I don’t know about any other teachers out there, but when I first started back teaching in the beginning of August I was concerned with things like how am I going to teach this new group of kids? What are they going to be like? What will I do with them all day? How will I deal with the parents? WHAT am I actually going to teach them? I think these are questions that many teachers ask themselves. The root of it all is: am I going to be effective with these students? It’s a tough job being a teacher, we’re hard on our students, but we’re harder on ourselves. It was really neat to get to sit down and do some serious catharsis and relive my highs and lows of each day and get into the thick of it with how I interact with my students on a daily basis and WHAT I actually end up teaching them.
The first thing I noticed is that children have a unique way of telling us what they need. In my case, with a room full of 4 and 5 year olds, they repeat A LOT of things, “my favorite color is pink and purple”, “I miss my mom”, “I don’t like fish sticks”, “can you read my book?” and it doesn’t end there. My favorite repeating phrase I’ve heard so far this year is, “Angry Birds Star Wars 2 is coming out on September 19”. I heard this so many times from one student in particular, I thought I was going to have to ban the phrase “Angry Birds” from my classroom.
What these little ones are really getting at is, it’s all about me. What is important to me? What does that have to do with me? Why are we doing this activity if I don’t like it? Chip Wood puts it this way in his book Yardsticks, “five-year-olds are not selfish, but they are at the center of their own universe and often find it hard to see the world from any other point of view” (2007, p. 58). After working with 4 and 5 year olds for the past three and a half years, I can say I whole-heartedly agree with Chip Wood on this. One of my goals this year is to use the interests of my students to better meet them where they are at and create engaging learning opportunities that are mostly led and created by them. I want to create spaces for them to experiment with the, physical, social/emotional, cognitive parts of their learning, all the while focusing on what their minds are most interested in.
What I have learned from taking a critical look at the environment of my classroom is that I was often doing whatever I wanted to do, without regard to what my student’s interests were. I wasn’t blatantly disregarding their interests, I just didn’t know what they were. After getting some excellent advice from my coach, I went down a deep dark path that many have traveled before. I got the Angry Birds Star Wars app--and quite frankly, I’ll probably never be the same. My first thought after playing this addicting game was, “5 year olds can do this?!”. After playing the game for a few rounds I began to develop my skills a bit more and understand the abilities of my birds, how I could leverage the slingshots aim, use the trajectory to destroy structures and so on. Now we’re talking some real physical science here--hey, if this is educational I can use this in my classroom!
You can’t imagine the excitement of the majority of my class when I told them we were going to make Angry Birds come to life in our very own school! We spent 2 days making our own birds and pigs out of ping pong balls and building a useable slingshot. I invited my most enthusiastic student (who just so happened to know the exact date when the new Angry Birds Star Wars 2 game was coming out) to come to the Angry Birds small group first. Now, it wasn’t perfect and conflicts arose within the group--but we built some structures for those menacing pigs to hide in and flung our birds into them. All the students experimented with the slingshot and how they could leverage different rubber band lengths to increase speed. Some students even figured out that if they put something heavy inside of the ping pong balls it would have a bigger impact.
While we were having some serious success garnering student interests and creating learning opportunities that were engaging to children---I was having a tough time correcting some negative behavior from certain students. What I noticed in particular was that there were very specific times and specific students that were struggling in conflict with their peers. I also noticed that my answer, more often than not was to remove a student from a situation. Often times, that seems the most convenient and wise thing to do. I’m starting to realize how much that is my go-to for particular students who I don’t think will really solve their conflict by talking.
In Becky Bailey’s Conscious Discipline, she says, “in order for children to learn how to behave properly, they must be taught” (2000, p. 13). What am I teaching a child when I remove them from the beloved blocks center because they REALLY wanted the block their friend was using and decided to take it? I think I’m teaching them that I have the power to take something from them if I don’t like what I see. I think I’m teaching them that I don’t value their feelings. More importantly, I’m not helping them see how the conflict they are having could help them relate to a friend and learn to be a problem solver. I need to model positive interactions with them when conflicts to arise (because they will!). This is something I really would like to take a step back on and gain some perspective on the power of modeling preferred, kind, respectful, and honoring behavior.
Wow, this is really wonderful! It makes me want to build an angry birds slingshot with my guys: what a cool idea! It reaches them at their interest level and teaches through play. They don't even realize they are learning, I bet! WIth my older guys I could even do some more sophisticated science things like measuring trajectory of different birds! Thanks for the great idea.
ReplyDeleteI can relate to some of what you're saying about removing a kid because it is convenient. I think on one hand, yes, modeling a preferred behavior is definitely important. They need the tools to know how to get along because they probably would avoid conflict if they could, right? But I also think that sometimes removing a child from a situation can be effective as a natural consequence. If you don't show respect/use kind words/ follow the rules agreed upon by the group, then you don't get to play. That reflects how society works, and kids need to experience that. As long as they have the opportunity to redeem themselves and get back into the activity some how, removing a kid isn't always the worst way to resolve conflict in my opinion :)
Really fabulous writing and what a wonderful peek into your classroom. It sounds like you are a truly compassionate and interested teacher and that you value your students a lot.
I love it!!! I love how you took the interest of your students and turned into something fun and educational at the same time. What a way to make science out of angry birds! Having experience as a pre-k teacher for two years, I definitely can understand the struggle of removing a child from a situation and modeling appropriate problem solving skills. Sometimes it's just easier to do the earlier one. However, I can attest that once you teach children how to problem solve and use their words, it will become natural to them and they will be able to do that on their own. However, if you feel the need to remove the child from the group, it is okay as long as the child understands why they are being removed from the group.
ReplyDeleteAs a Kindergarten teacher, I experience some of the same things. And I agree with what Katie wrote. Removal from a group is a natural consequence and is the way our society work. I do, however, think that the most important part of "punishing" a child by removing them from the group is to confer with them and make sure that they understand why they got in trouble and help them to come up with some solutions to handle the situation better the next time. I do this with my Kindergartners. I first ask them why do they think they were removed from the group and most of the time they already know the answer and when they don't I tell them by reminding them of the class rules. Then together we come up with ways to handle the situation next time.
And modeling behavior is hard so don't be so hard on yourself about. It takes time and practice.
As a fellow pre-k teacher, I totally understand the importance of student prompted lessons! Once a 4 year old sets their mind on something, it is an uphill climb trying to veer their attention in another direction. I think it is so awesome that you actually bought the app for angry birds! Now that's commitment! It is brilliant the way that you created a small group, that was pretty much a physics lesson, based totally on something the kids were obsessed with! I can see from the picture you posted just how excited your students were to create the game. This inspires me to do something outside the box like that.
ReplyDeleteI also really appreciate your reflection on removing misbehaving kids from conflicts. I feel your pain! It is really hard not to fall back on this method when it is so obvious that the chaos is coming from one direct source. It's hard to take the time to stop and correct behavior when there's 20+ other little minds that are about to lose interest the minute you start getting off topic. I'm excited to see what other procedures you come up with and try them out too!
Good job and good luck, Lindsey!
Hi Lindsey!
ReplyDeleteYour Angry Birds experiment was such a GREAT idea. I am in charge of writing the science lesson plans for my grade level and I am looking to bring in fun experiments likes this to really engage my students. I completely agree with you about forgetting to think about what our students interests are. In the classroom I feel like we are so used to telling our students what to do, what to learn and how to learn it but then we expect them to develop into independent thinkers. It is very contradictory and unfair!
I hope to work on giving my students the agency to take control of their education just as you have done for your students! If you ever fine any resources please feel free to send them my way. You also did an excellent job of applying what we 've read to your classroom and your students development. Keep up the good work!
Kyla
Hey Lindsey!
ReplyDeleteWhat a great blog post! Not only was your writing itself extremely engaging and concise, but also I loved hearing about your creation of the Angry Birds Lesson plan. It was really smart and creative of you to base this lesson off of a topic that you had noticed your students taking a personal interest in. In my opinion, this is a sign of a great teacher--by taking the time to engage with your students and notice what interests them beyond the realm of academics, you were able to create a lesson that was likely far more interesting to the majority of your young learners because it triggered them in not just an academic way, but also from a personal angle as well. I also liked the fact that this lesson was extremely hands-on and created with the intention to engage social and kinesthetic learners, which is particularly important to do when teaching such a young age. Engaging the kinesthetic learners is also something that I often forget to do as I often find myself creating lessons that predominately are structured around engaging visual and oral learners, so your lesson is definitely great motivation for me :)
I also understand your frustration with punishing your students by removing them from the activity, as I also often am hard on myself when I do this. However, there are many instances when I do think that this is the most effective method to teach a student a lesson and make their behavior improve. Many times, pulling a student out of a lesson gives the teacher the chance to speak privately on a more personal, down-to-earth level with the student about ways that they might improve in the future, whereas alternately their other option might be to sternly reprimand the misbehaving student which isn't always the most effective behavior. I always try to maintain a balance between being "firm, yet kind", and I think pulling a student out of a situation when he or she is misbehaving is often the most effective way to reinforce their better behavior. However, I definitely share your frustration with this discipline technique. If you ever read of any other potential methods to positively reinforce better behavior in the classroom, I would love to hear them!
Keep up the good work! I look forward to reading your future blog posts :)
Thanks for sharing,
Emily
The Angry Bird Lesson Plan is the bomb. I wonder how that would work for fifth graders. It's amazing what we can accomplish as teachers when we create lessons that are engaging and more geared to the way our students naturally learn. What's even more awesome is how in tune you are to your students needs. This is essential as an educator. I can tell how much you care about your kids by your willingness to do whatever is necessary to meet them where they are. Lindsey, I am learning a lot from you. Continue to be the dynamic, extraordinary, and loving teacher you were meant to be. I look forward to reading about your progress in the future.
ReplyDeleteIssiah Haynes
Your post was INCREDIBLE! Thank you so much for sharing all your insight and I love the Angry Bird Lesson. I think so often we can fall into being a teacher who tends to mainly the oral and visual learners, but I have come to realize the importance of incorporating activities and teaching methods that engage the students. With the correct foundation and communication of expectations, I think students could really thrive in setting where they are given the choice to get involved in what they are learning.
ReplyDeleteI am a big fan of positive disciple, but it can be so tough to remain consistent. In the beginning of the year, our class came up with a class promise. We spent several days talking about what makes a good community of learners, we read books that exemplified how we should act and had open discussions with each other about what we might want to include in our promise. The students all helped write it and we constructed a promise that we pledge ourselves to follow. When there is a need, we often go to the class promise. It seems like it is a long and tedious process, but I think taking time for discipline is important.
I'm looking forward to reading more in the future.
Thanks!
Christian