This past week has been another great week on my path to becoming an agriculture teacher! But like every week there is always something that I need to work to improve.
This week, I have found an area where I really need to improve on to maximize the lessons I teach each day, my timing for ending a lesson.
This week there have been several points where my timing for the end of the class has not been even close to being correct. I have been trying to teach new material right up to the bell. I know this is a problem because I have not given my students the chance to review for the day and when I am working in the shop there is no time to clean up. This has been causing a little bit of stress for my students as well as me.
The students have to rush to get their materials and safety glasses put away then run to their next class, while I end up having to clean up.
This week my goal is going to be to take the last 5 minutes of class to review what we did for the day and the objective in each one of my classes. (I did much better towards the beginning of the semester, this issue is one that has just recently started to arise).
In order to do this though, I need to get into the habit of checking the time and deciding on a good place to stop each lesson. I have found this list of 40 ways to end a lesson to give me ideas to help end my daily lessons so that I am not just asking questions about each objective all of the time.
A good lesson does not just teach new material, It also ends with review to ensure the students are understanding the lesson.
Matt,
ReplyDeleteYes, we need to continually reflect on how we are utilizing class session time. I know it can be difficult to "use" that time at the end for review, as it feels like you should be using it for further instruction. However, the review is an opportunity to "drive home" the objectives of the day, which should lead to better retention for future application by your students. Clean up... this is for the students to do in most cases. I suppose we could come up with a few examples of the teacher needing to clean up; however, you will wear yourself thin if you are the sole person cleaning up after each session.
The link you included on how to end lessons is great, and don't be afraid to combine a few of these review strategies, if need be.
Dr. Ewing