Students Speak: 5 Things Students Want In Class That DON’T Cost a Dime (or take all of your time!)

by Dr. Lynne Herr

If you peruse past blog entries here on the ESU 6 professional development blog, you’ll see many posts that urge educators to ask students questions about learning and school, then listen intently to their responses.

At a recent statewide ESU professional development session, we had the opportunity to interact with a panel of high school students who are part of the Omaha metro area Avenue Scholars program.  While every student’s situation is unique, these students face especially daunting personal circumstances of poverty, abuse, neglect and personal loss. Many proudly told us that they will be the first person from their extended family to graduate from high school.  They told stories of learning to advocate for themselves and their learning.  Of finding ways to love and accept everyone regardless of lifestyle, philosophical and situational differences.  They inspired each of us to listen more intently.  And to take action.

In addition to sharing their personal stories, students offered advice to teachers and administrators for helping them succeed in school.  You might be surprised to find that their suggestions require no funding.  Simply a willingness to change.  Here are five strategies to better engage students based on recommendations from the student panel:

Stop the Powerpoints.  (Or at least improve them.) Many of these students lamented that teacher after teacher throughout their school day shows long, dull Powerpoints that offer little chance for interaction or engagement.  Break your content into smaller chunks.  Add some color to a presentation.  Link to a brief youtube video that supports what you’re trying to teach. Try new tools like Prezi.

Let them move in class. Whether attending a school with block scheduling or more traditional class periods, all students wished they could get up and move during class.  Many told of sitting for an entire 90 minute period and struggling to stay awake and engaged.  Incorporate some purposeful movement throughout each class period.  (Example, “Get up and touch 3 walls, then add your answer to the white board.”)

Allow small group work and discussion in class.  No teenager (and no adult) wants to be embarrassed by offering an incorrect comment or answer in front of their peers.  Allow students to discuss something in pairs or small groups, then report their answer as a group.  This allows more students to be engaged during a class period by allowing them to speak, test their answers in a smaller setting, debate answers and form supportive relationships with each other.

Principals:  Greet as many students as possible, and get to know them by name.  Before joining the Avenue Scholars program, most of these students had spent considerable time in the principal’s office for disciplinary reasons.  All expressed a genuine wish for administrators to seek them out in positive situations.  Say hello when they come into the building.  Know something about their courses so you can ask a specific question:  “How’s that woods, project coming along, Joe?”  Call them into the office every once in a while to offer up some praise vs. punishment.

Teachers:  Get to know something about each student’s personal circumstances.  Most of these students face considerable pressure and responsibility outside of school.  They are responsible for younger siblings, household work, meal planning and preparation, as well as contributing to the family income via part-time jobs.  Many are also involved in student activities and sports.  Students want teachers who understand that school is just one demand that they face.  They aren’t asking for less work, but for teachers who form relationships with them and help them grow through support, caring and high expectations.

They've spoken.  Is anybody listening?

Find the Bright Spot

In the book Switch by Chip Heath and Dan Heath, the authors talk a lot about change. One of the techniques to changing behavior they mention is to look at problems from a different angle.  Rather than focusing solely on fixing a problem they suggest finding what is working - mining a nugget of success and then seeking replication.

For example if a student is struggling in school with academics and behavior, we tend to delve into an analysis of the causes and try to fix the problem.  Conversely to find the bright spot - we should ask when does the student find success?  It may be in only one class - but why not try the things from the successful class in other classes?
I think the key is to ask some basic questions:

• Where do we have success?
• What is different about these situations - what are people doing differently?
• How can we use what works in other situations?

I think the same thing applies to the improvement of instruction.  Rather than continually trying to fix the struggling teachers, we could look for the bright spots. For example we ask the question "in what classes are students really engaged in learning?"  We then look to see what happens differently in those classes; it could be a simple set of practices that could be used by the staff at large.   Granted there are a lot of factors that will come into play through implementation - but we are leveraging success rather than trying to fix failure.

As a leader think about this quote from the book: "'What is the ratio of the time I spend solving problems to the time I spend scaling successes?"   I think I'll try to spend more time scaling successes.

Toby