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Dear Fellow Educator,
Welcome to the Conscious Teaching newsletter, bringing you stories and strategies throughout the school year. I'm committed to making a difference for kids, by bringing a breath of fresh air to teachers. Feel free to write back with your own contributions that can be included in future newsletters. And please use the "Forward email" link at the bottom of this newsletter to share it with your colleagues. | |
Timesaving Strategies for Teachers, Part II
June is often a time for reflecting on the successes and
challenges of the school year. For many
teachers, finding ways to save time grading papers next year is on the top of
their summer to-do list. In the last newsletter, I described two key
assumptions that help generate specific time saving strategies. I also provided three examples. To view that newsletter, please click here. Below are some additional ideas
that may help:
Student Essays
Problem:
It bothers many teachers that when they correct student
essays, they put in the most time for kids who put in the least effort. They'll spend thirty minutes working on
Mark's poor paper, putting red ink all over it, only to watch him crumple it up
when he receives it in class. There are
two parts to this scenario. First is the
repetition of written comments that teachers tend to make for each paper. Second are all the grammatical corrections
teachers make that barely get a glance from the student.
Solutions:
1) Comments: Create a "teacher comment sheet" that
includes the written comments that you typically make on student papers. You can tailor the comment sheet for each
assignment. Each comment on the sheet
has a number. When you grade a student's
paper, instead of writing a comment that's an entire sentence long, simply
write the number that corresponds to the comment on the teacher comment
sheet.
In addition, for final summative comments that appear at the
end of the essay (such as "excellent use of examples"), have a second section
to your teacher comment sheet that is devoted to final overall comments. Simply circle the appropriate comments on that
section of your teacher comment sheet, and attach the sheet to the back of the
essay.
2) Corrections:
Indicate only three corrections for the student's paper, even if the
paper actually has twenty-five mistakes.
Go over some of the more oft-repeated mistakes with the whole class. If a parent complains that you haven't put
enough red ink on Mark's essay, simply say "Thank you so much for your interest
in Mark's work. Please have Mark correct
the three mistakes that I indicated and have him return the essay to me. I'll be happy then to put three more
corrections on it."
By going over the mistakes and corrections in class,
students will receive the feedback they need to improve. In addition, students who make the effort to
go beyond the first three corrections will receive the additional help that
they are asking for. Students who put a
minimum of effort into writing their essays won't be holding you hostage for
thirty minutes as you diligently reconstruct their entire paper for them.
3) Use a rubric to
grade student papers. This is used for
scoring written essays on standardized tests.
The graders simply assign a number- one through six, for example -to
each paper. The numbers correspond to a
document that describes in detail the characteristics for each of the six
papers. A six would be an excellent paper,
with most or all of the important elements included. A five would be a very good paper, with many
of the key elements included, and on down the line. If you are going to do this, it's helpful to
use student samples for each of the numbers in the rubric, as well as more
generic descriptors for each number.
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Training of Trainers in Conscious Classroom Management and
Brain-Compatible Teaching Skills June 25-27, 2008
There are still some slots open for the June Training of
Trainers in the San Francisco Bay Area.
This three-day seminar is designed for staff developers and classroom
teachers. Whether you are looking to
design a workshop on classroom management, improve your skills as a presenter,
or become a more effective classroom teacher, this training is for you. For more information, click here for a
flyer. This training, though designed
primarily for Staff Developers and Mentors, will work equally well for
classroom teachers of any level of experience.
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My Five-DVD Series on Conscious Classroom
Management
 This is a comprehensive series on classroom
management, coordinated with the book and facilitator guide. There are forty-nine clickable chapter items,
so you can click on exactly the short segment that you want to see.
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Thought for the Day
Things are looking up!
Regardless of how challenging your school year has been, regardless of
how many "learning moments" you had, things will tend to improve. Paraphrased from page 45 of Conscious
Classroom Management:
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The average teacher teaches the same thing three
years in a row before "feeling comfortable" with it.
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The average teacher doesn't plateau in ability
for seven years.
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Excellent teachers never plateau- Their teaching
and their experience keeps getting smoother and smoother.
Have a great summer!
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Sincerely,
Rick Smith
Conscious Teaching
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