Sunday, September 16, 2012

Seventh Hour

Last week, I have to admit I totally spaced on the blog (sorry!) . My mind was already in over drive trying to figure out what to do with my seventh hour. They are a rowdy group. I am dealing with a lot of side conversation and random shot outs. I can't even get them to write silently for two minutes. I have tried having them lay down on the floor with pillows and low lighting to calm them down, but that only works for a while. I want to try brain breaks, but I am worried that will get them more anxious. Last week, we did try a dancing brain break, but then they were high energy the rest of the hour. Does anyone have any ideas for what they do to help students stay focused even when it is seventh hour?


3 comments:

  1. Hmm. Well, I have done in my classroom that work fairly well is to "give" them the opportunity to speak to one another. What I mean by that is to give them the opportunity to speak during designated times. For, instance during transitions such as handing out papers, organizing things for later in the lesson, or surprise them at a random point and request for them to speak to there neighbor. Obviously you'd use short periods of time, but 30 seconds to a minutes every so often saves you a ton of "redirection" time later throughotu the whole period. Plus, your viewed as giving them a reward instead of punishing them for doing something wrong. The fact is they will talk if they want to talk, but if you "give" them the opportunity they won't "take" the opportunity from you at inopportune times. If it's a study hall, simply say give me 10 minutes of silence and I'll give you 1-2 minutes to talk. If they speak add a minute. You may give out 4-5 minutes of talk time but the remainder of the period should run quite smoothly. Hope you find this helpful.

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  2. I've told them that on Fridays we can do a fun activity at the end of the hour whether it is sharing music and talking about it, or sharing something that they like to do. That way I can give them some time to talk and share and have it be a positive thing as well as a motivation to stay focused the rest of the week. Also, I loosen the reins a bit during 7th hour so I don't get pushback so much. I have an L2 EL class, so I encourage lots of talking and interaction--and so I give my lesson for the day, and then get them talking, interacting, reading, writing, as soon as they can get themselves busy to do it--and then save some jokes, etc, and stories for the end of the hour. Hope that helps.

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  3. I've had the same issue with my 7th hour class. I agree with DeBoer that it seems to be effective to "reward" them with time to talk, but to do so in a structured way. They need to know when it's time to focus, they focus. When they have the opportunity to talk, then they talk. If they abuse this privilege or don't earn this privilege, it's on them.

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