talking

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Home : 2003 : September : 13

talking
By Rhonda

Last year I had a class much like you describe. One day it occurred to me that maybe my class didn't really know WHEN they could talk. I wanted to approach it from a more positive angle. I cut out some 5" circles- green(talk
freely), yellow (you can get up and whisper to a friend), red (no talking at all), and black (not obeying the circle). The most difficult part of the day was settling them down to begin work in the morning. I started out with a red circle and told them I hoped they could get a yellow circle soon. When they were ALL silent for about 20 minutes or so, I'd ask a student to change the circle

to yellow. If someone was talking, I'd just ask them to change the circle to black. When they have a black circle I start timing them. As soon as they are silent, I have someone change the circle back to red. I wrote on a scrap paper the amount of time. That amount of time would come off their recess or computer lab time. There were a few occassions where they missed the whole recess. I had them go in the gym and sit the whole time or sit in the computer lab the whole time. It didn't take long for this system to start making a big difference. Also, I learned to be careful about contacting parents. They're not always on your side like you'd hope. They also talk to each other. I've been fairly lucky, but I've seen talking to parents (unless it's really serious of course) backfire on teachers.