A Bicycle Cargo Trailer (View Similar on Amazon)

A Year’s Subscription to The Economist (Visit their website)

A Year’s Subscription to Private Eye (Visit their website)

Several puzzles plus the following books;

Terry Pratchett’s Snuff (View the book on Amazon)

Dan Ariely’s Predictably Irrational (View the book on Amazon)

Tim Harford’s Adapt (View the book on Amazon)

Benoit Mandelbrot’s The (Mis)Behaviour of Markets (View the book on Amazon)

Kathleen Taylor’s Brainwashing (View the book on Amazon)

Augusten Burroughs’s You Better Not Cry (View the book on Amazon)

and QI’s Advanced Banter (View the book on Amazon), The Noticeably Stouter Book of General Ignorance (View the book on Amazon), and John Lloyd and John Mitchinson’s The Book of the Dead (View the book on Amazon).

No prizes for telling that I’m a great reader of books!

I have managed to get through several of the books already and I love this one quote on books in the book of quotations;

“There are books in which the footnotes, or the comments scrawled by some reader’s hand in the margin, are more interesting than the text. The world is one of those books.” George Santayana

I’ve often noticed this with the online version of newspapers – the comments made by readers are very often more informative, and most definitely more interesting, than the article itself.

Mmmm … I wonder if the same will be true of this weblog eventually?

So what did you get for Christmas? Or have you forgotten it already after the start of the new term?

Last week in my introduction to Classroom and Behaviour Management I stated that classroom and behaviour management wasn’t easy and too many teachers beat themselves up over skills and techniques that take time to learn. I also noted that I wasn’t going to do the same as most other behaviour management advisers on the Internet and give you lists of techniques … that we would focus on one thing at a time and slowly work through learning this skill.

This week we will look at Orwell’s 1984 Doublethink and Sports Psychology to see how we can prepare ourselves for the rowdy class.

As you can imagine I subscribe to lots of (free) teaching resources and one e-mail, written by Dave Stott, caught my eye with regard to preparing yourself;

If you are expecting poor or challenging behaviour from a student, that is exactly what you will get …  if you are already in a negative frame of mind then the only students you are likely to see are the ones who are getting it wrong … If you are feeling negative, with low expectations, then when you enter the room the students you will see first, and will no doubt comment on, are the ones who are getting it wrong. They are being too noisy, out of their seat, have the wrong equipment, etc. In fact, your very first connection or comment to the class will be negative – and that sets the scene for the rest of the lesson.

This is obviously a prelude to catching the learner doing something positive and rewarding (praising) that behaviour rather than focusing on the negative. But, just how do we change the way we feel about going into a class that might just previously given you a hard time (or even the lesson from hell!) or has the worst reputation in whatever establishment you teach or, as in my situation, contains learners that have previously been excluded for violence and insubordination (sorry, just love the sound of that word …) towards teachers?

And here is where the teacher has to have their very own version of doublethink … to go into the class with a positive attitude, focused on achieving their lesson objectives and knowing that the class will love the material as much as they will … whilst at the same time having already planned for what to do when X, Y or Z misbehaviour happens, how they intend to deal with it without escalation and losing their focus on the lesson objectives and what to do when it all goes wrong (as it will sometimes!)

And here is where sports psychology helps. There are so many similarities between teachers and sports professionals but most especially in preparing for an event. Sports professionals have to go into any event ‘knowing’ that they are going to win. Going into a race, fight or match without such confidence will mean that they will lose … just as Dave Stott wrote going into a classroom with a negative attitude will mean a negative classroom experience.

However, as in the classroom, during the race, fight or match not everything goes strictly to plan. The sports professional will need to maintain their belief despite knowing this beforehand and during the event when everything that is happening around them suggesting that they are losing … what greater example of doublethink is there?

How do they do that?

There are 4Cs that are considered to be the main mental qualities needed for successful performance – be in on the sport’s field or in the classroom.

• Concentration – the ability to maintain focus
• Confidence – the belief in one’s abilities
• Control – the ability to maintain emotional control regardless of problems or behaviour
• Commitment – the ability to continue despite everything

If you can practise and master these qualities, you too can master any class or group.

Concentrate: Teaching is hard work! You need to be focussed mentally the whole time. You need to be noticing everything that is happening around the class. This takes energy. Are you getting enough sleep? Eating properly? These may sound ridiculous questions but believe me some teachers need reminding.

Confidence: “Confidence is a positive state of mind and a belief that you can meet the challenge ahead – a feeling of being in control. It is not the situation that directly affects confidence; thoughts, assumptions and expectations can build or destroy confidence.”*  Are you fully prepared? Have you practised your tactics mentally if not actually?

Control: Nervous, tense teachers have problems; learners pick up very quickly on these emotions. Are you relaxed? Are you in the right frame of mind? If not, sort these out before walking through the classroom door!

Commitment: Do not give up! On yourself or your learners… Teaching is a commitment. If you can’t make that commitment, you are in the wrong job. Remind yourself regularly of the commitment you have made to these learners.

Try these mental preparations and you will start to notice an improvement in classroom and behaviour management without any changes to your teaching methodology. When we start tweaking that, your performance really will take off.

So what techniques do you have to help you build energy for concentration? To give you confidence prior to an event or class? To help you relax and be in control before walking onto the stage that is a class? To remind you of the commitment you made when becoming a teacher?

Unfortunately this view was directly opposed to what I was originally going to write today which was going to be something like – the Top Ten Tips for Using PowerPoint in the Classroom. However, I have always felt that you cannot say principles and values are important to you unless you actually live by them and behave in the way dictated by your values … I know, very behaviourist of me!

That is why in the Persicum Short Course on Teaching the most important word is ‘We’ and in the Set of Class Rules for Persicum the rules apply to me as well as you … saying one thing and doing another only leads to mixed messages.

So, sticking to my values, I will write about one (very important) tip for using PowerPoint as a teacher today so you can focus and practise on that. Only when you have some mastery of this, should you then try to incorporate another tip into your teaching. (It is purely incidental, of course, that by doing it in this way it also means I have another nine days worth of posts already lined up!)

In John Adair’s book, 100 Greatest Ideas for Personal Success, (View the book on Amazon) Adair describes his “Communication Star” – a model for effective communication. Essentially there are five points to the star – the Communicator, The Content, The Method, the Communicant and the Situation. These combine to get across the Aim or message.

      Good communication requires an understanding and skilled  communicator , presenting a true and necessary content to an alert and able communicant, using the most appropriate method  in a  situation  that is contributing to the meeting of their minds, so that the AIM is fully achieved.
Taken from the Book 100 Greatest Ideas for Personal Success by John Adair

One of the most common problems with PowerPoint use in the Classroom is that the Content does not match the AIM of the slideshow or indeed lesson. I once read another business/sales book that stated that you should be able to sum up your slideshow in one sentence on one slide and if you can’t you are trying to put too much in!

I wouldn’t go quite that far, but I would state that you should be able to look at any of your slides and relate the words, text, pictures or video on that slide to the aim of the slideshow (or one of your lesson objectives!) If you cannot, you should ask yourself, do I need that slide?

But am I jumping ahead of myself? Having sat through and seen a very large number of PowerPoint presentations I often find myself wondering whether the presenter actually had an aim in mind before they started writing the presentation.

If the only reason you are doing a PowerPoint presentation is to put some ICT into a lesson, you need to think again.

Before starting to write any PowerPoint (or indeed any other slideshow) presentation think to yourself – what is my aim (or objective)? Is this the most appropriate method in this situation to get across my aim? Is all the content I was thinking of putting in the slideshow relevant to my aim?

Only once you have thought about these, should you start to write your slideshow!

Today I want to focus on another topic from Bach’s book, Secrets of a Buccaneer Scholar (View the book on Amazon), that of Cyclic Learning. Essentially Bach used this understanding of how he learnt, to start and progress through tough new subjects …

Chen Ning Yang, a Nobel Laureate in Physics, is quoted as saying;

There are only two kinds of math books. Those you cannot read beyond the first sentence, and those you cannot read beyond the first page.(Found in the book – QI: Advanced Banter)

Bach would use this technique to ensure that he is not put off by the seeming complexity of such books to the point of giving up learning. We all know this feeling. There are many responses; most just give up, some read and reread the first page over and over trying to understand it before moving on and some try to wade through the book not actually understanding anything. All are discouraged and end up believing that they could never understand it; they are not intelligent enough or similar.

The Cyclic Learning technique tries to keep up motivation by accepting we may not understand it all first off and we shouldn’t even try … His ‘Great Secret’ is “If I try to understand, but fail, that’s progress”.

The sequence is

First Pass: Read over the material. Try to understand. Some you will, some you won’t. Don’t worry just keep going, smile and enjoy…. remembering failing to understand is progress!

Review what you know: Congratulate yourself on picking up little bits here and there – even if that is I don’t know what such-and-such word means. (A few minutes ago you didn’t even know it existed … so well done; you’ve learnt something!)

Pause and do something else: Bach is a great believer in walking away and doing something else for a while (it might be a few minutes, or a few years, depending on his interest and the urgency of the need to learn the subject). This allows him (you) time to make those connections with stuff you already know and understand.

Next Pass: Re-read and see what happens – sometimes things will be clearer spontaneously; sometimes you might have to start looking up certain words / topics to try to understand them better. Again, no pressure. Smile and enjoy.

Review, Pause and Continue …

I was recently reading an article by Geoff Petty (Visit Geoff’s website) when he started talking about a Jigsaw Teaching Technique. I immediately thought, what an excellent idea…

Approach learning like you do a jigsaw; get an idea of the big picture … start with the easy bits, the corners, the straight edges then work in from there with the other easily identifiable pieces. Only when you have done the majority of the work, do you fill in the hard gaps.

In a way this is how we already teach, skim over the surface during their ‘younger’ days at school, find a bit more depth during A levels, then off to university to fill in the harder gaps.

But wouldn’t it be a great way to teach a lesson / term of work. First off, give the big picture – no need to understand what I’m saying, no pressure. Then start working around the edges, the easy bits before filling in the difficult bits in the middle … talk about differentiation! All with no pressure on the learner, just pick up what and when you can.

Anyway, I don’t actually think this was what Petty was talking about in the end. He was talking more about getting learners to piece together their own learning in group work or something … (Sorry Geoff, I got lost in my own imagining of what jigsaw learning was to take in your idea! I must re-read that article – another thing on the to-do list.)

Can you see a way of using Cyclic Learning in your own teaching and specialist subject area?

In general, I don’t think it matters that much whether they are rules/charters, defined positively (you will do something) as opposed to negatively (we do not do X, Y and/or Z) or how much influence learners had in developing them. In my mind, the important bit is the implementation of the rules/charter.

• Is it shared with all learners? Regularly?
• Is it displayed clearly? (In my experience, whatever their age or behavioural history, learners love designing these.)
• Are they fair? Do they apply to staff as well as learners? (Remember the most important word – ‘We’.)
• Does everyone use and understand the language of the rules/charter?
• Is it applied consistently?

The worst thing that can happen is to do this as an activity at the start of the year, forget about it and then try to refer to it when discipline slips several weeks/months later. Remember the importance of repetition on learning? Keeping to rules is just another skill/habit to learn. It needs to be reviewed and reinforced regularly.

But I digress… A weblog like this needs a set of rules/behaviours that everyone abides to. An established weblog can negotiate amongst its readers and self-regulate its own comments and behaviours to some extent, but starting out a new blogger needs to establish a set of rules for both content and comment.

My latest teaching role was within a new team, setting up a new programme. We had, therefore, a lot of scope to set things up how we wanted. One of my colleagues had been working in a prison and brought with them a model and language that we adopted for our classes.

Usually we would brainstorm ideas for how learners could be “successful” on our course (without defining what this meant allowing leeway to stray into ideas of happiness etc.) and then, using that age-old teacher’s craft of fitting any answer given into the “correct” answer, placed this on our behaviour model.

Unfortunately, I cannot enter into this sort of discussion at this stage with any readership I might get! My intention then is to give the behaviour model as the class rules on this blog, binding not only on me but you as readers, often refer back to the model and use it as a guide to posts and comments and whether they should be allowed.

The model, that I have stolen from my colleague who brought it with her from elsewhere …, is called “Conditions of Success” and refers to four “participations” that everyone – staff and learners – must attempt to live up to. They are;

• Supportive Participation,
• Open Participation,
• Active Participation and
• Respectful Participation

WE, emphasised big we – you and I working together for success, will participate openly in the fullest sense of that word. “Keeping an open mind” is a phrase we often hear, yet many of us live within our closed thoughts, not open to other’s ideas and ideologues. We will listen respectfully to everyone’s experiences, views and opinions and will keep an open mind before answering in a supportive and respectful way.

And finally, to make this weblog a success requires active participation: not only turning up and reading it regularly but adding your thoughts, experiences and ideas to the group. Why not start now by introducing yourself? You will need to register, but remember, I am bound by the Conditions of Success as much as you. I must participate respectfully too and this definitely means respecting others’ privacy and not passing on or selling your’s or anyone’s details!

Register here … then introduce yourself in the box below!

What I can’t stand about these programmes is the artifical nature of the rules. Popularity doesn’t make you good at anything; except when it comes to modern media, it seems. I know that I’m biased in this opinion because I have had the misfortune of having worked with “popular” teachers in the past.

Stereotyping is not good practice, so I won’t do it in this case.

I know of many ‘good’ teachers who are also popular. I must make this clear.

But there exists a group of teachers for whom the aim is to be “liked” … I’m sure you’ve come across them in your role. They can be identified by such activities as not applying the rules / code of conduct consistently, being “friends” with their learners (I’m sure I’ll write more about professional boundaries next time it comes up in the media … so in a week or so, I guess.), spending too much time chatting to them about reality TV shows and what they got up to at the weekend and, the worst crime in my mind, talking with learners about other teachers’ teaching (and not defending their colleagues!).

I wrote a few days ago about “those who can, teach, those that can’t, criticise” in my post on “What Makes a Good Teacher?“. It wasn’t actually, it was yesterday when dealing with “Classroom and Behaviour Management.” Anyway… wouldn’t it be great to see those people outside the profession who think it is so easy, coming in and actually having to try it for a few weeks.

A reality TV show where popularity wouldn’t win any prizes!

In fact, maybe the winner could get a place on a PGCE or GTP as their prize. But, of course, to win they would have to be prepared to spend long hours planning, assessing and giving feedback to learner … (I should have just said marking, you all would have understood what I meant.)

The judges could, of course, give extra credit to those participants who helped others, sharing techniques that worked, sharing resources and, I suspect, being a shoulder to cry on for those that find that teaching isn’t easy, after all, and that standing in front of a rude and rowdy class trying to “be in charge” (another quote from my Classroom and Behaviour Management Post) can be soul destroying sometimes.

You could start off with well behaved, ‘easy’ classes and then progress to more challenging groups. Many non-teachers tend to think this correlates to learners getting older; they are easier to teach at five than fifteen, that sort of thing. How wrong they would find out that misconception is!

I have to say, I still wouldn’t watch this … but: it would show teaching in a different light (not so easy after all is it!), give learners (and their parents) a little knowledge of just how much work goes into each lesson and start reversing this trend for popularity and looking more towards mastery and excellence as goalposts.

Wouldn’t it be nice to have a few role models on the television who were seen supporting others, sharing with others, and working hard to be good at something rather than being popular. And just wait for the celebrity teaching reality show!

Is this your first time looking up classroom and behaviour management tips on the Internet? If not, have you ever noticed how they all tend to be lists of tips? Here’s one I found on the TES website …

1. Be in Charge
2. Use Positive Classroom Rules
3. Make Rewards Work for You
4. Catch Them Being Good
5. Be Specific and Clear in your Instructions
6. Deal with Low Level Behaviours Before they get BIG
7. The Consequences of Non-Compliance
8. Find a “Best for Both” Outcome
9. Establish “Start of Lessons” Routines
10. Manage the End of the Lesson

Taken from Top Ten Behaviour Management Tips from MiniOwner

I don’t want to take anything away from these tips – there are some sensible suggestions in amongst these tips. But … how many of these do you already know (and probably even tried)?

Do any of us standing in front of a class not try to “be in charge”? Do we ever aim to give instructions that are not clear and specific? And yet, to paraphrase Sue Cowley’s book, the Buggers Still Misbehave!

So, time for a hometruth: Classroom and behaviour management is Not Easy!

It takes a lot of time and effort to get it right and it won’t be solved by a few “sticky plaster” tips you get from the internet. In order to improve you will need to work on your planning, practise your words, and possibly even change your whole teaching style.

Like any skill you cannot learn it all and put it all into practice in one go … so forget about all the lists you find everywhere else! Each week, I will address one small section or tactic of classroom and behaviour management. Work on that for the week (or more if needed) – when you are happy you have grasped that concept, you can move onto the next skill or tactic. (I know you know this already … you are a teacher after all!)

For this week I want you to focus on the fact that, as said above, classroom and behaviour management is not easy. There is a little known psychological bias known as the Dunning-Kruger effect (read more on this at wikipedia) which very basically simplified says that someone who doesn’t have a clue what they are talking about thinks they are more competent than they are, whereas if you have some skill you tend to underestimate your ability.

Don’t be fooled by those outside the profession who think that teachers have an easy job. They do not have a clue about the skill required to do the job. To paraphrase a common saying – “those that can teach, those that can’t criticise”.

All teachers have problems with classroom and behaviour management. However good they are, however long they have been doing it, some days it all goes wrong. Here is a great comment I found on the TES Forums;

They cannot seem to understand that if you have a class where all turn up with a pen, do not fight, swear or storm out of the room [it] is a massive achievement.

So don’t give up … it’s not going to be an easy ride, but you will make it and be a great teacher, if you persevere and keep trying!

Next week I’ll explain how Sport’s Psychology can help You with Classroom and Behaviour Management.

But I love the word ‘heuristic’!

A heuristic, as Bach explains, is “simply a non-guarenteed way of solving a problem. Like a suggestion. A heuristic may help, or it may not.” (Taken from Bach’s The Secrets of a Buccaneer Scholar: How Self-education and the Pursuit of Passion Can Lead to a Lifetime of Success). Of course, I then went straight to Wikipedia for its explanation of heuristic … but I digress, ironically in very much the manner of Bach’s Long Leash Heuristic.

One of the things I noticed early on in my teaching career is that trainee or new teachers like (or have) to keep very much to their planning schedule. They try to keep the learners very much on subject throughout the whole lesson. As Bach, a non-teacher I might add, discovered this doesn’t allow for those “interesting” conversations and discoveries that allow learners to link the subject matter to their own knowledge or learn new and useful information, not necessarily on the syllabus.

More experienced teachers tend to allow this more. I often hypothesise that this is more to do with the teacher’s confidence that they can get the group back on task than their desire to explore “around the subject”. But this is important (another phrase I overuse!).

Bach refers to creating “disposable time” – time that can be wasted. As Bach puts it;

” I don’t want to throw my time away. But without disposable time, I will be too conservative about what I learn. I will supress my curiosity. With disposable time, I take more risks. Often this brings unexpected treasure” – (Taken from Bach’s The Secrets of a Buccaneer Scholar: How Self-education and the Pursuit of Passion Can Lead to a Lifetime of Success)

‘Too conservative about what I learn’ – sounds like a damning indictment of the current education system and the pressure on teachers to get results rather than “educating” learners, doesn’t it? Can we change the system? NO!

But can we aim to become good teachers – reflect on one of my first posts on What Makes a Good Teacher? – ? Can we teach to enthuse and motivate? YES

How do we use then the long leash heuristic in our teaching?

The only real rule for this is not to jump on any slightly “off-topic” conversation straight away … give it a little slack and see where it goes. If, and when, it goes too far or when you decide you really do need to get back to the subject in hand … give the leash a tug and get back on topic. I love the phrase “I’d love to continue this very interesting subject, but we really need to finish X, Y or Z today. Maybe we can come back to it another time?”

It tells learners that ‘I’ value their input, opinions and what’s important to them. However, ‘we’ also have to discover, learn, whatever it is today’s lesson is on.

And don’t be afraid to bin the day’s lesson if the conversation, discovery, goes in a meaningful and useful way. This will really enthuse learners and what you discuss that lesson will be much more memorable to them than anything you try to ‘force’ upon them after that.

You cannot, by definition, plan these interludes. The only thing you can do is to ensure you allow plenty of time to achieve your lesson objectives. I’m sure you all remember rushed lessons trying to race through too much content. But do you remember the content? Not likely, as it was so rushed! So give yourself TIME.

‘What happens if I finish my objectives in five minutes?’ is a common question. You carry on with something else – surely you always plan for this anyway with additional activities, or you allow the learners some time for personal study, or you let them go early for working hard and getting the objectives completed.You are in charge, after all!

Because I can guarantee that another similar group will run out of time for those exact same objectives … that’s the joy of teaching, isn’t it?

The six most important words: ‘I admit I made a mistake’
The five most important words: ‘I am proud of you’
The four most important words: ‘What is your opinion?’
The three most important words: ‘If you please’
The two most important words: ‘Thank you’
The one most important word: ‘We’

The final line of this piece of wisdom is “The one least important word: ‘I’ ” but whilst this might apply to leadership it does not apply to teaching, especially when trying to defuse an escalation of aggression from a learner (more on that another time …)

The language you use in the classroom is important.

Admitting to being fallible; that mistakes are not only normal but are an essential part of learning is one of the greatest lessons a teacher can impart on a group. Go on, try it sometime …

We all know that we need to give our learners more positive feedback but how many of us actually realise just how much our learners look up to us and how valuable it can be to let the learner hear the words “I’m proud of you”…

Likewise asking their opinion (and then actively listening to it) helps increase their confidence and self-esteem. As does treating them with a bit of respect using the words “please” and “thank you”. We need to model the manners we want them to demonstrate.

Finally, learning is a collaboration. The more you get used to using the word “we”, the sooner the learners get used to hearing the word “we”, the sooner everyone starts working together towards the common goal …

So how well are you doing?

]]> http://www.persicum.co.uk/2012/01/03/the-persicum-short-course-on-teaching/feed/ 0 http://www.persicum.co.uk/2012/01/02/what-makes-a-good-teacher/ http://www.persicum.co.uk/2012/01/02/what-makes-a-good-teacher/#comments Mon, 02 Jan 2012 07:00:39 +0000 Robert Bradley http://www.persicum.co.uk/?p=122 I said in yesterday’s post (Secrets of a Buccaneer Teacher) that I was passionate about good teaching … but what is it? What makes a good teacher?

We all know what OFSTED believes is a good lesson;

As a result of teaching that is mainly good, most pupils and groups of pupils, including disabled pupils and those with special educational needs, are achieving well over time. Teachers have high expectations of all pupils.
Teachers use their well developed subject knowledge and their accurate assessment of pupils’ prior skills, knowledge and understanding to plan effectively and set challenging tasks.
Teachers regularly listen astutely to, carefully observe and skilfully question groups of pupils and individuals during lessons in order to reshape tasks and explanations to improve learning.
Teachers and other adults enthuse and motivate most pupils to participate. Teaching generally promotes pupils’ resilience, confidence and independence when tackling challenging activities.
Adapted from the OFSTED 2012 School Inspection Guidance

But is this the whole story?

I could list lots of evidence based research on what makes a good teacher … Mike Baker on the BBC once did a piece on ‘what makes a good teacher?‘ that lists many of these.

But John Adair in his book on Personal Success has a great definition of a good teacher;

“one whose actual lesson may be forgotten, but whose living enthusiasm is a quickening, animating and inspiring power“. 100 Greatest Ideas for Personal Success, John Adair.

I love this definition. We all remember our good teachers – their individual lessons might fade into obscurity but their effect on us doesn’t. They were great role models for us, they inspired us; to learn, to discover, to enjoy.

And I personally think this makes a great starting point for the trainee teacher, or indeed us old timers who really do like to reflect upon our teaching. Teaching is not about lesson objectives, achievement or targets despite what everyone is forced to tell you. Teaching is about “enthusing and motivating”, that is the real learning!

If you can inspire your learners (even just once …) then you are a good teacher.

I often think of the Tenessee Williams quote when thinking about striving for good lessons;

Success is blocked by concentrating on it and planning for it.
Success is shy – it won’t come while you are watching.

My advice then, (take it or leave it, your choice) … is to concentrate on inspiring your learners, work with them (motivation has to come in part from them) to help them discover what they want to learn.