Managing Your
Classroom Using Environmental Cues Benna
Golubtchik
The National Education Association
says that 82% of all teaching communication is non-verbal.
Thus, we have a powerful tool to guide our students' behavior
and learning.
In our lives, we use
certain cues to associate concepts or ideas non-verbally.
For example, when we hear certain music or phrases in
a commercial, we have been trained to think of a particular
product. When we hear "our song," we are apt to recall
the warm feelings it evokes. These appeal to our right
brain, or non-verbal side.
Teachers can use these
hooks to effectively appeal to their right brain students.
Research shows that when there is an incongruity between
verbal and non-verbal communication, it is the non-verbal
to which we overwhelmingly respond. We can therefore
use this model to bring students to positive learning
experiences.
Teachers can communicate
to their students through the logistics of the physical
classroom. For example, if the teacher always uses the
board at the front of the room to write important information,
the students are anchored to being quiet and copying.
If the teacher wants to begin a discussion, she can move
to another part of the room. When the discussion needs
to end, the teacher can return to her original spot and
begin writing on the board. The students sense that discussion
time has shifted to quiet working time.
As the teacher walks
around the room, his/her proximity to certain students
serves to keep them on task. Even a glance across the
room or stopping in mid-sentence to wait for quiet will
get students to focus back on their classwork.
It is useful to identify
different areas in your classroom to be used for different
types of activities. Instruction should be in front of
a board. Routines such as attendance might be done from
your desk. Counseling and individual guidance might take
place in a private corner or at the door. Motivational
activities should have their own distinct areas. These
identified locations serve as physical anchors that can
help to establish the routines.
A special corner of
your room could be reserved for students who need time
alone. You can join the student there later, if necessary.
Directions, such as
opening activities or pages to do in a book, should be
written down so that students can refer to them. When,
inevitably, someone asks what she is supposed to do,
after you have explained it three times, you can simply
point. That will work on most occasions. Students will
get used to looking for the posted answer to, "What am
I supposed to do now?", and become more self-reliant.
Disciplining can be
accomplished using anchors, too. An advantage of having
a separate location associated with discipline is that
it separates the students' overall classroom experience
from discipline and allows them to easily return their
focus to instruction when the teacher changes locations.
When an 8th grade class became unruly, the teacher carried
a chair to a corner of the room, climbed his "soap box," and
proceeded to preach to his students about their adolescent
behavior. They were shocked, stunned, and gave him complete
attention. When finished, he climbed down from the chair,
counted three seconds silently to break the mental state,
and walked to the front, where he resumed his lesson.
Weeks later, when the negative behavior returned, he
picked up the chair, moved to the back, and before he
could continue, the class was silent. An effectively
established anchor can be re-accessed and used again,
without repeating the entire experience.
This technique is also
useful when one teacher must cover the class of a popular
teacher. If the covering teacher observes the behavior
and subtly adapts the absent teacher's mannerisms, she
can transfer his/her credibility to herself, which allows
her to quickly establish a positive relationship. This
also works when transferring a class from one subject
teacher to another.
Anchors can be used
to promote classroom routines, maintain discipline, or
reinforce academic concepts. Subtle anchors such as the
ones mentioned above empower students to be more in control
of their behaviors. We are allowing our cues to help
them figure out what we want. Everyone benefits.
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