Every strong teacher needs to understand the importance of keeping his or her students busy. Teachers who let their students have that occasional free time have found out the hard way what happens when students are unengaged and bored- trouble!
Good teachers make smooth classes seem effortless and seamless. Much of that success comes from keeping the students occupied the entire class time. How do you do this?
1. Plan effectively. As you gain more experience, you'll be able to gauge exactly how long different tasks will take you and your students to accomplish. Plan enough so that you won't have any extra time at the end of class. None! Not even a minute. Create a habit of teaching right up to the last second of class.
2. Do the most important part of your lessons first. As teachers, we have several goals were trying to accomplish for each day and each lesson. Put the most important goal first so that you can adjust your time as you see fit as the lesson progresses. That way you will make sure you have no extra time left at the end of class.
3. Learn to read the clock. This sounds silly, but it's too obvious to overlook. If you see that the students are going to finish a task early, be thinking ahead. What can you do to fill those last seven minutes of class you hadn't expected to have?
4. Have something engaging you can always turn to in a time emergency. I love the book Lateral Thinking Puzzlers by Paul Sloane. It has hundreds of challenging little scenarios for the students to figure out. For example, "Romeo and Juliet are lying dead on the floor in a puddle of water. How did they die?" The students ask you yes or no questions until they figure out that Romeo and Juliet were really goldfish whose bowl had been knocked over. Definitely this one is for older students, but it works great at using up extra minutes at the end of class.
5. Keep your flexibility. If you notice that your students are totally unengaged and uninvolved in what you had planned, try moving them on to something else. A good teacher is always thinking on his or her feet! Avoid getting stuck on your old lesson plans. Try something new in order to engage your students.
If you work to fill every minute of your class time, youll find that the number of disruptions you have to deal with get less and less over time. A busy student just has less time to get other students off task!
And wouldnt that be nice?
Good teachers make smooth classes seem effortless and seamless. Much of that success comes from keeping the students occupied the entire class time. How do you do this?
1. Plan effectively. As you gain more experience, you'll be able to gauge exactly how long different tasks will take you and your students to accomplish. Plan enough so that you won't have any extra time at the end of class. None! Not even a minute. Create a habit of teaching right up to the last second of class.
2. Do the most important part of your lessons first. As teachers, we have several goals were trying to accomplish for each day and each lesson. Put the most important goal first so that you can adjust your time as you see fit as the lesson progresses. That way you will make sure you have no extra time left at the end of class.
3. Learn to read the clock. This sounds silly, but it's too obvious to overlook. If you see that the students are going to finish a task early, be thinking ahead. What can you do to fill those last seven minutes of class you hadn't expected to have?
4. Have something engaging you can always turn to in a time emergency. I love the book Lateral Thinking Puzzlers by Paul Sloane. It has hundreds of challenging little scenarios for the students to figure out. For example, "Romeo and Juliet are lying dead on the floor in a puddle of water. How did they die?" The students ask you yes or no questions until they figure out that Romeo and Juliet were really goldfish whose bowl had been knocked over. Definitely this one is for older students, but it works great at using up extra minutes at the end of class.
5. Keep your flexibility. If you notice that your students are totally unengaged and uninvolved in what you had planned, try moving them on to something else. A good teacher is always thinking on his or her feet! Avoid getting stuck on your old lesson plans. Try something new in order to engage your students.
If you work to fill every minute of your class time, youll find that the number of disruptions you have to deal with get less and less over time. A busy student just has less time to get other students off task!
And wouldnt that be nice?
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