Today I was working in a lower grade classroom. We had been doing lesson on drumming and movement, and the students had been entirely engaged, attentive, focused, and following directions. I wish I would have recorded it.
About halfway or more through the lesson, I started to say to the students, "when you hear the drum make a sound, make a big shape." (and I played the drum on the word sound). Before I could finish my sentence the students all started making noises. I was really confused. Where did that come from? It was so random. I looked at the teacher, and she was equally confused.
I gave the direction again, "When you hear the drum make a sound....." (again playing the drum on the word sound), and again the students cut me off with noise making.
I was really baffled. I thought for a moment, and I realized the students were following directions.The students had heard, "When you hear the drum, make a sound." And, they obeyed promptly, both times.
That scenario still has me laughing. It was so funny to me becuase it felt so random and caught me so off guard. It's also a great lesson. It is so important, as teachers, that we seek to understand the cause. Why aren't our students listening or following directions as we expected? Why aren't they succeding? We can't really fix the problem if we don't know the cause. Had I reacted with judgment instead of wonder, disciplined them, scolded them, etc., the outcome would have been so different. They would have listened and discontinued the behavior, but they also would have lost some trust in me. Our students need to feel safe in order to have the confidence to try new and scary things. They need to feel safe to guess, to try, to get the wrong answer, to explore, to fail, and ultimately to grow.
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