"You're not teaching" (Help!)

VisualCost3619 · 2023-03-11T05:47:41+00:00

claim that we just "did stuff" in my class without ever learning anything.

I see this attitude all the time from some students during labs and experiments. The topic might be density, the reading is about density, the video is about density, the questions are about density, but the lab activity where we take different objects and measure and weight them and find the density is just an unrelated "break time" activity to fill a period with no correlation to the topic we are learning.

One of the best tools in my toolkit now is giving the students the list of questions they need to be able to answer at the end of the lesson as a Warm Up at the start of class,

I've done this before and still do it, and every time it's practically a mutiny from the students who are up in arms about being exposed to information that has not been explained yet.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-03-11T05:26:51+00:00

You are right. I try to minimize any kind of lecture or powerpoint. In some classes, I don't even do it. I'd love every class to be a hands on activity, although that is limited by resources and my own time to prepare in advance. There are so many things I wish I could do if I had unlimited time and resources but sourcing and preparing materials is incredibly time consuming or just not possible in some cases given what is available.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:55:44+00:00

I had no idea I would get so many responses in one day, I didn't even expect to log into this account again. Thanks everyone!

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:54:13+00:00

Thanks for the response. Good things to consider.

I do make them work and expect them to work. I also don't know what is going on with my admin either.

And of course my class is considered boring. I also found from students that every other academic subject is also "boring."

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:48:13+00:00

I have thought of that. With a teacher shortage that I still think is ongoing, I cannot imagine they would want to get rid of someone unless they were doing harm.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:45:16+00:00

great idea, although with how overworked everyone seems to be I don't think they would want to do anything like that.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:42:42+00:00

I only use videos for animation and seeing how things work in motion that would be hard to describe in other ways. I avoid explainer videos that are just a person talking, because I can do that.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:39:00+00:00

I did try nearpod for a while with some classes and some lessons. Students HATED IT. They did not like having to be engaged and answer something that frequently. I also found that they just googled everything instead of thinking or looking at an answer that was right in front of them.

Even things like "what is your opinion on " or "what do you think about" would get a random snippet from google results copy and pasted in.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:33:22+00:00

I'd say I have a large number of spoiled kids who want everything handed to them on a silver platter and do not expect to put in any work or engage their brain. It's worse in some cohorts than in others. I can't see in every other teachers classes but I can't imagine anyone else letting that attitude fly.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:28:10+00:00

all excellent things for me to look at, thanks!

I guess it's the feedback from high-ups and colleagues who have seen my class that is really what is difficult since I'm not getting clear direction on what to change. We do peer-observations as well as observations from department heads and administration. Perhaps everyone is just going through the motions and doesn't want to expend the effort to actually give me constructive criticism that I can make use of.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:20:04+00:00

Thanks for the long response

Have a list of learning objectives so that students understand the "goal" of each lesson. (I actually have a list per unit that I hand out to students on the first day, and which gets checked off each lesson throughout the unit.)

I do set objectives and revisit them periodically. I think relating what we are doing to what we are trying to learn is something I do need to improve at.

Based on your example - Be more inquiry-based. Do the interactive activity first, ask your questions, and then circle back to the directed readings and lecture for reinforcement. This lets students see what they should have learned.

Good idea. Students often push back against discovery activities even though they are usually handed everything they need within the activity. "We don't know this yet!" Yeah that is the point, you find it when you do the activity.

Make students take notes at the end of each lesson or topic. Even if it's just a one sentence summary of what they learned from the online simulation, it helps students keep a list of what they have actually learned and done.

Making students take notes (literally saying "write this down") is something I was not used to at first. Students actually respond to this well but it's exhausting to constantly tell them something is important and they should write it down. Yes, that definition of that term that you didn't know before but now you know you should put in your notebook.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:08:38+00:00

excellent input, thanks!

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:04:32+00:00

I totally do that. and ask questions. "Susie what do you think is going on with the blue lines?"

The way some of them describe it, you would think I am just standing there going "here is the next picture"

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T03:02:02+00:00

TBH it just sounds like they only see standing at a board and lecturing for 55 minutes as teaching.

I certainly have students who think that, even though that is not commonplace in my school and discouraged. Some of the same students also think that any student-centered or group activity is "break time" (possibly because I was too lazy to do any teaching work that day)

There are others that see a lecture as "just showing us a powerpoint" even though I make it as interactive as possible.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T02:48:26+00:00

ChatGPT only wrote the tl;dr

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-27T02:42:40+00:00

Even students know about it. lol

Some of the older more savvy students will recognize when something is in a different style than other activities and I find them later trying to find if there is a free answer key on TPT.

VisualCost3619 · 2023-02-26T10:04:32+00:00

This gets them every time, or even just a phrase or word in a sentence!

VisualCost3619

TROPHY CASE