Teaching Hacks, The Look, and Monitoring

Teaching Hacks, The Look, and Monitoring

Y’all know that I love Teaching Hacks! You know what I mean? Those Pinterest-y ideas for quick fixes in the classroom?

Here are a few of my faves ...

1. Turn and Talks. All day, every day. Makes kids process learning and therefore RETAIN learning
2. Having kids use Whiteboard markers to write ON the desks. And then baby wipes to remove. (so much more fun than paper!)
3. Using Plickers to formatively assess in under 2 minutes. Because time is EVERYTHING to teachers. (except today they introduced a pay system?)
4. Bathroom pass on a lanyard (because, ewww, where does the pass go when they’re using the facilities?)
5. Written directions for everythingeverythingeverything. Every activity, assignment, everything with written directions on the board or screen. Helps ESE kids, ESOL kids, kids who have auditory processing issues, kids who just weren’t listening, kids who are flakey, and kids who are all over the place. If you write the directions down, half your management improves!

Ok, I’d like to add a new Teaching Hack to your list.

It’s so simple, but so rarely used.

It’s called “Read student work WHILE they’re working”

No, really. Stay with me!

Kids will trick you all the time. They can’t help it. They’re kids.  One favorite trick of most students is The Look.

This is different from the Teacher Look, the Mom Look or  The Administrator Look.

The Student Look is an “I’m innocent look”, maybe an “I’m thinking deeply look”, or even an “I am on task” look.

They use it all the time

Kids are great at looking busy. I used to happily walk around my classroom and monitor my students. I loved to walk around and do what  I THOUGHT was monitoring.

“Thanks for being on task, Destiny!”

“Let’s start our work, Carlos!”

“Brittany, you don’t have any work done! What have you been doing?”

“You’re almost done, Austin! Great job!”

What was wrong with those? I was monitoring for compliance, not for comprehension.

What’s the difference? I used to monitor to see if my kids were DOING their work, not if they were LEARNING what I wanted them to learn!

A kid can write stuff on paper all day but have no idea what we’re learning. They can be compliant by copying their friends’ words, they can be compliant by copying some things out of the book/packet, or they can be compliant just staying quiet and making wild guesses.

Kids can be tricksy. They can definitely LOOK busy but be missing the point.

I was constantly surprised AFTER students turned in their work and it was waaayyyy off, super wrong, or missed the point of the assignment/question entirely!

So how can we monitor for LEARNING? What’s the Teaching Hack here?

It’s so easy. Just read what they write WHILE they’re writing it.

I know we think we’re all already doing it. And maybe it was just me. But I see and hear lots of teachers monitoring around the room talking to kids about DOING work, not about WHAT they’re writing.

As you walk around the classroom, read what they write WHILE they are writing. Are they on point? Are their answers aligned to your question or are they off in left field? Do their answers read EXACTLY like the answers of the kid next to them? Are they wildly making stuff up? Are they copying some sort of answer out of the book without actually understanding it? Are they jotting down “IDK” for every third question?

And then -- when you see them on task but OFF-TRACK (not understanding), STOP and help them right then.

Don’t wait until kids turn in their work. Help them fix it right away, in the moment.

This takes EXACTLY as much effort as your monitoring for compliance does. You DO have to get up and walk around, just the same amount of steps. But it pays out waaayyyy more in student learning.

Totally worth it. Do mostly the same thing you are already doing but make it work better for you and your kids. Don’t get fooled by “The Student Look”. Monitor for LEARNING not for compliance.

Now that’s a Teaching Hack!!

Thoughts? Questions? Email me at newmantr@pcsb.org