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Teacher Question about Netiquette


mangofirst

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Sitting here grinning about an 8th grade grammar Nazi who always brings her A game to class and has piles of papers sitting around the house!   


I definitely never bring papers home. I tried that when I first started teaching and they never got graded, so now I leave them at school. It helps me to keep that work versus professional line drawn, although I'm constantly finding teaching moments in life, so there's no real line, but a girl can pretend.

Thanks for all of your ideas and comments. I tried a test run yesterday. Part of my curriculum calls for students to participate in Socratic seminar over specific questions on our content (currently "Flowers for Algernon'), so I thought I would try that online first, because in theory they should be more comfortable with that versus face to face. As expected, one class was a complete disaster, one class did very well, and one was in between. And I'm sure it would've gone the same way if we had done a classic Socratic seminar.

I hear the comments about teaching everything in smaller chunks, and of course that is how our curriculum is set up, but I'm also expected to get these students to lead the classroom, so there's a catch 22 here with how much I should "give" them versus letting them discover things on their own.

I would love to hear your suggestions for student led discussions with no input from the teacher. Does anyone have a magic wand?
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On 9/21/2018 at 5:55 AM, Chris A said:

On this forum (K-forum) the participants come and discuss topics because of their enjoyment of the subject matter

 

You could use a champion that others will follow or will want to compete with.  Starting a group of kids from scratch is difficult.

 

2) Anonymity tends to stimulate unwanted behavior by those scoring high on narcissism and histrionics, etc.  

Yes, it would be a much easier task if my content weren't chosen for me. But for now, I have no way to get around that.  I have however created a Steven Crowder-esque "Change My Mind" poster for all 8th grade ELA students to participate on. I choose a stance that I'm certain most students will want to argue against. This week I did "Listening to music while doing assignments is distracting. Change my mind." This has gotten them more engaged in the idea of argument, so I be plan on continuing it. The idea is that they just add their reasoning to a sticky note and add it to the poster in the hallway.

 

The kids are not starting from scratch, but sometimes it feels that way. I'm having a hard time figuring out what background knowledge is actually in those little hormone filled brains.

 

We will definitely not be doing anonymous online discussion with 8th graders. They must be held accountable for their own content. There are ways for them to be anonymous with the teacher having access to whodunit I'm sure, but Google classroom is not set up that way.

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10 hours ago, Dave1290 said:

Good writers write from their heart and soul expressing themselves, which I'm sure you know already.  Once they can do that it becomes easier. They have to "feel comfy in their own skin."  Having seen you here, I know you'll handle it well.   :)

I try, I try. But when I'm stifled by pre-formulated curriculum, things get dicey. I would love to teach a creative writing class! The thing that middles schoolers should be focused on is finding their voice. This curriculum does not allow for much student choice, and my hands are tied right now. 🤷

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5 minutes ago, mangofirst said:

I would love to hear your suggestions for student led discussions with no input from the teacher. Does anyone have a magic wand?

 

Is this where we insert the "Here hold my beer" comments?  😎

 

Empower them ALL.  Not just the ones who "get it."  Find and create a "mix" of leaders and those who struggle.  Empower them to share their TRUE & HONEST thoughts.  A lot to ask with some but once they realize you have faith in them to accomplish the mission they'll blossom in their own little ways.  OR at LEAST try to reach the end goal that piques everyone's curiosity and draws them into it more.

 

As an artilleryman and section chief for about 8 years in the Army I had one kid who couldn't walk and chew gum.  NO ONE wanted this guy in their section.  I took him in mine and gave him the job many didn't want.  That dude was going to bring my 105mm howitizer into position in the firing battery.  He screws up and my section winds up moving a da&n cannon around by hand or hooking it back upto the 2.5 ton truck to be pulled around and back into the PROPER firing position.  Ya screw up you've got EVERYone on my rear.  That happens I'm not gonna be happy!  I put my faith in him to do a good job and he knew it.  Yanno what?  He NEVER failed me!  NEVER!  I empowered him in my own little way.  You do the same and smile as they blossom.  

 

It'll happen teach.  Turn on the smile and just don't beat them too hard.  hahahaha

 

 

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2 hours ago, mangofirst said:

I would love to hear your suggestions for student led discussions with no input from the teacher. Does anyone have a magic wand?

Any input would be anecdotal from me and definitely not expert. 

 

By their 13th-14th year of age, adolescents have the cognitive capacity to do most of what adults are capable of doing, but self-regulation and judgment are still developing. This is a pretty critical set of capabilities for student-led learning, one would think. 

 

Some examples online:

 

http://www.ascd.org/publications/educational-leadership/mar14/vol71/num06/When-Students-Lead-Their-Learning.aspx.

https://www.facinghistory.org/resource-library/teaching-strategies

 

Most of what I find from educational foundations is what I'd call meta-techniques, i.e., "planning to do the planning" to create what you actually want.  This is endemic to the discipline it seems (among other disciplines).  Most of the techniques that appeal to me would be direct techniques, i.e., changing the "What" into "How" directly, and harvesting any experiential data on how well each method works, and its limitations.  This type of information is usually completely absent.  I liken this situation to reading a sociology article: when you get to the end, all you know is a bunch of new terminology...and nothing you can use to actually begin to solve your problems.  😴

 

Chris

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2 hours ago, mangofirst said:

 I have however created a Steven Crowder-esque "Change My Mind" poster for all 8th grade ELA students to participate on.

 

Oh, that's fabulous!  :lol:  Those particular Crowder segments are his most serious, most intellectual dialogs.  He uses humor in almost everything else.

 

Quote

 

The kids are not starting from scratch, but sometimes it feels that way. I'm having a hard time figuring out what background knowledge is actually in those little hormone filled brains.

Have the students write down on paper three things they feel strongly about.  Then help the student to whittle that down to a single subject they can talk about, ie soccer, cheer leading, homework, video games, football, Justin Bieber, annoying little brothers, etc.  Then when they come to class tell them them must argue for the OPPOSITE side.

+++

 

Something that bothers me but I'm not sure what you can do about it:  I notice a lot of kids when engaged in conversation will attempt to "prove" things by searching Google ON THEIR CELL PHONE as you are talking to them!  I think this is more a boy thing more than a girl thing.

 

Us boys are "right fighters" very task oriented and we like to be right about everything.  Most of you girls are MUCH more social and just want to get along.  Boys and girls are different.

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2 hours ago, Dave1290 said:

I put my faith in him to do a good job and he knew it.  Yanno what?  He NEVER failed me! 

Great story!  👍

 

There is a similar principle which states if you take a non-leader and put him in a leadership position he will step UP to the role.

+++

@mangofirst I wanted to give you a little background on me so you know why I am so specific.  I am a trained community mental health therapist and I specialized in family and adolescent therapy.  I worked with families and kids in individual and group therapy.  I am also a certified school counselor although I never worked in the schools.  I worked in a dropout prevention program and I went into the schools to work on mental health issues.

 

I am a big believer in the effectiveness of small groups especially with adolescents.  Peer pressure!  ;)

 

 

 

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43 minutes ago, Chris A said:

Any input would be anecdotal from me and definitely not expert. 

 

By their 13th-14th year of age, adolescents have the cognitive capacity to do most of what adults are capable of doing, but self-regulation and judgment are still developing. This is a pretty critical set of capabilities for student-led learning, one would think. 

I was just having an internal conversation about this. "Are we asking these kids to do something that they aren't developmentally capable of?" Methinks the answer is yes. So I think maybe I should bring my focus back down a bit to be more about the building blocks for them to get to that point in a few years (personally, I don't think it happens until that prefrontal cortex wakes up at around 22-25, or at least that was my experience). Being self directed is one thing, but having the cognitive ability to create your own argument is quite another. Thanks for validating my thoughts. 

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5 minutes ago, wvu80 said:

I am a big believer in the effectiveness of small groups especially with adolescents.  Peer pressure!  ;)

 

 

 

I love the idea of group work, I just can't figure out how to implement it effectively and efficiently (and without creating a bunch of extra work for me). Every time my kids work in groups, it seems like they waste a lot of time, or only certain kids are working.

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3 minutes ago, mangofirst said:

I was just having an internal conversation about this. "Are we asking these kids to do something that they aren't developmentally capable of?" Methinks the answer is yes. So I think maybe I should bring my focus back down a bit to be more about the building blocks for them to get to that point in a few years (personally, I don't think it happens until that prefrontal cortex wakes up at around 22-25, or at least that was my experience). Being self directed is one thing, but having the cognitive ability to create your own argument is quite another. Thanks for validating my thoughts. 

They can handle it in 8th grade, you just need to find the right topic/issue.

 

It is simple. 

 

Either get them to help you select them, or you select them.  They have to post in one topic, and respond to 2 posts of other students (agree or disagree, and why).

 

Topics

 

Best artist/singer

Best movies of the summer

Best song out right now

Best place to go visit

Favorite food

Best sports star

 

 

Ethics don't come into play, in the classical sense, manners do.  Don't they call that "citizenship"?

 

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NYT has put out a giant list of argument topics, so I get the idea.

My problem is that the students are supposed to be arguing about "the changes Charlie experiences after surgery" and "How the author’s choices contribute to your understanding of those changes and their impact on Charlie." So I guess my question is really, how do I get students to engage in an argument they don't care about. [emoji849]

I would have no problem teaching argumentative writing if I were able to choose my own curriculum. I was quite good at it when I taught AP Language to juniors.

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8 minutes ago, mangofirst said:

So I guess my question is really, how do I get students to engage in an argument they don't care about. emoji849.png

You don't. 

 

Young adolescent's live in a world of their own as they break away from family as a peer group to teens as their new peer group.  They are a pretty self-centered and un-focused bunch at this age striving for independence from their family and looking for acceptance from their peers.  It's a very confusing time for them as they begin to form their own opinions about the world around them and find out who they are as people.  Where do I fit in?

 

That's not bad, that's just developmentally the way it is.

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Just a little [publicly available] information about the students in my classes...

 

We want them all to be at mastery level or advanced, of course, but here are some charts and graphs because CHARTS & GRAPHS!!

Regular Bar Chart

 

 

Stacked Bar Chart

 

For those of you who are good at charts and graphs, is there one that would show this data in a more visually appealing way than these?  This side of my brain rarely gets used, so it's a little rusty, but I figured since I'm starting grad school soon, I should brush up.

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So Flowers for Algeron has a lot of themes, topics and issues that can be brought into what is going on in their world today.

 

This is still to get them to used to posting and responding in a forum on Google Classroom right?

 

Assignment:

 

There will be 3 (or whatever) topics you can post in.  You have to post in one of the topics, you have to reply to at least two posts of others, saying why you agree or disagree with what they said and WHY.  Bonus for creating a topic, teacher/class must approve topic.

 

Spelling and grammar not critical, but make an effort.

 

Teacher being in romance with student.  Is it appropriate,  at any age?

 

If you could have a surgery to be the best singer, or fastest runner would you do it if you knew you would lose your friends and family?

 

Class votes on best original post, and best response to a post, winner gets free toaster (or something, iTunes card).

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9 minutes ago, mangofirst said:

Just a little [publicly available] information about the students in my classes...

 

We want them all to be at mastery level or advanced, of course, but here are some charts and graphs because CHARTS & GRAPHS!!

Regular Bar Chart

 

 

Stacked Bar Chart

 

For those of you who are good at charts and graphs, is there one that would show this data in a more visually appealing way than these?  This side of my brain rarely gets used, so it's a little rusty, but I figured since I'm starting grad school soon, I should brush up.

The regular bar chart is better, for me, and it would be much better if it listed the percentage in each category, you would see number plus the bar height with percentage lines in background.

 

How can you possibly get that many kids in red up to grade level and at same time try to have a discussion.

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2 minutes ago, dwilawyer said:

The regular bar chart is better, for me, and it would be much better if it listed the percentage in each category, you would see number plus the bar height with percentage lines in background.

 

How can you possibly get that many kids in red up to grade level and at same time try to have a discussion.

Well, my personal (school evaluation-type) goal is for all of my students to grow by 5 points, so that's actually almost attainable.  I guess I should clarify that federally and state-wise the goal is student growth, but there has also always been this (really dumb) thinking that all students should achieve mastery or higher scores.  It's impossible.  Isn't there some theory or law that states that humans are not all smart and are not all capable of being smart?  I mean, in every way I've ever seen humankind scaled, there's always a low, middle, and high...

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