Pre-Conference Preparation

With the second round of parent conferences coming next week, I was just wondering what other teachers do to prepare for conferences? Do you just show parents the students’ grades or do you have student work/assessments that you show? I usually have the students fill out some type of sheet evaluating themselves in my class. I like being prepared with something for conferences because I don’t like making things up on the fly, but it’s hard to be completely prepared with so many students and not knowing who will show up.

So what do you do before conferences to get ready?

Ideas

Does anyone have any great techniques out there that they use to help students with ADHD/ADD to stay more focused or attentive in class so that it does not take away from their learning?

Success

Currently I am in the process of grading students’ memoirs (like a personal narrative type of writing) and as I am reading through them I am pleasantly surprised! Not only are the fun to read, but I can’t believe how well-written some of them are! I think back to last year and I cringe thinking about those papers! But this year I can definitely see improvement in our curriculum and in the outcome of the students’ writing. I’m not saying every student got an A, but I could see them at least attempting the techniques we went over and being successful because of it.

I know for me, I expect a lot out of my students and myself, which sometimes causes me to focus more on the struggles or problems that occur, rather than the positives. But I think it truly is uplifting when students produce work that is something to be proud of, and I am very proud of the students that put a lot of effort into their writing…it definitely showed!

Any other successes that you have had this year with your students that made you really proud?

Students Presenting

Recently we had students present some posters that they had made for an activity in class. It made me think about presenting and speaking in front of an audience and how even though we have students do it, they don’t really understand how to do it effectively. Many presentations they do are informal, but even so they should be practicing the skill of speaking in front of an audience in a meaningful way. I know this can be something very scary for students, and then there are some students who it doesn’t seem to phase, but I was just thinking about how I need to address this more and have students practice those speaking techniques more consciously (eye contact, volume of voice, etc.) So I was wondering if you have students do presentations in your class, what do you expect of them as far as the speaking and presenting goes? Do you make students aware these techniques and or just expect that they do it? Or is more like students just present information and you are only interested in the content? Any tips to help them practice these skills?

Advisory

At the beginning and end of the week we have advisory in the morning for about 10 minutes. I know advisory is supposed to be like a home-base for students and it is a nice connection for them, especially at the beginning of the year. I go over announcements with the students and words of the day, and I focus on grades at mid and end quarter. We will also do some sharing about weekends and sometimes play some games. But I feel as the year goes on that Advisory gets monotonous. Does anybody do any other activities with their advisory? Any other ideas for things to do with students that are fun and meaningful, but don’t take too much prepping?

Writing a play based on a story

I was inspired by Gina's post about trying to make lessons more engaging for students. I happened on this one almost by accident. As we were reading, we were talking about dialogue between two of the characters. Then I was talking to them about story elements and how you can tell what characters are like by their dialogue. One student commented about how two students in class were like the characters in the story. I thought--YES--why not have my EL students create a play based on a story we read together as a class? I said it out loud to the students! Once I said that, they were more engaged with our plot outline we did, as well as looking at dialogue in the story. I also had them use some whisper phones to hear themselves talk. I am not sure how much room content teachers have in their curriculum, but if writing a class play together can cover one of the standards--maybe teaching drama terms as well as story elements--it could work.
It lets the drama terms come alive. As well, it allows for differentiation of students in the classroom: students who are strong speakers can take the leading roles, lower level readers can work on scenery and maybe even be part of the scenery with small speaking roles (example a tree could have a couple of lines), students good at writing can help compose the lines, etc.--even draw scenery or build props.

Works Cited Page

Hi,

This week a question of priorities when you can't find time. In English 7 we are preparing to write a research paper. We will be researching and writing next week. Every time I teach a paper, I struggle to fit in information about the Works Cited page in and it is always rushed. I realize that it is something that I need to teach, but I never feel I do a very good job of it. I tried to make it a focal point in my honors class by teaching it earlier, and I think that will help, but I think what ultimately stops me from teaching it well is my lack of care about the works cited page. I am not very concerned about if the commas are in the right spot or if there should be a colon. Does it really matter if the title is underlined or italicized? My apathy translates into my priorities in the classroom. However I know from college that it does matter to some instructors, so teaching the process is important.

My larger question is are there things in your subject area that you find simply procedural? Do you struggle to give this the priority that other teachers might? How do you motivate yourself to teach it? What are some strategies you use to teach very procedural topics?