I’ve learned a lot in the past three years about everything a teacher has to do that isn’t teaching. One of those things is marketing/selling a new course. Last year I didn’t market my design courses enough so I ended up with not enough students in them. Consequently I am teaching life science this year in addition to 3 design classes (I love biology, but most of the these students don’t want to be there; so you can imagine how much fun that is for a teacher.)

This year I’ve been doing design favors for the teacher who is in charge of T-shirt and banner printing. In exchange for a couple of T-shirt designs I did for him, he’s going to let me print a number of full-color banners on laminated paper.

I’m going to have him print up two of these 4-foot banners (click for larger image):

I started having my design students use a forum I installed on our class web site. Every Monday, students read a posting by me and respond to a prompt. This week, I just wanted to get their feedback on the class. The results just go to show that a mixture of activities is best for all students. What one student hates another loves, and what the first student loves the second one hates.

A couple of examples:

“ive liked the chapter lessons and the work with photoshop, i didnt like the posters, they were boring and irritating”

“my favorite thing and that i learned from was making posters about different thingslike proximity and stuff like that. i dont like doing different lessons”

“My favorite thing i did in this class was when we looked at actual photoshop contests and we looked at all of them. Also i learned how to use photoshop now…kinda ”

“I really enjoy the Photoshop lessons, & i didn’t like the poster redesigning”

“My favorite thing I’ve done so far are the diffrent posters that we made about proximity,repetition etc. I dont really like all the quizes and photoshop.”

And, finally,

“My favorite thing that we have done in this class is freetime when you finish your work.”

I’m really worried about the life science classes I’m teaching this year. These are students who have or cannot pass algebra and it seems in most cases they have failed previous science classes. Many of them are very unmotivated, and most of my students are failing so far despite my best attempts.

I am shadowing another life science teacher since I have not taught science before and have no curriculum of my own. In fact, I believe I’m expected to use the same assignments at the same pace so that all the life science classes are virtually interchangeable. This approach is not working out too well. I think I’m teaching it the exact same way as the other teacher, yet her classes have far fewer failing students. I cannot help be feel something’s wrong with what I’m doing. However, the teacher whom I’m shadowing is less than approachable.

My BTSA Support Teacher – I’ll call her Mandy – had two suggestions that together gave me a brainstorm. One, she suggested that I might ease my problem with students repeated talking during exams by randomly giving a candy to those who are behaving correctly. I love this idea. Two, she suggested I can justify changing up the curriculum a bit because “the current path is not working for these students.”

So I bought a bunch of bags of small candies at Wal-Mart. You can get like 200 pieces for seven bucks. Then I got plain and colored tongue depressors at Michaels. They even had some glow-stick bracelets at a good price, and I grabbed those too. Today, I located a few large beakers in the science hallway. I pulled out the markers.

Near the end of each science class today, I introduced “Five Questions”. I had each student write his/her name on a stick of his/her choice, decorate the stick and return it to me. I put all the sticks into a large beaker. Then I asked five questions, one at a time. The questions were right out of today’s notes and should be right there in front of the student. After each question, I pulled a stick out of the beaker and called on that student. If the student knew the answer, his/her stick went into a smaller beaker. A wrong answer landed the student’s stick onto my desk. When we were done, the students who answered corrected came up and picked their favorite goody from the goody jar. They were so excited! Many students were disappointed that they were not called. I told them they might be next.

Of course, many students still did not know the answers because these students did not bother to write the notes today. I am hoping that Five Questions is incentive enough to start writing notes. Subsequently I hope test scores will go up too, and perhaps even the general level of work completion and turn-in.

I’ll report back in a few weeks or months.

UPDATE 10/2/08

This has turned out to be very popular with my life science students. They are better at getting their materials put away and back into their assigned seats quickly so that we can do “5 questions” at the end of class. So far, the winners have mainly been those students who were already doing okay. I’m interested whether the less engaged students will start answering correctly, which means having paid closer attention in class that day. It may be slow going, but I’m hoping that this will have a positive effect. At the very least, it is a nice closure activity.

Having graded tests today for my graphic design class, I’m think I need to try “5 questions” there too. They do not appear to be taking the reading seriously and are just jumping ahead to do all the tutorials. This is detrimental to their understanding of the software and design concepts in general.

UPDATE 10/13/08

After viewing recent quiz scores in my design classes, I decided to try this game there as well. The kids in the design classes love it as much as the science students.

There’s a life science test coming up on Friday, and various design quizzes tomorrow and Friday. I’ll be calculating the average scores for these and see if there’s been any improvement in lesson retention so far.

UPDATE 10/17/08

My life science classes have shown some improvement. In 6th period, for example, last month’s Unit 3 test generated a 60% average grade. Today’s Unit 4 test generated a 66% average. These numbers include only students who took the test. This difference may have to do with the nature of the individual test questions and not my methods, but this result encourages me to keep trying 5 Questions.

Here are some stats:

UPDATE 11/18/08

5th Period did much better this unit test, while 6th period dipped but still did better in terms of % of As, Bs & Cs compared to Unit 3.

I tried something new this week. It’s getting down to last few weeks of the semester. I have an depressingly high percentage of students who are failing my classes, especially Web design. I’m brainstorming like crazy to help them pull their grades up.

My policy is that students can turn in missing work later in the same semester with only a ten percent reduction in score. This is reasonably effective in getting them to at least get the work done eventually. Each assignment has it’s own part in connecting all the material together.

For all I know it may be backfiring because some students are willing the take the cut because it’s easier to procrastinate. But for now, I’ve got to keep that option open so some of these kids can get their grades out of the gutter. I’ve got to get them to take ownership for their achievement.

Earlier in the semester I was far too busy planning lessons to spend much time contemplating rewards programs. Recently, however, I’ve found ways to speed up lesson planning. Now I can try doing some of the other things teachers do besides just teach. I’m becoming a cheerleader to my students.

I drafted up these little paper slips the fill out and hand to individual students. When I deliver them, I include verbal praise and encouragement, maybe a pat on the back or shoulder depending on the personality of the student.

I share them here in case you want to snag them. Each is in PDF form so you can view the layout, and also in Word form so you can edit it for your needs (6 slips per page.)

WAY TO GO!

These are notifications of grade increase. If, as I am entering grades, I notice a jump from F to D, D to C, C to B or B to A, I want to congratulate the student. My mentor teacher suggested I should do it for F students too if they’ve come up a ways, even if they’re still in F territory. She reminded me that these students are sometimes the most in need of encouragement. So if a student has come up from say 46% to 53%, they get one of these too.

On the slips, I record the letter grade next to the percentage. One of the most important things I put on the slip is, “Because of your hard work, your grade has come up!” This is to help reinforce to students that their academic achievement comes from their own effort. I can visualize that 53% coming up to 57% and then 61%, and then at least the student has passed the class. With continued effort, he or she can do even better next semester.

Download PDF | Download MS Word

BRAVO!

Then I started feeling sorry for my A students. These kids work hard day after day and rarely need my individual help. With my system above, they’ve never get that pat on the back in spite of consistently making their best effort. So this one says, “Bravo!!! You’ve maintained an A through hard work and smarts!” I also personally congratulate the students.

Download PDF | Download MS Word

OOPS!

Finally, I realized I needed an early warning system for grade drops. I had given a “Way to go!” slip to a student one day, and then when he turned in his next assignment, three-quarters was missing. Since he was right on the cusp of the higher grade, it dropped down again. I wrote this one up so I could explain what was the latest trigger to send a grade down. Luckily, this boy had the entire assignment but had simply made a mistake in turning in the digital folder. His grade is back up again.

Download PDF | Download MS Word

So far, the kids have been very receptive to this system. One student who had struggled out of an F into a D was so proud, he held it out in his two hands and told another student he wanted to frame that little piece of paper. Another student was overjoyed to receive two in one day – one from my graphic design class and one from my Web design class. Even the A students smiled and exuded pride.

It turns out, the grade is not always its own reward. Students need teachers to say, “Hey, I noticed how well you are doing!”

When there’s an “away” game for any of the high school sports, it usually cuts into my 7th period art class. Sometimes into my 6th period art too; today is one of those days. All varsity and junior varisty baseball and softball players left campus after lunch. That’s four teams in a school of about 250 students. Eleven students are missing across my two classes.

I’ve noticed a correlation between sports participation and talkativeness. It’s dead silent in here during 6th period save the scritching of pencils, some small whispering, and the tapping of my keyboard. It’s kind of unnerving. You get used to commotion after a while. I feel like a dictator up here in front of the silent masses.

This kind of thing really causes havoc if we’re in the middle of an art project. This is especially true of a group project like the posters we are doing. In 6th period, there are five groups and four of them are missing one or members today. I do have sports players make up the missed day at home, but how to you grade a group effort on a rubric if many students were away for sports? The rest of their group either does their work for them or falls behind. It’s difficult to resolve this as a teacher and be fair to everyone involved.

I suppose I could find one-day assignments for students who are still in class on game days. Maybe I’d do it if we reached some sort of critical mass of missing students, such as over 25% like today. Then everyone could pick up the project again when the jocks return. But then we’d lack continuity for everyone.

Decisions, decisions.