Organization and Management of the Classroom: Lesson 4

Lesson 4:
Maintaining Learner Involvement

Quality learning activities not only increase the amount students learn but also reduce behavior problems and create happier students. This lesson provides information on ways that teachers and paraeducators make instructional time in the classroom more productive and rewarding.

Strategies for increasing and maintaining active learner involvement are important to establishing an effective classroom. Students who are actively involved in learning activities benefit more from learning time. Learner involvement includes time spent listening to the teacher or paraeducator, time spent attending to activities and most importantly time actively participating in learning by asking and answering questions. The following provide suggestions for strategies to increase the students' active involvement in learning activities.

Give complete and specific instructions;
Provide practice at the appropriate levels of difficulty;
Make sure student learning efforts are correct;
Provide alternative activities for students who complete assignments early;
Actively involve students in the lesson; and
Use attention to increase performance.

Give Complete and Specific Instructions

Paraeducators are often asked to introduce instructional activities or to help clarify directions for students. Clear directions are essential. It is easy to misinterpret difficulty with directions as noncompliance or a behavior problem. Try to avoid the following when giving directions:

Chaining: In a series of instructions, students remember the first and the last or are so confused they don't know what to do.
Vague: Don't give directions without a concrete activity/action.
Questions: Student may think they have a choice or that you don't really mean it.
Directions followed by a reason: Students remember the reason and forget the directions so give reasons first then directions.

Try using the following suggestions when giving directions to students:

Make sure you have the students attention before giving the directions. Ask for a response from the student to make sure he/she is listening;
Review as necessary prior to giving directions. Provide a connection to past lessons;
Be simple and specific. The directions must include all necessary information without including extra information;
Use positive directions, tell each student what you want them to do rather than what you don't want;
Include examples and modeling of the behavior or activity; and
Be ready to reinforce the student when they follow the directions. Use praise more frequently when teaching a new task or behavior.

Provide Instructional Activities at Appropriate Level

Learning activities which are too difficult or too easy make poor use of instructional time. A key to high involvement of students in learning activities is the appropriateness of the timing and design of the lesson. Key decisions about what learning activities take place are the responsibility of the teacher. In order to make good decisions about the instructional process, the teacher must have information about how effective learning activities are. The following ideas provide the paraeducator with background information regarding how the teacher attempts to provide learning activities which are at an appropriate level for each student. The paraeducator should be aware of these ideas when carrying out lessons and provide feedback to the teacher regarding the effectiveness of the lesson.

Fundamental Steps in the Instructional Sequence

Well designed learning activities involve the following steps:

Review
Students review previously learned material.
Present New Content/Skills
Teacher presents new content or skills. Often this includes explanation and modeling.
Guided Practice
Students are allowed to practice skills with considerable feedback from the teacher and/or paraeducator. Emphasis is on shaping the skills and avoiding practicing errors. Practice may be broken down into intermediate steps.
Feedback and Corrections.
Students are provided with feedback and retaught until they have learned the skill.
Independent Student Practice
Students are asked to practice the skill to develop mastery and efficiency. Focus may shift to speed and accuracy.
Weekly and Monthly Review
Skills are routinely reviewed and generalized to new settings.

Skipping steps or moving too quickly through the sequence can cause students to have learning problems and lose interest in the materials.

Practice at the Right Level

Independent practice must be designed correctly to maintain interest and involvement.

Precede independent practice with supervised practice;
Know that the student can do all components before letting him/her practice alone;
Provide work that is challenging, but not too difficult;
Do not give unnecessary "busy work" to occupy time. Develop additional activities which are relevant learning activities; and
Do implement peer tutoring, small group discussions and activities to keep a students' attention on-task.

Avoiding Boredom

Maintaining student interest in learning activities is a key factor in learning involvement. Students may tire of activities before they have mastered the skill. To avoid students loosing interest in learning activities:

Provide a feeling of progress:
- when work is difficult or new, more frequent feedback and positive reinforcement may be necessary
- make goals accessible, show the intermediate steps to the goal
- make it easy to see progress
Provide challenges:
- Find the right level of difficulty. Providing information to the teacher is especially important in this area.
Provide variety:
- in level of challenge
- in presentation
- in materials
- in grouping

Adjust to meet individual students' needs

Often lessons must be adjusted to accommodate the learning or behavior needs of individual students. Rates of learning can be increased by effectively matching the lesson to individual students. The following are examples of areas which might be adjusted in a lesson to meet the needs of students.

Vary the amount of praise;
Vary the order of presentation;
Vary the amount of practice at each step;
Provide time for questions; and
Monitor each student's knowledge.

Provide Alternative Activities

One of the biggest challenges of working with groups of students is keeping them all working productively. The organization and scheduling of the classroom, and adjusting for individual student differences, means that all students do not require the same amount of time to complete activities.

As one means of dealing with this issue many teachers provide students with independent work folders. These folders contain learning activities which are individually tailored to the students' needs for practice. The material in the folder is work which students can practice without additional assistance from the teacher or the paraeducator. The work in the folder must be directly related to the current learning objectives for the students. Students utilize the time between activities to work in the folder. This might include the time when the student finishes an assignment ahead of other students, or when a student has a question and is waiting for the teacher or paraeducator to respond. The folders allow the student to work productively while they are waiting for the teacher or other students.

Paraeducators can play an important role in correcting and maintaining the work in these folders.

Hints for Keeping Students Actively Involved in Group Activities

While a lesson is being presented the paraeducator can use a number of strategies to help keep all students actively engaged in the learning activity.

Make sure that students understand the activity and have all materials necessary before beginning.
Ask questions before identifying who will be answering them. This means that each student will have to think about the question and formulate an answer.
Ask questions of all students. Make sure that students realize that they could be asked a question at any time. You can tailor questions for particular students but don't identify the student before asking the question.
After presenting the question and allowing all student the opportunity to formulate an answer as a specific student to respond and give him/her time to answer.
Quickly provide assistance to students who are making errors or who do not know how to proceed. Allowing students to practice errors is a waste of instructional time.
Find ways to have high levels of student participation by actively responding to questions. The more students actually use information to understand or explain a concept, the more actively they are involved.
Reinforce student learning often
Don't let interruptions disrupt the flow of the activity.

Timings and Time Limits

The use of timings and time limits is one way to increase the efficiency of learning activities. Competing against the clock is often naturally rewarding for students. It also shifts the focus away from just accuracy to include the rate of completion. Timings refer to timing how long it takes to complete a task or set of problems. Time limits means providing a predetermined amount of time to complete a task. Timings have the additional advantage of communicating high learning expectations.

Several cautions regarding timed activities are important:

Selection of Activities.: Care must be taken to choose the right types of activities. Problems or activities must be ones the student can complete without assistance from the teacher or the paraeducator. Problems which are too difficult or activities which students cannot complete with reasonable accuracy should not be used in timed activities.
Clear Procedures.: Student must be clear on the procedures needed to complete the activity before it begins. Consistency in the way that timed activities are conducted will help students be familiar with the procedure.
Minimize Competition.: Students should compete against themselves, not other students. It is important to emphasize improving skills but minimize the competition among students for the fastest time or the highest rates of performance. The difficulty of the problems or the activity can be customized for each student as necessary. Be prepared to answer student questions about competition and fairness.
Supplementary Activities.: Supplementary activities should be planned for those who finish early.
Recognize Improvement.: Maintain records of student performance and recognize/reward students for improvement.

Often a regularly scheduled time is set aside for timed activities. Students learn the procedures to be followed during the timed activity and these same procedures are used consistently. Students must be given the opportunity to learn and practice the procedures used in the timed activities.

Using Your Attention to Increase Student Performance

The attention provided by the teacher and the paraeducator influence student behavior. The teacher and the paraeducator should identify behaviors that they wish to see maintained and increased in the classroom. Emphasis should be on providing attention to the students who exhibit these behaviors. One of the most common mistakes made in classrooms is paying too much attention to misbehavior. The teacher and the paraeducator should develop methods for dealing with behavior problems which minimize attention and time. For additional information on managing behavior please see Lesson 5: Use of Classroom Rules & Procedures and Unit 5: Behavior Management.

Characteristics of Effective Praise

Praise can be made more effective by observing the following:

Praise must follow the "if-then rule". Praise students only if they are doing what you want them to be doing.
Include the student name in your praise. It helps to be specific.
The praise should be descriptive. It should let the student know what they are doing correctly.
The praise must be convincing. You should use a tone of voice and body language which convey that the praise is genuine. The praise must also be appropriate for the age and grade level of the student.
The praise is more effective if it is varied.
The praise should not disrupt the class or the lesson.

Sample Praising

The following two statements are examples of praise which includes the student's name, is descriptive, and is convincing:

"Steve, you went from one page right to the next; that's the way to keep working! "

"Janice, you capitalized the first word of every sentence, you've really learned the rule!"

Strategies for Praising Students

As a paraeducator you should work on developing the following skills:

Learn to acknowledge and attend to positive behavior while ignoring minor problems.
Learn to move among students so that you can monitor students work and behavior. Movement should be at random and should include all students. Take the opportunity to attend to students and provide praise as you move around the room.
Scan the room frequently from wherever you are in the room.
Praise students who are on-task and students who are following the rules and procedures. If a student is not on-task, first praise students near him/her who are.
When you need to remind a student to be on-task, observe the student and follow-up with praise when he/she is back on-task.

Avoid Giving Attention to Misbehavior

When you do have to remind a student that they are not following the rules or procedures, the reminder should be quick and unobtrusive. You should give the student the minimum amount of attention necessary to let them know you are aware of the problem and to provide a cue as to the appropriate behavior. You should not spend time lecturing the student or discussing the behavior with the student. If the behavior continues follow the next step in the behavior management plan (See also Unit 5: Behavior Management).

Strategies at the Beginning of the Year

(Emmer, Evertson, and Anderson;1979) The following are a series of suggestions for dealing with students and organizing the classroom. You should:

Maximize contact with students;
Monitor students frequently;
Intervene quickly to deal with behavior problems;
Ensure high levels of time-on-task;
Provide frequent detailed feedback;
Structure activities and materials carefully;
Established clear routines; and
Rehearse student behaviors.

Project PARA 311 Barkley Center Lincoln, NE 68583-0738 (402) 472-8737 para@para.unl.edu