Getting kids to "want" to do their work

I was searching the internet tonight to try to locate something to help me with my 8th grade students write their final reflections. I came across the AOL@SCHOOL SITE, which is directly linked into the NEA website. I came across this article: Getting Students to Complete their work.

The article is written by Charlotte Wellen, who teaches at a Glasser Quality High School. The Glasser method is based upon the choice theory. I didn't recognize this was the method used by the educator who I recently took a full day workshop on classroom management, but this is it. The kids have a choice. They have the choice to do the work or not to. They have the choice to pay attention in class or not. They must know that with choices come consequences though. Usually the student's are then left to determine their own consequence or to work with the class at the beginning of a school year to identify classroom consequences for different unwanted classroom behavior.

What is missing so much today in my classroom, is the internal "wanting" to do well for sheer personal satisfaction. The kids want to please us, they want to please their parents, they want to show off and be naughty to please others in the classroom and to look "cool". It is a lot "cooler" to show off and get into trouble rather than behave and do their work. Why is this? Is it sheer rebellion?

I really like the way the teacher talks to her students. She puts the "owness" back on them. I think it will take some practice, but I am working on it, one student at a time.

It is all because we care and want them to succeed! Relationships are very important in the middle years, and hopefully we can foster them.

Any other ideas for classroom management? Especially in the technology classroom. How about for 80 minute blocks of time in a computer lab? Long time for 6&7th graders!

Reflection

A reflection... (may be a little bit all over the place!)

I am in awe of these technology educators that I have come across on twitter and in my web 2.0 journey. Where do they find the time? I have been reading all about the Personal Learning Network and Jeff Utecht's blog was great! I still wonder, where do these educator's get the time to update their wiki's, twitter with each other, blog, attend conference's, globally connect, and still engage their students using technology. Where do they find the time with all of the other pressing issues in Education today that we are faced with?

In the new NEA magazine that came in the mail today, I was reading a really interesting article about why teachers are leaving the profession. Why teachers leave? Why are they leaving you ask? Well, let's see?? They do not have support, they are not valued by administration, they feel pressure to do well and help the kids pass the "test", they do not make enough money to pay their rent, educators should be seen and not heard (why not work together?), and my biggest issue, this is your classroom, you deal with the kids and discipline. Not to say my administration does not deal with discipline, that is not the case, but it is a silent, unwritten rule, that you would look weak if you were always sending students to the office.

I am disappointed to have lost one colleague last year and now another this year to the above issues. I am sticking it out to see if things will change and education will get better. I have a family to feed and can't or don't want to go back to the private sector. I know that I can make a difference even if it is within my 4 classroom walls, so I will continue to work in my new web 2.0 tools as much as I can. I will hope for change and still work with my peers to develop it.

I will begin by showing this video at our May staff meeting and explain to the staff how I first saw the video on teachertube, then I was poking around twitter and came upon the creator's blog, and from there I figured out that it was he (Darren Draper) who created this amazingly neat video that I wanted to share with my entire staff! Here is the website that I also will share with staff from the school that he teaches at.

I have to admit, I haven't even touched my RSS feeds, I check my emails now and again, bombard my two other computer teachers with links to great websites and ideas, and sit with twitter on so I do not miss any good links to things, so I guess I am finding some time, but at the expense of what? I have to find that balance or this will consume me! I have to finish my capstone project, but all of this web 2.0 stuff is swirling around, and how will I put together something cohesive to show my school district that using web 2.0 tools in my classroom will somehow be beneficial to our students??

I am sure I will manage. I always seem to. I now have a nice network to help me achieve this goal, and I am so happy to have taken this course. How fitting it is my last one before I graduate! :) Me with a Master's degree. Who would have thought!