Guest Posts

Tips for Quieting a Noisy Classroom

by Laura Gurley on June 4, 2012

When it comes to classroom management there are an endless number of things that teachers struggle with. Even the most experienced and practiced of educators encounter moments when their system fails and mini chaos envelops their classroom. Noise can be one of the most prevalent challenges a teacher encounters throughout their days. Though you adore your classroom full of energetic and enthusiastic students, there comes a point when the excited chatter has to end in order for your day to be productive. It’s not that noisy students are necessarily a bad thing—as teachers we should encourage our students’ spark, passion, and excitement. However, a noisy classroom is not always the best environment for productive and focused learning. Try these three tips to help quiet your noisy students.

Accept Responsibility

It is our responsibility to manage our classrooms carefully. By accepting responsibility for your misbehaving classroom, you will be better able to remedy it. As the true authority in the classroom, the things that go right in the classroom and the things that go awry might be in part because of the way you are managing the every-changing environment.  If your students are consistently talking out of turn and noisy in the classroom, it is likely time to reevaluate your policies and procedures on misbehavior and talking.

Establish Clear Procedures

Consistency and thoroughness are key when it comes to teaching. Students thrive in situations where they completely understand what is asked of them and what is expected of them. From the very get go, you need to establish procedures that students can follow so as to reduce unwanted noisiness in a classroom. Be consistent. Have a procedure for the general goings on of your classroom. How should students enter your classroom? How do they ask to use the restroom? How should they go about asking a question in class? When is it appropriate to leave your seat? While this may sound somewhat harsh or overly specific, establishing clear procedures for the things that they need to do throughout the day can actually be a huge relief to students. Students should fully understand when it is fair for them to talk in a classroom, what productive conversation sounds like, and when it is time to keep talking and noise down. Be straight forward with your student and work with them to establish rules and guidelines that everyone feels they can follow.

Raise Expectations

In general, people will give you what you expect of them. As a teacher, we should hold our students to the highest expectations. This is a concept that educators should consider carefully. What exactly do you expect from your students? In the case of a noisy classroom, what do you actually expect from your students when it comes to talking? When do you expect them to talk? When do you not? On a larger scale, what do you expect from them when it comes to behavior? We should expect that our students respect you and one another. In doing so, we should demand that they express this respect on all occasions.

* This guest post is contributed by Katheryn Rivas, who writes on the topics of online university.  She welcomes your comments at her email Id: katherynrivas87@gmail.com. 

Related Classroom Management Posts.  Classroom Management that Works  |  Energizers! | Top Ten Classroom Management Ideas and Resources

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Summer Tutoring Tips for Teachers

by Laura Gurley on May 22, 2012

With the school year ending, many of you may want to use your free time tutoring over the summer. Yet it’s difficult to know how much to charge or what average prices are by city. The following are several pointers and statistics to guide you, so that you can jump in ready and prepared at the start of summer.

 1.  What subjects do students look for most?

The most common subjects year-round are K-12 math, English, and (as a bit of a surprise) computer programming. For high-schoolers preparing to take SAT or ACT exams in the following school year, summer is also a popular time to seek test-prep tutoring. Many students also want to learn fun, recreational subjects – try teaching music, cooking, a foreign language, dance, or art.

2. How much should I charge?

In the end, this number is really up to you, but you should use the average prices in your area to gauge your final price. The cities that charge the most are New York, San Francisco, and Palo Alto at approximately $55/hour. If you’re in one of those areas, you can probably raise your price a bit. Meanwhile, Los Angeles averages just above $30/hour and Boston, a little more than $40/hour. The absolute minimum we’ve seen is $10/ hour. Take a look at the in-depth breakdown of average tutoring prices.

4. Where should I go to find students?

Because of the messy word-of-mouth system, it is usually difficult for students and parents to find a great tutor. Yet the reverse process of tutors looking for students is less complicated. It’s easier for tutors to showcase the wide range of subjects they can teach, than it is for students to look for specialized help on one subject. Having your tutor profile on tutorspree.com makes it easy for students and parents to find you, look through your skills, and get in touch.

4. Where should the lessons take place?

It’s very common for lessons to take place in the student’s home. Other options are the local library, coffee shops, or whichever location the parents prefer.

5. How often should lessons take place?

One of the advantages of tutoring is that the day, time, and hours are built around your schedule. Some students may want to meet weekly, some only on weekends, some every other Tuesday. It’s best to decide on a fixed schedule and location (re: #4) from the beginning to prevent lessons from falling out.

6. A final pointer: Individual tutoring vs. teaching to a class

It’s important to note that building trust with an individual student is easier and quicker than if you were teaching to a large class. From the start, it is important to get a picture of the student’s strengths, weaknesses, and interests. Tutoring then allows you to follow up continuously for student and parent feedback, and tailor your curriculum accordingly. You can also take note of what type of learner the student is (such as kinesthetic or auditory). Finally, as you would for a class, don’t forget to have fun! Incorporating jokes, funky-colored stationery, laughter, and stories are just some of the ways to make your lessons something to look forward to over the summer.

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This guest post comes from Iris Yuan is an Education Consultant at Tutorspree.com, a website that works nationwide to rebuild the tutoring system and make it more transparent. For more information, you can reach Iris at iris@tutorspree.com and follow @Tutorspree on Twitter.

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Anyone have any plans to tutor this summer? If not, how are you planning on filling your days?

 

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Using Audio Recording Technology

by Laura Gurley on April 23, 2012

Looking for a way to spice up your lessons with some tech-related fun? One of the easiest ways to enhance your lesson plans is to incorporate audio recording technology.

If you have a computer lab available to your class, each child can access the sound recorder found in the Accessories folder of every Microsoft Windows-run machine. This voice recorder is limited to simple record, save, and playback functions, but young kids love to hear their own voices played back to them, so this limited functionality should be enough to keep them engaged.

Ideas for how to Use PC Audio Recording

  • Put on a Play. Assign each child a part in a very short play script. Each child can record his or her line (or sound effect) ahead of time, and have it ready to play back on cue. Then, point to each child in order, have them play their respective line, and watch them light up as the story unfolds and they each get to help create it.
  • Create Audio MadLibs . Assign each child a noun, adjective, adverb, or verb according to a MadLib script. Then, read the MadLib story out loud, and when you reach an opening in the script, ask the kids to play their appropriate recordings. Hearing the hilarity of the story will keep kids engaged, and they’ll learn the parts of speech while having fun.
  • Play Audio Recorder “Telephone.” Begin by reading a short poem or tongue twister for one student to hear. Then, in “telephone” fashion, have each child record what they thought they heard, and share it with the child next to them. Next, replay each version for everyone to hear and watch, step by step, how the communication degrades. In this activity, the children will be exposed to poetry, and they will have the chance to witness common breakdowns in communication and memory.

Ideas on How to Use a Digital Audio Recorder

If you don’t have access to a computer lab, lesson plans can also be enhanced using a single voice recorder device. A voice recorder can cost anywhere from $7.00 to $250.00, though for these purposes, a very simple, inexpensive model should do just fine.

    • Create a Collaborative Poem. Simply pass a voice recorder around the room, and have each child contribute a line to the poem. Then, play the entire poem back for everyone to hear. You can use this technique to teach the different genres of poetry, or to teach rhyme, alliteration and onomatopoeia.

As you can see, incorporating audio recording technology into your lesson plans can be a great way to enhance your students’ learning experiences and make learning more interactive, at very little or no cost. Audio recording can help students learn in a new way, and can help them find their individual voices. Just remember to be creative and have fun, because that’s what learning should be.

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Today’s Guest Poster: Sarah Stockton is an Outreach Coordinator for Voices.com, a site that connects businesses with professional voice talents in the audio recording industry. She enjoys helping potential voice talent find their start in the voice industry.

Photo credits: Woodleywonderworksand Dave Kobrehel

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Teaching Tip Tuesday: How to Organize a Teacher’s Desk

by Laura Gurley on March 6, 2012

Organization is important to effectiveness in the classroom, and there’s no place that seems to gather the mess like a teacher’s desk.

Pens and broken pencils. A parent’s note that came with Johnny last Tuesday. A flier about the upcoming bake sale. Lesson plans and worksheet copies.

And piles of this. And piles of that.

A teacher’s desk can become a breeding ground for messes, frustration, and ineffectiveness.

This week for our teaching tip, we’d like to feature the lovely Charity Preston of the hugely-helpful teaching blog, The Organized Classroom Blog. Charity has lots going on over her way in regards to practically setting up your classroom for success, and she has a bundle of excellent ideas for how to keep your desk, paperwork, and supplies organized, too. The following video is about 10 minutes long, but Charity walks you through some important ideas to make your teaching more productive in the long-run. {In other words, it’ll be worth your ten minutes, promise.}

Never underestimate the power of effective systems. The time it takes to set them up in the beginning far outweighs the time {and stress} it takes to try to tame the mess that not having systems produces.

You can read more from Charity and see additional ideas from this post over at her blog, here.

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How about you? Have a teaching tip for organization you’ve found helpful? We’d love to see it in the comments!

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Teaching the Holocaust, from the Daughter of a Survivor. {Guest Post by Marsha Goren}

February 5, 2012

The following guest post is by a subscriber and teaching colleague, Marsha Goren. Marsha’s mother survived the Holocaust, and now Marsha has launched a website with educational resources to educate students about the realities of this global tragedy. In January of each year, the UN declares a day to remember the victims of the Holocaust. [...]

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What Makes an Effective Teacher? {Guest Post. Kisha Tolbert-Woods.}

February 3, 2012
Classroom Window

As I approach my 10th year as an educator, I can’t help but to reflect back on my teaching and coaching practices. I begin to ask myself– What makes an effective educator? Why do some educators seem passionate, while others seem so passive? Not until having the opportunity to become a reading coach and instructional partner, did [...]

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Asking a Question Might Be the Smartest Thing You Do All Day

January 22, 2012

Today’s guest post comes from Dr. Lori Desautels. Lori has just written a book entitled, How May I Serve You? Revelation in Education, and is currently a university supervisor for the Indianapolis Teaching Fellows and Teach for America. With classroom and counseling experience, Lori has a passion for using neuroscience to teach more effectively. She’ll [...]

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Surviving the First Year Teaching, Part Two

November 22, 2011

If you are a first year teacher, or if you are mentoring a first year teacher, perhaps the second part in our series “Surviving the First Year Teaching” by guest poster and high school teacher Jeremy Rinkel will provide some helpful insights. Be sure to check out the first five tips here to being a [...]

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Surviving the First Year, Part One

November 20, 2011

If you are a first year teacher, enjoy this two-part series where guest poster and high school teacher Jeremy Rinkel shares ten important tips to surviving that critical first year in the classroom.   5 Tips for Surviving the First Year Teaching Create a healthy balance between work & home.  Everyone needs time away from work.  Most [...]

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Encouraging Reluctant Readers with the Amazon Kindle

October 14, 2011

I have been blessed this year with a classroom set of Amazon Kindles to use with my students. We are still trying to “work out the bugs”, but I believe the Kindles are going to be a great addition of classroom technology. Every year, I have students complete a reading attitude survey within the first [...]

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