Background
When I learned a few months ago that I would be teaching two classes of freshman geography this semester, I was both excited and intimidated. After working with tenth graders last semester, I felt like I would be able to handle things fairly well. Sometimes my optimism is my greatest undoing. As soon as my students walked into the classroom on the first day, I knew I was going to have my hands full. I was met with loud conversation, laughter, and jumping around the classroom. After the late bell rang, they began to settle down and began wondering why I was in front of the class rather than my master teacher they had heard so much about.
I met with my master teacher several times over the course of the summer and we decided it would be best if I had control of the class from the first day. I felt confident enough in my abilities and we had planned the first couple of units ahead of time, so I felt it would be the best way to prepare for my future professional career. The students, thankfully, were receptive to the idea of having a student teacher, though some still call me by my master teacher's name on accident. The first day came and went like any other day and I was looking forward to preparing these young minds for a wealth of learning throughout their first semester of high school.
During the first week, the high volume, disruptive laughter, and irrelevant conversation did not let up. My syllabus does not specifically define any punishments for disruptive behavior, primarily because I do not want my classroom to feel like an obligation (read: detention). I encourage free, thoughtful, respectful interactions between my students by carefully explaining the importance of insightful, productive dialogue, and ensuring everyone's opinions are respected rather than mocked or scolded. I want them to feel welcome in this warm, caring environment I am attempting to structure for them. A couple more weeks passed, and it remained my daily challenge to curb disruptive behavior in the classroom. It is important to first define what I consider "distracting" and "disrupting" within my personal teaching pedagogy prior to the start of my action research project:
I met with my master teacher several times over the course of the summer and we decided it would be best if I had control of the class from the first day. I felt confident enough in my abilities and we had planned the first couple of units ahead of time, so I felt it would be the best way to prepare for my future professional career. The students, thankfully, were receptive to the idea of having a student teacher, though some still call me by my master teacher's name on accident. The first day came and went like any other day and I was looking forward to preparing these young minds for a wealth of learning throughout their first semester of high school.
During the first week, the high volume, disruptive laughter, and irrelevant conversation did not let up. My syllabus does not specifically define any punishments for disruptive behavior, primarily because I do not want my classroom to feel like an obligation (read: detention). I encourage free, thoughtful, respectful interactions between my students by carefully explaining the importance of insightful, productive dialogue, and ensuring everyone's opinions are respected rather than mocked or scolded. I want them to feel welcome in this warm, caring environment I am attempting to structure for them. A couple more weeks passed, and it remained my daily challenge to curb disruptive behavior in the classroom. It is important to first define what I consider "distracting" and "disrupting" within my personal teaching pedagogy prior to the start of my action research project:
- I consider it a disruption when students are talking while I am talking or while other students are trying to share their thoughts and analyses with the rest of the class.
- I consider it a distraction if I ask for the students' attention and I have wait for three seconds or longer for them to become quiet and respectful of their peers trying to listen.
- Students who are routinely remaining off-task during the class period and engaging in dialogue or gesturing that is inappropriate for the task at hand are promoting further distractions in my classroom.
Context
This semester, I am student teaching in a world geography class. The class has been structured to address not only geography standards, but technology standards as well. Thus, all students who are enrolled in the course will fulfill the school’s technology requirement upon completion of the course with a passing grade. The class is an elective course and is typically taken by freshmen (9th grade). Only one of my students is beyond freshman year, however he is taking this course because he transferred from another school.
My class, as well as the school’s population, is composed of mostly white students. Between the two classes I teach (a combined 65 students), 48 are Caucasian, 13 are Hispanic, 3 are African American, and 1 is Persian American. All of my students are fluent English speakers (none identified as English language learners) and none of my students qualify for free or reduced lunches (the district-wide indicator of low socioeconomic status). My cooperating teacher had me teaching both classes from the first day of school. I have up to this point successfully integrated myself within the school structure and the students identify me as their teacher, despite what their class schedules might say. Upon carrying out my initial assessments, I was able to establish a positive rapport with most of my students and clearly communicate my overall goals for the class this semester:
My class, as well as the school’s population, is composed of mostly white students. Between the two classes I teach (a combined 65 students), 48 are Caucasian, 13 are Hispanic, 3 are African American, and 1 is Persian American. All of my students are fluent English speakers (none identified as English language learners) and none of my students qualify for free or reduced lunches (the district-wide indicator of low socioeconomic status). My cooperating teacher had me teaching both classes from the first day of school. I have up to this point successfully integrated myself within the school structure and the students identify me as their teacher, despite what their class schedules might say. Upon carrying out my initial assessments, I was able to establish a positive rapport with most of my students and clearly communicate my overall goals for the class this semester:
- Being respectful of each other’s beliefs and opinions.
- Learning how geography can help us beyond the classroom.
- Using technology in an appropriate, productive manner.
Assessed Needs
At the outset of my action research, I knew it would be essential to collect relevant data in order to help determine how to approach behavior in my classroom. I first wanted to find out how I personally reacted to disruptive and distraction student behavior. Over a five-day span, I kept track of the number of times I practiced the following methods of ending or compensating for disruptive behavior:
- Wait for students to be quiet before continuing with the lesson.
- Ask specific students to stop disruptive or distracting behavior.
- Speak over students if they are talking while I am talking.
- Repeat instruction if all students were not paying attention.
I tracked my personal methods of responding to disruptive behavior by taking notes and tallies during and after class. Each of the charts to the right depicts the frequency of these responses over the span of a five day school week (each color represents a day of the week). The most glaring contrast between these two graphs is the fact that the number of total responses in my Period 6 class (30) is drastically higher than the number of total responses in my Period 7 class (6). There are several possible explanations for this. My Period 6 class contains 40 students while my Period 7 class has only 23 students. I have noticed throughout my student teaching so far that it is much easier to manage a lower number of students. My closer proximity to the students in Period 7 makes it easier to control and curb disruptive behavior before it even begins. Also, I have several students that are either on 504 plans or are preparing to enter IEPs with the district. All of these students are in my Period 6 class. This is not to say that these students are the ones causing the distractions. However, my need to give concerted attention towards these students gives more opportunities for others to lose focus in the class and persist with disruptive behavior.
I have noticed that as a result of these two very different classes, I am not able to accomplish as much with my Period 6 class as I am with my Period 7 class. Routinely, my Period 7 class finishes ahead of schedule and many students have the self-awareness to get even further ahead by looking at the unit calendars online on our class website. Due to the fact that Period 7 does not give me opportunities to grow in the area of promoting positive classroom behavior, I have decided to focus exclusively on my Period 6 class.
I have noticed that as a result of these two very different classes, I am not able to accomplish as much with my Period 6 class as I am with my Period 7 class. Routinely, my Period 7 class finishes ahead of schedule and many students have the self-awareness to get even further ahead by looking at the unit calendars online on our class website. Due to the fact that Period 7 does not give me opportunities to grow in the area of promoting positive classroom behavior, I have decided to focus exclusively on my Period 6 class.
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After assessing my own personal reactions to disruptive, distracting behavior, I next wanted to assess my students' perceptions of such interruptions. I created a 10-statement Likert Scale Google form (left) that I had my students complete at the start of one of our class periods last week. The use of a Google form allows for immediate feedback, as well as an ability to neatly organize and summarize student responses. The statements were focused on the students' perceptions of me as a teacher, respect, distractions, and productivity. (The last statement on the Likert Scale Google form was designed to humor my students and provide them with a small hook for the lesson we were to indulge in that day.) For each statements, students were asked to select a number on a range from 1-5, 1 for "Strongly Disagree" and 5 for "Strongly Agree." The numbers of the x-axis of these graphs represent the numbers on the Likert Scale, and the numbers on the y-axis represent the number of student responses. The results did not turn out the way I was expecting them to.
It was only after I had polled both Period 6 and Period 7 students that I learned I could not separate the responses according the class period. Thus, the data from this assessment contains the responses of both classes. Three of the statement responses stood out to me and my own understandings of my classroom management. First, unsurprisingly, most students responded that they "Strongly Agree" with the fact that they always remain respectful when I am talking in the classroom. Eight students did not respond to this statement in the affirmative, which I feel is an accurate reflection of the class; usually only about six or eight students create persistent and consistent distractions day in and day out in my classroom. When asked about how students feel about distracting behavior in the classroom, I was met with surprising results. Due to my concern for the ability of students to perform effectively in my classroom, I was expecting most of my students to agree with the fact that, “distracting behavior was a negative effect in the classroom.” However, only a fifth of my students agreed with that statement, only 7% "Strongly Agreed." 55% of the class did not agree with the statement that distracting behavior had a negative effect on their learning. |
It is important to point out that a couple students asked me what that statement meant while they were taking the survey. I told them to answer as best as they could and that there were no wrong answers. This indicates to me that there might have been some possible confusion with the way this question was phrased. However, the takeaway from this question is the students are under less pressure than I am. Due to the fact that I am so concerned with my personal performance as an educator, I may have overlooked the fact that something like distractive behavior might not be as big of an issue for my students.
Yet, the same chunk of students believe that students who disrupt or distract others should be disciplined, more than half agreeing (54%). Even more interesting was the fact that not a single student selected "Strongly Disagree." While most students feel they are not distracted by disruptive behavior, a majority feel that those who do distract others should be disciplined in some form or another. One possible explanation for these findings may be best explained with an experience I encountered recently.
In my Period 6 class, there are two or three students who regularly (daily basis) cause disruptions during my instruction or in student learning. However, rather than looks and comments of frustration, many other students smile and laugh, particularly if these two students know each other. I believe it probable that while students do not find their behavior to be distracting, they feel the need to support the behavior only to see what my response will be if the behavior does not end when I ask it to. In other words, some of my students like to playfully get a rise out of other students in order to test my limits and patience. Why shouldn't they? These students, more so than any other student in any other grade level, are trying to adapt to a new academic environment. There undoubtedly has been some discomfort throughout the attempts of my students to appropriately acclimate to high school. These distractions and disruptions could dissipate by the end of the school year, but they are persistent enough now for me to want to explore ways in which to curb this behavior permanently.
Yet, the same chunk of students believe that students who disrupt or distract others should be disciplined, more than half agreeing (54%). Even more interesting was the fact that not a single student selected "Strongly Disagree." While most students feel they are not distracted by disruptive behavior, a majority feel that those who do distract others should be disciplined in some form or another. One possible explanation for these findings may be best explained with an experience I encountered recently.
In my Period 6 class, there are two or three students who regularly (daily basis) cause disruptions during my instruction or in student learning. However, rather than looks and comments of frustration, many other students smile and laugh, particularly if these two students know each other. I believe it probable that while students do not find their behavior to be distracting, they feel the need to support the behavior only to see what my response will be if the behavior does not end when I ask it to. In other words, some of my students like to playfully get a rise out of other students in order to test my limits and patience. Why shouldn't they? These students, more so than any other student in any other grade level, are trying to adapt to a new academic environment. There undoubtedly has been some discomfort throughout the attempts of my students to appropriately acclimate to high school. These distractions and disruptions could dissipate by the end of the school year, but they are persistent enough now for me to want to explore ways in which to curb this behavior permanently.
My final needs assessment involved keeping a tally sheet of distracting, disruptive behavior specific to particular students in my classroom. While the target of my action research is to enhance the learning of all students in my class, I am curious about whether or not I will need to narrow my attention to a group of students in particular. I found that over the span of a single week in my class, several students showed consistent problem behaviors in my classroom.
Specifically, four students exhibited high rates of problem behaviors (left). While I did collect data within my Period 7 class, there was not enough data to draw sufficient conclusions. Aside from the students represented in the shown Period 6 chart, 13 students exhibited one form of problem behavior in the classroom. Typically, this was in response to other students exhibiting problem behaviors. That is, there was at times a chain reaction of problem behaviors in the classroom. I maintained my standard response method of waiting for the students to stop their behaviors before continuing with the lesson, which again resulted in wasted class time on behavior management.
Why was I not swifter with my response to these behaviors? A large part of my “omoi” is to help my students become responsible, global citizens. I feel that this cannot be accomplished if my pedagogical practices involve an increased focus on neutralizing problem behaviors in the classroom. Rather, my teacher character is one of assumed maturity. I give all of my students the benefit of the doubt when it comes to problem behaviors. I treat them like I would any other adult and expect the same respect in return. For those who do not display that same level of respect, I believe the most productive form of intervention is one that involves a cooperative development of response strategies, not simply sending them to the principal’s office. I want to establish a unique character for my students, which sends a clear message: we can all be productive if we respect one another and work together to solve our problems.
So, is it right to assume that four, five, or six students are the root cause of problem behaviors in my classroom? Not necessarily. It became clear that while there were a select number of students causing consistent distractions in the classroom, the remaining students either felt it was okay to occasionally partake in the same problem behaviors, or simply remain quiet as requested. This further supports my growing belief that a positive learning community needs to be established or further reinforced in my classroom. Rather than focusing on a specific subset of students, I believe that establishing a positive learning community will help reduce problem behaviors across the board and promote deeper learning and understanding in my classroom.
Specifically, four students exhibited high rates of problem behaviors (left). While I did collect data within my Period 7 class, there was not enough data to draw sufficient conclusions. Aside from the students represented in the shown Period 6 chart, 13 students exhibited one form of problem behavior in the classroom. Typically, this was in response to other students exhibiting problem behaviors. That is, there was at times a chain reaction of problem behaviors in the classroom. I maintained my standard response method of waiting for the students to stop their behaviors before continuing with the lesson, which again resulted in wasted class time on behavior management.
Why was I not swifter with my response to these behaviors? A large part of my “omoi” is to help my students become responsible, global citizens. I feel that this cannot be accomplished if my pedagogical practices involve an increased focus on neutralizing problem behaviors in the classroom. Rather, my teacher character is one of assumed maturity. I give all of my students the benefit of the doubt when it comes to problem behaviors. I treat them like I would any other adult and expect the same respect in return. For those who do not display that same level of respect, I believe the most productive form of intervention is one that involves a cooperative development of response strategies, not simply sending them to the principal’s office. I want to establish a unique character for my students, which sends a clear message: we can all be productive if we respect one another and work together to solve our problems.
So, is it right to assume that four, five, or six students are the root cause of problem behaviors in my classroom? Not necessarily. It became clear that while there were a select number of students causing consistent distractions in the classroom, the remaining students either felt it was okay to occasionally partake in the same problem behaviors, or simply remain quiet as requested. This further supports my growing belief that a positive learning community needs to be established or further reinforced in my classroom. Rather than focusing on a specific subset of students, I believe that establishing a positive learning community will help reduce problem behaviors across the board and promote deeper learning and understanding in my classroom.
Research Question
After compiling my assessment data, I am still left to ponder about my research question. I have spent weeks with my seminar class at the University of San Diego refining it and improving it little by little, but all of my assessments seem to lead me in new, uncharted directions. However, considering the students' perception of disruptive behavior and my habit of sacrificing valuable class time to ensure all students are focused and prepared for learning, I have developed the following research question and subquestions:
How can I curb disruptive, distractive behavior and create a positive learning community within my classroom to maximize student opportunities for learning and understanding?
I do believe that my students are not as distracted as I am by errant behavior in the classroom, but I feel that universally proactive behavior can be a benefit for all. My hope is that by finding effective ways of encouraging students to drive towards success and productive behavior I will in turn be enhancing the learning of all students in the classroom. In addition, my overall research question and subquestions are aimed at fostering good citizenship in the community, which I firmly believe starts in the classroom.
How can I curb disruptive, distractive behavior and create a positive learning community within my classroom to maximize student opportunities for learning and understanding?
- How can I focus on improving the behavior of a select number of students without distracting the rest of the class further?
- What, if any, correlation is there in my class between behavior and performance?
- How can I encourage my students to practice appropriate, productive behavior beyond the classroom?
I do believe that my students are not as distracted as I am by errant behavior in the classroom, but I feel that universally proactive behavior can be a benefit for all. My hope is that by finding effective ways of encouraging students to drive towards success and productive behavior I will in turn be enhancing the learning of all students in the classroom. In addition, my overall research question and subquestions are aimed at fostering good citizenship in the community, which I firmly believe starts in the classroom.