Getting to like you,
getting to hope you like me…No, this blog post is not a musical theatre
sing-along (but how fun would that be?? Bonus points if you knew this was a King and I reference!). What I want to
talk about is getting to know your students, and I figured this was a pretty
good topic to devote my first post of the 2013-2014 school year to. (By the
way, welcome back, readers!)
The “Why”
Just why should we take
time at the beginning of the school year to get to know our students anyway?
Well, there are lots of reasons -- many
of which I’m sure you can name – but the one that stands out most to me relates
to differentiation. If we’re going to devote ourselves to differentiating our
instruction with our students’ interests, learning styles, and readiness in
mind, then we need to invest some time learning about our students’ interests,
learning styles, and readiness.
Carol Ann Tomlinson, guru
of differentiated instruction, adds a few more items to the “why” list in her
book, Leading and Managing a
Differentiated Classroom (2010):
·
“It sends a
message to each student that the teacher sees him or her as an individual, and
it also suggests that he or she is interesting enough for an adult to want to
know better” (p. 78). We all want to feel like more than a number, right? It’s
this kind of interest shown by a teacher that helps a student begin to trust
that teacher and begin to see that teacher as a “support system in the
classroom” (p.78). The student is not anonymous anymore – anonymity is not even
an option in this type of classroom.
·
If a teacher
shows an interest in getting to know her students, she is showing her students
that she values them. And guess who students are inclined to work for? “People they
value (i.e., people who value them)” (p. 79).
·
Getting to
know our students helps us as teachers to invest in them; we invest most deeply
in “those who are ‘three dimensional’ to us” (p. 79).
The “How”
What are some ways in
which we can get to know our students? Every classroom teacher has his or her
own methods of doing this, but it’s always nice to add to our repertoires. One
important way to get to know our students is to use a pre-assessment at the
start of a unit. We can determine a student’s existing background knowledge
about the topic, as well as any misconceptions he or she may have; we can see
if the student has any particular interests or questions relating to this
topic. As such, we are already preparing ourselves to possibly differentiate
our instruction within this unit based on readiness and/or interest. We can add
learning style into the mix by asking students to complete a learning style
survey or inventory at the beginning of the year (there are plenty of these
available online, some of which also relate to Gardner’s multiple
intelligences).
Tomlinson makes some
suggestions for the “how” as well:
·
Greet your
students at the door as they enter your classroom. A quick greeting (“How’d the
homework go last night?,” “How’s soccer practice?,” “Are those new shoes?”) can
go a long way in helping a teacher determine valuable information about a
student’s daily life, mood, and attitude and can help make the student feel
like a valued individual (p. 82).
·
Ask your
students to bring in “All About Me” bags filled with five objects that help the
teacher and the other students learn more about them (p. 82).
·
Use
note-taking as a way to keep track of things you learn about students on the
fly. As you circulate during a lesson, you can learn a lot about students – with
whom they work well (and with whom they don’t), what their learning preferences
are (do they like to work alone, with others, in silence, etc.). Having a way to quickly jot down this type of
information will help inform your instruction (p. 82).
·
Use surveys to
“ask students to share their sense of themselves as learners in a particular
subject, their interests, and their methods for learning effectively” (p. 82).
·
Create a
number line and label it 1 to 10. Title it How
do you feel about _____? The topic can change depending on the day. “For
example, one day students might be asked how they feel about a book they read
yesterday in class, and another day they might be asked how they feel about
starting a new math unit” (p. 82). Students then place small sticky notes or
stickers beneath the appropriate number that represents their feelings on that
particular topic. This can be a great, quick way to take the pulse of a class.
Some Final Tips
These come from my own
experiences, and the experiences of colleagues, in the classroom:
1.
Once you’ve
collected this kind of “getting to know you” information from your students, use it. If the information remains in a
folder that gets other paperwork piled on top of it, then it’s not going to
assist you in planning for differentiation.
2.
When you do
use this “getting to know you” information, go ahead and share this with
students. Let them know, for example, when you have incorporated certain
aspects into a lesson based on what you know about students’ preferred ways of
learning. This will go a long way in building a culture of respect and trust in
your classroom.
3.
Get to know
your students yourself. Yes, we can often receive quite valuable information
about a student from a colleague, but we have to avoid becoming “overly swayed
by a student’s record from previous school years” (Tomlinson, 2010, p. 83).
Recognize that students can change, and that we want to challenge them to grow,
which is hard to do if we’ve got a fixed vision of who they are.
4.
“Remember that
students are your best source of information” (p. 84). Use formative assessment
tools such as tickets-to-leave or surveys to check in with students
occasionally and ask them to “share their sense of how they’re doing” (p. 84).
And use what you learn!
I hope everyone’s school year
is off to a great start! My “blogging schedule” is now officially back in
motion, so expect a post from me towards the end of each week.
