have you done to address listening issues in your classroom?

Be Kind to Your Erasers!

The poor, abused eraser. :(

There was a BIG problem with respecting supplies in my classroom this year, especially the erasers.  I have supply baskets at each table and started off with  or 4 brand new, big pink erasers at each.  Lots of erasers "disappeared" (I finally put out new ones but said I would not replace anymore if they were going to keep "disappearing") and the ones that stayed were not in good shape.  It drives me crazy when I see students drawing on, stabbing, and/or cutting the shared erasers.  If they want to destroy their own supplies, fine by me.  But when it's the supplies that are shared by all the students, we have a problem.  I finally remembered the Fugleflick, "Be Kind to Your Erasers" by Art teacher, Tricia Fuglestad and made a poster inspired by the video.  (I could not show it at the time but have since worked out my video issues at school.)

The students were intrigued by the poster and I think humanizing the erasers on the poster helped.  It seems like when the students can imagine the art supplies as people, they remember to take better care of them.  Example: I have students who talk about Mr.Brush every time we paint, even before I can point to the poster!

I used pencil, markers, watercolors, and magazine pages to make my poster.