It is important to be specific when dealing with students. Younger students may not understand what you mean by "clean up," and older students may take advantage of the nebulous wordage by cleaning up their desk when you meant for them to clean the whole room. Below are some ways that you can be more specific and use clear directions to your advantage.
When giving directions, do you find that your students begin BEFORE you have finished? While this can be annoying, it is also very distracting and can take up extra class time. Try using a signal with students to let them know when they may begin following your instructions. Train your students at the beginning of the year and continue to use a speech such as this one through the year:
"I am about to give you directions for our next activity. You may not begin until I say, "Go" (or insert your own signal here). I expect you to be silent, still and listening until I say, "Go". Then continue with your directions. When you are finished, give students the signal (such as saying, "Go"). If you see students beginning to move before you are finished, stop your directions and say, "I see people moving even though I haven't given the signal. EVERYONE should be listening, not doing."
If your students are used to starting before you are finished with your directions, it will take you a while to train them. You must be very consistent in order for this to work and must not allow them to continue this behavior.
When dealing with behavior problems in class, it is important to be specific. When talking with the student/students, you need to:
- State the problem (the incorrect behavior)
- State the consequence (you should have a list of consequences to follow)
- State your expectations of the student
- State the next consequence if the behavior continues
For example:
If a student calls another student a name, you would take the offending student aside and say,
"John, you called Jeremy a mean name. That behavior is unacceptable. You have time out for 5 minutes during computer time because you chose to call Jeremy a bad name which hurt his feelings. I expect you and all of my students to be nice to other people. That means not calling others names, teasing them, or hurting their feelings. I also expect you to apologize to Jeremy when we are finished. If you continue to call other people names, you will miss 10 minutes of recess.
Sometimes you may want to give the student a chance to earn the privilege to give back the consequence. If you decide that this approach will help your student understand how to behave appropriately, make sure to clearly state how he/she may earn that privilege before the conversation is finished.
When giving feedback to students on writing assignments, projects, and other open-ended assignments, it is helpful to make your comments as specific as possible. This type of feedback helps your students to learn from their mistakes rather than learning that their mistakes give them bad grades.
Do not fret about correcting student work before it is turned in for a grade. The point of corrections is to show students how to do the work correctly. Simply marking it as wrong will not be helpful. Students need to know what is wrong, why it is wrong, and how to fix it. There is no way that they will automatically know why something is wrong or how to fix it just because it has a red "X" next to it. Being specific in your comments is a type of teaching tool.
Example: "This sentence sounds awkward with the rest of the paragraph. Perhaps you could rewrite it like this...(correct the sentence)" This type of correction helps the student understand why the sentence is awkward and how to fix it. A simple comment of "awk." is not nearly as helpful!
