Technique #5

Description: Sometimes when we are teaching content we immediately

lower the standards for the content in the way we speak about it.
Sometimes without even knowing we can be apologizing for worthy
content and even acknowledge to the students that you pity that they
have to learn this content. This can happen quickly, and it might just
be a quick comment but that quick comment can make the student
suddenly care less about what they are about to learn. The book gives
us four primary ways that we accidentally do this in our classroom
without even intentionally doing it. First, we assume that something is
going to be boring for the students. This is done when we might say to
a student that we know that the work is dull, but we will just have to
try to get through it. Already you have diminished how the students
might already feel about the content before you even get started. Next
we might do something where we blame the content itself, by stating
that Im sorry that we have to learn this but it is on the test so we
have to learn it. The students dont need to know that the only reason
you are teaching the content is because you are obligated to by the
curriculum. Next this is tricky because it talks about being accessible,
which essentially states that you are replacing content with fun things,
and then try to lean on a good reason for you doing this. Finally there
is apologizing for your students, this can happen when you make it
sound like you didnt expect them to get the content in the first place.
This dejects them early on and wont boost their confidence and they
arent going to want to put the time in for something that they are told
they might not get anyway.

Observation/Implementation: I think that this is such an easy mistake
to make, because we want to sound like we are empathetic to the
students, and sometimes yes that portion of the lesson might be the
best. However, lets hope if it really was that boring of a topic that a
teacher could be creative enough to make the lesson more engaging. I
have seen this in my own classes where a teacher might accidentally
say that the work is boring but we will just have to get through it
because we have a test that we have to take on it at one point. I can
say however, that in my classroom Mrs. Harris never says any of these
negative comments and makes everything that she teaches seem to
be a bunch of fun and something that we are lucky to get to hear or
read about. I have yet to hear her mention any of these apology
terms, and I know that she must be very conscious about this. It is
easy to fall into the rut of using these phrases, and even though I
have heard these used before I have never thought about how those
might affect my learning, or my attitude towards a body of work. This
idea that what we affect the attitude of our students learning is so
important and sometimes it is easy to forget that the simple use of our
language before a lesson can really impact the amount that our
students want to listen, or affect their overall desire to learn the new
material. If we watch out for those phrases it can help improve not
only the attitude of the class, but help our students retain more
information from the lesson, because they will be more willing to listen
to that new information.




Technique # 7

Description: It is important before you teach content that you make
sure that your lesson is effective and that you have a good reason for
teaching it. This can be double checked by using the 4 Ms method,
this is stated with the 4 Ms: manageable, measureable, made first,
and most important. The idea behind manageable is that the objective
should be checked for size and scope, and made sure that it can be
taught in a single lesson for that day. Dont plan to teach something in
one day if it actually is going to take a week, because you will only
stress out your students. Measuring is when you make sure that at the
end of the day or lesson that you should be able to see your students
improvement or how effective your teaching actually was. A great way
to do this is to have the students do an exit ticket before the end of
the day. Made first, means that the objective will be more effective if it
is made to lead the activity, not the activity made first and then
selecting an objective to form around this. The objective should always
come first. Finally, the idea of most important is the simple idea is that
you should look beyond the fluff and see what is most important to
teach your students to get them where they need to be. This will help
you move the students right along to where they need to be, and help
get them up that mountain of learning.

Observation/Implementation: I think this is something that we have
had to learn as a block together this year. That first off our objective
should come before we try to find a way of doing the lesson or activity,
because that is based on the standard that we are trying to implement
or teach. A foremost we are trying to at the end of a lesson try to do
an assessment with our students to see how they are taking in the
information, and how we did as a teacher in teaching this new
material. I think that my teacher at Trace Crossings Elementary does a
great job at following the 4 Ms and seems to keep the end result in
mind when she is planning her lesson or activity for the day/week. I
think that her assessments whether the students do them by
themselves or the one on one assessments my teacher does with
literature is very measureable and has given her great insight to what
her students know. I think that she is great about looking at the end
result of her year, and really tries to get her students to that point,
and thus far she really has. I think that it is important in the class to
really look at your lesson or activity first before you implement it to
look to see if you have these four things and that it is really something
that is going to help them climb that mountain to that end result, and
that you can really measure their progress to help see where they are
when it comes to climbing that mountain. I think that my students did
a great job with the lessons that Mrs. Harris gave them this semester,
and it was possible because she did a great job with explaining it to
them, and making it clear and having a distinct destination at the end.



Technique #20
Description: This technique revolves around the idea of a strategy
called an Exit Ticket. An exit ticket is a short amount of problems
that they have to solve at the close of class. When the students either
leave for the day, or switch gears on the lesson plan you can take the
answers and pull the data together to figure out where the students
are at with the new lesson, which can also be seen as a form of
formative assessment. These are only supposed to be around one to
three questions and they are designed to yield data. If the students
are clearly struggling with the new data then the teacher can go back
and re-teach problem areas that the students arent grasping from the
lesson.

Observation/Implementation: My teacher at Trace will sometimes use
this technique with mathematics to see where the students are with
their mathematics or their reading. At the end of their math block for
the day she sometimes will give them one or two problems to do that
are placed on the overhead projector. When they are done she collects
the work, and sees how the class is doing as a whole, and how
students are doing individually. Then she sometimes the next day or
even later that day will go back and ask the questions to the whole
class to see where some students thinking may have been regarding
the problem. This way she can evaluate the students, but also herself
when it comes to teaching the math lesson, and look for areas of
improvements.

Technique #19
Description: The idea of technique number nineteen is the technique
called, At Bats, which is a basic technique that can be viewed in
many classrooms. At Bats means that you teach the students the
basics of the lesson, and then you repeatedly practice with them. This
helps ingrain the skill without stopping just because the student got
one right answer. This technique can be aided with following three
helpful key points. First, go until the student can do it on their own.
Second, use various multiplications and formats so the student can do
it many different ways. Finally, grab opportunities for enrichment and
differentiation. This way those that are accelerated students are given
ample opportunity to push themselves on difficult problems, and those
that are struggling have time to practice this new method of learning.

Observation/Implementation: My second grade teacher at Trace
Crossings uses At Bats when it comes to math and sentence structure.
She will give them plenty of opportunities in the day to practice their
new knowledge, while staying free from judgment. They can do this
through there reading journals where they write as much as she asks
each individual student for, and she can look at the sentence structure
for formation of ideas. They get to practice, but she will only give
advice, not take the work for a grade so that it is free from judgment.
With math she has these brown bags that have counting cubes in them


Technique #22
Description: This technique is called, Cold Call, and is widely used in
classrooms of various ages. This technique is to insure that all of the
students are thinking of an answer to a question asked in class in their
minds so that you have full class participation. Also the idea is that no
only one student from the class is always answering the questions. As
a teacher you simply asked one student from your class to answer the
question without any indication that they may want to answer the
question, or have the answer at all. With this technique you have
students having to actively participate in class in fear that they made
be called on at some point during the lesson, and will worry about not
having the answer. Without the class relying on one student for the
answer to all of the class questions you have more responsibility on all
of the students needing to have an answer.

Observation/Implementation: I have seen this technique used in my
classes even here in college, but especially in my classroom at Trace
for various lessons. My teacher will randomly call on my students to
answer questions on math and reading, and probably other subjects as
well but I am only there for reading and math. While the technique is
sometimes viewed as harsh towards students by forcing them into the
classroom limelight; I have seen it work wonders for my class. If she
has read a story to the class sometimes she will ask questions about
details from the story, or about the sequence of events from the story,


Technique #24
Description: The technique revolves around the idea of pepper, which
is a teaching technique that uses fast paced group activities to review
familiar information and foundational skills. The teach will call out a
question to a student or the class, and they are to quickly respond
back. The teacher usually shouldnt slow down and leave time for
discussion or engage when it comes to the answer. If the answer to a
question is right the teacher is supposed to quickly move on to a new
question to the next student. If the answer is wrong then the teacher
might ask the question to a new student, and see if they can figure out
the problem. This is all usually aided with the help of the ball that the
teacher passes back and forth. If a teacher doesnt like to call on
random students in fear that they may not know the answer then
he/she can ask for raised hands before throwing the ball.

Observation/Implementation: I am in a second grade classroom at
Trace Crossings Elementary, and I have seen this done when the
lesson usually revolves around reading or literature. She will fire off
questions about the previously read book, and wont have them
elaborate on details, and will just keep the questions coming. This
helps cement the reading into the students mind, but also helps them
prepare to write down the information into their reading journals. The
time for actual engagement and detail responses is either in the actual
journal or during carpet time when they turn and talk to their partners.
She sometimes will lead these questions by passing a small ball
around the room and so it becomes more of a cold call response. I find
that this makes the students pay attention to her when she is reading
the story, because they dont want to not know the answer when she
calls on them.

Technique #29
Description: The technique given by the book is called Do Now, and
is a short activity that you have written on the board or that is waiting
on their desk before they enter. This way it is as if every moment of
their class period is being used for learning. This sometimes can help
lead into the daily lesson, because the students are anticipating what
is coming. There are four criteria that help discern whether the, Do
Now, for the day is effective. First, the students should be able to
complete the work without any additional help from the teacher, and
without any discussion with classmates. Second, the activity should
only take around three to five minutes to complete. Third, it should
require that it be pencil to paper, and have a written product from it.
Finally, that the activity should hopeful preview into the days lesson.

Observation/Implementation: Every couple of days or so my teacher
will have a question on the board that her students will answer before
the class begins. The students are to come in the class and get
situated and pull out their materials and review the question. Usually
the question is centered around engagement for something that they
might be learning that day. For example they have been asked a
question, What was a really bad day for you like, tell me about it.
Then the students pulled out their journals and wrote an answer to the
question, which is engaging, but also helps with writing practice. Then
after they were done, and later in the class day, they we read the
story, Alexander and the No Good, Very Bad Day, and they already
had the connection from their earlier, Do Now, so they had a
connection to the text already formed.

Technique #42

Description: This is the basic idea that you should never within a
classroom wait to long to act on something, or wait to long to deliver
probable consequences. To earn your students respect and gain
control of the classroom you should administer small consequences
and minor interventions early before emotional situations can get out
of hand. No matter how well you think your wits and charm can work
in the classroom, they wont. Its all about the student believing they
can better themselves. The idea if that you should take action, and
make sure you dont get angry. You need to make sure that you are
acting early to the situation, to prevent major consequences later.
Always act reliably; if you are consistent then the students are more
like to trust you. Plus if they can know a guaranteed response from
you then they will focus more on the action than the actual response.
Finally you should act proportionally, start small when misbehavior is
small, so essentially let the crime fit the time. If it keeps occurring
then you can start to increase the consequence, but dont give them a
huge punishment the first few go around, especially when the student
is at a young age. Try to be aware if the misbehavior was deliberate or
not, and go from there when determining whether to just give a
warning or a consequence. The best thing you can do in your
classroom is developing a scale system for your students, with
consequences that keep growing in size. Your students will know the
punishments, and will know where their misbehaviors can lead them,
so there is nothing to play at.

Observation/Implementation: When a teacher takes to long to react on
an event the students will see this as a weakness or that the teacher
just doesnt really care about the misbehavior. When this happens
then they feel like they can truly get away with anything, and will try
to get away with more. When this happens you start to lose control on
the class as a whole, and those misbehaviors that you had before will
start to grow in number, and will also grow in their magnitude. In my
classroom at Trace I feel that my teacher has a really quick reaction
time, and so the students know that she means business. She usually
states what the misbehavior was quick and swiftly, and the student
knows not to do it again. She has great control of her classroom, and
usually most of the students know what is appropriate to do in the
classroom. If you wait to long to talk to a student about a misbehavior
then you run into the problem of them not even remembering what
they really did wrong. The human mind doesnt hold onto small details
of an event for long, and so the longer you wait the more likely the
student wont entirely remember what they did wrong. If the student
doesnt remember the event fully, then you run into the problem of
not being able to correct the misbehavior and them doing it again at a
later date, and wont see the problem with this because you didnt
mind last time? So why does it matter now? When this happens you
have lost control completely of the situation and your class, and it is
really hard to rope that back in.


Technique #43

Description: This is a short idea that you should always correct
students in a positive manner. Try to always make consistent
corrections with your students, and make sure that theses corrections
are positive. You should tell your students what you are wanting to see
them do, so that they can see how they could improve or change the
negative behavior. The idea is made up of six rules: live in the now,
assume the best, allow plausible anonymity, build momentum and
narrate the positive, challenge, and talk expectations and aspirations.
First, live in the here and now and tell students what they can correct
from this point forward, not what they did wrong in the last minute or
so, because they cant change what already has been done. Next,
dont just assume that a student was disobeying it could just a
misunderstanding on the students part or be due to a lack of practice.
The plausible anonymity is that you should try to refrain from using a
students name and should deliver advice without names so the student
and you are having an understanding that the improvement comments
are between the two of you and not just the entire class so they will be
more likely to try and improve. When you are making comments they
should lean towards the positive and the students should be getting
feedback that wants them to do better and keep going. This will help
them achieve momentum in the activity and learning. You should even
try to create challenges in the class, for example by pointing out the
class as a whole was great last week so lets see if they can be better
this week. You can even point out the positive action done by one
student, thus making the others want to copy that positive action so
they can receive praise. Lastly you should try to show that you are
caring in the students time and effort and dont patronize them when
they are slow, but let them know I need you with us. It doesnt sound
as harsh, and makes it sound as if you really need their help in the
situation.

Observation/Implementation: Students generally want to make their
teachers and parents proud, and nothing can ruin their day more than
when they feel that they have really messed up their positive
relationship with you. When you frame your observation with them in
positivity then you make them feel like they are still loved and no
damage has really been done to your relationship. However, you are
still able to correct the situation or possible misbehavior, and make
adjustments without singling them out in a negative way. This can also
be great because it can work as motivation for them to work harder,
and more efficiently. In my classroom my teacher really tries hard to
talking to her students in a positive way that makes them feel like they
arent exactly in trouble or that she is mad at them. That is when a
relationship can truly start to break is when the student feels like their
might now be a crack in the foundation of your relationship with them.
Or they start to believe the, my teacher is just mean, stereotype. My
teacher tries to talk to the students as if she is hoping they will make a
better choice, and not that they did something wrong. She tries to look
forward to the future, instead of harping on them for something they
did wrong. This makes them feel like they can gain back brownie
points with her before the day is out, and that they are still in her
good graces, and not completely shut out.



Technique # 46

Description: The way that I would remember what the J-factor is as
written by the book is just the idea that it is the factor of joy in a
lesson, that truly makes school and learning fun in the classroom. The
idea is that a great teacher shows energy, passion, enthusiasm, fun,
and humor in a lesson. It isnt to take away from the hard work in a
lesson, but to help the students enjoy what they are learning about
and help get through that hard work. For example playing games in
the classroom can make a lesson more fun, and help them learn new
material almost at a stronger rate, because they can come back on
that fun memory of learning the information and it is more deeply
engrained in their mind. Doing drama, song, and dance to learn
lessons is probably one of my favorite ways to bring fun into a lesson
that can otherwise be boring. Songs are catchy and stick in their
brains for a lifetime. Some of the songs I learned in my primary
schooling years still stick with me now, and thats how I remember the
information that I was taught. When you also add suspense and
suspicion in a lesson you also help make the student feel like they
arent in just a cycle of work and lessons that can be boring, especially
for younger students and they wont be as likely to tune out the ever
important lesson. This is not an instructional tool, it is a way to make
students feel a sense of belonging and that they are home in the
classroom, such as giving them nicknames.

Observation/Implementation: My teacher in our classroom is great
about trying to find ways to make her lessons more enjoyable for the
students. For example when it comes to practicing literacy in our class
she tends to use a lot of games for the students to use to work on
their skills with fluency and vocabulary so that they are really enjoying
themselves, but they are still practicing skills and making the most of
class time. You can do this in a classroom by really adding some fun
aspects into the lesson to make it fun for the students to learn, and
they are getting something out of it. Changing up the cycle of work is
great, but usually I wouldnt say it is best to do this with the younger
students only because when you change up the younger students
routine they tend to have a harder time focusing, and they lose that
train of thought and get rowdy. For example on the day that we went
to presentations and our schedule was moved all around my students
didnt pay attention nearly as well, and we had a more difficult time
controlling them. I think it is important to add in that joy factor in your
class room, because it will only make the students want to learn more,
and they will get more out of your lessons.